We´re all mad here

 I plough through my days like an old whale- I feed, I swim a bit, but nothing more. Of course, I will do necessary housework. I will cook, because huby needs lunch. I even did a Zwetschkenstrudel today, but only, because I was extremely fed off with my lack of motivation and did a screening of my fridge. Plums and puff pastry had to go, so Strudel it was. Same with the lunch- there was diced bacon and some cheese which went into burgers- hubby had forgotten to freeze the minced meat he had bought the day before. I ignored two phone calls of a friend. I really did not feel like talking about meeting in a restaurant and listen to her complaints about her family, her blood pressure and the exorbitant costs of living. Thank you very much, but I have enough negativism to fight off, I do not need hers, too. Especially since she´s a person who won´t stop talking. One has to be quick to chime in, when she´s taking a breath, and even then she might remind you that she hasn´t yet finished with talking. Thanks again, but we will have a meeting when I will feel more energetic! Not as energetic as hubby, who is giving a very good imitation of the legendary Duracell rabbit in the commercials (I so miss those old ads) and runs along all day long. Today he turned one of the rooms in the basement topsy-turvy and found two big Legos he had bought once upon a time. He wants to give them to the boys for Saint Nicholas. He can, if he wants to. Let them have an early Christmas. Secretly I hope that he will change his mind, but not so sure about this...

 ...and while it is not as cold as the last days, it´s depressingly dark and wet. I wanted to go out today to shop things for crafting, and it would have been possible, because hubby was back from OEAMTC in record time- it had been a tiny fuse that brought the infotainment system to a halt. So I would have had a car to drive off to Germany, but I lacked the inner motivation to get my old body out of the house. Instead I had a spa douche, a long rest (I got up at six thirty and still don´t know why), did more book eliminating to create space for my precious HP book nooks. The German translation of HP 1-5 is with Elsa now, Minalima edition is safe in the glass case. The chronicals of Narnia, German edition, will go to Cassian soon. Since I do not own any Star Wars related books Oscar and Xaver will come away empty-handed, but both aren´t great book lovers anyway, so... My Tolkien collection requires two whole shelves of the big book case now, so quite a lot of cookbooks went into the box for flea markets and book booths. Technically cooking books are out anyway. Today I sat in the kitchen, reading a gardening magazine. I was too lazy to get upstairs and select a recipe for the pumpkin soup I wanted to do for lunch, so I tried Alexa instead. She read a recipe to me which I deemed bland and told her to sort it out. What she did was send it, only that neither hubby nor I found out whereto she has sent it...
Today´s after-lunch rest was taken in the TV nook. I think I was off to dreamland five minutes after I sat down and woke for some seconds, when hubby ended his rest, then I slept on. In the late afternoon Flavius and Cassian did a video call, which ended with hubby allowing them an overnight stay on Saturday. BTW, Cassian is wearing a headband at the moment- he refuses his hair to be cut, wants it long. I am curious how long he will succeed. His brother is the exact opposite- once again he has cut his hair himself. Looks extremely funny. Now let´s hope that the younger won´t try his barber ambitions on his older brother- that surely would end in blood and thunder!

 All seven Christmas stockings are done and ready for getting filled around Saint Nicholas Day. Around, because Dil 1 does not care for the day (yet her sons do), so we do not know yet when son will show up with the three in tow. Show up he will, or Oscar and Xaver will bombard him with questions why they are not allowed to pick up their present(s). Dil 2 insists on celebrating the day the Romanian way- on the morning of the 6th of December, with painstakingly cleaned boots, which has to be done on the evening of the fifth. Usually son will bring the boys over in the late afternoon of the Krampus day and let them pick up presents and sweets- under the sound of a Krampus´s rattling chains, which makes the present giving so interesting. Cassian loves the character of the Krampus and always tries to chase one. Poor Krampus, in case he gets caught! Family number three dwells too far off to pick presents up here at Nicholas Day. But they might come earlier to do so. I am enthused. But I promise I will survive, as always.
Today I read the information sheet of my medication for the first time. No car driving, will make you extremely tired, will increase your pulse rate- what the hell did this medic in training prescribe? There must be a notification that my pulse rate is always too high and refuses to go down even with medication! Well, three pills more to go, then we will see the outcome!
Today hubby took my car and drove the old garden chairs and the beloved outdoor couch to the rubbish dump, but only after I made him swear we´d look for a new, equally comfortable one. In retrospect it had been Schnuckele who had started the couch´s downfall, when the little monster had clawed at it all summer long, until the couch ended up in the basement, unfortunately too late. Hubby even made lunch, fried sausages with garlic bread and salad, and then we rested. Ha, I was up earlier than my husband! Then again, he had been the one running along all morning, while I was doing basic housework and crocheting only. And I decided to keep the carpets (hubby: too big, too white; me: don´t care, they are soft and will stay).
After hubby had carried the last box with Halloween decoration to the basement I sat down and started planning for wintery deco by watching reels on my mobile. The lanterns are already out on the terrace but need ´inner values´ like little trees and figures from the Potter Universe, but that´s a job for Cassian and Flavius to do, who will be here more often from the middle of November on- mummy does another exhibition introducing Romanian artists. She will exhibit her old paintings, as always. I think she hasn´t painted much the last years. Maybe I should gift Cassian a new text marker- one of the most recent improvements in one of her paintings is the boy´s addition of orange lines to a painting in black and white...

