Keep Track of Julia: March 2019

Well, despite my best intentions and my promise to my good friend Rod Germaine, it has been more than 2 months since I updated this blog. I have some valid excuses though; the house has been painted inside and out, I fell and hurt my leg, and I had one of the worst colds I have ever had. So, here is the news.

January 18 - For the first time ever, a bat flew into the house and into my bedroom. It circled around a few times and then unerringly found its way out. Not a big fruit bat or a small vampire bat, but an ordinary flying rat sized bat. Reminds me of the time I was visiting my friend June Cassey when I lived in Ottawa. She and her husband, Joe, lived in a house that must be 200 years old now, if it is still standing on Cartier St. It had been a bank at one time. In any event, a bat got caught in the gabled room at the top of the house. June and I went around with sheets and tennis rackets trying to get it out. We should have just sat quietly and waited for it to find its own way. Sitting quietly was not in June's nature.

January 21 - I swam today with a murmuring of egrets. I know it is a murmuring of starlings, but there were so many egrets, that it almost qualified. And they were making the same sweeping movements as a flock as a murmuring. It was a lovely sunny day and every time I popped my head out of the water to take a breath, I would see the sun glinting off their pure white wings. So blessed!

I finally got a glimpse of the visiting flycatcher the other day. He has been hanging around for 3 or 4 months now.

The Indian Flycatcher in flight. You only really see the tail floating on the wind. They are very fast.

The Crested Serpent Eagle has been very busy of late as well. Swooping around and calling out. I wonder if they have had babies.

Not the actual one that lives across from me, but he does perch in the mango tree just like this sometimes.

January 27 - Well here's one for the books. The cats were agitated in my dressing room. I thought they were just exploring until I started hearing strange noises. Turns out it was an Asian Palm Civet cornered among my shoes and clothing racks. It was so scared that it pooped in a couple of places. Turns out it also peed and got a nice splattering on one of my dresses. I did not discover this until I went to visit my friends in Naula and ended up with the pee dress as the only piece of clothing I had brought with me.

After trying to throw a sheet over it and it trying to climb the walls without success, it seems that it found its way out through the grill in the window. That must have been how it got in in the first place.

Looked just like this except it was hissing, baring its teeth and scared out of its wits.

After another couple of trips to the dentist, I have a brand new crown on my implant. Looks great. Only took 2 years in the making.

View of the Mahaweli River from Peradeniya bridge.

On the road to the dentist.

Painting began on February 5. I had intended to only have the inside done, but in the end I had both the inside and outside of my part of the house painted. Well not painted exactly as I had them use lime wash for most of it. It does produce a bit of dust, it is nontoxic to mammals but it is certainly toxic to the ants and termites so as well as looking much better; now everything is white, it has rid me of a lot of critters.

The actual work took about 2.5 weeks while the clean up took over a month. It is just like moving house. Never again in this lifetime. It didn't help that early on, I was so tired and in such a rush to get something done that I fell and hurt my right leg. The bruise was on the bone and took a long time to heal. Plus, the weather turned stinking hot and the entire household caught a bad cold virus that we are just getting over. Even Veenitha, who has never been sick a day in 6 years caught it. She did not miss a day of work though.

All the mix up was disconcerting for the cats.

Everything is all over the place, but Nangi doesn't care.

Trying to keep things in their normal place for the babies.

Every room was completely pulled apart, everything cleaned, floors scrubbed and polished.

Finally putting things back together.

Chinese cut outs. Some of the last ones to have been done by hand. Now they are done by machine. A gift from the Kawasakis that I lost in a file folder for a while. Thanks to an ant infestation, I found them again, had them framed and here they are.

In between house cleaning and being sick, I did manage to go out a couple of times for lunch and to a wine tasting, but ended up regretting it as it just made me relapse.

I had to cancel all my classes due to the house being in a mess and being sick, plus I lost my second assistant since the end of last year. The silver lining in all this is that I decided that I would suspend my children's class. I am calling it a suspension, but really it is permanently cancelled. I couldn't do it without an assistant in any event and truth be told, I did not really like doing it. I am not a natural born teacher and don't like kids all that much and it was a lot of work. So I am LKR.30,000/month poorer, but much more relaxed.

This is a dracaena in flower by our front gate. First time I have seen its flower. Wonderful.

Violet trumpet vine growing over our front gate. These flowers bloom if it is going to rain. They are unerring in their prediction. They also let out a heavy garlic smell when the rain is about to come.

Berries if a prayer plant from the garden have lasted since Christmas when they stood in for holly.

I made another trip to my friends at Flamboyant Villas in Naula along with my friend Judith. It was wonderful not to have to worry about the house and just float in the pool and enjoy Simon's wonderful dry martinis while sitting under Orion's Belt. I was up one night coughing my lungs up and got sunburned floating in the pool, but it was all worth it.