In spite of having to deal with an intransigent teenager, I am having a good, productive day:

• Cleaning: I'm throwing all sorts of stuff away, cleaning out both the front and back of my truck (have to haul a buck goat for a friend tomorrow), doing laundry, and sending stuff to the thrift store. I will haul a load of stuff to the thrift store tomorrow and bring the goat back. Getting rid of stuff is oddly freeing and exhilirating. In one of my favorite books, Ursula LeGuin's The Dispossessed, there is a place where materialism is unpopular and simply not done. The residents there call excess stuff "excrement", and I sort of agree. If you don't need it, and don't really even like it all that much, then why keep it cluttering up your life? To the dumpster! To the thrift store!
  
• Planting: No, not outdoors yet. I have been buying all sorts of fruit with seeds and planting the seeds. Things planted so far: Meyer lemons, Key limes, kumquats, starfruit, blood oranges, honey tangerines, papaya. Still to plant today or tomorrow: Hawaiian papaya, minneola. Hmmm. The minneola seeds look dried out. They may not grow. Will see if I have another one to get seeds from. The are lemon seedlings coming up already (not Meyer lemons). The Cara Cara navel oranges had no seeds at all, and neither did the pummelo. I should go to Spokane in early February and hit the ethnic markets for more weird fruit and stuff.
  
• Cooking!: Making tamales, my first time using beef, and of course, some of the vegetarian ones too, because I also like those. I am trying the tapioca recipe yet again, because even though I don't mind buying it from Winter Ridge (the health food store here), they do not have it consistently. After the tamales are done (I will freeze many of them for later use in lunches or as snacks), I will make a beef roast, probably tomorrow. I have all sorts of nice veggies to roast with it: Butterfinger potatoes from Ronningers, rutabagas, celeriac, turnips, parsnips, leeks, onion, and of course, herbs. That will be so good. Mmmmmm.....
  
• And after the kids go home tomorrow: Clay. I want to make an ermine, because the ermine is an animal I relate to and respect, a small, intelligent, and tenacious creature. I admire the courage and fearlessness of the ermine/weasel. I guess you could call this an aspirational figure. Heh...How many people aspire to be like a weasel? They are so maligned, like bats and spiders, coyotes and wolves.

But mostly, I am in a housecleaning mood. Probably had a bit too much caffeine (yeah, I never did kick it entirely, just cut back, lol).