Category: everyday life

Gardening

Another weekend activity was planting my flower garden. For the past four years, each spring, something would happen which would prevent me from doing it the way I like.

In 2016, I just started my new job; I was traveling to Texas each week, and I do not even remember how that summer looked like. I remember that I only put some flowers in the planters on the deck. In 2017, the weather was really bad, and half of what I planted died. In 2018, I had my back surgery. And in 2019 I could not start panting until June, because it was so cold! Each spring, I was saying to myself that next year it will be better. And here comes 2020!

I knew that after this weekend, the weather wouldn’t be great for a while, so Sunday morning, I headed to the Home Depot. It was not “first thing in the morning,” I was up for almost five hours by that time, but 10 AM is still considered morning 🙂

At Home Depot, it was pretty well organized, they had a separate entrance and exit, and they only allowed a limited number of people into the store simultaneously. I have to say, that selection was not that great; I know pretty well what I need to get to have all of my flowerbeds and planters the way I want. This time, many items which I used to buy every year where not there. If it were business as usual, I would come back one more time and one more time and would visit other stores, but that time around, I decided that I will go with what they have. So unless I will run into them in Jewel-Osco, I won’t have any ivy, coleuses, or decorative sweet potato vines. But hey – I got a full trunk!

I started planting in the afternoon but managed to finish everything in one day.The weather was beautiful, I was outside in a t-short and capris, and I really like how it all turned out!

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Time in Deer Grove Forest Preserve

This weekend was nice and warm and sunny, and tomorrow it will become much colder. It does not look like we are going to have another summer-like day till Memorial Day weekend.

I tried to use this warm time as much as possible, doing tons of things outdoors.

I spent a total of at least four hours in the forest preserve, both biking and walking. On Saturday, I decided to take mom to the forest preserve again since she enjoyed it so much last weekend.
This time, in an attempt to minimize encounters with other people, I decided to take her to a different site, which worked great. Although there were still people, there were way fewer visitors there. Also, the roads are wider, so you can keep the distance. And last but not least, the change of scenery is a good thing.

A woodpecker
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Happy 100th Birthday Captain Tom!

I case somebody missed this amazing story!

Sam's avatarOne Chance to See the World

Yesterday the UK celebrated the 100th birthday of a man many of us didn’t even know a couple weeks back. Captain Tom Moore, born 30th April 1920, served in the Second World War and even in 2020 is making the British people proud.

He decided to raise money for NHS Charities Together by walking 100 laps of his garden before his 100th birthday, with an aim of raising £1,000.

He raised £32 million.

For his incredible achievement he received a guard of honour from the 1st Battalion of the Yorkshire Regiment (at a safe distance) on his final lap.

On top of this, the RAF surprised Tom with a flypast by a Hurricane and Spitfire over his home.

He said of the event:

‘I am one of the few people here who have seen Hurricane’s and Spitfire’s flying past in anger. Today they are flying past peacefully. That’s what’s outstanding’.

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State of Mind, State of Health, State of Body, State of Finances, State of the State of Illinois

Today is May 1st, and the weather was gorgeous. I will do my best not to write about what I didn’t do today, but instead, to write about something I did :).

This week, I started to wear contact lenses again. On Tuesday, there were eight weeks past my second cataract surgery, and by all medical advice, I could start. I was freaking out because the implants are so close to the surface, I can see them. And I only started to wear soft contacts in October, and then stopped at the end of January, so I am not very skilled with them. Taking them off is the scariest thing because you almost scratch the eye. Besides, my eyes are still dry after the surgery, 

I started from just two hours on Tuesday and wore them for eight hours today. Some days, I can’t put on or take off one of the contacts for a very long time, but overall, things are fine. The only weird thing is that my close vision is way worse in the contacts than in glasses. 

Unfortunately, my eye doctor won’t start seeing patients in May, which means I won’t have a better prescription for a while.  

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Things Which Made Me Feel Good

My yoga teacher started free meditation sessions on Wednesdays, and this week I tried it for the first time. It felt great; we did a lot of breathing exercises and a long meditation at the end. She also reduced her rate for all the group classes, so that everybody could take as many classes as they can. 

