Procrastination

I have one project for this weekend: design a garden. A particular garden. I've been delaying and delaying.

I have done all my laundry (I should have done it yesterday), even the esoteric, wash-by-hand stuff, like the crochet dress that needs to be squeezed out and laid flat just so. The two black cashmere sweaters.

I have been out to find an antifungal treatment for the rose. I did not find it. Instead I bought fancy tuna from Sahadis. At $6 a can it is a splurge (for tuna)and I'm not convinced it's that much better than other Spanish/olive oil brands. But it made me feel better. I stuffed it into a pita with feta and cherry tomatoes and Italian parsley and some sherry vinegar and pepper and wolfed it. Delicious.

I have vacuumed the apartment. I made cookies. That was last night. When I should have been doing laundry. I also watched two episodes of Daniel Deronda, instead of one, astonished and happy to find another George Eliot on instant Netflix.

Listening now to Joan Sutherland I have only just discovered the provenance of the Woody Woodpecker song: Meyerbeer's Les Huguenots - the aria O beau pays de la Touraine. Wow. Why did I never notice it before. Because I never had a garden to design at the same time, probably.

The duvet is out in what sun there is, airing. I'm reading The Sheltering Sky and am thinking what a good disinfectant the sun is. Not that my duvet needs disinfecting! But there's almost nothing nicer than getting into a fresh-smelling, clean air and sunlight bed. A small and special pleasure.

I've pretty much run out of things to do. But! There's the new smoke alarm to install. It involves drilling, which I like doing. Maybe I'll save it as a reward.

Maybe I'll have another cookie. I don't even eat cookies. But these are the spicy raisin bars I made last week, too, and these I eat. I could/should garden, but I'm not allowed to until I have this garden on paper. Oh boy.

Maybe I should clean out the fridge.

I'm scared.