an extra long weekend

On Wednesday this week I had a couch surfer, Elena, who is originally from Russia, but has been living in the States for 25 years, having married an American. He died some time back, and she decided that she doesn't much like the way things are going in the US, so she left. She has been travelling since March, and has come north in hopes of seeing snow and Northern Lights. Her next stop will be back to Russia, where she will move back into the flat she has owned all along. Up until this autumn a cousin of hers has been using it, but she is ready to move on to something else at just about the same time that Elena is ready to return home.

I had her meet me at the gym for Phire practice, where we showed her some acroyoga moves, we played a bit on the aerial silks, and she taught us some partner yoga stretches. Then she and I had a pleasant walk home and sat up chatting for a fair bit thereafter. She had been to the Gammelstad Church Village (which is a World Heritage Site) already, so I recommended to her that she go to Storforsen while she was in the area, and we looked on line to determine that it is possible to get there at this time of the year via public transit. There is a set of buses that one could take from my place that would get one to the hotel by the rapids at 12:30, and another set of buses that would leave the hotel at 16:30 and get one back to my place at 20:30. Alternatively, one could rent a car for the afternoon for about the same price as a flight to Stockholm from here, so she thought the bus was a better option, and we agreed to take the first bus together in the morning on my way to work.

Thursday morning she wasn't feeling so well, and decided not to take the bus out there, especially as I only needed to go to work for a short time (having already put in my 20 hours for the week), so we could do something together after work. As I was walking in I talked to David on the phone (who was driving to Umeå, four hours south of here) for work, and asked him if it would be possible to borrow his car to drive out to Storforsen, and he said yes, but I would need to get the key from Caroline.

She was able to give me her apartment key between her classes at 10:00, so I walked over, got the car key, drove back to Uni, returned her apartment key, and then went home and picked up Elena and we drove out to Storforsen (stopping on the way for her to fill the tank with gas), arriving at 12:30 (same time she could have been there had she taken that bus).

We then spent a lovely 45 minutes wandering around the park, where she took many photos and some videos of the rapids. It was about -10 C, so even though there is no snow, there was beautiful, thick, crystalline frost everywhere. Eventually we were both quite cold, so we went into the visitor center (which was actually open till 15:00--I would have expected it to have been closed for the season already), where I spent too much money on a pair of reindeer skin mittens lined with fluffy wool. Then we drove home, getting there just after 15:00, so about an hour and a half earlier than the bus would have even departed Storforsen.

This gave us time to bake a black currant cobbler (using lots of cream that had been left over from Norrskensfesten in the topping). My friend Julia joined us, and David got back from Umeå on time to help us eat it, and we four had a delightful evening visiting.

Friday morning Elena headed north to Kiruna and I slept in (10 hours of sleep that night!), spent some time catching up on email and then took a nap. When I got up again I made a yummy soup of potato, carrot, Brock, and spinach, which I blended to a lovely green. I had just time to eat it before hopping on my trike and heading to Phire practice, after which Villiam followed me home (and I fed him breakfast--the boy hadn't eaten all day, since he isn't hungry when he first gets up in the mornings, so he didn't eat before work, and then after work he had only time to go directly to head directly to practice) and kept me company as I finished up the nålbindning for leash I was making for the new mittens. He went home just before 23:00, and I took a moment to check the computer to see if any important messages had come in, to find one from my sister letting me know that mom was back in the Emergency room, this time with fluid in the lungs which "they suspect is a result of some issues with her heart".

Needless to say that news worried me, and even at that point I suspected that this could prevent her planned trip to visit me next month. As a result I didn't go sensibly to bed, but sat at the computer for another hour, when I heard a sound from the other room of something falling and smashing. So I got up and went looking, to discover that David's aloe vera plant had leapt off of the window ledge, and was lying on the floor in a pile of broken ceramic pot bits, loose dirt, and goo from its broken leaves. I did my best not to think this symbolic, got the plant upright again, cleaned up the mess, and finally managed to go to sleep till about 03:00 that night, after chatting with friends on line for distraction. No new updates on her status came in till 04:00, so I didn't see them till I got up at 07:00, by which time Beth had reported that they had cleared a blockage in the same stent that had gotten blocked back in August. While there they put in a second stent, and that mom was slowly waking back up from the sedation.

