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The Weekend in two pages
May. 5th, 2008 08:35 pmHere I am, back online after a weekend full of work and sunshine.
We cleared out the one-time pigsty and removed the last walls between the two attic rooms; we battled ivy and lugged heaps of stones from one barn to the other; we planted things and put up poles and painted the old steel joists. A cat got stuck under the ridge of the roof. And I turned 25 and got three cakes. And a sock wreath.
But all in due course.
I enjoyed my birthday party a lot (I hope the guests did too, except for one who I know didn’t; she left early and apparently had some trouble finding her way home; I would feel sorry for her if she hadn’t behaved so oddly) even though the preparations were rather stressful and I got stuck in a traffic jam with three of my guests, which cost us nerves and time.
When all the guests but![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
ladyelleth and Eestima had gone, my brother returned from putting up a May birch*. As he was busy doing traditional stuff anyway, he followed another tradition, this time a Westphalian one. It goes like this: When you’re a woman and you turn 25 and you’re still not married, you get a Schachtelkranz. The reasoning goes that if you’re 25 and unmarried you turn into a alte Schachtel (old baggage, as Granny Weatherwax would say), so people collect boxes (Schachteln) and make a wreath which you have to hang from your door for 25 days. It’s sexist, but there you go. Men get sock wreaths instead of box wreaths (I assume this has to do with the humorous shape of hanging socks; this custom comes, of course, from the days when you didn’t have pre-marital sex.)
Now 2008 is a leap year, so everything gets turned around (technically the girls would’ve had to put up May birches for their beloveds this year, but nobody researches this stuff properly these days) and I, despite being a girl, was entitled to a wreath of old socks. And my loving brother made one.
However he said he couldn’t resist the old Schachtel thing, so each of the 25 socks contains in turn a small box. And a Kinder surprise egg (whatever THAT is supposed to imply! At this point you have to know that Kinder means “children” in German…)
Since we got all the partying done in the night from April 30th to May 1st, my actual birthday was free for – further work on the house. (May 1st is Labour Day, so there was no work or university to attend; besides this year Ascension Day also landed on May 1st. I am mispleased. If this hadn’t been a leap year Labour Day would have been the Wednesday and Ascension Day would have been on May 2nd, giving us a practically free week, but as it was…) But as the weather was so beautiful we did as much work outside as was possible. The pigsty is now ready for renovation; we removed the remains of the old roof except for the steel joists which we de-rusted and painted with protective lacquer. Some friends from Jörg’s former judo club joined us and helped putting up some more poles for the fence, this time without damaging any pipes.ladyelleth stayed until Sunday, too, and Jörg’s mom helped as well so we had a lot of hands around for a change. Jörg’s mother had made a birthday cake for me, but as we were so many it got eaten within a few minutes, and she made another one the next day, which again disappeared immediately, so she made a third one for Sunday when there would be only three left to eat it. It was eaten rather quickly anyway…
All the while I had a Middle English song stuck in my head. If there’s one thing more embarrassing than a stupid earworm, it’s a stupid earworm in an obsolete language. Then again, I normally get church songs stuck in my head while working in the garden – my theory is that the people who used to work there in the olden days were very religious and kept on singing hymns while gardening so the soil took them in and still emits them whenever you stick a spade in. So Sumer is icumen in is at least different…
My parents dropped by on Thursday to hand over some presents before going on to my grandfather’s birthday celebration (he and I share a birthday, alas), issue an invitation for dinner on Sunday, and say that they always had bangs of conscience when they saw us working and they couldn’t help. I managed not to say anything sarcastic.
When, late on Sunday, after we had dropped our debris-buckets, hammers, shovels and other tools, and after we had taken the dinner invitation and returned from my parents’, we opened the door. As often happens, our cats saw us arriving and came inside with us.
This time, however, Caesar – our uphill neighbours’ cat – came along as well.
