Uninspired, again

I haven't had much to say again lately. I'm uninspired. Some days are like that. (Or weeks, or months.) Oh well.

I try not to let my life get caught up too seriously in everyday living. I don't have a routine for going to Costco every Saturday morning like a woman I knew in California, or a day when I vacuum the drapes like someone I read about once. My weekends aren't predictable, my evenings aren't prescribed, my bedtime isn't set in stone.

I like variety. I like to stay involved in life with a wide range of interests and things to think about. But sometimes, it seems, it is just comfortable to sink into oblivion and 'hang out' doing - and thinking - nothing. Putter around the house, maybe. Page through stacks of old magazines to simply look at the pictures. Watch landscaping shows on HGTV. Nap.

We did have a plan for this weekend. We were finally going to make a new gate for our yard to replace the one we took apart last year so that we could get the John Deere tractor between the front and the back yards, and which the big storm last December ultimately finished off. (We think the remains got burned by our neighbors in the 'blackout' after the storm when we were all trying to stay warm! Somehow I am very entertained by that thought.) Anyway, we set off for a Home Depot expedition yesterday morning (getting sidetracked only for a short while by the nearby bagel place) and came home ready to get started. We'd been lured by a 'gate kit' that promised to make gate-making simple and foolproof and which, since we didn't really know HOW to make a gate, seemed like a good idea.

Of course we laid out all the parts and poured over the instructions (Written, obviously, by the Chinese with an inadequate grasp of English, in 5 steps, despite the clearly advertised-on-the-box statement that there were only 3 steps) only to realize that we had way more parts than were mentioned in the instruction sheet and even a few more than were listed on the "Parts" list. Oh well. We pressed on. (With a lot of 'bucking ourselves up' talk of the sign we were going to create and put on the "Gate Kit" display at Home Depot describing its inadequacies for all to see.)

I would have given up in despair several times along the way but Mark was Mr. Optimism himself and we managed to get the thing up. We didn't even have to take it apart half-way through and turn something over or reverse a part. And it fit. It is level. It works!

Well, as far as we got. In our joy at getting the functional mechanics of it straight, we decided to put off cutting and nailing the actual boards in place until today in favor of getting the lawn mowed and some yard trimming done. And therein was our mistake - today it is raining cats and dogs and we can't get it finished. So there is our incomplete metal frame, flapping around on an otherwise wooden fence, for all the neighbors to see...

Again I say: Oh well.

So today I am uninspired, and sinking into oblivion. Not a bad way to spend a rainy Sunday.