I had a lovely breakfast on the patio this morning: scrambled eggs with cream cheese and kale, followed by canteloupe. Now I'm sewing.

I'm still surprised at how much of sewing a garment does not involve actually sewing pieces of fabric together. Prep time is enormous and finishing as you go also takes up a lot of time.

Prep time includes choosing and buying a pattern, appropriate fabric, and notions like thread, zippers, bias binding and interfacing; washing or pretreating the materials in the way that you want to clean the finished garment (I like to make machine washable stuff so mostly that means a trip through the washer and dryer for the fabric and a warm-water dip and drip-dry for the interfacing); tracing off the pattern pieces and making any fit adjustments; ironing the fabric; laying out the fabric and pattern pieces with weights and cutting them out; fusing the interfacing and cutting out those pieces.

Sewing seams is really the least of it! There's pinning seams together, sometimes basting, and then after you sew them you must iron them open or to one side, and finish the seams somehow so the raw fabric edges don't ravel. Don't forget clipping thread ends and stray threads, too. It's a fun and challenging hobby.

And in the end I have a finished garment, to wear with pleasure, compliments, and pride. I finding sewing for myself very rewarding.

Today is coincidentally the birthdays of two friends: theferrett and sararunning. The Ferrett asked all his friends to do something fun for his birthday present, and I'm cooperating by playing the CD I ordered that arrived today: Spider Robinson, "Belaboring the Obvious." I played the title song first, it's my favorite on the album, and now I'm playing it through from the start.

I called Sara to wish her happy and we'll make plans later this month after I'm over this darn cold.

I did get out between 6:30 and 7:30 to water and weed--it was still cool, but it's going to be over 90 F later today, and I am not heat tolerant! In fact I am rather a fragile flower of femininity when it comes to temperature: I have a very narrow range outside which I am not really suitable for human companionship.

I got out in the garden this evening for about 20 minutes, actually. I managed to find the chicken wire and wrap the three leggy plants (lemon cucumber, summer squash, and muskmelon) in their containers--none too soon, ideally I'd have done it before they started growing longer stems with leaves and suckers. But now they have something to cling to and grow up, and when fruit comes it'll be supported off the dirt and the ground.

All three tomatoes have blossoms, along with the lemon cucumber and the summer squash.

I puttered in the yard a bit this morning, really more appreciating it than working--I may have pulled a handful of weeds and tweaked the position of some containers so they get more sun.

Later I finished tracing off the jacket pattern then dithered about whether to make a muslin to check fit, make another tank top out of something else, or just cut the jacket out of the green seersucker I'd planned. In the end making another tank top won, at least temporarily--it's all put together and the seams finished except that I need to hem it and bias bind the neckline and armholes. Unfortunately I don't have enough commercial bias binding so I decided to check whether I had enough fabric left to cut self binding. I did, and it was the entire pain I expected (exacerbated because I don't have the nifty bias binding tool so had to fold and press by hand). I've stitched one side of the neckline and I think there is plenty of binding left for the armholes. It's a lovely white stretch linen, with an open black floral pattern printed on it and then outline embroidery in black, offset considerably from the print. I originally bought the yardage to wear as a sarong on our Jamaican trip five years ago, and I'm glad to have made something wearable out of it.

At one point I took a break from sewing the tank and cut out the jacket in the green seersucker. I pinned the paper pattern pieces together to check fit and I don't think I need a muslin on this one. I haven't done any sewing on it yet: I still have to fuse interfacing to two pieces.

One thing I've really noticed in the sequence of sewing three tank tops from the same pattern is how important seam finishing is, and how I've changed my treatment. I started off just zigzag stitching the edges on the first and second one. I wore them and when they were washed I noticed a great deal of thread unraveling from the edges of the seams in spite of the zigzag treatment. I'm considering going back and turning under the edges with hand sewing--I like these tops enough to maybe make it worthwhile. On this third iteration (the white and black linen) I did a more professional finish, turning under the edges and stitching them so that there are no unfinished fabric edges visible; I also decided to bind the shoulder seams with bias tape, because they'll get a lot of stress hanging on the hanger and when I put the top on (it just pulls over the head, no buttons or zipper).