Caesar has been growing more courageous around us for a few weeks, once even walking into our kitchen although he went back out quickly and before our cats saw him there. He has been seen frolicking with ‘náro and Darcy, too, so apparently they have befriended each other, more or less.
That friendship didn’t extend to suffering him in their inner sanctum – i.e., our house – though. Our kittens growled, Caesar fled upstairs, our kittens followed. What came next was a concerto of threatening cat noises (which sound very un-catlike and more like Roland’s threatening battle-noises,kaneda will know what I mean). ‘náro had his ears cocked to the side and his eyes wide and dark; he looked, I am sorry to report, rather a lot like Pikachu. Caesar was obviously terrified of the fluffy Pokémon and ran up the stairs to the attic, again followed by Pika-náro and Darcy.
Long story short: They chased him as far up as he could go, which is under the ridge of the roof. There he was, and though we managed to lure them to the living room, Caesar couldn't be moved to come down again. So 'náro and Darcy had to spend the night in kitchen and living room while we hoped that Caesar might climb down from the ridge during the night.
But noooo.
Ten hours later he still sat up there, and we were forced to find the longest ladder and pluck him off the roof. He was afraid of moving, but when Jörg held him, he was all cuddly. Once he had been carried down the stairs he jumped off Jörg's arms and walked out (I can save myself, dammit!). End of drama. Also, end of sleeping.
Four days of no work - no paid work, that is - and all motivation to return to the real workplace is gone. Even though today was fairly relaxed, it was sooo frustrating.
*A Rhenanian custom. During Beltane night the guys put up May birches decorated with paper strips in front of their beloved’s window. Traditionally we did not have that plague of a holiday that the Anglo-Saxon world celebrates on Feb.14th, so we have various variants of pre-Christian celebration of love customs instead. In the past ten or so years St. Valentine’s Day has taken hold and partly replaced the original customs, much like Hallowe’en trick-or-treating is spreading even in areas that have other similar traditions such as the wassailing on St. Martin’s Day. Bah.
- - -
( Nachlese )
- - -
We cleared out the one-time pigsty and removed the last walls between the two attic rooms; we battled ivy and lugged heaps of stones from one barn to the other; we planted things and put up poles and painted the old steel joists. A cat got stuck under the ridge of the roof. And I turned 25 and got three cakes. And a sock wreath.
But all in due course.
I enjoyed my birthday party a lot (I hope the guests did too, except for one who I know didn’t; she left early and apparently had some trouble finding her way home; I would feel sorry for her if she hadn’t behaved so oddly) even though the preparations were rather stressful and I got stuck in a traffic jam with three of my guests, which cost us nerves and time.
When all the guests but
ladyelleth and Eestima had gone, my brother returned from putting up a May birch*. As he was busy doing traditional stuff anyway, he followed another tradition, this time a Westphalian one. It goes like this: When you’re a woman and you turn 25 and you’re still not married, you get a Schachtelkranz. The reasoning goes that if you’re 25 and unmarried you turn into a alte Schachtel (old baggage, as Granny Weatherwax would say), so people collect boxes (Schachteln) and make a wreath which you have to hang from your door for 25 days. It’s sexist, but there you go. Men get sock wreaths instead of box wreaths (I assume this has to do with the humorous shape of hanging socks; this custom comes, of course, from the days when you didn’t have pre-marital sex.)Now 2008 is a leap year, so everything gets turned around (technically the girls would’ve had to put up May birches for their beloveds this year, but nobody researches this stuff properly these days) and I, despite being a girl, was entitled to a wreath of old socks. And my loving brother made one.