 ...but only a bit. What I learned: Taking antibiotics may help you by killing bacterias, yet it will also tire you out immensely. I got up at seven thirty, still tired, made me a cup of coffee and sat down at the dining table to make me a breakfast sandwich, when the doorbell rang, and in came the chimney sweep- oops, I had forgotten about him, mostly by not dressing properly. I fled to the TV nook, all the while trying to strangle hubby by thoughts only- he could have warned me! When he was off I finally was able to dress for the day, which started at ten, when daughter came out of her room, had breakfast, too, then dressed for shopping. She was very glad that she had a freee day, because the airport had gotten a terror warning, and it hadn´t been the only airport affected today. The world has gone mad, or better, some people have lost their mind completely! Not that we shopped much or for an extended time- first stop had been KIK for some deco I saw in the leaflet, which they did not have, as always. But I got myself new jeans and a nightshirt meant for Christmas, and since the festive season for it is too short anyway I decided to wear it after a first test washing. Then we went to the furniture shop for small carpets for the bedroom. Found some white ones- not too fluffy but definitely cosy. A bit. And white!!! of all things. Now let´s see what happens, and how soon I will have to buy new ones. I also bought a small casserole with a cover, since hubby once again managed to buy a pan with lid but a handle not fit for the oven. Dear man, I want to do burnt pork ends, which can be done in the oven, but not in one of our old casseroles made for feeding ten people at least! In the furniture shop fatigue set in full force, I was practically dead on my feet, and we decided to drive back home. Tedi and Action can wait for another week, when daughter will be back because of paint work in her flat. Hubby cooked mussles in tomato sauce while I warmed yesterday´s lunch for me- I am not a big fan of mussels. I eat them, but no big love between us. Then hubby went to rest on the sofa, daughter in her room, and I dragged my poor self to the recliner. Five minutes later I was fast asleep and stayed this way for almost two hours, that´s when daughter woke me for a round of crossword puzzles. Damn, that girl (??? She´s 27!) gets better with every puzzle we do! Soon she will be better than me! I think I might have to practice a bit more!
The rest of the day got spent with pruning the lemon trees, which also need a dose of domestic remedy to kill scale insects- they have infested some of the twigs. Cannot use toxic, when the trees are used to flower in the conservatory during the wintery season- those fruits would turn out inedible! Took me quite a while to finish and after that I was knackered once again. So not much will happen this evening, I will be in bed early (because I have to be up quite early also)...

 In the times of corona parents taught their offspring how to sneeze or cough without endangering those around them. The precaution must have completely passed family number three, because the children as well as their parents spread their germs generously, always leaving out the elbow trick. This morning at four I woke because of a really weird dream, and because I had to do a tour to the loo. But mostly, because my throat was burning. The germ spreaders have been successful, I should write them a thank-you card. Needless to say that I did not fall asleep easily afterwards, throtteling this bunch of idiots who gave me their cold in my mind. That´s by worst the most careless and ruthless family I have come to know. Not even my pleas did any good. I dread to think that they plan another visit at the end of November, and that they will be here for Christmas this year. Maybe I will decorate my private Christmas tree in the studio and charter a cook for Christmassy dinners, might be better for my health. The weird dreams I had did not make me feel any better- first I dreamed that our neighbour, the one with the cancer, had died. Well, it is a distinct possibility that this will happen any time soon- she has been brought to the hospital by helicopter three weeks ago, spent two weeks in the main hospital in Salzburg then got brought to a local one nearby. This does not mean that I want to dream this occurance twice- same topic, same people (me and daughter´s godmother), different locations. My next dream was so bizarre that I won´t retell it, but it involved an Austrian ski racer (female but looking a bit manly and secretly married to a woman) and her cat, which turned into a girl the moment she was with her mother. Yay, an animagus, forced by the coach, who had forbidden same-gender marriages among the racers. I must have read too many articles about the topic lately...
Needless to say that I spent most of the day sulking along and resting- in bed, on my recliner, on the sofa, covered by a blanket, because the house felt cold though it wasn´t. At some point I remembered that I had a new box of Boxagrippal in my drawer- my mind is a vast desert a times. Had I taken the pills sooner I would have felt better during day. Not that I would have dragged the darn lemon trees into the house by myself (too big, too heavy) because hubby was off all morning long, grocery shopping (two items), picking DiL2 and grandsons up at the trainstation and bringing them home (yay, they are back, double yay, they will be in school and kindergarten from tomorrow on). No cooking got done, we had leftovers aplenty, because neither Elsa nor Matthäus ate the Grammelknödel hubby had warmed. I had to make Topfenknödel for them, which they loved. Their mother not so much, because the rascals thought them way better than the ones she does. I told her to mix a slice of soft butter into the dough, which will enhance the taste, that´s all.
And finally, in the late afternoon, Charlotte and Konstanze returned from vacation. Girls are back, dog is back, what more could one want? You could also say the Huns are back- the two put an end to the row of quiet days we had during autumn holidays. I already dread tomorrow morning, when Charlotte´s cries of distress will wake us again...