It's a lot more work, really. It just about triples the sewing time, given that you end up sewing each seam three times: once to join two pieces of fabric, and then once on each edge of the pieces you just sewed together. But since I learned how important planning, laying out, cutting, and thread-marking are, sewing was less than half the total time I've spent on a garment--maybe only a third; having it increase, even triple, doesn't bother me.

Still watching lots of Michael Jackson videos. Grieving is weird.

First weekend at home without social engagements in a while, and I spent today catching up with my yard and other projects.

In the food garden, I weeded, fertilized, and watered. The tomatoes are flowering! The herbs are going like gangbusters: I had to pinch off a dozen or more flowers from the basil. I may take some parsley, thyme, oregano, and basil into work on Monday for the cow-orkers.

In the front yard I weeded, deadheaded the drying flowers, transplanted a patch of pinks (dianthus) to balance the colors and a rosemary to replace the late, lamented rosemary that ate the yard, fertilized, and watered. The pinks (one intense and dark, the other bright with white picotee edges) are flowering well and smell spicy-sweet; the orange and yellow nasturtiums are also coming along. The gold (mini Stella d'Oro) and deep pink daylilies are going strong, and the pink callas are beginning to bloom. (Sensing a theme? All the flowers in the front range from gold through orange and pink to purple, including the camelia and the rhododendrons.)

After lunch I hemmed a pair of black pants (previously too short, I had picked out the old hem weeks ago) and colored over the faded fold line with a black Sharpie. Then I refashioned an old black linen blouse into one that fits by cutting off the old collar and both button plackets and inserting a gathered panel of black linen (cut from an old pair of pants) at the center front.

Then I started tracing off a pattern for a short-sleeve jacket. I don't like to cut up my patterns because I sometimes make changes, so I trace them onto pattern tissue (you can buy it, it's gridded) before use. I have 2 more pieces to trace out tomorrow; I gave up tonight because I'm making mistakes while trying to rush things, my usual failure mode when I'm tired.

And on breaks I've been watching lots of Michael Jackson videos, online and on TV.

I am surprisingly moved by the death of Michael Jackson. I haven't paid attention to his music for many years, and only a bit more attention to his life was forced on me by widespread (almost inescapable) media focus whenever something remotely newsworthy happened.

I grew up on his music and the music of people influenced by him: my first album purchased with my own money was by the Osmonds, who were marketed as a substitute for the Jackson 5. I remember his slight fade during the mid 1970s and the slam of "Off the Wall" into the musical space I danced through in high school and just after. Then "Thriller," a masterpiece of pop and marketing, as if a chick had finally pecked through a shell, fledged, and flew all at once.

I've admired his dancing all that time, too. He had an uncanny ability to isolate parts of his body and move as if he were an unstrung puppet, unaffected by gravity. His sense of timing was surprising, fresh and flawless--think about the arm pop in the Thriller video that happens not on the beat but after it, and then he changes direction as if he didn't have to dump any inertia!

None of this is adequate excuse for the grief and wist I feel--because Michael Jackson's death reflects me at all the various ages I remember him. Every incident brings back the me that observed and reacted at the time, with the dreams, hopes, and fears I had then. Every song expresses my emotions at particular times in my life.

I cannot connect to the man, because I did not know him. But he helped me know myself, and I am grateful for it, as much as for the beauty and pleasure he brought into my world.

May his memory be a blessing, and may the people who loved him be comforted.

A query for my fellow fans: can you help me find and buy recordings of this music?

Many years ago (maybe in 1997?) a man who was wooing me sent me a cassette tape with, among other things, some songs recorded by Steven Brust that I played over and over with pleasure. One of the songs was about a Zippo holster; another was a love song consisting of obvious remarks such as "water is wet" with a refrain including the words "More redundant than is absolutely necessary according to the Department of Redundancy Department." I believe there were two other songs but I don't remember them.

