You love life very much.

That’s my fortune cookie message from tonight’s chicken with snow peas ... most of which I managed to eat with chopsticks! Which was quite an accomplishment for me because, for someone who is relatively adept with my hand-eye coordination, I struggle when I attempt to use chopsticks (prolly ’cause, as I’ve mentioned before, I never even learned how to hold a pencil correctly).

Anyhoo, I love that fortune. I mean, it would be cool to get one that said I’d just won a million bucks or something, especially if it were true! And I got one last week that said something about me having a great sense of humor and loving a good time or something along those lines.

None of which explains this bad mood/case of the gloom ’n’ doom I’ve had since about ... oh, what year is this? ... but at least this afternoon I saw a glimmer of hope.

First of all, I take my car to Jay’s so he can drive it around to hear the squeak it’s been making (only on bumpy roads ... which, as Jay pointed out: fortunately, there are plenty of those in this little town).

“Sounds like you’ve got some squirrels in there!” Jay says as we tool down ______ Street, about a block from the news office. (Not trying to hide anything; I truly have no idea what the name of the street is!) “Oh, and your brakes are squeaking, too; you need to get those fixed sometime within the next couple of weeks.”

We get back to Jay’s shop. He bounces the car up and down and asks me if I can still hear the noise. Yes, I can.

He opens the hood, looks around and then goes inside. Comes out with a spray can of some sort and sprays it on some squarish-looking thing on the left side of the engine, up near the windshield.

“What’s that?” I ask, meaning the part he is spraying.

“Oh, this? It’s like WD-40, only stronger,” he replies.

God love him. He is a mechanic, but he doesn’t try to make me feel stupid for being a woman ... even though I made him drive my car a couple of years ago to try to hear the squeak, which conveniently did NOT squeak whilst we were driving around.

Maybe I really DO have squirrels.

; )

Today was a lovely day, so I decided to go for a walk. Mostly ’cause I wanted to take some pictures of the yellow tulips a few blocks down, but also because — well, who couldn’t use a little fresh air now and then? Just to “blow the stink off you,” as my pal Patti might say.

It was a short walk, about 20 minutes, but I came back with some goodies.

These remind me of badminton birdies (??):

Some tiny violets scattered all over the ground; the flowers are about the size of a quarter:

I believe these are buds on a gumball tree ... but I could be mistaken:

Weeping sugar maple (this is from my favorite tree, color-wise, in town):

I think this is a Norway spruce (it’s the tree just outside the window right in front of me):