How to Knit Up the Raveled Sleeve of Care

In other words--sorry, Shakespeare--how to sleep.

Sleep is the issue right now.  Getting to sleep, primarily.  I've had two doctors' appointments on the topic this week. Yesterday's was with a neurologist, who cheerfully and attentively listened to my lament and then dictated a strict protocol :

1. Go to bed at the same time every night
2. No TV or computer screen-watching within an hour-and-a-half of going to bed.
3. Dim the lights during that time
4. No heavy physical or mental exertion during that time.  Books on tape acceptable.
5. No reading in bed 
6. Listen to a hypnotherapy relaxation tape 5-6 minutes in another room before going to bed.
7. No lying in bed trying to get to sleep for more than 15-20 minutes; get up and repeat step 6. 
8. Do not use a clock to time the 15-20 minutes.
9. Write down all worries and spend 30-45 minutes a day immersed in them in the early afternoon.
10. No naps except between  2-4 pm and for only 30 minutes
11.  Do not even THINK of using the bed for other than for sleep, sex, and sickness
12. Consider going to a Cognitive Behavioral Therapist who specializes in insomnia

Reader, I was so desperate I did  #1-8  last night.  By God, it worked!  I had to get up after 20 minutes in bed, subjectively judged, and listen to 5-6  more minutes of the tape,  and then I went back to bed and slept.  It was a miracle!

Here's what Shakespeare really said.  Sadly, I learned these lines from watching "Rumpole of the Bailey," not from two Shakespeare classes in college.  I guess I wasn't old enough then to appreciate their wisdom-- I was always fighting sleep so I could get papers written.

"Sleep that knits up the ravell'd sleave of care,
The death of each day's life, sore labour's bath,
Balm of hurt minds, great nature's second course,
Chief nourisher in life's feast."

• William Shakespeare, Macbeth (1605), Act II, scene 2, line 36.

Breakfast with Ross

Wednesday's headline

This is how it goes around here:  Get up, read latest SF Chronicle article on Ross Mirkarimi, rant at hapless husband, and vow to MARCH IN THE STREETS if this man doesn't lose his job as Sheriff of San Francisco.  Repeat the next day.  Husband now assuming beleaguered expression upon entering kitchen.

For anyone who doesn't know:  The newly-elected sheriff manhandled his wife on New Year's Eve, leaving an impressive bruise on her upper arm.   A day later, she goes to a neighbor, tells her the story, shows the bruise, and  has the neighbor videotape it.  Three days later,  the neighbor goes to the police.  Ross Mirkarimi says it's a "private domestic matter," which drives your blogger sincerely insane.   In California, no domestic violence is a purely private matter.  It is a crime.  Even if the frightened wife pushes to have charges dropped.

It doesn't help that Mirkarimi is arrogant: he does't know the law.  Trumped-up tears after a plea bargain.  Jerry feels the wife should leave the country as soon as possible with her two-year old child, or "she'll end up like OJ's wife."  Direct quote.

And this morning:  The mayor of San Francisco has now suspended Mirkarimi without pay (sweet! Though have concerns re wife and child) while there's an ethics investigation.

Stay tuned.  At least you don't have to have breakfast with me.

A Gift from Ted Kooser

Heard Ted Kooser read this poem on PBS last night.


Daddy Longlegs
By Ted Kooser

Here, on fine long legs springy as steel,

a life rides, sealed in a small brown pill

that skims along over the basement floor

wrapped up in a simple obsession.

Eight legs reach out like the master ribs

of a web in which some thought is caught

dead center in its own small world,

a thought so far from the touch of things

that we can only guess at it.  If mine,

it would be the secret dream

of walking alone across the floor of my life

with an easy grace, and with love enough

to live on at the center of myself.


From Flying at Night Poems 1965-1985, by Ted Kooser

Defending Your Knees

Knee Defenders

The Sunday New York Times yielded this nugget in an article about comfort on planes called "How to Avoid That Cramped Seat."  You can buy a gadget called "The Knee Defender," which is described as "a set of plastic wedges that slip onto the legs of your tray table and physically prevent the seat in front of you from reclining." Oh, boy!

Several years ago,  Jerry and I sat behind a couple in Economy who immediately reclined their seats after take-off and left them reclined for a 7-hour flight from Paris to New York. By the time we got off the plane, we were crippled: our hips ached and our legs were so stiff we could barely stand.  I despised this selfish couple (and these days would speak up), and immediately began investigating frequent flyer miles so we could upgrade to Business Class.

But we still fly Economy on shorter flights, and sometimes it's hell.  People want what they want, with no thought to the people sitting behind them, who are then in the moral dilemma of screwing the people behind them.  I blame it all on the airlines, pitting passenger against passenger.

