What's for breakfast? Language scramble!

Last night, I dreamt that a German man accosted me on the street and complimented my shoes. We started chatting and I introduced himself, which struck him as a bit forward, but he went ahead and introduced himself as well as the silent young man with him, who was called Frank. As I shook Frank's hand, I almost said, "Viel Vergnügen." This is more or less the Spanish "Mucho gusto!" translated literally into German. But I corrected myself and came out with "Ich freue mich auf die Vergnügung!" which is...utter nonsense. Frank kept smiling pleasantly the entire time, and it finally dawned on me that he was deaf. On the third try, I got the phrase correct, and this was the version that his companion translated into DGS for him, so go me.

(The backstory to the meeting was kind of cute, since the street was inside an illustration from the 1950s by an Irish cartoonist and to entre it, I had to shrink myself down to size in the manner of the Good Folk--clearly not something I'd made a habit of, since it took a couple tries to reach the right height; the first time I tried to entre a building, I could get only my head and shoulders in.)

My finest ow-er.

Because the members of our condo association are such penny-pinching bastardsdoughty do-it-yourselfers, when they learned that the flow of water into our den could be prevented by lowering the grade several inches, their response was to plan a work day to tackle the job. The irony that the entire reason for the water in our den was that in doing the landscaping themselves before, they'd made the mistake of building up the lawn too high was lost on everyone.

Predictably, the number of volunteers who actually turned out to help was less than originally pledged. Poor monshu got flung into the window frame by a quick-braking CTA driver on Saturday and was down for the count. The former president is still recovering from a skiing accident, the hippy-dippy chick on the second floor came down with some unspecified malady (which did not prevent her from kibbutzing our her window, however), and the graphic designer next door begged off for unspecified reasons possibly related to the fact that it was a fantastically gorgeous day.

Since the whole point of the job was to improve conditions in our unit, I felt honour-bound to be there, working as hard as anyone else the whole time. But I just couldn't do it. After three-and-a-half hours of shoveling dirt, ripping up roots, and dumping wheelbarrowloads of soil in the north yard without a real break, I crept inside and nibbled on a few biscuits (my first real food of the day, since I'd awakened too dyspeptic try eating anything). After less than an hour, my conscience got the better of me, and I headed back out to haul bushes from their winter shelter and piece back the sod.

At this point, I was getting something of a second wind, but I knew I'd badly exceeded my creaky body's limitations and had to stop if I expected to come into work at all today. So I left the others to replant the shrubs while I scrubbed the filth from my hands (include some tarry substance that I needed acetone to remove), gobbled Advil, and contemplated a long soak in the tub that never came to pass because the business of filling and such it was too tiring to consider.

Despite beavering away for another three hours or so, the remaining trio--our next-door neighbour and the other gay couple--seem to have borne me no ill-will. (Perhaps they simply don't want to take the risk of alienating me before we tackle the other half of the front lawn?) We all got together on our shared deck afterwards for drinks, snacks, storytime and dinner. It was a moment of togetherness unlike any we've had all year, and it made me see the advantages of making this a common project rather than outsourcing.

Of course, if the argument for strolling down to the parking lot and handing a Mexican labourer $20 to wield a shovel in my place wasn't already compelling enough yesterday, it's rearticulating itself with striking clarity today every time my back screams in agony at any attempt to bend over or even take a step. I'm a librarian, not a landscaper. It violates every sensible economic principle to have me do badly what I could pay someone else to do well, particularly when the money saved will only rot in savings instead of flowing back into circulation. Not to mention the fact that, when I get home, I'll still have to do the laundry that I didn't get to yesterday on account of being shagged out.

Among the leaves

While I was eating my lunch on a stone bench outside, a small dark bird with a long stiff tail and a beautifully iridescent green throat alighted in the budding Judas tree in front of me. It was there only a moment before it flew off again, and I returned to discreetly ogling the workman disassembling the floor of the temporary pavilion in the meadow beyond.

Despite the unofficial opening of our deck season last night, it's still just a little too chilly to sit comfortably outside in only shirtsleeves. There are still trees left which have only begun to bud, but the woody areas are already dappled with shade from the fresh leaves. What a wonderful time to go hiking if I only had the opportunity!

(no subject)

An offer came in for my condo tonight.

You can get an idea how I feel about it from the fact that the first three songs I played after I read it were from Interpol, Controlled Bleeding, and The Smiths, in that order.

Edit: After I wrote this, I went downstairs to check the laundry and found monshu awake. I crawled into bed with him and then the little creature jumped up on the bed to nestle between us. Having a cat snuggle against your leg while you scratch your sleepy boyfriend's neck for him is like a 50 cc shot of Perspective.