Oh, How We Danced and We Swallowed the Night, For it Was All Ripe For Dreaming

Oh my god, you guys! We are officially out of Iowa. We headed to Louisville Friday morning at what was supposed to be 7 o'clock, but turned out to be 7:45. Hey, that's pretty good for us.

Of course, there was supposed to be a chance of frost on Friday night. The ONE time in a year and a half that I go out of town, there's a chance of frost and I can't cover my warm weather plants. I worried about that a little, but I asked people on the Iowa City Gardeners Facebook site, and they said it didn't look it did freeze after all. I just hope my worries about Gus being without us for the first time in his little life will also be unfounded.

We stopped at Big Grove in Champaign, Illinois for lunch. It's about halfway to Louisville, and they have great drinks, and good food and they gave us ranch flavored popcorn (how Midwestern of them). Anyway, I had a Pear Rhubarb non-alcoholic cider with CBD in it. It was tasty as hell, and CBD tends to help with my migraines.

We got to Louisville closer to 6 pm, and headed out to find somewhere to eat. We are about a block away from tons of restaurants and bars, so it wasn't hard. There was a great taco place that had an hour and  half wait, but we figured it must be worth the wait, so we headed next door to the Prohibition bar and distillery and had a drink while we waited.

We finally got a text that our table was ready and we headed over.

You know what? It WAS worth the wait. The tacos were crazy different ideas. John had one with lobster, and mac and cheese. They also had great margaritas.

Our server was also a lot of fun. I loved her shirt. Who doesn't want someone to feed them tacos and tell them they're pretty?

On the way back to our place we noticed this bar that was also a dog park. We thought it was a brilliant idea, and since we were all missing our pets, we went in for one last one. Except me, I was definitely done drinking for the night.

We had to sign a bunch of different liability waivers, like we wouldn't sue the bar, we'd the sue the dog owner instead if we got bit. I'm sure the dog owners had to sign even more waivers.

What's a few signatures in order to hang out in an outdoor beer garden, surrounded by dogs, under a sign that says, "Fetch, Drink, Poop, Repeat"?

Coadster's boyfriend loves animals. He was so happy to pet all of these other dogs while he was missing his own.

Soooooo...Tacos, margaritas, dogs, and a fire pit. I can't think of a better first night anywhere.

Long as I Remember the Rain Been Comin' Down, Clouds of Mystery Pourin' Confusion on the Ground

 

Well, kids. It's been a while. I have spent the last two weeks getting everything ready in the gardens. I was kind of an idiot and decided that I needed to create twice as much work for myself, and I rented a plot in the community gardens to grow even MORE food. We're saving money on groceries, and I know that my produce isn't being sprayed with chemicals, and that no people (other than myself) are being exploited so that I can eat, and that is all worth a LOT. 

Sadly, I am old and I will work myself into a coma if I'm not careful...Okay, I'm exaggerating just a little, but by Sunday afternoon of last weekend, I had to stop working and head straight home because I almost passed out from exhaustion or heat stroke, or old age. Take your pick.

I know I always say this, but I am a lame, lazy gardener. I plant all of this stuff. Half the time I don't even know exactly what it is, whether it's an annual or perennial, or how to take care of it. I just keep digging up more and more of my yard when I buy something pretty I'm sure I need. Of course, there's no rhyme or reason to it, and all of the weird spaces in between the garden beds became increasingly hard to mow. So, last weekend I hefted many, many, 55 pound bags of mulch around my perennial, and sunflower beds, to cover the grass and make my life easier by not having to mow these little strips of grass in between gardens. We'll see how that goes.

 If you don't live in Iowa, you may not be aware, but it is raining and raining and raining here. Every day for the last few weeks, it's been pouring down. You know the old joke, "If April showers bring May flowers, what do May flowers bring?...Pilgrims!" Well May showers still bring May flowers. I have never had so many of my Irises bloom before. It almost makes all the rain worth it...Almost.

Anyway, I hope all of your May showers bring May flowers, and your May flowers don't bring Pilgrims, because America doesn't seem to take to kindly to immigrants these days,.

Kentucky Whiskey Make You Feel So fine, Open Up Your Eyes and Give Your Nose a Shine

Do you ever get in one of those moods where you just want to get out of town, even for a little bit, and see something else? Well, I am right there right now. Don't get me wrong, I love Iowa City, or I wouldn't live here, but we are right smack dab in the middle of the country, and while I like looking out at cornfields as much as the next woman, it would be very nice to see...Not-cornfields, you know?

So, to that end, and because Coadster and her boyfriend have had a rough road climbing out of their Covid experiences, we decided to take a little trip on Memorial Day weekend. We gave the kids the option of where to go, somewhere roughly eight hours away or less. We thought, Nashville, or Duluth, or maybe Kansas City, but the kids chose Louisville. It might be the Bourbon, but it's got something for everyone there besides the Bourbon. John and I have both been there twice before for bike races, but both times were in the Winter. I think it will be lovely to be there when it's warm out.