Please let me know if you can help me!

I had a pleasant walk in the cool sunshine on my lunch hour. I walked up a busy street to the park blocks which run north, lined and scattered with huge trees. At a sidewalk cafe I ate my sandwich and fig cookie and read, while the susurrus of city life--sirens, a crying child, barking dogs, quick steps and slow passing by--covered the conversation at nearby tables.

On the way back through the park I passed by a croquet lawn laid out casually by office workers on their lunches. I glanced back when I heard the crack of a mallet hitting a ball and noticed a large yellow and black butterfly flitting around the hoops, brilliant against varied greens of sunlit grass and shady trees.

"Women have always dressed to reflect what men want them to be and if men want them to be hookers then I am sorry for what men have become." Christopher Brosius.

So far this morning I have weeded the food garden, harvested a double handful of basil, had breakfast, chatted online with my LDR, and drove to the fabric store for bias tape and few other things so I can finish some of my wardrobe refashion projects. Next up: lunch.

Later this weekend I plan to go to the credit union, finish a blouse, pick up prescriptions and a library book, add soil to a flower bed and transplant the rosemary into it, and make chickenwire cages for the climbing vines (lemon cucumber, muskmelon, and summer squash). I need to squeeze in some reading time and start a packing list for my trip to the Bay Area next weekend.

What are you doing this fine spring day?

I had the most amazing sandwich/salad for dinner, from a local bakery. The base was toasted brioche bread covered with a salad of lightly-dressed greens, a layer of pepper bacon, then a layer of roasted asparagus, and topped with a poached egg. I ran a knife through it several times and tossed it together so the brioche became crouton-ish and it was fabulous.

The garden is coming along. Lots of oregano, thyme, and basil to harvest; the tomato plants are growing vigorously. The muskmelon, summer squash, and lemon cucumber are growing but slower than the tomatoes. This weekend I'm going to put up the chicken wire around the containers so those three vines have something to cling to and grow up.

The summer squash are interplanted with sweet peas (decorative), and they can cling to the chicken wire too. I'm not even sure they're going to bloom, although this cooler weather may turn the trick. It's raining right now after a week of mostly cloudy, cool weather. Not hard rain, just a drizzle; it sounds nice outside my open den window.

I have fond memories of watching a pick-up artist (wasn't it Ross Jeffries?) on some interview television show at PDXBoink2. So, fellow snigglers, here is a pdf of a thesis done on the "speed seduction" community. I haven't read it all (over 100 pages long) but the bits I've managed are interesting if more sympathetic than I would be.

I've been living in books for a couple of weeks--reading avidly whenever I'm not obligated to be doing something else. Reading is even starting to cut into my sleep time: I stayed up too late last night to finish a book, and it's one I've read before! All my other interests have dropped by the wayside: I haven't checked whether my plants need water, I haven't sewed or knitted.

This morning I realized why. Reading this way has always been my denial, my avoidance, when life isn't going very well but there's not much I can do about it. Instead of living in this unsatisfying world I pick a pleasant fictional world to live in for a while.

The bad stuff is pretty mild, but the frustration isn't, and that's what I'm avoiding. And that's okay: there's nothing that demands my attention that isn't getting it, I can escape a little.

Excellent aliens grill dinner.

One of my co-workers just called out to my area that the boats are coming in, so we all rushed to the window.

At Rose Festival various ocean-going naval boats get shore leave here. They arrive over two days in the early afternoon (hoping to minimize the effect on rush-hour traffic), escorted by the city's fire boat, which shoots plumes of water high into the air. This happened to be the US Coast Guard, or at least, 3 ships of the US Coast Guard. We're also getting one US Navy ship and three Canadian this year.

The sun is shining, the sky is blue with some scalloped translucent clouds, and I can see Mount Hood from my desk. The foothills are shaded in greens from bright to almost-black, depending on the trees growing there. Nearer I can see the river gliding between the stone-colored concrete of the Esplanade and freeway on the east bank, and the grassy park decorated with carnival rides on the west bank. Occasionally a falcon stoops past the window, 16 floors up, quite a contrast to the helicopter circling over the mooring boats a few blocks away.