GadgetDuck, which sells this ingenious item, knows this.  They provide a courtesy card for the traveler whose seat is being blocked: "I realize this may be an inconvenience.  If so,  I hope you will complain to the  airline.  Maybe working together we can convince the airlines to provide enough space between rows so that people can recline their seats without banging into other passengers."

You can adjust the Knee Defender  to give the other passenger some reclining room.   And it's perfectly legal to use them (but would I?)  GadgetDuck.com for $19.95.

The Knee Defender at work.  You install it with the tray table lowered.

"Voices in Cloth" Quilt Show

Some of the fabric that came home with me

    Yesterday, the Craneway Pavillion was full of  people looking at quilts, buying from vendors, eating, or chatting with people they ran into.  I saw at least half of my world there yesterday,  people I hadn't seen in years, plus people from my pool class, from my former place of employment, and of course from my quilt group.

My friend Lin, who came with me, was introduced countless times as "my-friend- Lin-who-went-to-high-school-with-me," sometimes with "We reconnected with on Facebook" added.  She was very patient, I thought.  And appreciative of quilts, much more judicious in her appreciation of them than I was, noticing many details I missed.

Perhaps my favorite moment of the day was running into my pool chums, Anne and Valerie.  They reported that two women standing in front of one of my quilts commented that it was their favorite quilt.  Val, who is English, hastened to tell them,"We know the ah-tist!"  I loved that.

I didn't take as many photos as I would have liked to. Here are few, and some don't do justice to the quilts.   I've included my own two quilts, by special request from a reader, even though I've posted photos of them earlier.

The first four quilts  are from a Special Exhibit, "Ancestral Memories," quilts made by members of the African American Quilt Guild of Oakland.

Detail of  "From Slavery to the White House," by the Betty Shabazz Academy of San Francisco and the Alumnae Chapter of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority

A view of most of "From Slavery to the White House", dress square at lower left

"All My Roads Lead Back to You," Alice Beasley. 
The quilter wrote, "A portrait of my mother as a saucy three-year old c. 1914 sitting on her father's knee."

Detail of "All My Roads Lead Back to You,"  the child's foot extending beyond the bottom edge of the quilt

"Mount Diablo" by Susan Fuller. I include this as an example of something I can't imagine being able to do, a representational landscape.

"Twig Salad" by Priscilla Read

"Cracker Two, by Rebecca Rohrkaste. The reds are actually less orange, and there's a beautiful and subtle variety of them.

"Free Fall" by Ann Rhode.  One of the few hand-quilted pieces I saw.

"Fresh Fruit" by Susan Fuller, a remarkably detailed and beautifully rendered representation of fruit

"Autumn Kaleidoscope" by Pepper Sbarbaro

And my own:

"Circles and Squares," designed and pieced by me; machine quilted by Angie Woolman

"Snowscape"
 Rebecca stepped in and hung this quilt lower after I took the photo. Also machine quilted by Angie Woolman

The Making of A Quilt Show

I've been a member of the East Bay Heritage Quilters for about 10 years, but this was the first time I've help set up the massive show they put on every other year, "Voices in Cloth," which happens this weekend.  Set-up volunteers (and you have to do some volunteer time somewhere, somehow, if you want to have a quilt in the show) had to be at the Craneway Pavillion, at the Richmond Marina, by 9 am on Friday.  This vast room was part of a Ford Plant  during World War II. The rain poured down.    Brooks Island, just off shore, was visible through the fog, and by afternoon, so was San Francisco. It's a spectacular setting.

Between 9 am and 2: 30 pm, this enormous room was transformed by many quilter-volunteers into a full-fledged quilt show ringed by numerous vendor booths. I went with friends from my quilt group, Rebecca and Ann, who are old hands at set-up, and became a member of Ann's team.

The Craneway Pavillion at 9 am

Ann fitting poles into stands

A forest of stands, ultimately enough for more than 200 quilts to be displayed

A mock-up of the show, showing the configuration of  the walls of quilts

Ann wearing her  Row Captain hat as we get  underway with setting up the stands and poles for our row

A fleet of ironing boards and an army of iron-ers worked on the muslin panels that hang behind each quilt

The ironed muslim panels hang from the poles, ready for quilts

Hanging  each quilt according to the master plan

By 2:30, most of the quilts were hung

Quilters even have colorful raincoats

Pool Party on Dry Land

Here's a look at the lunch party my pool exercise class had for our former instructor,  Kate.   Our classmate Anne allowed us to shove around furniture in her living and dining rooms  so that we could set up folding tables and chairs to seat 24.  Delicious, inventive food and spring flowers. 

Turns out we're quite a  fashionable lot when dry and dressed.  In ten years, we've never seen each other in anything but  swimsuits or jeans.

Rosemary pound cake with polenta and sour cream

Chicken salad adorned with nasturtiums

Brownies with penuche frosting

 One of two long tables

This is Olinda. At 86, she and her friend Kiyoko are the oldest members.

They brought sushi.