Thursday Thoughts By Kate Phillips As previously noted, we are having lots of company this summer. Most visitors are scheduled on our calendar, but occasionally friends turn up unexpectedly. When this happened recently around dinner time, I was glad I was a regular viewer of The Kitchen on The Food Network. The five hosts often reveal cooking hacks (shortcuts) that can help out in an emergency. In this case, I had plenty of food to stretch the meal to accommodate two more people, but dessert isn’t a regular course unless company is expected so I didn’t have anything planned. Then I remembered the hosts sharing that a boxed cake mix and a can of soda will provide a delicious dessert. With nothing to lose, I mixed a box of spice cake ingredients with a gingerale. Stirred and baked according to package directions. Added some frosting after it cooled and served it confidently to our guests. It was a hit! The hosts also recommended chocolate cake mixed with cherry coke and yellow cake mixed with lemon lime soda, Just wanted to let you in on a good thing.

Thursday Thoughts By Kate Phillips There is so much to do around town in the summer. Have some fun! Go to a free summer concert or children’s performance. We had company so we packed up a picnic and went to a town concert. It was terrific! The music was excellent and the crowd was filled with people of all ages enjoying themselves—a perfect summer evening in a lovely town. Friends and neighbors gathered together to make new summer memories for their families—simple and easy and delightful.

Thursday Thoughts By Kate Phillips My dogs are having wild lives these days. I let them out and went to get myself some lemonade, but turned around when I heard very loud barking. I opened the door to see what the problem was, but I didn’t have my glasses on. I grabbed a garden shovel hoping it was a turtle I could pick up and relocate and not a snake I would run away from while screaming. Halfway across the yard, I thought there were barking at a tree stump but then I realized it was a woodchuck sitting on its hind legs with its arms spread wide to make it look too big to attack. The woodchuck never moved even as I was backing away. I tried every treat I could think of to coax the dogs away from the woodchuck, but nothing worked until I jingled the car keys and said, “Let’s go for a ride.” The dogs ran for the car. The woodchuck ran to the side gate and flattened itself to fit under it—hopefully, never to be seen inside the fence again! A few days later, the dogs went outside to play. They barked at the squirrels in the trees and chased one rabbit out of the yard. I checked on them a few times and then they decided to come in. As they ran for the door, they surprised a bird that ran under the steps. The dogs could not fit under them, but were trying to get to the bird which I couldn’t see, but could hear. Luckily, this creature was not as interesting to the dogs as the woodchuck, squirrels, and rabbit so they came in when I called them. I wish the fence would keep out all wildlife, but if it only keeps out skunks I will consider myself lucky. Both dogs were sprayed by one once before the fence went up. I have no wish to relive that stinky event!

Thursday Thoughts By Kate Phillips I hope everyone had a happy Fourth of July. If you are looking for something to read, here are some of the books on my summer reading list: I started reading Wonder and Other Survival Skills: A Selection of Essays from Orion Magazine on July 1st. I love to wonder and I think it is a survival skill so the title really appealed to me. Among the contributors, I have read Diane Ackerman and Rick Bass before—in fact, I own most of each of their books—but I have never heard of Michael P. Branch whose essay “A Ladder to The Pleiades” I chose randomly to read first. It was a delight. I will never look at a night sky without thinking of his three-year-old daughter and the life lessons she taught him. I am not sure in which order I will read the rest of these books. Astrophysics for People in a Hurry by Neil deGrasse Tyson ties into the essay I mentioned above, but I chose it long before that because of the author and subject. I did the same with Bang! The Complete History of the Universe by Brian May (guitarist in Queen) Patrick Moore, and Chris Lintott. As I mentioned above, I read Diane Ackerman so her book The Human Age: The World Shaped By Us is on the list. Since I am a fan, I think I will enjoy Arthur & Sherlock: Conan Doyle and the Creation of Holmes by Michael Sims. In the fiction category, I have chosen Midnight at the Bright Ideas Bookstore by Matthew Sullivan; Grief Cottage by Gail Godwin; and A House Among the Trees by Julia Glass. All of them tie into books and/or authors. I hope you enjoy your summer reading list as much as I’m going to enjoy mine.

Thursday Thoughts By Kate Phillips Company that has been scheduled to visit months ahead is arriving to celebrate the Fourth of July. Their dog can no longer make it up the stairs so we thought we’d change the rarely-used formal dining room into a guest room as this particular dog isn’t the only company having issues with stairs. Mostly my stuff was stored in there so I cleaned it out, but, of course, it took longer than I thought. Once it was emptied out, it had to be scrubbed—walls, floors, cupboards. Then a bed, side tables, bureau, bookcase, and lamps had to be relocated along with some wall art. Then the workmen were scheduled. The old dining room needed a new outlet for the old TV in the new bedroom so I called an electrician. Then the cable guy came the day after to hook up the cable box. Plumber came after that to fix a running toilet, but found a bigger problem under the sink. Pipes replaced the next day so it’s all good, but time consuming and distracting. Then I had to do the usual guest prep: make the bed, put out guest towels, fresh flowers, food shopping, cleaning the rest of the house while still keeping up with regular laundry and other chores and errands—not to mention working hard to get the July issue of the magazine to the printer. When will someone invent an app so at the push of a button a home is guest-ready?

Thursday Thoughts By Kate Phillips I am not a fan of ice cream. I chalk that up to the two summers during high school that I spent dishing it out in bowls, cones, and banana splits at a local shop. I didn’t mind the orders for bowls and cones, but to this day I hate banana splits. They take a long time to make. Three scoops of ice cream—99 percent of the time three different kinds and often in a certain order. A choice of five toppings—chocolate sauce, hot fudge, pineapple, cherry, and marshmallow—99 percent of the time specific toppings on specific ice cream scoops. Then add whipped cream and/or nuts and a cherry on top. If there wasn’t a line of people waiting, a banana split wasn’t too hard to deliver, but considering there was almost always a line and people came in groups, there was more to deliver than one banana split in most orders. If I or any other employee didn’t get it exactly as ordered, we had to start all over again. And even when we did get it right, the lights above the order windows attracted lots of bugs. If they dived into the whipped cream before we let it go, we had to start all over again. A nightmare! I’ve never eaten a banana split and I never will.

Thursday Thoughts By Kate Phillips In an effort to keep heat out of the house and the air conditioners not running so hard, we keep the shades pulled down for most of the day. This is not an attractive view so I put big framed prints and posters on the window sills to brighten up the rooms. I also discovered self-sticking wall decals you can attach right to the shades. There is a wide array of choices from artwork reproductions and architectural photos to nature scenes and literary quotes as well as fun characters for children. I chose a full moon rising over the ocean for one room and a beautiful hiking path through the woods in another. There are also prints of windows with all kinds of views if you want to pretend you live in Paris or Italy. However, my favorite window covering in the summer is a 1/4 inch thick piece of opaque plastic we had cut at the hardware store to almost the size of the kitchen window that faces south. Uncovered, sunlight heats the room up and blinds us when we walk in. Now the opaque plastic deflects the heat while diffusing the light evenly. While the window view is gone, the kitchen is cool and welcoming—like a tall glass of lemonade or sangria—two of my favorite things in summer.