However he said he couldn’t resist the old Schachtel thing, so each of the 25 socks contains in turn a small box. And a Kinder surprise egg (whatever THAT is supposed to imply! At this point you have to know that Kinder means “children” in German…)
Since we got all the partying done in the night from April 30th to May 1st, my actual birthday was free for – further work on the house. (May 1st is Labour Day, so there was no work or university to attend; besides this year Ascension Day also landed on May 1st. I am mispleased. If this hadn’t been a leap year Labour Day would have been the Wednesday and Ascension Day would have been on May 2nd, giving us a practically free week, but as it was…) But as the weather was so beautiful we did as much work outside as was possible. The pigsty is now ready for renovation; we removed the remains of the old roof except for the steel joists which we de-rusted and painted with protective lacquer. Some friends from Jörg’s former judo club joined us and helped putting up some more poles for the fence, this time without damaging any pipes.
ladyelleth stayed until Sunday, too, and Jörg’s mom helped as well so we had a lot of hands around for a change. Jörg’s mother had made a birthday cake for me, but as we were so many it got eaten within a few minutes, and she made another one the next day, which again disappeared immediately, so she made a third one for Sunday when there would be only three left to eat it. It was eaten rather quickly anyway…All the while I had a Middle English song stuck in my head. If there’s one thing more embarrassing than a stupid earworm, it’s a stupid earworm in an obsolete language. Then again, I normally get church songs stuck in my head while working in the garden – my theory is that the people who used to work there in the olden days were very religious and kept on singing hymns while gardening so the soil took them in and still emits them whenever you stick a spade in. So Sumer is icumen in is at least different…
My parents dropped by on Thursday to hand over some presents before going on to my grandfather’s birthday celebration (he and I share a birthday, alas), issue an invitation for dinner on Sunday, and say that they always had bangs of conscience when they saw us working and they couldn’t help. I managed not to say anything sarcastic.
When, late on Sunday, after we had dropped our debris-buckets, hammers, shovels and other tools, and after we had taken the dinner invitation and returned from my parents’, we opened the door. As often happens, our cats saw us arriving and came inside with us.
This time, however, Caesar – our uphill neighbours’ cat – came along as well.
Caesar has been growing more courageous around us for a few weeks, once even walking into our kitchen although he went back out quickly and before our cats saw him there. He has been seen frolicking with ‘náro and Darcy, too, so apparently they have befriended each other, more or less.
That friendship didn’t extend to suffering him in their inner sanctum – i.e., our house – though. Our kittens growled, Caesar fled upstairs, our kittens followed. What came next was a concerto of threatening cat noises (which sound very un-catlike and more like Roland’s threatening battle-noises,
kaneda will know what I mean). ‘náro had his ears cocked to the side and his eyes wide and dark; he looked, I am sorry to report, rather a lot like Pikachu. Caesar was obviously terrified of the fluffy Pokémon and ran up the stairs to the attic, again followed by Pika-náro and Darcy. Long story short: They chased him as far up as he could go, which is under the ridge of the roof. There he was, and though we managed to lure them to the living room, Caesar couldn't be moved to come down again. So 'náro and Darcy had to spend the night in kitchen and living room while we hoped that Caesar might climb down from the ridge during the night.
But noooo.
Ten hours later he still sat up there, and we were forced to find the longest ladder and pluck him off the roof. He was afraid of moving, but when Jörg held him, he was all cuddly. Once he had been carried down the stairs he jumped off Jörg's arms and walked out (I can save myself, dammit!). End of drama. Also, end of sleeping.
Four days of no work - no paid work, that is - and all motivation to return to the real workplace is gone. Even though today was fairly relaxed, it was sooo frustrating.
*A Rhenanian custom. During Beltane night the guys put up May birches decorated with paper strips in front of their beloved’s window. Traditionally we did not have that plague of a holiday that the Anglo-Saxon world celebrates on Feb.14th, so we have various variants of pre-Christian celebration of love customs instead. In the past ten or so years St. Valentine’s Day has taken hold and partly replaced the original customs, much like Hallowe’en trick-or-treating is spreading even in areas that have other similar traditions such as the wassailing on St. Martin’s Day. Bah.
- - -
( Nachlese )
- - -
