UFO in My Yard

An UnFinished Object, that is. It's the barn. I was so impressed with the way the construction crew worked from sunup to sundown yesterday that I just assumed they could smell both Friday and the end of the project coming and were working really hard to finish everything up in time for the weekend so that I could be happy. HA! That shows what I know. A friend of mine who works with builders all the time tactfully suggested that they needed to "divert the crew to a project that was weather dependent," which I suppose is reasonable, but I don't care for it one bit. I want my damn barn. Please.
On the up side, it was an entertaining mail day (aside from the campaign "literature," [litter-ature, perhaps? I think it deserves its own special word] which is a discussion for another day). I live for the mail. This is one of the hazards of staying home all day, and the contents of the mailbox can make or break my afternoon. The regular mail today was a bitter disappointment: one bill, one flex spending account letter, some junk mail, and the aforementioned campaign-related idiocy. Not a single magazine. Not even a catalog, which is inexplicable at this time of year. But, when I got up to the house, there were TWO packages waiting and that more than made up for the sorry contents of the mailbox. One package was an end table for the family room. This counts as a double bonus when I rate the mail because I get to have the new furniture and the fun of putting it together. I'm saving this particular pleasure for the weekend: a little tonic to balance the negative effect of the five basketball games that we have in store.
The other package had clothes for me. I love mail order clothing. First you get to buy clothes without having to drive to the mall and wait in lines and be confused by the over-abundance of merchandise. Then, on a totally different day--usually just about the time you've stopped expecting anything--you come home and find a package waiting for you, which is almost like getting a present. Plus, most of the stuff I order is for me, which makes it even better. Today my package contained a chocolate brown zip front hooded sweatshirt, a blue heavyweight fleece jacket to replace the pumpkin orange pullover that I bought when I was pregnant and tended to buy everything five sizes too big, and a new winter coat to replace the one the dog ate last year. The coat is very warm, and I can't say enough good things about having a jacket with two sleeves.
The wealth of packages today brought the anticipated lift to my mood. B.P. (before package) I had been suffering the ill effects of spending way too much time in the elementary school cafeteria with a pack of third grade boys. Not my own third grade boy, of course; he was a perfect angel as always, but he eats with an unruly crowd. But a.p., I was so filled with light and energy that I decided to include some experimental roasted squash with dinner. Squash is always a gamble in my house, but I'm feeling lucky today. On the other hand, Mark Bittman promised me that it was almost impossible to roast the squash too much and --looking now at my very brown buttercup squash--I'm not entirely sure he was being truthful. In any event, I was also inspired to make brownies for dessert, so even if the squash is pure poison, I'll probably be forgiven.
Unaware of the burnt squash that is headed their way, my family is demanding their dinner. I hate to put up a post without pictures, though. Consider this one a down payment on a future post.