Happenss is a Hint of Spring

~ Jenny

Okay, it’s not exactly warm here up north, but things are shifting, we’re not getting a lot of freezing temperatures and . . . basically I’m short on things to be happy about so I grabbed that one.

Give me some good stuff, people: What made you happy this week?

80 thoughts on “Happenss is a Hint of Spring”

  1. I’m happy we have snow! I pay Maine taxes so I can have snow in the winter! Also, it’s pretty.
    Last week I said, and I quote: “I haven’t had a cold in three years.” Such folly, such hubris. Guess what.
    So what made me happy was sleeping away most of Thursday.
    I saw a swift red fox run across the white snow, although there was no lazy dog to see it with me. My sleek black cat and the red fox have an amicable relationship.

  2. I am happy because my daughter who is in her first year of a degree in illustration has been selected to go on a semester exchange next year to a US college.
    There were only two places up for grabs and she was told her application was the best.
    A big boost to her confidence and she is really looking forward to going and experiencing a different kind of art teaching.
    Somehow, when your kids are successful at something, it’s even better than when you are yourself. So very very happy for her.

    1. Congratulations to yor daughter!!
      And yes, the happiness is even greater when your kids accomplish such things !

  3. I’m happy our power came back on after two days with none and the basement drying out after filling up with 14″ of water after the ice storm.

  4. I am happy to have power again, though no internet yet. I am even happier to have a generator for the two days we were without power.

    I am happy because I am enjoying things I am rereading this week.

    I am happy because as of Friday I get to eat fun things again. I was hoping for a better number on the scale, and a flatter tummy, but will still call this a success. I can hear my pizza coming closer and salad with real salad dressing. There may be dancing.

  5. I’m happy today because 1) we started out sunny, and even if it doesn’t stay that’s a nice way to begin; 2) the structure I installed yesterday to support sunflowers blown down by the wind storm is holding; 3) lots of things are blooming; 4) I got through the hard part of a pre-relaunch revision yesterday, edited out over 3000 words (this one was 94K which is a lot for a book that’s essentially a romance novel. I found some scenes that were POV other than the heroes; those are gone now. Kill your darlings, right?), and have just a ‘layout edit’ remaining.

    Also DH is in the kitchen preparing to feed me bacon & eggs & waffles, because he’s awesome like that. 🙂

  6. We’re only two weeks away from Daylight Savings Time (in the US), which will make us all miserable for a few days, but then we adjust and there’s more light in the evening and we have more energy (the human kind, I mean, not the fossil fuel or renewable kinds). And it will be time to start the very earliest greens (outdoors). Tatsoi is hardy enough to sprout in March and survive frost, even as a seeding.

    Meanwhile, I had a really nice video chat with a college friend this week. We’ve both grown since then, but in similar ways, so we still really like hanging out together.

    And I did something scary (emotionally, not physically) a few months ago, and it’s about to come to fruition this week, for better or worse, which is also scary, but it also makes me happy that I took the risk even if it doesn’t pan out. And I got to discuss it with my college friend, and she was very encouraging, which made me happy too.

    1. Only two more weeks until DST? Argh! Then I get another month of working outdoors in the dark in the morning before it lightens up again. This is why I try to ignore it. I hate the switch back from DST just as much–suddenly I’m back to working in the dark outdoors as I clean runs at the end of the day. Not a happy! Why can’t they just pick one and stick with it???

  7. I’m happy because I got to see some live music in Nashville yesterday and have dinner with my cousin who lives there. And now I’ve landed in Toronto so will soon see my husband and dogs and stepdaughter all of whom are reliable to give me much love, hugs and kisses.

  8. I was delighted to discover the hepatica I’d forgotten I planted last year, with little hope of success, has started flowering. I’ve been wanting to grow one for ages, but they can be quite tricky here. Had a great catch-up with an old friend I hadn’t seen for over a year. And in my first visit to a garden centre this year I happened on a Japanese quince with flowers in the shade of rose-red I’ve been after for years.

    1. I have a few hepaticas. A friend gave me two, saying “do not divide these once you get them planted. They like to die on you”. And a few years later, I decided to divide one of them and, yes, it died. However the other one product a seedling so I am back to having two. There is a grower here in Oregon that has double-flowered hepaticas in blue, white or pink for an outrageous price (in my opinion). If I were a little more confident that I could keep them alive, I would probably spring for one or two.

