Favorite Things

 Here are a few of my favorite things!

I cleaned the garage yesterday.  It was quite an event, since the garage was hot from the hot day.  The heat, combined with dust in the garage, and hard labor, made for an exhausting effort.  

I moved a shelving unit, packed in cage covers for trapping, and books, from the bags I bought at the Hammond library for $5 a grocery bag full.  From over 100 books I bought in those grocery bag sales, I'm down to maybe 20 left to read.  Looks nice now in the garage, I think.  I'm easy to please.

I encountered things stashed in my garage I just cannot let go.  Not yet at least.  They are some of my favorite things, because of memories they invoke.

I haven't used this REI backpack for a long time.  Its main use came when I was young and adventurous and did a lot of backpacking.  It went to Alaska with me, when I worked there.  I took it hiking on the Resurrection Pass trail system and when I'd camp out between the Marathon mountains, or go into Denali National Park when I had time off.  It carried everything I owned when I returned from Oregon one fall, by hitchhiking to Whitehorse, then hiking the Chilkoot trail backwards down to Skagway.  

It hangs now on the wall, unused in recent decades, but its like a piece of treasured art to me.

Same with this sleeping bag.  I only really used it in my Alaska years because rated to like 50 below zero, its way too hot for Oregon.  I used it even when I had an apartment in Seward because it would get so cold there would be ice coating the radiator heater inside the window.  It kept me warm in that plastic roofed shack way up a trail out off Nash road too, when I lived up there, sleeping on a cot.  And on backpacking trips.  Like the trip hiking the Chilkoot to Skagway.  White outs and early snowstorms made that bag an important companion on that paricular journey.

Its zipper broke, so I fixed it, even though I don't use it anymore.  It's a mummy bag too, something I can no longer tolerate, but I just can't let it go.  It's microfiber not down, so it retains warmth when wet, I recite in justification.  Lol.

Then there's this backpacking stove.  Seriously outdated in weight and size for the nowaday backpacker.  I got it used, when I was young, and cleaned it up myself, even sanded off rust and repainted it and got a tiny pump for it.   The tank takes kerosine.  At higher altitudes, with less atmospheric pressure, you have to pump up the tank to add pressure so it will burn.  It's awesome and I can't let it go either.  I keep it clean and working even though I no longer use it.  Go figure!

Then there's this homemade net, made from an old net frame and a volleyball net I found at goodwill.  How long have I had that, repairing tears as needed?   Ha!  Ten or fifteen years I suppose.  I made the net with soft netting and the length of bag I wanted for netting cats and used it this year even.  I don't like the commercial nets with stiff plastic netting and short bag lengths.  I used it for adult cats as recently as this last March, not long after I'd hurt my back, wracked with sciatica.  It briefly got better, so I took my chances, took my net, and caught two adult feral girls inside an elderly woman's trailer who needed spayed badly.   I wouldn't want to be without it.  I used it a few weeks ago again to fish those kittens out from between two walls in the walmart garden center.

I also love this more recent purchase (have had it about five or six years).  It's a lightweight fold up sterno stove, in a case that also holds a couple cans of sterno.  I take it in the car when I go anywhere and can fix myself a cup of coffee or soup or actually anything, quickly, and even inside since the fumes are not toxic.  I use it here when the power goes out too.  It was super cheap.

Or how about these Bushnell binoculars I got at a thrift store maybe 20 years ago?  No strap, a little difficult to focus at times, but they are my go to.  I've got a much better pair now, but these are just so familiar.  I know how to interpret cat shadows in the dark when drop trapping like last week when all electronic monitoring cameras failed and I needed to go old school easy once again.  I reached for these....as I do so often.

How about this cheap thrift store one battery alarm clock?  I have had it years and still love it.  It makes a soothing tick tock, which helps me sleep and is oh so reliable.  I've changed the AA battery once.

And my books, how I love them!  I read at night, and fastened this holder on the bunk above me, to hold them, so I can just reach up and pull one down to read nights.  I hang my reading glasses off it too, so at least I don't lose the pair there.   I recently was given a bag of 36 mysteries by Dick Francis.  32 left in the bag!

Now I absolutely love the guardian of my computer--this tonte, gifted me by Barbara last year.  

I love my socks too, tie dye bright and all cotton.  I got a pair for Christmas from my WA friend, then she sent me two more pair after I told her how much I love them.  I don't want to wear any other socks.

And finally, I have this piece of art on my bedroom wall.  It's called Peaceful Harbor and I LOVE it.  I thought I'd won in it in a fundraising auction a friend in Portland held for her cat rescue.  But I found out later I didn't win it myself, as my bid was low, but another dear friend up in Sherwood, saw I had bid on it, and made a winning bid, for me, without me even knowing she did this.  It's like my very precious treasure for several reasons, then, besides me loving the painting itself.

Happy day everyone.  What are your favorite things?