I am watching, I am exercising my voyeurism. I have no desire to go out and join the hubbub. I enjoy the visual treat from my self-imposed distance.

My friend Sara and I drove up the Gorge this weekend to a small town on the Washington side. Our mutual friend Steve is playing Bottom in A Mid Summer Night's Dream and we wanted to see the show. We've been to a few of his previous performances, mostly comedies.

The drive out was absolutely beautiful. Looking north across the Columbia River to the steppes and ridges, watching the gradual change from wetland to desert as we drove east I noticed especially this time that the western hills were sharply cut while the eastern ones had rounded shoulders.

We went directly to the town that has the theater and had dinner, then meandered up onto the bluff, parked, and found seats; before the play started Steve's friend joined us. The theater space has a thrust stage and the floor had been set up with a group of chairs on either side of a wide central corridor between the entry and the stage; parts of the play were performed there, with actors entering from the back (main door) and moving toward the stage, up stairs onto it, and then down again. It was an effective setting and the staging worked well, I thought.

Unfortunately the actors were mostly very inexperienced and the best that can be said for some of them was that they had learned their lines and the basic staging. There was no amplification and most of the cast was too soft-spoken for me to hear; there was little tonal emphasis, the rhythm of the speeches was completely off as if the actors didn't understand what they were saying or even the thrust of the scene, and most didn't seem physically comfortable.

There were a few outstanding exceptions including Steve and the actors playing Oberon, Puck, and Thisbe. I enjoyed the play and enjoyed as much as I could of each person's performance. Afterward we headed to the house with a brief stop for groceries.

Steve's house is on a rising hill with an excellent view south across the river to the Oregon side; on both sides of the river you can see highways and train tracks (with reasonable watchable traffic most of the time). There's a large greatroom on the main floor, with a huge covered deck on the west side that is comfortable, bright, and open, with excellent views east, south, and west. The four of us sat around talking for a couple of hours and then wandered to our rest.

A leisurely morning of gradual breakfast prep and consumption followed by hours of talking, walking around the house and yard, and just enjoying the weather and view followed. We drove back to Portland late Saturday afternoon having had a wonderful escape from city life and regular chores.

I got up Sunday morning and gardened in the cool morning air for an hour. The rest of the day I puttered in the house, sewing a little, reading a little. After dinner we saw the new animated movie Up in digital 3-D, which I enjoyed but haven't really thought through or analyzed yet.

I can't believe it's June already.

I worked on a lot of projects yesterday. I sewed for a couple of hours in the early morning, turning a skirt that doesn't fit anymore (although I have had years of pleasure wearing it, it's time for it to move on in the cycle of life) into a work-appropriate tank top. Not quite finished: the back facing doesn't fit right because I forgot to match the dart I added to the upper back in the facing, so I'm going to take the dart out and hope for the best.

Then my friend Sara came over to help with the yard. She brought her very-long-handled tree trimming tools so we could de-shadify one corner where the maple trees in the park behind my house are sending branches from high on the trunk down at an angle so that they cover about 15 feet horizontally and the tips are less than 6 feet off the ground. This is somewhat of a safety hazard because people run up my driveway and use the branches to climb/vault the wire fabric fencing as a quick way into the park. (Otherwise they'd have to walk a block to the real entrance.) Also the clematis and 3 rosa rugosa I planted near the fence are no longer getting enough sun since the maple branches grew out.

Then we powerwashed part of the concrete pad. I have a huge T-shaped concrete pad that starts out as my driveway; the driveway itself runs along the north side of my property from the street at the front to within 15 feet of the back fence, and also branches off at a 90 degree angle once you reach the back of the house and forms a patio across the west side (back of the house) to the "attached garage" (which isn't usable as a garage because it has a dirt floor). We store wood along the driveway part. I bought a couple of truckloads of wood 8 or 9 years ago right after having the woodstove installed, and although we did stack it, the process of digging through for pieces that fit into the stove has created a random assortment of large pieces around the stacks.