      1. Thanks for the warning about dividing them. I think I’ve got the easiest one (for the UK): Hepatica nobilis, which is a European native, though not to the UK.

        1. What color is your hepatica, JaneB? I’ve seen pictures of it in blue/purples and in white only. No one I know grows it in my area, and I’d love to see it somewhere. I think I’ll ask around my neighborhood to see if anyone has some I can see in person.

          1. It’s an azure blue, and single – it’s the blue ones that appeal to me. Try an image search on the name. It’s very small – only a few inches tall – which is how I’d missed it until I did the late winter clearance.

    2. I love flowering quince! They used to be quite prevalent in the SE USA but sort of fell out of fashion. I’m delighted that I have seen more in bloom in the past week, so perhaps there is a resurgence in popularity.

  9. I’m happy my snow drops and crocuses are blooming and my miniature daffodils are about to. I’ve also finished most of my big weeding (and put the weeds where the good insect life can flourish) so you can actually see the flowers.

    I have been reading the history book about the French affair of the Poisons during the time of Louis XIV with great bemusement. People apparently had no qualms about giving their servants poisons to give to other people without fear the servants will turn them in. But one story in there, without poisons, is too good not to share.

    Apparently the King’s maitresse en titre Mde de Montespan was upset that the king had a new, young, beautiful, and stupid mistress Mlle de Fontanges who was given a suite of rooms with a staircase to the kings rooms known only by a few (how secret it could be in a palace inhabited by thousands where the king was watched every moment of his day?)
    Anyway, depending on the version, either Mde de Maintenon’s pet bears wandered into Mlle de Fontanges rooms and destroyed them or Mde de Maintenon took them there.
    Either way it’s such a new-to-me image of Versailles to have pet bears wandering around ….

    Otherwise, the big happy is that I will take a 10 day road trip to see my brother, my son, and my BFF for nearly 50 years. Also my mom, which is not such a joy.

  10. So many reasons for happiness that I lose count!

    The house is warm and dry.

    The replacement vehicle is over a hundred less per month and the check engine light has never threatened to light.

    The lettuce crop yielded the first salad of the year last night (for breakfast this morning) and included leaves from the spinach plant.

    All six of my pepper plants sprouted (three purple super-hots and three red fire peppers).

    I have six tomato seedlings in amber mason jars for the dotter’s raised bed garden outside. Three heirloom cherry tomatoes, two golden harvest tomatoes and a mega tomato. They can’t stay in the jars, but the jars are good for starters.

    I’m getting more sleep, if not on any predictable schedule.

    The ribs, while still a knitting project in progress, do not hurt as much or as often unless I sneeze. Sneezes are a vision of death. Rolling out of bed is nearly a thing again. (Still using the wedge.)

    Today is shopping day at the Friendly Neighborhood Food Lion. There will be bacon in the house again. 🙂

    2. GO, tomatoes! and peppers! Also, ribs! Do.Not.Sneeze. I think I have been trying to sneeze all your sneezes for you this past week.

  11. Happiness is chorale beginning rehearsals for an end-of-April concert–Carmina Burana, not my fav, but fun.
    Got cleared to go back to heavier weights, so am building back up to all of 5 lbs
    after a month of 2 lbs. How quickly we lose muscle!
    On my way in a few minutes to a jazz concert featuring a friend who’s moved
    to Chicago.

  12. I am happy because the exterminator came and piped sealant into the largest of the mouse holes and I no longer have a mouse missing my sock-clad toes by mere inches all night and half of every day. Of course, it showed up on Friday night of a 3 day weekend, so there was nobody I could call about it until Tuesday. It is heaven to be able to sit at my computer 3 feet from the mouse hole and not jump in reaction to the Mouse Olympics. Less gratifying is the bill they taped to my door last night for $107.43. It said that if the bill was not paid in 30 days they would terminate my lease, but it referred to that payment as rent, which really confused me. I assume that it is a charge for the exterminator,but that is not what the letter said.

    Less gratifying was the fact that the battery went out on the programmable thermostat they foisted upon me. I called the office about it last week, but nobody came to look at it. Since the fan was on automatic, the heat did not come on as the temperature dropped overnight and it was 65F when I got up. Since I pay for my own heat, it bothers me that I am without a way to regulate it. Fortunately, once I switched the fan to manual-on, the heat made it back up to 70F. I wish I had thought to do that last night.

