Like a hamster...

[altivo]

Sigh. I guess it's winter. Daytime temperature in the mid-30s (F) and it was spitting snow and rain mixed when I left the supermarket this morning with a week's supplies. Came home, went to a guild meeting, brought a member back to our place so she could shop through raw fleeces. She took two, yay!

We had hot soup, Gary's home made, for lunch, and I sat down to write. Soon I was so chilled I was shivering. No I don't have a fever, I just haven't gotten used to the change of season. Went and put on a sweat suit, still chilly. So I went to the blanket chest and got my favorite wool and mohair lap robe, an old handwoven plaid thing that I bought at the same farm auction where I got Tess. It was stored most of the summer in the cedar lined chest after we found moths in some wool in the garage.

It smells like cedar. Now that's not unpleasant or bad, I like cedar all right, and it's certainly better than mothballs, but as smells sometimes do, it has associations for me. My first reaction after wrapping it around myself was "I smell like a guinea pig." I asked Gary, and he said I smelled like a hamster. No surprise. I had guinea pigs and rabbits as a kid, and used cedar shavings for bedding in their cages. He had a hamster.

The smell is starting to fade already. At this level it's making me remember something else. My mother had a cedar lined chest too. I think my sister has it now, out in San Diego. This fainter hint of cedar reminds me of when she would open that chest to get something out. She didn't keep woolens in it, as intended, but mostly family keepsakes like old photographs and letters. I have one of her photo albums here, and it makes me want to sit and look at it (preferably next to the woodstove, which hasn't been lit yet but will be if the temperature keeps dropping.) No time for that, though. I have to get back to my writing if I'm going to catch back up to where I should be after a week.

NaNo Count: 9,039 words and still writing
Revised count as of 9 pm: 10,952 words (I'll get some more chapters uploaded tomorrow.)

Comments

[herefox.livejournal.com]

I really, really wish I had room for a cedar chest. I adore the smell of cedar...and I just like the idea of having a chest in general. I never had rodents as a kid though, my mom is phobic.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Rabbits are not rodents. Sorry, I have to be pedantic about that all the time. I still have a bunny. Lapines make great pets. The guinea pigs, hamsters, and gerbils are interesting and sometimes smart, but nowhere near as tame and affectionate.

Cedar is nice. You can have the scent without the big hulking chest (we use ours as a coffee table.) I have several chunks of red cedar about the size of bars of soap. These can be tucked into drawers to give the same scent and moth protection. They have to be unfinished, of course, and when the scent fades you take a little sandpaper to them to expose a new surface. I've also seen red cedar sold in the shape of eggs for the same purpose, and in home improvement places you can get it as eighth-inch thick veneer pieces that could be used to line drawers or cover the bottoms, with similar results. Great for a drawer where you keep knitted wool socks, for instance.

[herefox.livejournal.com]

No, but the guinea pigs and hamsters are :-) Which are what I was referring to as I actually missed the rabbit mention.

We baby sat my cousin's hamster once and it got out of the cage, my mom jumped and screamed anytime she thought she saw the slightest movement on the floor. Thankfully we found it before my cousin got back in town.

Whoops. Meant to mention that I do have some cedar blocks that are scattered around my room, most especially in the bins where I keep my wool but there's something about having a whole huge chest of it that appeals to me. Probably because I read too much fantasy as a kid ;-)

[altivo.livejournal.com]

You read too much fantasy as a kid? Impossible. Now please don't tell me you've outgrown it...

My sister had a hamster for a while. They're regular escape artists. Hers got loose a number of times, but usually was retrieved within a day or so. The notable exception was when it got loose in the basement of the house. That lasted for weeks because there were lots of hiding places. We knew it was still there because it kept nibbling on the onions and potatoes stored down there. I think she finally got it back by leaving the cage open with good food like carrots and sunflower seeds in it and the next day it was right back in the cage.

[herefox.livejournal.com]

We eventually found it under my bed (I had a water bed at the time with drawers under the frame. It was hanging out behind the drawers. I don't think we ever would have found it if it hadn't gotten hungry)

I haven't outgrown fantasy. I still even hit the children's section in bookstores most of the time to see if anything catches my eyes.

[rustitobuck.livejournal.com]

Sigh.

I wish it was cold enough around my place to curl up in soft, warm stuff. Wool and mohair!

Cold days and soup.

I miss my fireplace.

The barren landscape could use a dusting of snow. Haven't got any here yet.

Cedar is nice. I had gerbils when I was a kid, and we kept them in cedar chips. (Randy little devils too, I think the total gerbil population in my extended family hit 200.) Dad kept his sweaters in the cedar chest, so he smelled like...Dad...cedar and Old Spice.

Sounds like you have it pretty nice.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

I was always careful to get only female gerbils, so never had a population problem. The guinea pigs did multiply, but not at a terribly high rate.

We haven't really had any snow accumulation, just falling flakes now and then. This morning there was heavy frost though, entailing windshield scraping and all that, and we've had ice to break on water buckets for the last two or three days.

[cabcat.livejournal.com]

Hamster horse!! :D