Whoosh, what a day!

I decided tonight blogging is a great thing when you live alone--since you don't have someone to talk about your day with (okay, I could call my kids, but . . . ) you can blog. I remember the night after Jordan's wedding--we'd had four days of extended family (including the New York Alters whom we all love), wonderful fun and fellowship. The morning after the wedding I served breakfast to about twenty people (not the bride and groom!) and then, suddenly, everyone was gone. I wasn't blogging then, so didn't have that, but I told my friend Jeannie the next day that it was one of the few times I wished I was married, because I wanted someone to relive it all with. She, happily married, said, "You could have called me. It would have been easier than having a man around!"
Today is another such day though far less momentous than Jordan's wedding. But I got so much done that I feel so good about that I want to tell someone. Went to the grocery store and then the nursery--only going to buy cyclamen and fountain grass, I told myself. Too early for herbs--but the fountain grass isn't in yet, and there was a lovely array of herbs. So I came home with bright red cyclamen (it looks great in the planter boxes on either side of my front steps that my brother made for me), cilantro, basil, Italian parsley, and sage. Didn't buy oregano, thyme or chives, because those wintered over. Planted the new stuff, trimmed back the old, and scrubbed the winter dirt off the front porch--even washed a cushion cover and then struggled the cushion back into it. Of course tonight they're saying severe storms, so I had to put all the delicate new plants under the roofed part of the porch.
Then I came inside and worked on the chicken/tomatillo enchilada casserole I'll serve to guests tomorrow night, made a fruit salad for that meal, and cooked myself a "faux gourmet" meal--sauteed chicken breast with a sauce of chicken broth (I always buy the free range organic in a box, rarely use cubes anymore), red wine, and goat cheese. I had bought some baby beets with wonderful fresh greens attached, so I roasted the beets and cooked the greens. Megan keeps telling me that the way to avoid senility (do you suppose she's already worried?) is to eat dark, leafy greens. I love spinach, but I don't much like turnip greens or collards. Beet greens are good though. My mom used to serve them with vinegar, and as a child Jamie always ate them that way. I fixed them for him a few years ago, and he said, "I don't much like beets, Mom." How they change!
Did a little bit of writing on the Texas women this afternoon--Emily Morgan, the "Yellow Rose of Texas"--that story is a wonderful example of how Texans twist the truth the make a better story. The myth about her distracting Santa Anna at San Jacinto is just that--myth. But you'll have to read the book to find out the truth (or google her). Think next I'll do Adina de Zavala and Clara Driscoll, the two women who saved the Alamo and ended up at real odds over it. But tonight I have a new J. A. Jance novel, and I intend to spend the evening with it.
It's the night before the new, early daylight savings change--can't decide if I want to go to bed an hour earlier, sleep an hour later--or maybe both. I can tell it's spring because in the morning my nose is so stuffy I have to get up, even if I could sleep late!