So I baked some crescent rolls filled with raspberry and almond and Julia picked me up to head to the home of Linda, one of the Phire people, who was hosting a house warming brunch. We arrived at the same time as Villiam and Annette, and soon thereafter Ellinor also joined us. We had a delightful time eating too much good food and chatting, and finally returned home a bit after 14:00.

David and Caroline arrived not too long thereafter and he and I got the Frostheim hot tub up on its blocks and levelled, then discussed the plans for the new carport for the tractor we are going to build along the side of the shipping container, behind the sheds. Then they decided that since the plant had gotten too tall to stand on its own they would cut off and keep the top bit, and the rest could be gotten rid of. Since they were tossing so many leaves I decided to experiment with them and see if I could make a hair conditioner from them. One web page I read suggested that mixing fresh aloe vera gel with coconut oil makes a good conditioner. However, that page suggested 2 T of gel, and the discarded leaves yielded a full cup of it. I had only 1/3 cup of coconut oil left in the house(which already had vanilla powder in it), so that was how much I mixed in. I had thought to freeze it in small batches for later use, but the gel is mostly water, which means that cooling it causes the oil to float to the top and solidify. Therefore, in an attempt to get them to blend better (and stay blended), I picked off the solid oil and blended it with 1/4 cup of oat flour, after which I blended it with the gel again. This seemed to help. I will report back later if it is any good as a conditioner, after I actually use it.

Eventually they went back to the apartment, and I checked in to see the latest updates in mom's current saga, and then went to bed early, since we had plans to be out the door early on Sunday. Today David picked me up at 07:00 and we went out to his parent's house, where we turned logs into boards. He ran the saw, and my job was to clean off the saw dust and stack the boards neatly, with plenty of room for air to circulate around them. Since it was about -4 C the saw dust needed to be scrapped off with a metal scraper before using the brush on the boards. We worked from a bit before 09:00 to just after 15:00 (which was all the light that was available for the day, though we did take a half an hour for a quick lunch). Then we had tea (and more food) with his parents before heading back home.

During the drive I checked back in to see that my sisters had posted some not so encouraging news about mom's status. Her heart is doing poorly enough that they needed to put in a balloon pump to keep it beating, but she is still with us for now. She was doing well enough when we got home that I was able to do a quick phone call with her. She sounded upbeat, but weak (apparently she hasn't been sleeping well in the hospital).

David and I unhooked the trailer, then drove out to Storheden, where I did some quick grocery shopping at ICA, then picked up Caroline and her groceries, drove her home, and then returned to the house so that we could put the boards into the shed. As we got close to the house David told me that he was in need of some alone time, so he went out to rearrange things in the second shed (since the neatly stacked pile of boards in the first shed from all of the other times he has cut logs at his dad's this autumn was getting a bit big to take more) and I went in to cook some food for tomorrow. Since David needed alone time, but I needed togetherness time I sent Villiam a note and asked if he could come over, which he did, arriving while I was still cooking. This was good, as David came in to call me out to help carry boards before the food was done, so Villiam was able to finish up the last step for me.

Then I fed both boys before David went back to the apartment, and Villiam hung out with me till 23:00, by which time I was feeling much better. We played piano (he plays improvisation stuff for a while then pauses, I press any random white key, and he continues the improv, repeat till we are tired of the game), and then we switched to the dulcimer, where he taught me to play a song he can play on the piano. It is amazing how much easier it is to learn a song from a person than from a piece of paper (though I did write down the notes so that I won't forget).

Now I should do my yoga and get to bed, since tomorrow is Monday, and I need to go to work. Hopefully I will wake up to good news on mom's health front.