Daily Archives: October 17, 2017

jigsaw puzzle update

I’m just going to write this without going back to my earlier post about jigsaw puzzles. I’m just working off the little slip of paper that I note the start and stop dates of each puzzle with.

Since June, I’ve done 4 1000 piece puzzles. I finished the fourth last week. There were two gaps, which readers of this blog should know about. I finished Lochaven Cottage on June 24, then didn’t start Yosemite Valley until July 17. That gap was due to Jeremy’s move.

That one was finished the day before I left for Germany. It was three days after I got back that I started Lighthouse. That took 3 1/2 weeks to finish. Only two days later, I started Hummingbirds and Hosta, the last one.

That one was tough. It was a painting, but it looked like it was taken from a photograph, complete with out of focus red blobs among the green background. For about two weeks, the puzzle was about three quarters finished but the remaining parts were all the same shade of green.

It’s not about the results, I kept telling myself, it’s about the process. And I did enjoy it. Now I’ve started another one but it’s only 750 pieces. I forget the title but it’s a Scottish castle under a dramatic sky. More fun!

voice mail

My nephew Danny is planning a family get together this weekend at his house in Lincoln. Us Bay Area folks are planning on going but there are questions about who is staying overnight, how we can car pool, etc. Mom sent me an email yesterday with a bunch of things on it so rather than responding in kind, I called her. They didn’t answer, so I left a message.

I got no response until I checked my email this morning. She said she tried to call but my email was full. Full? What have I got stored . . .? Oh.

So, here’s my story. I save certain voice mails from my kids. The ones that seem indicative of milestones. I usually transfer them to my hard drive and take them off my phone to avoid just the problem that I now have but the last one I got from Zach and the anguished calls from Jeremy and Mom that awful night are still there. I just checked and I did transfer them but I didn’t erase them from my phone. There are a few other, more recent ones, saved.

It’s funny, I only had to hear the first couple of seconds of each one of those to bring it all back this morning. I didn’t get much work done for a while after that. Luckily, the theatre was dark and hardly anyone was around.

For months I was sure I had a early November voice mail message from Zach talking about his upcoming trip to California with Emily. When I finally went through them carefully, it wasn’t there. I guess I erased it by mistake somewhere along the line. Here’s the last one I have, from the summer before.