    I went to deliver some post Valentine’s Day candy to my friend who owns a lingerie store and found that she was marking down things for the sale rack. I bought myself a new robe which has helped a lot during this weekend of volatile temperatures. I will have to cure myself of the habit of eating breakfast in my robe,because it is cream colored and I spill a lot when trying to eat and read the paper simultaneously. The new robe is very soft and is almost full length. I haven’t seen a full length robe in almost a decade and am so happy that my shins now get to stay warm, too.

    After hearing that Minneapolis had received 2 feet of new snow, I finally stopped procrastinating and called my northernmost niece. She had been working from home for a few days and so was able to avoid the worst of the snow. I really must call her more often, because talking to her is a total joy. Annie has an endless store of interesting thoughts to share.

  13. Mixed week. I am not unhappy precisely. More – that I’m in a state somewhere between bemusement and shock. Wednesday’s dusting of snow turned out to be 11 inches and we were snowed in until yesterday afternoon. It brought down my 90 year old, 35 foot tall, pink star magnolia. Well it split that sucker right in two. And when it came down, it pulled half of itself out of the ground. Also my 15 year old ceanothus “Julia Phelps” was decapitated by the heavy snow and I have a hunch it is not going to recover, since ceanothus can be short-lived anyway. The weatherman says two more storms are on the way but may only produce a dusting of snow.

    My happy out of this is I will no long have to bitch- I mean nag- that my husband is not trimming the end of the magnolia branches back far enough from the flower border and my flower are not getting enough sunlight. I now have to determine if my shade garden is going to no longer be a shade garden because it is going to get full sun in the afternoon.

      1. Thank you for the sympathy. I spent the first hour after my husband told me, sighing at the window and saying “My poor tree” I am reminding myself that after the sewer line replacement job from hell last year took out a huge section of one side of my planting bed, the changes I made to the garden in that area are going to make more appealing.

  14. I, uh, have a New Happy. My first title from JMS Books is out! Publisher’s direct-buy link isn’t live yet, but it’s up on Amazon: MISTLETANGO by Alexandra Caluen.
    So.
    Very.
    Excited.
    🙂

  15. Two sweatshirts, a long sleeved jersey an almost cotton camisole and I’m almost toasty. Twenty six days down with two more to go till March. A fire in the fireplace with the wood slowly dwindling. Along with the roast today I bought multicolored carrots from Trader Joe’s. That’s orange, yellow, white and purple along with couple of regular carrot coins to toss in the pan. I made mocha brownies yesterday with a packet of coffee crystals I found at the supermarket, Folgers is the brand. And the sun is out, finally.

  16. I’m happy because my ankle has heated enough that I’m up to being able to walk 2.5 miles! It’s such a relief to be able to move freely again after 3+ months of crutches.

  17. Happy we are heading home and the sun is shining thus proving if you wait and time the trip home at just the right hour, we should have a safe and good weather trip back to Vancouver. Woohoo. The road is dry. No need for four x four.

    Spent several days with friends, family and took in a few games of the Scotties Tournament of Hearts. Husband’s old school friend’s daughter was playing. She won the sportsmanship award. Amazing shots on the button.

    I hear you Maine Betty. I haven’t had a cold for years. I feel a head cold coming on. The weather was -22c wind chill for the days we were at the tournament. Will dose up on vitamin C and the Bs when we get home.

  18. I am happy that when I went to Barnes & Noble to browse and see what they had, I found (and bought!) all 4 of the first Murderbot books in hardcover. I bought the first 2 e-books ( on sale) but didn’t buy the rest as I wanted to make sure I would like them before I bought them all and by the time I had decided to get them, they were back to full price. So now I have them ready for a complete re-read for the storm we may, or may not, get tomorrow night. Nothing takes your mind off of bad weather like a good book!

  19. I got all 5 of Lancaster’s Stariel novels in paper format delivered to my door. The last two arrived yesterday. Beautiful books. Just looking at them on my shelf makes me happy.

  20. DS and I went to a wrestling event (WWE). It’s our “thing” and we had great seats. Only downside was very loud guy behind us got louder as he had more beer – our ears were ringing by the end.

