Catching up as summer slips away

I've really not done much blogging this summer, at least not as much as I'd planned. All this time off has been filled with housekeeping projects, cooking, reading, watching tv, and spending time with the dogs. It's been really nice, actually. I'm not ready to go back to work yet; it feels like the summer just got started, and yet it's already almost over. I have two weeks left. I've worked hard to finish up the list of tasks I had set for myself this summer. Among them are things like:

• Cleaning the porch. The wooden beams were dirty and cobweb-y, and the tile floor was really dirty. I spent a whole afternoon washing down the painted wood and mopping. 
•  Rearranging the kitchen cabinets, and unpacking and storing the china my grandmother gave me before she died. I have some really fancy large collections of two patterns complete with teapots and serving pieces. I guess I'll have to have a tea party one day! Ha.
• Cleaning and oiling all of our wooden furniture. We have a beautiful teak dining table and credenza that were badly in need of it, and several other pieces (end tables, nightstands) that I took care of too on the same day.
•  Organizing and decluttering the laundry room. 
•  Giving all of the floors in the house a good cleaning. We have pretty original hardwood floors in most of the rooms, with the exception of the den which has laminate floors (which are also very pretty). 
• Washing all linens in the house, which included a trip to the laundromat for machines big enough for bedspreads and comforters. I just did that yesterday.
• Plenty of yard work. Gregg has done all of the mowing and most of the weed-eating, but I've trimmed hedges and taken truckloads of yard waste to the dump. I've also pulled weeds and regularly scooped up dog poop from the back yard.
• Cleaning out closets, although I didn't get as far with this one as I'd hoped.

Almost every day, I've given myself tasks to do over and above ordinary maintenance cleaning. Which is all I plan to do for the next two weeks before I go back to work--maintenance. I want to enjoy these last few days of freedom as much as possible. 

I got a new phone yesterday! I finally dropped mine one too many times, and it was toast. We had had our phones for years, and they weren't the latest thing when we first bought them. So now we have the latest Samsung Galaxy--the S10. It will take some time to get used to it, but already I'm loving the extra space, the much improved camera, and the longer lasting charge. Speaking of the camera, here is a video I took of a hummingbird visiting our back porch feeder with it yesterday: 

And here are a couple of pictures of our Crepe Myrtle trees, which are covered in blooms:

We have a line of five of these trees along the southeast side of our house. I just love them.

I'm reading a new book: The Red Tent by Anita Diamant. It's set in Old Testament days and is the story of Dinah, the daughter of Jacob by his wife Leah. If anyone asks if I've done any traveling this summer I can tell them "Yes!"....time travelling, that is! Between the Philippa Gregory books about the Plantagenets and Tudors, and now this, I've been living halfway in the past these past couple of months!

I've also gotten hooked on True Blood and try to watch two or three episodes a night. It's dark and funny and outlandish--vampires and shapeshifters, maenads and werewolves, anyone?--but it's so much fun! It's bloody and sexy and soapy...a perfect summer tv series, in my opinion. And the music is good, too. I've been having a good time watching it.

Weather wise, the past week has been wonderful. Cooler and less humid, with blue skies and pleasant breezes. Of course, it would cool down as soon as our a/c was repaired. :)  It's funny how around here 90 degrees F for a high and 68 for the low feels almost like the onset of fall! All of a sudden it's nice to sit out on the porch in the late afternoon, again. We've been enjoying it out there each evening, sitting with the dogs. They're going to be so unhappy when I go back to work. They're more spoiled than they've ever been right now!

Well, that's about all I've been up to. What about you?

Binge

Whew! This summer is flying by! I have exactly three more weeks left before I go back to work. I'm not complaining--I never expected to have a job where I get so much time off and I'm so very grateful for it.

It's been hot hot hot here. The temperatures and humidity have been so high that the heat index has been hovering between 105-110F. That's insane. Stepping outside is like walking into a sauna.  So much for spending time outdoors in the summer!

Since I've been in the house estivating for the past few weeks, I've been taking the opportunity to binge on books and tv. It's been a real treat to spend hours every day reading and discovering new tv shows. Here's what I've read and watched so far this summer:

Books:

As I've mentioned here already, I've been on a Philippa Gregory kick since May. I've read several of her Plantagenet/Tudor novels and since she's such a prolific writer, there are plenty more to choose from. I'm on a small break from them at the moment. Here are the ones I've read, in the order in which I read them:

The Red Queen
The White Princess
The Lady of the Rivers
The Constant Princess
The Kingmaker's Daughter
The Other Queen

All of these are set prior to the reign of Henry VIII, with the exception of The Constant Princess, and that one is mostly about Katherine of Aragon's early life, her brief marriage to Henry's older brother Arthur, and the lie she told to be allowed to marry Henry after Arthur's death. And now that I think about it, The Other Queen is set after Henry had died and his daughter Elizabeth was on the throne. I forgot about it because it was my least favorite of the six books I've read so far.

I've read a couple of other books this summer, too.

Educated by Tara Westover
The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie by Alan Bradley

Educated is the true story of a young woman raised by mentally ill, violent, dysfunctional parents in the mountains of Idaho. They were fundamentalist-leaning Mormons, survivalists, poverty stricken, and "end of days" preppers along the lines of the Ruby Ridge family. Tara never saw the inside of a classroom until she was almost an adult, and the family never saw doctors even when truly horrific accidents and illnesses struck. Despite all this, Tara ended up going to Cambridge and Harvard and traveling all over the world, eventually earning a Ph.D and writing Educated about her jaw-dropping life story. It's incredibly compelling and I highly recommend it! This is my book club's August selection but I finished it in two days this past week. I couldn't put it down!

The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie was a loan from a book club friend that I discovered while dusting and organizing my bookshelves last week. I finally got around to reading it, and it was...meh. I'm not a huge fan of light mystery novels, and that's what this is. Apparently it's the first of a series of books about a brilliant 11 year old chemistry loving prodigy girl named Flavia de Luce. It's set in 1950s England, which was my favorite part of the book, but otherwise it wasn't my cup of tea. (Cup of tea! Ha!) I doubt I'll be reading any other books in the series.

TV:

I got a cheap 3 month trial of Starz so that I could watch their series based on the Philippa Gregory books: The White Queen, The White Princess, and The Spanish Princess. All three are gorgeous to look at (the settings, the costumes) and the actors are all pretty good. I'm through with the first two, and have just started The Spanish Princess.

We've also been watching American Gods on Starz. The book by Neil Gaiman is one of my all time favorites, and the show is pretty good, too. The casting is spot on and the way it's adapted for television is well done. I think Gaiman is one of the executive producers.

HBO  has been knocking it out of the park with some of their new series. We've been watching Big Little Lies (season 2...with Meryl Streep!) Euphoria, Years and Years, and most recently (and we're binging this one) True Blood. Yes, I know I'm extremely late to the True Blood party, but that just means we have the whole series to watch at our leisure. I always thought the premise sounded kind of silly but it turns out the show is very fun to watch. Speaking of fun....and the lack of it.....Years and Years is set 15 years into the future, and it's uncomfortable to watch as it's almost dystopian, and then the shocking surprise ending of episode 4 didn't sit well with me. I doubt I'll be watching any more of that one.

So there you have it: How I've been spending my summer vacation! Have you read or watched anything on my list? Or anything else good I should know about? I'd love to hear about it if you have.