Not (quite) a dead blog and some general weirdness

Skipping over the details of the last few months is probably for the best; a quick summary should do.

After getting back from beach vacation in late spring, things got weird at Egg's work (precursor to all the recent economic/financial weirdness lately perhaps?). A month later I went back south because my snowbird mother was borderline incapacitated with lower back/hip/knee pain, and they needed help getting the things squared away for hurricane season and getting the sailboat back to FL. We dodged squalls all the way back and got pasted by a few really wicked ones, but in between I did manage a little sock knitting. The picture looks idyllic, but there was some weird juju out there the entire trip.

Home for July and most of August, then up the interstate to Farm Country for a month to take care of my mother following her hip replacement surgery. A bum hip had been causing all that pain, and the change post-surgery was nothing short of amazing.

Doggie got a farm vacation. Things that suburban dogs don't normally get to do, like digging,

rolling in (deer? muskrat? groundhog?) poop,

and interacting with big critters.

For entertainment I went to a few farm auctions, and I found treasure! That is, I'm sure this "thingy" (actually there are two of them) is something wonderful, once I figure out just what this weird contraption is.





















The auction bill said "antique yarn winder", but that doesn't seem right somehow. The Amish neighbors all had no idea, and even when one of them took me and my mystery object to visit a couple 90-something year old elders a little further away, no luck either. The consensus was that it looked very interesting, and they'd love to know what it finally turns out to be, whenever I do find out. The mystery continues for now...