Another good thing was that I’ve experimented with some baking, and things turned to be better than I could even imagine. 

I can hardly call it baking; I used the cinnamon bread for that recipe, and fresh berries and yogurt for toppings (only one of the tiny cakes was topped with the tart cherry jam). But I could not even imagine how good it will taste!

I’ve also experimented with the flake dough; the first one was not so great, but the second one was much better! I am going to repeat over the weekend, and then hopefully will take some pictures. 

Also, it was great to see these signs of spring!

I Miss the City

I miss Chicago really badly, but I can’t find any essential reason to travel, and thereby I am not going there. It’s not only to obey to the governor’s orders but also because I am the only person which my mom is in contact, and I do not want to risk to bring something back to her.

I saw this footage on the WBEZ site and wanted to share:

Drone footage of Chicago under quarantine

One More Walk in the Forest Preserve

Last weekend, Saturday was as bad as it could be – rain all day without stopping. The forecast for Sunday, however, was gorgeous, and I thought that I might try to take mom to the forest preserve.
Mom is holding up very well, but it’s not so easy for her. I am not taking her anywhere, even to the grocery store; she does not get a chance to meet my friends anymore. I thought that I might at least let her see some beautiful sights.

The week before that, the forest preserve was so crowded on Sunday, that I was afraid that it would be closed. But that Sunday morning, when I was biking, I barely saw any people. I told mom that we are going to try. She asked: you think it’s safe? I told her: I will drive you there and we will see. If there will be too many people for my comfort, we are turning around and driving back.

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Taking Time off Work to do Work

Boris and I are trying to do several research projects together, and doing this is the best thing to preserve our togetherness when we are physically apart for an extended time. As much as I wanted to do all these things (one was his idea, and two others are mine), I was finding it challenging to squizz this extra work in. I do not know who is bored during quarantine, or who does not know what to do with their time, but it’s not me :). Each weekend I was thinking – I need an extra day! And then I thought – but I have some! Indeed, I checked my PTO balance and found that I have more than five weeks off this year. Yes, I hope to be able to use them to help Anna later in the year, but for the time being, traveling is not an option anyway.

I took Friday off to do some of that work. Granted, there was also some “waste of time” built-in, but I also did substantial writing, and we spent about two hours discussing one of these projects on FaceTime.

I do not know why I didn’t think about taking time off before, but I am glad I did :). Most likely, I will do it again in a week, I feel like it’s a great way to stay sane. Or, and I did turn my slack and work email off for that day!

Watching Movies Together

Since the Siskel Film Center started their “Film Center from your Sofa” programming, I was thinking of how Igor and I can watch movies together, as if we were actually at the movies. And after I figured out how to share the screen on zoom, I knew that that was the answer. The only thing to figure out was what to watch and what time will work.

We settled for the movie “The Booksellers” .

The allure of the printed volume is at the heart of this engaging, Gotham-centered overview of the rare-book trade. One collector compares the relationship of an individual and a book to a love affair, and bibliophile Fran Lebowitz (whose recurrent comments form a loose spine for the film) avows that she could never bring herself to throw a book away. Executive-produced and narrated by Parker Posey, THE BOOKSELLERS explores the rapidly changing (some would say, dying) world of high-end book dealers, book scouts, collectors, and antiquarians. In the post-Amazon, post-Kindle world, are bookstores—and even the book itself—doomed? The disappearance of many beloved bookstores strikes a melancholy note, but the film also takes note of a recent boom in small, independent stores, and bookseller Heather O’Donnell asserts, “The death of the book is highly overrated.” (MR)

From the Siskel Center website

We loved the movie and the idea of watching together (for the price of one :)), although Igor had some sound quality issues. As for me, I had a virtual night out 🙂

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So Proud of Our School District!

This is our school district – Community Consolidated District 15, and I am so proud of the work of its’ staff! It is not just in Chicago, but in Palatine as well, that lots of children depend on breakfasts and lunches at school. And when schools are closed, the school district delivers!