"free" time

One of the many reasons I like being at home

I'm actually taking advantage of Memorial Day to have a long weekend, something you'd think would happen often when I'm only working part-time, but no- instead it seems like I manage to spread my 20-25 hours a week across practically every single day of every month? What gives?

So- I spent Friday playing, went out to breakfast, over to see an art exhibit, Duke gardens for a stroll, plant shopping- never too many plants right?- out to lunch, then polished off the night seeing Star Trek. A fairly perfect day off, with absolutely no work and no cooking either, very sweet.

Yesterday I worked in the veggie patch for about 8 hours. Planted the sweet potatoes, more cucumber and winter squash seeds- the first ones didn't sprout, too cold I guess, got trellis up for the tomatoes, better late than never, weeded, mulched and planted a bunch of miscellaneous stuff I started from seed like basil plants and flowers that were suffering in little pots. I harvested green onions and pulled up bok choy from last fall after gathering the seeds.

Doesn't seem like it would take all day, but it did.

This morning we got up at 5:30 AM to head to Jordan Lake to kayak - our first time in the boats since Florida in February? Again- what's up with not playing more when I supposedly have free time? It was a beautiful morning- we were on the water by 7:00. We paddled up the narrow arm from Farrington point where there is a marsh that you have to work to get back into- ie; get out of the boat and pull across the edge of the beaver dam, but once inside there is a heron rookery where we were able to see more than a dozen great blue heron nests each with a couple of very big babies standing around in them. We were also surrounded by brilliant yellow prothonotary warblers, a regular occurrence out there in summer, they are not troubled by us in our boats and fly right past and perch nearby for great viewing. The most unusual birds were orchard orioles, both mature and first year males, that look entirely different from each other, the first years are yellow with a black throat and grayish wings with white wing bars, the mature males are a fabulous chestnut brown on breast and back with dark wings.

We managed to get back to the cars about 10:30 just as all the yahoos were hitting the lake in their power boats and jet skis, and escape back to the quiet of home to eat a giant brunch and take a nap during the afternoon rain. Then I went out and suckered and tied the tomatoes to the fence. I'll sleep good tonight and get up tomorrow for another full day of gardening, which might not sound like time off, but since my jobs involve working in other peoples gardens and with other peoples plants, it's a treat to spend an entire day working in my own space, doing the things I want and need to do.