Hubby has already removed most of the Halloween decoration, but I managed to take some pictures of the entrance area. Now you know whereto those knitted pumpkins went!

 ...in the form of family number three invading at eleven in the morning. We got woken by some heavy birds doing a hop-along on our roof at seven, got up early to do last preparations, we warmed the goulash we had stored in the freezer, so no lunch cooking had to be done. From then on my poor ears were ringing because of the steady nattering of too many people in a house too small, even though Elsa was doing a lot of finger knitting and made one woolen hose after another, using up quite a lot of my good yarn while ignoring the one I gave her. But that´s Elsa, it cannot be helped. Hubby, son and grandson went to number two´s house to help out but did not come back for a long while. It was already getting dark when they reappeared (okay, the weather had detoriated a bit), and most of the preparations for Halloween snacks had been dealt with. Meanwhile DiL had incessantly talked about her new job and I had a severe headache. Not even typing today´s rather unimportant entry could be done in quiet, because our grandchildren seemed to be glued to me- apparently I am the better version of a grandparent. Now it´s back to the kitchen to do the ghosts in a blanket, before the youngsters will be out for trick or treating. BTW: my ghost in the lantern, mostly unoccupied the last weeks, was perpetually spooking along (which involves a lot of howling), since Elsa found the button to turn it on. I think that darn thing will go to the next church flea market in March- I do not want to cope with the same infernal noise next Halloween...

 ...and I should definitely not scratch it during sleep. This morning I had to change the bedding again, because I bled all over it. It wasn´t even a big wound, but bled profusely. And I´m not even taking blood thinners! I hate changing the bedding- one day it will completely ruin my back!
Daughter´s flat got looked at: Yes, there is a bit of a water damage but barely seeable, humidity is a bit higher than usual but should go down now that the roof is repaired, the painter will come next week and hubby plans to install a new insect screen, since there´s still scaffolding in front of the window. I would not do it, not for all the money in the world, because daughter lives on the 7th floor. Looking out of the window alone does make me dizzy!
Another day spent inside the house- when I came back from the airport I saw the hunter´s moon clearly- next to no clouds in the sky, one day late, which is so typical, because I wanted to try out the handy tips I found on FB for taking better pictures on a mobile! yesterday night I was energetic, tonight I was tired and demotivated. When I got up, the sky had clouded over, and soon after the rain started. I tidied the guestroom, crocheted a bit (stocking number one is finished now), napped, warmed what was left of yesterday´s lunch, but all in all I was good for nothing. Too cold, too dark, definitely not my favourite season! I hope this apathy won´t stick- daughter will be back on Friday for baking Halloween muffins for her workmates and another early shift come Saturday morning. I so hope that family number three will realise that they won´t miss much when they will come only on Halloween day and hopefully go back to St. Pölten on All Saints Day, because one never knows, there´s one more day of autumn holidays on the second of November...
My car needs more repair work, and hubby will arrange it- means I will get to know the exact date two days before, because he surely will forget to tell me, as always. Only that I need to get out more often next week- appointment at my bank, dentist, Tedi and Action- vitally important, because Christmas is near and I need a few (or more) things for deco crafting. I studied the leaflets, and they look promising.
Halloween decoration will be off on the first, I will let Elsa and Matthäus do a hunt for skulls and the like (like an Easter egg hunt)- the winner gets what´s left of the Halloween candies. Elsa will win, of course, but she always shares with her brother, be it sweets, be it germs. And I can sit and watch, or crochet. I opt for the latter...

