Shears of death

I nearly broke my record of always being able to start a fire, no matter what the conditions. Six weeks of fires with no ready kindling? Done. Five days of rain in Jasper National Park? No sweat. But I was almost brought down by car camping at a state park. Here’s what was available: a good stack of split hardwood, one state park map (coated), one generous handful of toilet paper, and six or so tiny rain-soaked twigs. The map wouldn’t burn, the toilet paper didn’t burn hot enough to light a match. Glaring resentfully at the roaring blazes at the RV campsites next to us, and praying that one of them wouldn’t offer to help, I gathered a few more twigs, brazenly set fire to the rest of the toilet paper, and proceeded to build the tiniest of fires, patiently getting one matchstick-thin twig alight, then laying a slightly thicker one on top, slowly... slowly... until finally, I had a dependable little blaze. “Now we’re cooking with gas!” I announced jubilantly to Husband, who had supported me through the challenge to my Femme du Nord-ness by fetching toilet paper and shredding bits of bark.

I purchased my first pair of hedge trimmers this week, and by god they’re fun. Taxing on ye old arm muscles (my arm shook every time I lifted my post-gardening drink, making me look like an arthritic boozer), yet unbearably fun to SNIP SNIP SNIP an unruly shrub into a neat sphere. After consulting with musician and surprise landscaper friend S (where do people get these multitude of talents?), I was delighted to learn than non-flowering bushes can be trimmed anytime, which means I have three unruly bastards out there to subjugate with my shears of death.

READING/READ
On the Rue Tatin by Susan Loomis, about an American cooking in France, A Brief Lunacy, about a couple held hostage by their crazy daughter’s crazy boyfriend in their Maine home, and Unformed Landscape by Peter Stamm, a bleak little novel about a lonely woman in Norway.