    Baked my 3rd sourdough loaf this week, as well as crackers and banana bread from the left over starter. Bread-making skills are coming along and the crackers were tasty.

    DH and I got tickets to see Bruce Springsteen in November. Lots of bands/singers on tour in Canada this year.

    FT with a very close friend cheered me up. My tailbone is still very sore from falling 10 days ago and my anxiety is spiking. I’m doing my best to support several friends who are going through difficult events but I’m finding it tiring. She shared that she’s struggling with an “empathy deficit” too and recommended a Brene Brown book she’s reading.

  21. Looks like snow here. The happy is that the dog should be home from the groomer’s long before it starts.

    I have one more week before the meetings start again so i will make the most of relaxing.

  22. Happiness this week consisted of
    1) Getting 18 inches more insulation in my attic and only having to pay a reduced rate for it because it was part of a free energy audit program.

    2) Getting a video from my daughter showing my six year old granddaughter playing in her first T-Ball game. She loves it! (And her Dad is one of her teams coaches :))

    3) Went for my annual radiation oncologist check-in. This is six years after initial diagnosis of triple negative breast cancer and 5 years and 3 months after completing my radiation treatments. He never wants to see me again! Apparently, if this type of breast cancer is going to recur, it almost always happens within two to three years of initial diagnosis and treatment. There is just about zero chance of it recurring after five years!

  23. I’m happy that the puppy (can I still refer to her as a puppy at 11 months?) has recovered from being spayed and can now run and jump again to her heart’s content–of course she wants to play fetch 24×7, so that tempers the happy just a bit.

    I was also happy to see a dusting of snow on the local mountains here in sunny California this week, where we almost never get snow at this low an elevation. Probably a sign of the impending Apocalypse, but pretty nonetheless.

    Best happy was a visit with DS today (and not just because he played fetch enough with the puppy to wear her out for a few hours).

  24. I have just watched Attenborough’s Frozen Planet 2 and fuuuuuuuuuck it’s not like I don’t know (I work in a sustainability-adjacent field) but really, how does one live thinking about it? One doesn’t, most of the time, one just lives. So I too need a happy reminder.

    David Attenborough

    OMG our world is beautiful

    COP targets – and individual drive to achieve them, and the great strides many countries have made (not mine, grrr).

    My daughter (15) went to school today with her clarinet, her saxophone and, new this year, a cello. A boy stopped to help her carry it. Music brings her so much pleasure, and that brings me joy.

    My 13 year old and his mates have decided they want to train and enter a 6 hour adventure race (bike/run/rogaine) in April. My kids are cool.

    My partner built our daughter two new bookshelves in her room. She is thrilled. I’m thrilled. I don’t care what people say, booktok is not terrible.

    It’s the New Zealand census on 7 March. Harry Styles has a concert in Wellington. I’m not going (boo), but it means Harry Styles has to fill in the NZ census form, and while meaningless in the scheme of things, I kinda love that. Also, Harry Styles is enough to make people happy anyway.

    And, on that, a series of Harry Styles quotes from an interview in the early solo days that still makes me happy.

    “Who’s to say that young girls who like pop music — short for popular, right? — have worse musical taste than a 30-year-old hipster guy? That’s not up to you to say.” “How can you say young girls don’t get it? They’re our future. Our future doctors, lawyers, mothers, presidents, they kind of keep the world going.” “Teenage-girl fans — they don’t lie. If they like you, they’re there. They don’t act ‘too cool.’ They like you, and they tell you. Which is sick.”

    Whittaker’s chocolate. Hot cross buns. Fresh orange juice. Lemon and sugar pancakes.

    Irish dancing. Running.

    Jamie Lee Curtis caught on camera celebrating for her friend Michelle Yeoh https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/jan/12/jamie-lee-curtis-michelle-yeoh-golden-globes. Yeah, friends.

    Making colourful things with wool.

    Jenny and Bob writing. KJ Charles has a new book in a week.

    Argh. xx

    1. Whoopsie I got carried away. At least I’m in a better space than I was when turning the TV off!

      1. My gosh your happiness rant was lovely, Allanah! This is partly why I have such an admiration for Kiwi (& kiwi-esque) people in general! It’s like there’s some kind of decency/niceness virus in the water there….

      2. Carries away to a good place.
        I read really fast and thought Bob and Jenny were writing a KJ Charles book. That would be interesting.

