cookies and cellars

It's almost time to start up the home-based cookie factory for the summer. I made some macaroons tonight for a customer/friend I met at craft fairs last fall. We're trading a bunch of macaroons for her and her booth buddy plus the recipe (its from a book, really) in exchange for some cash and a recipe for her white chocolate fudge with dried cranberries. I am looking forward to trying that recipe.

Meanwhile, I have a couple dozen leftover macaroons sitting here calling my name. Either that or I have to put them away in a container, and that sounds like work after a long day. Bleah. It might be easier to just eat them.

Today was hot and muggy and the bugs are starting to come out. We're cleaning out a cellar for a woman here on the island, and it is hot, dirty, sweaty, heavy work. I am trying to find a home for a big old metal teacher's desk. The thing must weigh a ton, and it's got to come up out of that cellar through the bulkhead. Ugh. Today we tried it with a hand truck rolling up some planks laid over the stairs, but that didn't work. Tomorrow, I think I may try thumping it up one step at a time and see how that goes. There is no room to get a vehicle into position to tie a rope around it and haul it up that way. We'll have to see how it goes. Perhaps a lever of some kind could lift it where it needs to go. I have to say, this is way better than building another screen porch. The worst I have to come up with is how to get a heavy thing up and out, not how to weave shingles or flashing or hang doors or whatever. This is much, much easier on the brain. Tougher on the back, but easier on the gray matter.

I think some people don't understand how I can welcome the brawn-over-brains work like this sometimes. I used to work on an assembly line in a factory, and there is a real rhythm that I can get into doing mindless work. There is a simplicity to it that reminds me that some things do not need to be figured out, they just need to be shoveled. I pick up a load of stuff, carry it to its new place and go back for anther. It can almost approach a zen-like state if I let it. Lift, walk, place, walk, lift, walk place.... I can unplug my brain, let it float and keep on keepin' on. Before I know it, things are looking really good and I cam feeling good about ow much has been accomplished. It is sort of like mowing the grass or shoveling the driveway. There's nothing to do for it really but pick up the shovel and get started. With this cellar, there is nothing to do but pick up the first pile of boxes and get started. I'll post pictures tomorrow when we finish up.