One month ago, on Dec. 21st, Basil turned one year old. I gave him a willow cube as a gift and he's greatly enjoyed it. He's had round willow balls in the past, but Binky Bunny was out of them, so I tried a different shape. I didn't know if he'd be able to roll it around like he can with the ball, but surprisingly he can. Or maybe it's more of a flip, since he pushes it from the bottom & it sort of turns as it moves. In any case, he's had a lot of fun with it, he really likes the willow toys. Later, he had some fresh endive, which he enthusiastically gobbled up. I think he had a good birthday celebration.

On New Year's weekend, I started a new painting. I'd done the preliminary last year of a small flock of tundra swans that I intended on doing in ink wash, but feared I couldn't get the sky to look right, especially considering how new I am to that technique. So I decided to do it in acrylic and started the background as the year began. This pic is on the first day. A fiend turned the photo upside down to show how it could be at sea, rather than stormy clouds over snow. I was amazed at how different it looks upside down.
Since the photo was taken, I've changed it a bit and started the swans themselves. I'm working dark to light, so right now, the swans blend into the grey clouds, which is a bit too much camouflage. As they get lighter, that problem should evaporate. Tundra swans are a bit smaller than other types and don't do the stereotypical S shape with their necks. They live at more Northerly longitudes, also. It's not going to be an action pack painting, but a quiet moment of swans pausing in their travels.
___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
I jumped on the Wordle bandwagon last week and have been doing relatively well at it, usually getting the answer in 3 or 4 tries. So far, I haven't missed any, but I'm sure that will happen eventually. I like challenging my brain and must admit that I'm pleased that there's finally a trend I can be a part of.

Some people take their Christmas trees down directly after Christmas Day, others after New Year's Day. This year I'm noticing a lot of people still have their trees up, long after Epiphany, which used to be the last deadline. But I can see 4 townhouses from my apartment windows which still display lit Christmas trees.
Mine is still up due to the broken rib. Last week, I lifted a small pile of magazines which didn't agree with it, so I don't think dragging a couple heavy Rubbermaid bins out of the closet & out to the living room would be the best idea at this point. Maybe after the weekend? Normally, I begin taking it down around the 4th or 5th of Jan. I have removed many of the other decorations, but not the tree or Nativity. They are both on the opposite side of the living room from the window, so even though I turn on the tree every night, it can't be seen from outside.
When my sister drove me home from the hospital after having the rib diagnosis, we were surprised at how many houses had their outside Christmas lights on, despite it being close to midnight. People used to turn the holiday lights off when they went to bed or shortly before, not leave them burning all night as they do now. So if the outside lights have new habits, maybe the inside trees do too? I'm curious to see how long the trees will stay up now. Should I make a guess and see how close I get?
In many ways, I'm pleased that I can see the neighboring trees longer, but it's a curious new trend. (photo is my tree taken in December 2021).

2021 was better than the year before, but that was a low bar. The biggest and best thing that happened was getting a new piggy, Basil, who has brightened my isolation. He's a very interactive little guy, though still a bit nippy, but we're working on that.
I read 164 books, mostly fiction, but plenty of nonfiction. The books were set on every continent except Antarctica. I painted/drew 10 pictures, mostly small ones. I did the weekly challenge of the Inktober drawing display on social media. I wrote a bunch of book reviews, not sure of the exact number, but at least 5 or 6. Learned to play 2 new games on Gold Token game site: All Aboard-based on train routes and Dragon's Breath, using mah jong tiles. Several new house plants were added to my collection and all but the coleus is doing well.
There were some new health problems over the year: cellulitis in my jaw and face in the spring and a broken rib at Christmas, which I'm still dealing with.
The furnace-a/c leaked 3 times from May to Oct. flooding part my living room and halllway. The condo maintenance people were slow in figuring out the problem, but said in Oct they'd finally found the cause(clog in pipes in another apartment) and had fixed it. The rigmarole with the insurance company was an added bonus.
My car worked intermittently, mainly due to me not driving it enough. But even when I was, it was stalling and not starting, so there was mechanical things happening as well. I had begun doing curbside pickup and drive thrus when really helped with the isolation, but it hasn't been consistent. At this time I need to have a mechanic look at it because it's not starting again & stalling at red lights when it does.
I began watching West Wing at the very end of 2020 and continued through the year. I missed it when it was actually on TV and it's surprising how many of the issues that were covered then are still relevant. I also started watching Jeopardy, where I alternately feel smug when I get an answer that the contestants don't or amazed the things I don't know. I also enjoyed shows such as Atlantic Crossings, White Lotus, All Creatures Great and Small and Insecure.
I've set some small goals for the coming year; do more paintings, update this blog at least monthly, walking more and write more book reviews. Hopefully I can accomplish most, if not all of them. Let's hope 2022 is a better year for all of us.

