Day: April 13, 2017

Tie o’ the Day #2 is a many-hued purple harlequin pattern by ALFANI. And no, the “blouse” (which I won’t actually wear today) is not mine. It is Suzanne’s, and it, too, is by ALFANI. It is also the first girly piece of clothing that Tie o’ the Day has featured. Let me just be frank: Suzanne looks suave in this, although she does not wear ties with it or with any other of her outfits. But in fact, these days she is looking fantastic in anything she wears. She is over fifty pounds less of the woman she was just months ago. And I am glad she doesn’t have to be on blood pressure meds anymore. I am so proud of her.

Suzanne has always been aware of and indulgent of my varied eccentricities. She doesn’t mind a closet full o’ ties. She doesn’t mind the bins of bow ties and pocket squares. She smiles at the tiny boxes of cufflinks and lapel pins.

She doesn’t mind stacks of books used as home decor. She doesn’t mind that many of these books have titles like The Toothpick: Technology and Culture. Nor does she mind that I own at least 3 copies of Slouching Toward Bethlehem, by Joan Didion, and Teaching A Stone to Talk, by Annie Dillard. Oh, and then there are probably 5 or 6 copies of T. S. Eliot’s The Waste Land and Other Poems. And even though we are paring down our possessions significantly, it will not even occur to her to pester me to keep only one copy of each book.

She’s fine with my mismatched socks, and my sometimes mix-matched shoes. She’s okay when I come home with the right side of my head shaved. My sarcasm and jocularity wear her out sometimes, but that doesn’t mean she wants me to be any other way. At least, I hope she doesn’t. Time will tell. 😁

Full disclosure: The above is not to be considered the full extent of my life-long eccentricities. 🤡

Tie o’ the Day #1 is a flowery bow by Stacy Adams. It creates a nice piece of blendy clash fashion with the colorful shirt. The top is a brand called L r g. Maybe that stands for “large”. Maybe it’s pronounced “allergy”–because it is springtime, and there’s the abundance of bloomy allergens. Note the giraffe. Giraffe’s are tall, in case you didn’t know.😜

After I finished Hair Duty for Mom this morning, I immediately drove from Deltassippi to C-ville, hauling the correct sewing project Suzanne needed up here. The mutts were wondering why we had stayed in D-ville for only 20 hours. But they are fine-a-roo.

I have been lucky that all of my dogs have been road warriors. That’s the kind of thing that qualifies as blessing, in my opinion–since driving has been such a huge part of my life. I have no idea what the Heck Tate I would have done all these years if I had a dog that was a sickly traveler. Perhaps I don’t have to worry much about that being a necessary dog trait of future pups now that we will be dwelling in only a single house soon. Of course, there is always that traveling-for-pleasure thing. So I guess any new canine additions really do need to travel well. I don’t want to have to feed them Dramamine or make them wear nausea patches, like Suzanne has to wear on airplanes.

Oh, and I love driving my dogs on rides in the bed of my ancient truck. I love it because they take such joy in truck-riding. Their floppy ears blow back wildly, and they bark at any living creature we pass while we are out on the gravel roads in the desert. Their favorite critters are rabbits and chuckers. They relish seeing the occasional quimp, as do I. They are, however, occasionally frightened by large tumbleweeds that blow towards the truck in strong winds. As am I. 🤠