weights and measures

I don't know how much I weigh in stone, maybe 2, as in the above pictured.  Just guessing.
The days are progressing convincingly toward warm-spring, as we leave winter-spring behind.  I read yesterday that the Sami in arctic Scandinavia counted 8 seasons in their year.  Mud season is our equivalent to warm-spring.

 There is just a little leftover snow in a few northside places. Multitudes of tinnitis inducing peepers sound off in the evenings, raucous birds sing for mates well before the sun has risen, spring beauties are showing,  and geese and sandhill cranes are persistently setting on nests of eggs.  Sitting?

I've been weaving spring scarfs on a fresh 26 yard warp, since Groundhog's Day officially marked the turn of my workshop calendar from winter to winter-spring.  I put away cashmere, alpaca, and merino, yarns, and started in again on the perfect 4:  linen, cotton, hemp and silk.  This year I have new West Texas organic cotton from Voices of Industry to add to my usual Bockens. It is a beautiful and lustrous cotton, in milky white.   I've been using it in overshot designs, which remind me of cake frosting, on wedding cakes, specifically. (We have been eating a diet free of lactose,  gluten and sugar for the last 2 months, and I find my thoughts turn frequently to cake).

I've been very excited about this weaving, and apologize to anyone who has visited me in the workshop in the last month, if I have raved on about things weaving after you have lost all interest.  Maybe it's the diet!

In the woods, I have confronted a large, placid raccoon that has me unnerved, and I am not usually worried about anything in the woods.  On its first appearance, near where the turkeys danced, it simply sat and stared at us as Daniel and I walked by. Actually, Daniel decided to approach the sitting still raccoon, for reasons of his own, and when it didn't move away, kept approaching it.  I offered an opinion, from further back, What if it's not well?    It's healthy, he said, from ten paces in front of the beast.  I walked away, and Daniel caught up with me.

It didn't run away, I said. Yes it did, he said.  Later we encountered it, again, sitting near the same place.  It stared, unmoving, while we walked past.  The next day I walked up the  hill road and took the same trail out.  As I neared the place where the raccoon had been, I remembered it, and started peering under the trees. Thankfully, I didn't see it.

What if it's on the other side of the road?  I thought, and turning my head, came face to face with the stare of the same raccoon, not 10 feet from me!  Startled, I screeched a little, then slowly turned and walked away, not to appear as if I were running away.  I thought it might feel like pursuing if I showed fear, and I wondered how fast a large, ill raccoon can run.

Truly, I haven't a clue what any animal thinks.  After a while of brisk, and brisker walking, I hazarded a glance back, and saw no raccoon, teeth bared, giving chase.  Then I ran.