So I called my husband out to restack some of it on the newly-powerwashed section, then we powerwashed the newly-cleared section. Next Sara cleared the weeds and grass off a small bed I'd grown tomatoes in 10 years ago. She even edged it with some of the too-big-for-the-woodstove blocks. I shoveled in several 5-gallon bucketsful of good compost (and while the pile is getting smaller there is still quite a bit there, leaf fall and shrub trimmings and pulled weeds from the last 19 years that is full of worms and has turned into rich, dark, crumbly stuff) and planted two of my tomato starts ("Sugar Lump" cherry tomatoes and "Oregon Spring" tomatoes for sandwiches and salads).

Then I dug out all the plant pots I could find for the herbs I bought: three kinds of basil, two kinds of thyme, chocolate mint, rosemary, Italian parsley. No sage, I don't like it! I also have a start for lemon cucumbers (my favorite kind), another tomato start (a yellow variety), and seeds for patty pan squash. All of those will go into dirt today, mostly in containers because I don't have any more non-grassy planting areas left.

Some weekend soon Sara will bring over her chipper and we'll turn the limbs we pulled down (3 or 4 that are each at least 15 feet long) into chips and mulch. My Japanese maple (transplanted 3 weeks ago from the neighbor's yard--thanks, neighbor!) is doing well. In the front flower beds, the pinks are in bloom, the bulbs are done and I need to clip down the foliage, the daylilies have strong leaves and even a few buds, and the nasturtiums are coming up nicely. I need to pull out some mint and plant it in a pot, then dig up the rest and I'll have another spot to plant some flowers.

For today I've got the drill out. A friend dropped off a bunch of empty 5-gallon buckets yesterday; I'm going to drill drainage holes in the buckets and use them as plant containers. I want to paint them, too; the white color they currently are doesn't help warm the soil. I wonder if I still have a can of spray paint in the basement....

At Elms in the Yard, a cool story about a music rehearsal with a tie to a famous harpist.

Today I had Venezualan food for lunch.

There's a new cart in the parking block near my office with all the others; it's clean and freshly painted, very well organized inside. The cook/owner is from Venezuala and quite attractive, but I went there for the food. It's called Caraquena, and I found it on the Portland Food Carts site.

I had the arepas special, with sides of black beans (some of the best I've ever had, smokey and sweet with a slight herbal flavor), fried plantains (apparently not my thing), a salad with a very mustardy vinaigrette that cut the other flavors nicely, and two shredded chicken arepas. Arepas are little sandwiches, and what makes them special is the bun, which is made from a stiff but not heavy corn batter and fried up into buns while you wait. They're somewhere between cornbread and polenta. The sauce is also quite good, with avocados and chopped onions.

Also on the menu are a cruzado, which is a stew of beef and chicken various roots, flavored with cilantro; pabellon, described as shreded beef cooked with cumin and sweet peppers served iwth rice, beans, and plaintains; and empanadas. The arepas come in beef and black bean, spced tomato sauce beef, ham and cheese, chicken, or beans and cheese.

I'll definitely be eating here often.

I wrap my tools around me when I work.
I am the interface. I translate,
Turn sense to form, from barely formed to sense.

The makers record speech and leave for me
Or write onto a page or a blank form.
I wrap my tools around me when I work.

I type the words from tape or digitized,
Decipher pencil scratchings and transcribe.
Turn sense to form, from barely formed to sense.

Cocooned in chair, desk, keyboard, screen,
Wired by earphone, pedal under my foot,
I wrap my tools around me when I work.

I turn the whispers in my ear to text,
Make sense of work performed the day before
Turn sense to form, from barely formed to sense.

The pages are printed, the emails have gone,
The tapes are erased, drafts shredded, work done.
I wrap my tools around me when I work
Turn sense to form, from barely formed to sense.

Inspired by a necklace-crown by the Lionesse.