Like many people, I've become more interested in house plants during the pandemic and each May buy a couple new kinds. The pic shows one of this year's, a zebra plant in a brontosaurus planter my sister bought me in pre-Covid times. It's grown a bit more since I took the photo in spring, but slow enough that I'm not worried about it outgrowing it's cute dino home. I also bought a purple inch plant, which used to eb called by an anti-Semitic name. That one isn't in a planter yet, as I'm still looking for the puma planter that I so liked as a child. I think it may be on the top shelf in a closet, but haven't climbed up to check yet. The plants from the spring of 2020, a purple passion vine and a croton are still doing well and actually need to be transplanted to bigger pots.
I'd love to have more vintage pots with animal themes and they do still exist on ebay. But some of them are so overpriced and the shipping costs are ridiculous. I suppose I could buy 1 or 2 that I like best over several months, but I'm still trying to decide if that's feasible.
There's a few other kinds of plants that I'd like to add to my collection, such as a swiss chees plant, a vine with round leaves which have holes in resembling the famous cheese. I like plants with colorful leaves or unusual shapes.
At this point, I have more house plants than will fit on my windowsill, so this winter I bought a plant stand with 5 shelves arranged artfully, which I will assemble when I've finished clearing space for it. There's still a couple bags of papers which need to go to the recycling bin before I have the area cleared. It will be pleasing to see the transplanted denizens setting on the stand in front of the window.

On Feb. 23rd, after my sister was at the hair salon, she surprised me by going to a pet shop & sending me pics of the guinea pigs they had. There was a baby Abyssinian(the kind with mussed fur) we both were drawn to and we agree he was the one. So I finally got a new piggy! I named him Basil, after the amateur archeologist who discovered Sutton Hoo in Britain, portrayed by Ralph Fiennes in the new move "The Dig". He was 8 weeks old and would fit in one hand. The first evening he hid for awhile & then came out to explore, but was skittish whenever I moved.
Since then, he's gotten over some of his nervousness, discovered that veggies are yummy and has grown increasingly interactive with me. He's silly as all piggies are, but shows some traits unique to himself. He's very curious and rambunctious and always seems to be busy. He loves to eat hay and beefsteak tomatoes. He's grown a little bit in the month I've had him, how much depends on what angle I'm looking at him, but he's still pretty small. The colors and swirls in his fur are fascinating and makes him one of the cutest piggies I've ever seen.
While I would've liked a new piggy sooner, Basil was worth waiting for. I'm enjoying learning about his personality and seeing him grow. He makes me smile and I spend so much time watching his antics. Without a pet, there is a dimension of my life that is missing and a fulfilment in having Basil and lavishing him with love and attention.

The year has begun with a combination of listlessness and sadness. With Rollo gone, my days have more loneliness and grief. My isolation is much more accented now without a companion and in some ways, my days feel more pointless.
In mid-January, it was found that a leak from my unit was causing water to go into the apartment downstairs, so I had to have a plumber out to fix it, which was quite upsetting with the fear of his bringing Covid in with him. No one has been in my apartment since last March, not even my sister and that made it a safe space. All that was threatened by the plumber. After he left, I used a can and a half of Lysol spray and tons of disinfectant wipes to clean every area he was in. The 14 days from his visit is almost up and so far I’m alright, though I think the excessive Lysol irritated my asthma, but my inhaler is keeping it manageable.
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________
I watched in horror as the mobs stormed the Capitol building on Jan. 6, looking like some Eastern European overthrow attempt. It’s frustrating that the memory of that incident is being swept under the rug by people trying to rewrite history. Though that’s what they were doing in the first place.
But I did enjoy the Inauguration of a new President on Jan. 20th. The modified ceremony was still moving and full of pageantry and was more interesting than usual with the varied performances and personalities. I especially enjoyed the poem by Amanda Gorman and the Pledge of Allegiance done in ASL.
______________________________________________________________________________________________________________
My art projects are progressing at varying speeds. But when I saw that Twitter was having an art challenge for drawtheoceans featuring rays, I worked all weekend to finish a postcard sized picture of a manta ray so I could be included. Health problems kept me awake Sat. night and I used my time to work on the drawing, figuring out a new technique for the skin tones of the ray. My larger drawing of Canada geese is about half done, but working pretty well.
I’ve been trying to set short term goals, but even small ones are hard to meet sometimes, as I’m so tired and lack energy these days. I was dealing with isolation pretty well before, but it’s been more difficult since Rollo has been gone. I hope this feeling isn’t permanent.