      1. Yes! Also, I think the same applies to romance novels. Who gets to say that e.g. Jack Reacher novels are more worthy than romance? Or that romance writing, no matter how good, is never as good as ‘litfic’ (unless you’re Sally Rooney). I call bullshit. Sexist bullshit. I am absolutely here for what girls and women love, and to hell with the arbiters of cool. They know nothing. (So there :p)

  25. Happiness is good news.

    My cousin’s sweet dog who I have dog sat for years had to have emergency surgery. The prognosis wasn’t good, they wouldn’t even guarantee that she would survive the surgery. But she is doing super well. They removed a tumor the size of a volley ball, along with her spleen and a kidney. But she is home and weaseling out of her protective donut. Dietary restrictions for a while and then I am delivering a giant basket of dog cookies.

    My early spring flowers are also blooming, which is lovely, but they are going to take it on the chin later today and for the rest of this week. Spring is such a tease. Argh.

  26. How about…I just reread my favorite book, Agnes and the Hitman, for the third (fourth?) time. 😉

  27. I forgot to check this site yesterday, and the email came this morning. I’m so glad to see so many “happys” for fellow Arghers. We missed the worst of the big winter storm in Kansas City area, which is a happy. There are crocuses (croci?) coming up, and tulips and daffodils, plus dozens of Amaryllis belladonna leaves. Can’t wait for spring. Wish Daylight Savings Time would disappear forever. Every year I go from being one hour later than my family in Arizona, to being two hours later, which means that they are ready to text or talk when I am getting ready for bed. Arizona does not do this time-changing nonsense. They keep Standard Time all year. Argh!

  28. I’m happy that the 3 new plants I put in the ground a week before our arctic wave hit came through the cold just fine.

    1. Unfortunately, the source of happiness is also the source of crazy-making. Ben Aaronovitch has a new Rivers of London novella due out in June in the UK, called Winter’s Gifts. I can’t find any US release date for it. Has anyone heard anything? (It is a stand alone; first one set is US with Agent Reynolds as the protagonist.)

  29. I’m happy that all the carpet that was in the house is out in the yard under a tarp waiting to be hauled away.
    I have finally been able to hire people to wash my walls.

    And there are spring flowers in the parks. My first in person snowdrops. Pretty cool to see in person things I’ve only read about.

      1. My snowdrops, which grow like weeds and are thinned out by the handfuls every year, had been in bloom for two weeks and after close to a foot of snow are not happy. I don’t think they have much scent at the moment. Although I haven’t noticed much in previous decades. Shrubs that are in bloom at the same time which are fragrant are witch hazel and viburnum bodnantense “pink dawn”. I love them both but for some reason, winter blooming flowers send my asthma insane and I can’t bring cuttings into the house

      2. The native snowdrop in the UK, Galanthus nivalis, isn’t scented. Some species are, I believe, and the hybrid famous for it is G. ‘S. Arnott’, which smells of honey. When I was at the cottage, the garden there included scented snowdrops – I was most surprised to come across them for the first time.

      3. I haven’t much of a sense of smell, that’s how we got into this, but it no longer catches in the back of my throat or makes me feel unwell if I stay too long in the kitchen. Definitely an improvement.

  31. I’m a bit late because I haven’t been feeling very happy the last couple of days. Too many things to do and worry about. But right now, Black Cat who nearly died last month is sitting on the table purring like a steam train and rubbing his head against my chin. Very happy-making.

  32. Tuesday. Last day of February. I have prepared a draft of A March Farm Report complete with (16) pictures. Most of the hydroponic gardens are back in commission. The post is scheduled for 12:01 AM March the first. I have already done a scantily clad indoor farming happy dance. 🙂 [This of course invites a crop blight of some kind, like asking “What Could Go Wrong?”]

    1. You should set up your own movement of scantily clad indoor farmers, you can be the main guru, it will probably give people a whole new interest in life

  33. I am happy that I am at Basler Fasnacht! It has been great visting my brother’s family. People really should look up this fest for images, it’s wild.
    Unfortunately someone over here gave me some sort of evil plague; I haven’t swabbed yet, kind of afraid to, so I spent much of yesterday afternoon huddled under blankies shivering.
    It’s gotta be some kind of 24 hour virus, right?!

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