 

Coadster's goal is to visit every National Park in her lifetime. So, I reserved a Mammoth Cave tour for us. Also, I thought it would be fun to see Churchill Downs. It's been closed for Winter the other two times we were there. I got us tickets to watch the ponies race, and to check out the Kentucky Derby Museum. And, yes I am going to have my first Mint Julep ever. When in Louisville...Of course, my friend Rob says, "It's just whiskey with some mint. It's not a big deal", but I don't care. So, I'll drink whiskey with mint, possibly wear a goofy looking ladies' hat, and bet on horses with the weirdest names. What's not to get excited about?

So, in a couple of weeks, we'll take off out of here and go to a new town. We'll be smart and be careful about Covid, and we'll try to do and see new stuff. Stuff that doesn't happen anywhere near a cornfield. I can't wait.

Start Again in the Month of May, Come On and Blow the Wires Away

If I've learned one thing in my long life, it's that May is always a busy month. When the girls were younger, it was the end of the school year, and all of their activities were ending with parties and extra last meets/concerts/shows/games/whathaveyou. Now that my daughters are adults, John and I have bike races that we're putting on/racing in, and Mother's Day, and Coadster's birthday, and now Gus' birthday. So much STUFF.

 

This year for Mother's Day I bought myself a bench for our backyard. I've always wanted at least one. I'm trying to make our garden some kind of white trash fairy garden with pretty flowers and plants and shade, and all my metal and stone and wood and ceramic thingy's. Now, I can sit on my little bench and gaze out at my little, messy kingdom...That is, if I can find the damn time.

So, Mother's Day was very mellow. John went to his mom's for most of the morning, and Stinky went to see her grandmother. Since we celebrated my special f*cking day last week, this week I was able to go for a nice run, and putter about in the garden. Alone time, and puttering? What more could a girl want? I'm being serious here.
 

Hey there, sexy.

 

Today was Gus' first birthday. He has no idea that he was born in a pandemic and in a few short months, his life will look very different. I have been home for most of the time. I had to go back into work for a couple of weeks after the Derecho, since we had no electricity or internet, and then I went in every third week for a few months at the beginning of each semester, but in August we will have to head back full-time. Sigh. My fantasy has always been to work from home. Wait. Let me be more accurate. My fantasy since I was born, was to be able to afford to retire, but since that may never happen, my SECOND fantasy is to work from home. So, I did get to fulfill that on and off for almost a year and a half, and I'm grateful, but I'm also bitterly jealous of those people who, after the Pandemic,, will be able to work from home FOREVER. So much sighing.

Anyway, poor Gus gets lonely fast, even with two other cats, so I'm a little worried about how he'll be when I go back to work, and then if we go to California for two weeks in July, he could be really sad. Luckily, Stinky and sometimes her husband will be here , so he'll have some human contact...

I hope all y'all are handling the stress of busy May's and getting spoiled if you mother anyone or anything, because as we all know, that mothering shit is hard.

Oh, The Merry Month of May, The Merry Month of May, So Frolic, So Gay

It's Spring in Iowa, Mutha F*ckas! Which means morels. Apparently, it was a bad year for our fungus friends. It was too dry, and there weren't too many of them, but luckily for us, we have friends who have some land out in the country where they found a whole bunch and sold us half a pound. People must forget that morels aren't around for very long, because for two weeks after I posted something on Facebook saying I had them, people were asking me if I could give them some. No. Derrrrr. They were delicious, though.
 

Spring in Iowa also means VERY windy bike rides. This Saturday was insane. It was so windy that I couldn't stand up on my bike and pedal uphills, or I would have been blown off the road. The way home we had the wind at our backs, and barely had to pedal. I'm still not sure if that made up for the hell of the headwind on the way out, though.

 The other thing about the ride was that there are TONS of animals all out and frolicking around. I had no idea how often I told every animal we rode past how much I loved them until John started GoPro videoing our rides. I watch the videos later and cringe a little when I hear myself express my feelings to each cow and pig and chicken and goat and sheep and alpaca...And you get it. I love a lot of animals.

Mother's Day is coming up next weekend, but my girls asked if they could celebrate it with me yesterday instead. They are fully vaccinated now, and so is their grandmother, so they finally get to see her on Mother's Day. She is in her 90's, and has dementia, so it could be their last one with her.

So, they gave me that lovely yard peacock as my gift and took John and I out to dinner at the Kalona Brewing Company. It was so nice, and Coadster's boyfriend went to find the waitress and order more beer for us, but he was sneaky and also paid the check. He's a really nice guy.

The lilacs bloomed this weekend. Like morels, they don't last long, so I try to huff them as much as I can, while they're here.

 The cats love Spring because it's the return of porch season. Gus would live out on the porch on his human dad's lap, and be happy until the end of his days.

I hope your Spring has sprung, and you found illusive mushrooms (whatever kind you fancy), and that the winds don't blow too hard for you.