The unthinkable happened and Rollo is gone. All of a sudden on Sat. Dec. 19th, he stopped eating and late at night he began staggering and at one point fell over, which was heartbreaking. I stayed up till after 2 am with him doing everything I knew to do. As soon as I woke in the morning when it was daylight, I rushed into his room to find he'd crossed the Rainbow Bridge not long before. Describing the symptoms to my sister, a nurse, she said it sounded as if he'd had a series of strokes. I am crying writing about it. My previous piggies had lived to be 6 and half years old, but Rollo was a little over 5, so I feel cheated. I was hoping to have him into next year.
Since he was my companion all through the Covid isolation, his absence is felt keenly. The first few days I was devastated by grief and didn't know how to cope. I miss his funny antics, cutting up veggies for him, treat time and interactions and conversations with him. He was the most outgoing piggy I've had & had such an outsized personality.
It's getting a little easier to be in this room with his empty cage. And I will soon have his ashes back from the vet, so he will be here in another form. But I miss his cute, silly self so very much. Goodbye Rollo, I will always remember you.

This weekend, the TV channel PBS broadcast part of a John Denver concert from 1986 & I enjoyed hearing so many songs from my youth, plus a couple which were new to me. It brought back a lot of memories, since I was a fan and in the early 70's he was on the radio constantly. He became popular in the infancy of the environmental movement & I like how so many of his songs had nature references. He wrote about nature and human exploration from astronauts to Jacque Cousteau's ship. And there was the wonderfully romantic "Annie's Song". His songs also form a soundtrack for one lovely summer between the bullying years of middle school to the new adventure of high school and a long vacation my mom, my sister and I had at my Grandma's tiny Appalachian town in Maryland. One of my uncles took me on numerous hikes where we went up a small mountain or berry picking in 3 states. Another uncle drove us to all sorts of tourist spots and I distinctly recall John Denver songs on the radio on the trips there. The music makes me remember how I felt then, music does that like nothing else, takes one to a time and place. I remember putting aside most of my worries and fears for just those few weeks and resolutely lived in the moment. It was wonderful and some of my fondest memories are from that time.
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Rollo has been doing well except for a few days mid month when he became less active. I took him back to the vet on the 20th and she found he had stasis again. Not sure why, since he'd been eating lots of veggies and hay. He took meds for about a week and is doing fine again, thank Heavens.
_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Normally, I don't allow myself to begin playing Christmas carols till the day after Thanksgiving, but this year, I started on Tuesday before Thanksgiving. I'm planning on posting a Christmas song on Facebook twice a week all through Advent and was looking up some new ones to add with old favorites. There are some songs that I only like when certain people sing them, such as the "Chestnuts Roasting on an Open Fire" song. Unless it's Nat King Cole, I dislike the song. Josh Groban does the very best "O Holy Night". David Bowie and Bing Crosby doing "Little Drummer Boy" can't be beat, even though it's a bit different. I finally selected 7 songs to post on Wednesdays and Sundays until Christmas.
Usually I'm busy preparing for craft shows at this time of year and don't start decorating till I'm done with them. But this year, most craft shows have been cancelled, so I'm hoping to get the tree up earlier. It's one of the few activities where all the work is worth it. If only most chores had something all sparkly and festive at the end!

Rollo came through the surgery well and I brought his wobbly self home that night. He was slowly improving until the Monday after surgery, when he stopped eating and curled into a tight ball of pain. I was able to get him back to the vet on Tuesday, where she said that because he hadn't been eating hay or veggies, he was experiencing stasis, where his digestion had stopped moving due to lack of fiber. She prescribed simethicone drops & changed some of his other meds. The drops were quite miraculous and he started feeling better later that evening. A few days later, on Thursday, he turned into an eating machine, spending hours eating hay and anything else I put in front of him. He became less frantic after that, but was still making up for lost time and I was giving him fresh veggies every 3 or 4 hours. With his return to regular food, the vet approved discontinuing the Critical care mix and medicines, which pleased both Rollo and I. Though I was often amused by his funny antics, the feeding sessions were exhausting both of us.
Since then, he has steadily improved and continues eating and drinking well. I even found an online pet shop which sells homemade organic treats made with hay, oats and fruits that he enjoys. He's put on a tiny bit of weight, though remains too skinny, but at least he's not as gaunt as he was. He's quite perky and playful and it's wonderful having my silly little piggy feeling like his usual self again.