Friday, October 28
Oct. 29th, 2022 12:01 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
gottawonderToday I am grateful for:
Still good weather. Not windy today, which is good for the contractors.
They were able to put in two more windows upstairs, in the kind of open area on the second floor around the stairs. No idea what that space is called.
I end up being a little...short? With the contractor at times, because he gets very long-winded in his conversations. With the windows, I feel like there is very little to discuss other than where he is working tomorrow, so that I can have the areas around those windows clear. The timing is such that I am often either on my way to the barn or to town, so I try to keep it short. I hope I am not being rude about it, but if I didn't kind of keep things concise he would easily go on for half an hour or more, just kind of talking to himself out loud about what he did that day and what he plans to do tomorrow.
I hope that I am doing enough to make him feel appreciated (I think he's pretty needy this way, but I guess I would like some acknowledgment too, of my work), but I also have to usually get going at that time of day.
Also, the more we talk, the less he gets done.
I went to see River, and that was good. I was able to ride with the girl with physical challenges because her sister wasn't there (thus K was not teaching a lesson). I am okay to be around when it is R's lessons, as R is less...well....anal.
This particular student anyhow, R likes it if I ride when it's just her, because it is more social, and this girl likes having other riders. She isn't able to do much on her own, so it makes the riding more fun if there are others there.
R had set up kind of a Halloween obstacle course, and one of the decorations was a blow up black cat kind of thingy, which River was a bit worried about, but not bad. The funniest thing was R had a nerf gun so you could try to tag the blow up cat, but it kind of just spit the dart out about a foot away and it was somehow funny that it failed so badly.
It was nice to ride around inside with other riders. I haven't hardly done that all summer, especially since K is so protective of his space when he has lessons. Nice to just relax and ride with others.
I came home and napped.
I am feeling a bit overwhelmed, since all I did last night was bring in boxes, and try to sort through them and see if I could find logical places for things. It's like we have been moving for the last three years, because we never feel entirely finished with the process.
Fun song for you, Ratty : https://youtu.be/4THFRpw68oQ
Today I learned that in the song "Yankee Doodle", the reference to macaroni was not about pasta, but instead it refers to a ridiculous kind of wig that a dandy might wear, and by extension became a way to describe a person who might wear such a thing.
Yankee Doodle went to town
A-riding on a pony,
Stuck a feather in his cap
And called it macaroni.
The macaroni wig was an example of such Rococo dandy fashion, popular in elite circles in Western Europe and much mocked in the London press. The term macaroni was used to describe a fashionable man who dressed and spoke in an outlandishly affected and effeminate manner. The term pejoratively referred to a man who "exceeded the ordinary bounds of fashion"[12] in terms of clothes, fastidious eating, and gambling.
This does make more sense than a reference to pasta. It confused the crap out of me as a kid.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yankee_Doodle
Still good weather. Not windy today, which is good for the contractors.
They were able to put in two more windows upstairs, in the kind of open area on the second floor around the stairs. No idea what that space is called.
I end up being a little...short? With the contractor at times, because he gets very long-winded in his conversations. With the windows, I feel like there is very little to discuss other than where he is working tomorrow, so that I can have the areas around those windows clear. The timing is such that I am often either on my way to the barn or to town, so I try to keep it short. I hope I am not being rude about it, but if I didn't kind of keep things concise he would easily go on for half an hour or more, just kind of talking to himself out loud about what he did that day and what he plans to do tomorrow.
I hope that I am doing enough to make him feel appreciated (I think he's pretty needy this way, but I guess I would like some acknowledgment too, of my work), but I also have to usually get going at that time of day.
Also, the more we talk, the less he gets done.
I went to see River, and that was good. I was able to ride with the girl with physical challenges because her sister wasn't there (thus K was not teaching a lesson). I am okay to be around when it is R's lessons, as R is less...well....anal.
This particular student anyhow, R likes it if I ride when it's just her, because it is more social, and this girl likes having other riders. She isn't able to do much on her own, so it makes the riding more fun if there are others there.
R had set up kind of a Halloween obstacle course, and one of the decorations was a blow up black cat kind of thingy, which River was a bit worried about, but not bad. The funniest thing was R had a nerf gun so you could try to tag the blow up cat, but it kind of just spit the dart out about a foot away and it was somehow funny that it failed so badly.
It was nice to ride around inside with other riders. I haven't hardly done that all summer, especially since K is so protective of his space when he has lessons. Nice to just relax and ride with others.
I came home and napped.
I am feeling a bit overwhelmed, since all I did last night was bring in boxes, and try to sort through them and see if I could find logical places for things. It's like we have been moving for the last three years, because we never feel entirely finished with the process.
Fun song for you, Ratty : https://youtu.be/4THFRpw68oQ
Today I learned that in the song "Yankee Doodle", the reference to macaroni was not about pasta, but instead it refers to a ridiculous kind of wig that a dandy might wear, and by extension became a way to describe a person who might wear such a thing.
Yankee Doodle went to town
A-riding on a pony,
Stuck a feather in his cap
And called it macaroni.
The macaroni wig was an example of such Rococo dandy fashion, popular in elite circles in Western Europe and much mocked in the London press. The term macaroni was used to describe a fashionable man who dressed and spoke in an outlandishly affected and effeminate manner. The term pejoratively referred to a man who "exceeded the ordinary bounds of fashion"[12] in terms of clothes, fastidious eating, and gambling.
This does make more sense than a reference to pasta. It confused the crap out of me as a kid.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yankee_Doodle
no subject
Date: 2022-11-08 01:20 pm (UTC)