Karmic-Dragonfly

Wyrd biþ ful aræd - Fate is fully determined -- a line from the poem known as The Wanderer. Not sure I agree with the sentiment, but the line stood out to me.

Friends and family struggle to comprehend why I am taking Old English classes. And I get it lol! It's definitely a niche interest! By the way, I signed up for class #3, starting next week!

Here are my list of answers to the voiced or implied 'why' question 😅:
1. I have an interest in languages generally. But not necessarily all languages — only certain ones seem to draw me. Sometimes I describe this as having flashbacks to previous lives, meaning maybe in a previous life, I spoke the language that attracts me now.

2. Studying something that has no monetary value seems like a nice fuck-you activity to late stage capitalists. What better way to spend my time than on something they can't capitalize on?

3. It gives me a happy place to get me out of the drear of the current news. I mean, there are worse ways to drown your sorrows! Not meaning to say I will give up my wine though.

***
I have been spending time working around the house -- cutting hedges, mowing the grass, stuff like that. I don't mind saying that the older I get, the harder those chores become!

I have also been reconnecting with friends that I haven't seen in a while -- 1 couple had me over for dinner the other night, and I hadn't seen them since before the pandemic! Lunch with a couple other friends I hadn't seen in a few months. And a birthday dinner for friends, some of whom I hadn't seen since Thanksgiving! I had another couple friends over for dessert the other night. And of course the weekly Friday wine with another friend.

In our current time, it's good to keep people close.

***
I wanted to go to the river trail I favor today, but I was pretty sore from the last hedge clipping, so I chose an easier walk at a park. Got to see this cute green snake!

Today was the day to move my grandmother's lemon tree back outside. As usual, I have starved it for water a few weeks before the move in order to make it easier to lift -- as evidenced by the drooping leaves!


I'm glad the weather is finally warming up! Lots of daffodils in the yard, which I have been bringing indoors.


The time change did not agree with me last weekend -- I don't remember being quite so groggy. Not helped by this being my week to host book club, so I just ordered pizza, put out a salad from a bag, and made a key lime pie. I didn't have time to do anything more elaborate.

The book was my choice since I was hosting. I picked an old one -- The Waves by Virginia Woolfe - not a great choice - at least I didn't particularly like it, although I understood it was experimental.

Also this past week, I was disappointed not to be able to see the blood moon lunar eclipse this last Thursday morning. I did get up at 2 in the morning, then again closer to 3, but the sky was too overcast to see it.

So Mom made it through the pneumonia. But I consider this a reprieve, mostly for my youngest sister and her husband, who are her caregivers. To say that Mom's death will obliterate my youngest sister is an understatement. So I am happy for the reprieve for now.

Old English is getting ever so slightly easier as I progress through this 2nd semester. I really do enjoy doing it, although it has been a lot of work.

It's winter, and as usual I am generally hibernating. We got some snow and ice (or should I say, "snaw and is") this week. I'm already ready for February to be over! The spring time change will be happening in a just a few weeks!



Snow crocus were blooming. Here's a pic of them under the snow ("under þam snawe")


I am looking forward to just being able to go walking down at the river again!

Had dinner and gift exchange w/ some friends last night.

I got a couple of nice gifts. For example I had previously sent a friend a scan of a Polaroid "One Step" photo I took 30 years ago of my partner.

I had scanned the photo and have it in a small frame in the house. Every so often it fades, so I print it again. Well, he took that image file, cleaned it up in Photoshop and had it printed. It's a nice thing! And I'm deciding now where to hang it in the house.


And another friend gave me this sampler of several versions of Port -- 10, 20, 30, and 40 years old plus some chocolate from a local store and some sweets he baked! Also a nice gift!

I went with a couple of college mates back to the town where we attended university. There is a Christmas illumination event with fireworks held every year - this was the 1st time I have attended.

I was really impressed with the fireworks. They were "18th century" type fireworks, which meant they could not go very high. So they felt like they were right in your face! Very close overhead! I kept worrying they would set something on fire -- you can see they were fired right in front of the building.

Well, there are a lot of things that I need right now. But top of mind this morning is that I would like to have a friend to talk grammar with! Specifically Old English grammar -- anybody who is a language nerd that likes to talk about this stuff would do!

It's pretty hard to find someone who enjoys grammar 🤓

Why do I need that? Well, when I figure out something and suddenly have a breakthrough in understanding, it would be really nice to have someone to share it with!

Example:

I puzzled over this sentence in the flashcards for the current class chapter:


I originally read Þām wīfe līcaþ sē mete. as "The woman likes (or enjoys) the food."

In that situation, I would have expected "the woman" to be in the nominative as the subject, and "the food" to be in the accusative as the direct object. But I noticed the articles and nouns are not in those cases.

Þām wīfe is Dative = "to the woman" or "for the woman" or "by the woman" -- some phrase like that.
sē mete is Nominative as a subject.

So after I puzzled a bit and looked up the endings to make sure, I realized regardless of the word order, I needed to read this as "The food is enjoyed by the woman." So the food is the subject, and the "by the woman" is the Dative form for that noun.

That makes perfect sense, and I am happy that I noticed the articles and nouns are not in the cases that support the way I originally read the sentence. I mean, even the fact that I noticed means that some of this material is sinking in!

Seriously though, this class is moving fast, and I'm having to spend way more time than I expected on it!

Saw the play Dr Faustus tonight with friends.

Nice performance. But It was hot as the hinges of hell and so many moths flying around. The play was performed outside in the courtyard with bright performance lights on. The high temp today was 99F (37.2C), but by showtime at 8pm, the ambient temperature had begun to drop, so I expect it was around 94F (34.4C) and still fairly humid.



Before other folks got there, I spent some time in the garden, communing with the trees and plants.

Not getting to the river as much as I was -- although I'm still working part time, lately the days are often broken into parts -- with a scheduled morning meeting and then a mid-afternoon meeting, which means no river time! Sucks, actually.

But I did go down today for some much needed water sound therapy!



This is a video, but in my browser does not look like it -- click to open in a new window.


I had ice cream with my Brazilian friends this past weekend. I think it was the first time since BEFORE THE PANDEMIC - omg...COVID messed with things! But it was really good to see them. And I don't think I had at all met their youngest child, who is now 6 years old now!

Luckily, their English is so good now that we could have conversations in English -- because my Portuguese is just not up to it now, lol! The kids spoke both easily. It was nice time!

Met a guy on the trail Friday...spent some time talking, walking, looking at snakes (really -- lots of snakes out at the river). I would say that he had a quiet soul...and I was digging the quiet depth of him. Blue eyes that I had a hard time not staring deeply into!

I really like meeting new people. I left things by saying if we ever see each other again on the trails, we'll spend some time hanging out.

Speaking of the aforementioned...




I remember when the Prisma app was free. Now subscription of course, so I signed up for 3 day free trial. Pretty much same as it was years ago, and I don't think it's worth subscribing too. But the filters applied to photos can be cool and interesting...and then I lose interest.



It has been a busy weekend. Friend over for wine Friday evening; friend had a party Saturday night; today my board games group was at my house.

A little bit heavy, because I didn't have time to leave it inside much longer -- having some dental surgery and won't be able to lift anything heavy for a while. So I needed to get it out.