 He must have apprenticed to DiL2, who often brings home foreign groceries and makes her poor husband try out new recipes she wants to taste but definitely not cook. Well, I am pretty sure that I wasn´t the one who bought the pomegranates. I also wasn´t the one who presented a new, Persian recipe. And I definitly did not rummage in the drawers for walnuts, at a time when all shops here had already closed and weren´t to open for the next two days. So when I came down this morning to have breakfast and found a bowl with pomegranate seeds and hubby telling me that I was the lucky one who had to do the fesenjan I was mightily baffled. After all hubby had been studying the recipe for days then. And had I known the outcome I´d have ordered advieh, to not have to tinker about the seasoning. Though the hardest part of it was not if we had all those spices but where hubby had hidden them. He truly is a master of making things disappear! The good thing was that it was not difficult to do the recipe. It did not even take much time. But my take is that if one so clearly insists on doing a meal and buys the ingredients, he can also do the cooking. And not bragging about cooking skills (as hubby had done in front of the two ladies on visit) then backpedal!
For the first time there´s snow on the mountain we can see from our bedroom window. Snow came down to 1200 metres (my guess). And it´s also cold down in the valley- nine degrees. Appropriate to October, they say. ´Don´t want it´- that´s what I say. Hubby was out just before lunch, to rake the leaves together which had come down during the attack of strong winds. The construction firm sent a worker who re-erected the site fence. I watched those outdoor activities, made me another cup of coffee and supervised the chicken simmering in pomegranate-walnut sauce. I think the recipe has potential to make it onto the will-do-again list. Even though I am not a fan of people chewing on pomegranate seed!
Hubby was off after a short period of resting- he needs to help son with taking down and storing the boys´ trampoline. I continued crocheting a Christmas stocking with absolutely no clue how to do the heel. Another try and error process ahead. Now let´s see how long it will take for me to figure it out- might take a while...
Daughter arrived in the afternoon for coffee, crossword puzzles and a late lunch, bringing fresh germs into our household. Vienna´s weather must have been as unpleasant as ours, and forgetting to take a warm coat with her did not exactly help. Even if her friend volunteered to give her one of hers- that friends is more than twenty centimetres shorter than daughter mine! So I might have to battle another cold soon...

 Short entry, because things turned from not so good to worse- neighbour Whatsapped yesterday to ask me if we could postpone her visit to today. I was barely able to read her message because of the many typos. So I wrote her back that Saturday had been the day she herself had decided to come for a visit, even showed her the message she wrote. She informed me that this was great and that she would bring another neighbour with her. Now I am truly screwed- two of the sort? Hubby will surely panic, he does not like the two of them. Me, neither. At least, not much.
So today was mostly a day for tidying for me and grocery shopping for hubby. Since we will have two days with shops closed (Sunday, as usual, and Monday because of Austrian National Day) we will try two new recipes to celebrate- shawarma and fesenjan. Why hubby has bought so many pomegranates I don´t know. What I know is that he can peel and deseed them by himself, though I am the one who got instructed how to do it by a Turkish friend. That does not mean that I have to like the process. Daughter, who will come to us on Monday, will surely love the Persian dish- after all I kindled her love for foreign dining and did not insist on cooking à la Mutti! Because in my case that would have turned out really bad- my mum had been a horrible cook!

 I hate days like today- windy, cool and very, very dark. We did not get any rain, though we should have. Hubby lit a fire in the late morning, because it was too cool in the living room. And no, 20 degrees in the living room is not enough to get through the cold season, as a climate scientist did tell us. She also told us that soon we´d have to do without house and car and live in flats in town. I cannot write what I´d tell her, should I ever meet her! Not even husband dearest left the house save for bringing the paper collection bin back. We had had early breakfast, because at seven demolition work started anew- what is it with hubby declaring ´Two day, three at most, and all will be done´? The walls of the old house are gone now, the floor plate remains. Then there´ll be excavation work to get the power line underground, means that our street will be blocked for some time. The architects of the new objects are swarming to get signatures of all residents affected, to finally be able to start building work. I fear the noise won´t stop for quite a while...
Not much got done during day: hubby read, I solved crossword puzzles and decorated the conservatory. The moment I turn around more skulls will miraculously appear and need a place where they can spook along. Only after after-lunch resting hubby and I were ready for a bit of housework. I resorted my table cloths, put them in baskets and shelved them in the rack the monstera is placed on- until yesterday I wasn´t even able to reach those compartments! I only had to eliminate two spiders to make them usable! Meanwhile hubby cleared out the bathroom cabinet, which stood a bit lopsided he said. I hadn´t noticed, my guess is that husband mine, self-declared caretaker, was bored- again. Good thing is that I am not bored easily, so I will leave lots of work to him, and he loves it! And just when I was about finishing this entry my sense of hearing noticed the soft murmur of rainfall. That´s good- I won´t have to water the plants remaining in the garden, and the palm trees won´t get more water to drown again, because they are safely stored on the terrace...