I have 9 days coming up next week

Nine entire days. One of them is my mother's birthday, so we ( the kids and I) are taking her to the Super Buffet so she can eat all afternoon and we can eat sushi. It is an Asian buffet, so it has a ton of really weird things (like fish sausage, which is really good, if you don;t think about it. Like blood pudding or haggis. Sort of.)

Then on Sunday, I might or might not be taking her back to our home town for a big birthday party for someone else. My brother is going to meet me there and at least we can visit. (SInce I never go anywhere alone, not even to work. But that is another story.)

Then I think I will spend the whole rest of the time working in my yard. I have a gardener, of sorts, who rents a house from me. He is a teensy bit behind. SIX MONTHS, if one were counting. So he has decided to do the gardening around here to work off the debt. Only he really likes the blower and the weed whacker and the mower a lot. The actual weeding, not so much.

I would clean the house,,,and I probably will do an afternoon downstairs, but the torn up floor and torn up ceiling is still in sort of a torn up construction mode, so what would be the point?

So I have one huge flowerbed that runs around the entire front yard that I can weed...which I really truly love to do. Right now, it isn't too hot and I can open the windows inthe house and play music and make a big muddy mess, flinging the weeds out onto the laen for someone else to pick up. I can plant the 5 million bulbs for the spring and plant some running roses (pink bably blankets) in front of the actual house, mulched with a good ton of newspapers I have been saving expressly for this very project.

And have you ever noticed that you can spend the day weeding and it's all "ooohh! aahh!" or you can spend the day cleaning and it's "So, what did you do today? And really, yard work is SO much easier. Plus no one expects you to fix dinner, either.

I'll take photos, because it is beyond belief what the flower beds look like. (And I did have a gardener. He was just very picky about the days he would come over. Like if it was a day with a vowel in it, it isn't a good day. maybe tomorrow. Unless I called him up and got all fussy with him. Then he would shamble over, do the lawn and leave heaps of grass behind, since the green trash will only hold so much. And then I would stomp around and drag the stuff off to the compost heap. One day, archaeologists are going to find this compost heap and wonder what the heck we worshiped.)

Oh, I have to hose off the decks and patios, also...,I LOVE hosing. My favorite thing. And I have to drain the pond for the winter, too. LOVE that job, too. Totally entertaining. I get to use the pressure washer and sump pump and everything. All that pond water goes into the vegetable garden.

And one day, I need to go over and paint the lobby with my green swatches....I want a green the color of Spanish moss, with the base coat WAY darker and semi gloss (stay with me)and the two rag roll colors way lighter. The base will just barely show thru but will catch the light, so it will always look like candlelight.

I just have to find the right three greens. The kitchen is yellow and ivory and black; (very French) the library is crime scene red and the dining room is pink with a plaster run decorative ceiling. My bedroom is going to be (after MUCH thought) a cage au lait (which Lisi still calls cafe ole) and the bedding will range from ecru to espresso. Very European. Luxe. And sexy. Sort of like Sifuente's apartment on NYPD Blue.

Darling is concerned about getting the heating in and I am only concerned about the paint on the walls. And the bevel pattern in the skylight. I want that all beveled, since the POINT is light. I have enough stained glass on the main floor.

No vacation sleeping in for this girl.