Monday, Sept 7
ALERT to study group sent out at 9:30 a.m.
Spent the morning setting up to drain the hot water tank to try to get rid of the muck inside. Brunch: Bacon, blueberry pancake, and fruit cocktail. As it was nearing done, the smoke severity changed and smoke started flowing into through the patio door, where the hose draining the tank was. We had to close the door, and started researching the source of the smoke blocking the visibility to 2.5 miles or less. The temperature lowered with the smoke, from 81 at Noon to 71 at 5:00 p.m. We could not see the hills east of us. Late in the afternoon, the sun was a red disc.
John worked some with the landscaping process, digging, sorting, and moving rocks and dirt. The loading ramp is filling with rocks, the garden soil is growing, and the front area is taking shape. All slowly. The smoke is not helpful.
Before the week was over, we had down to ½ mile visibility for several days. A week later, 9-13, it’s only at ¾ mile.
I called two neighbors to see if anyone knew the source of the smoke, and we got online to look for fires to the west of us.
Allen, our friend a mile up Naneum Rd. has relatives in Monse, WA near Brewster, and he knew there was a fire there. We found it on the MODIS Fire Mapping in our Google Earth Pro. I kept a watch on it, until it updated because all we had was the last 24 hours and the last 6 hrs.
Less than 2 hrs. later it had increased in coverage. The orange in the bottom image is the red in the top images now, as orange. The top right image shows the measurement of the miles as over 20 miles to the south from the original start of the fire at the northern tip of the pattern.
I received burned photos from the area on 9/12 which are too depressing to publish, but here are a few. Heat was so hot it melted aluminum. The winds were clocked at 83 mph. People stayed behind to water down their house structures, and saved a few, while getting burned themselves.
Monse, WA after fire swept through:
Burned trees-ground cover, heat melted aluminum, burned fields
FORD Bronco & Allen Aronica helping family with cleanup efforts
Smoke coverage was severe by mid-afternoon, seen in this backyard video from our patio (only 19 seconds long). Using straight-line distance, we are 76 miles from Brewster and Monse is 6 miles farther away.
Smoky Atmosphere Ellensburg, WA 9-7-20
Tonight at 6:00 p.m. is the last of the Nick on the Fly (NOTF) series, with a new series beginning this Wednesday night, 9-9.
NOTF #26–North Cascades talk w/Ralph Haugerud
CWU’s Nick Zentner travels to Wenatchee to visit with longtime USGS geologist Ralph Haugerud. 52 mins. Recorded 9-4-20. Topics: North Cascades field mapping, Baja BC pros and cons, & future work in the North Cascades.
See you tonight, and then Wednesday night this week with Nick again with his start of the new Fall episodes of Nick from Home. That day of the week is being changed this coming week to Friday, and the time will be 2:00 p.m. This will mess up a few people from watching the live broadcast and they’ll have to watch the replay.
Supper: Beef Stew with Cheddar Bratwurst, Fried cauliflower, and Cheddar Biscuits, caramel praline crunch/vanilla ice cream for dessert.
Tuesday, Sept 8
I cannot keep up with all that’s happening around this place. Latest is that our water heater, water pump pressure gauge problems continue, and the filters on the water coming from our well are clogging with gunk faster than we wish.
John went to town and I stayed home. He picked up his own meds at Fred Meyer Pharmacy, and my med at Super 1 Pharmacy, buying groceries while there. He went to Mid-State Coop for a O-ring washer for the 10″ Big Blue filter that takes sediment out of our well water. The installed O-ring has stretched and thinned, and leaked with this removal and re-installation.
He went to Bi-Mart for some white petroleum (silicone grease is recommended) to put on the O-ring to secure the seal, and while there picked up a sheet of their membership card winning numbers (we won nothing). I checked other friends’ numbers when he brought it home. 
Above photo by EvieMae Schuetz. Particles in the smoke filter and scatter sunlight. When the atmosphere is too filled with smoke the sky goes dark.
I tried to take a photo but what we saw would not reproduce on my camera, nor on John’s. I asked Evie if she could get a photo. She said she’d try. The results are fantastic as seen above.
Sun photography is not easy; See here at B & H Photo
Scroll down there and you can see the sort of photo I took.
Supper: Pizza and our cherry tomatoes, with caramel praline crunch / vanilla ice cream for dessert.
Take pills, fluoride teeth, and go to bed.
Wednesday, Sept 9
Today’s local news, the Daily Record, printed the Obituary for Charles Larry Firkins, our friend whom we’ve known since my joining the Kittitas Valley Fiddlers & Friends music group.
I captured the digital version of the Obit to email to our music group and to the family.
We had many chores, mostly in the house because of the temperature outside, but about noon, John left for town to buy 4 desks at CWU surplus sale for $2 each and to fill his old 1980 Chev farm truck with gasoline. The price of gas was $2.55 at Pilot, 34₵/gal less than Circle K that’s often the least expensive in town! So, it was worth a little extra drive to the west side of town.
The desks he brought home are shown below. To have room and access to clean them up, he had to remove more junk from our big shed. We are going to get a large 20’ dumpster to empty most of this into to get it off our property, he has moved some of these things many times. 
Top shows the purple top of the desk barely as John demos the way the desk drawers work. Bottom: with the desks out, junk was moved to the truck and backed into the hay barn. Now he has to unload and stack it. About 8 of the boxes are, in fact, empty. Eventually, I will have my computer set up in the new room, using one of the desks, and the desk top will be enhanced with the lavender (came out pink) painted ceiling.
I stayed home to receive phone calls while he went to town. I contacted several people – searching for a plumber. Luckily, we later made contact on the weekend (Saturday) with plumber, Kelly.
The following video was on at 6:00 p.m. tonight as a premiere:
‘Nick from Home’ Livestream #76 – Exotic A: Geologic Time
Thursday, Sept 10
This morning at 9:00 a.m. I was on Zoom to play Yahtzee. I won today with 391 points and 3 Yahtzees! (that’s a record for me forever).
Gerald called at 11:20 and I told him about the Obituary. I need to send it to Jarred and to Connie and have them coordinate who will print it for him. I’m guessing Connie would be the best. But I wanted Jarred to see it too, because he once played with the group, and would have known Charlie.
I fixed a nutrition drink.
Brunch (Surf & Turf): Chipped beef, Boiled/Iced shrimp, breaded Cod fish.
I finished contacting four new study group members.
I wrote Sadie Thayer about making a donation of OLD Singer Treadle Sewing machine to the Kittitas County Historical museum. (Over 80 years old) – was my mom’s and what I learned to sew on.
Supper: Corn-on-the-cob, bowl of chili (with Cheez-its), and apple crisp with strawberry ice cream for dessert. The Rascal-Cat doesn’t like the strawberry ice cream. Dog is happy with any flavor ice cream.
Friday, Sept 11
This morning I had a nutrition drink (Strawberry Ensure with Chobani strawberry yogurt). Makes a nice “milkshake”).
Called the CWU Help Desk about out of memory problems on browsers, Edge and Opera. Had changed a month ago from Google Chrome because it was using so much memory space. Was told to change to Firefox, but it gave me severe problems too, so I switched to Opera. Now both it and Edge crash without much on either one, and right in the middle of things. It’s killing my production. I regularly have to RESTART and then rebuild my system to make it operate again. My question to them was, “Can you go through my task manager with me and help me see what I can end task on and maybe which I don’t need in my system at all! What they do is set up a shared screen entry, so I can watch what they’re doing but they have control of my computer.
50 minutes on the phone, reduced the memory usage to 75%, from 88%. I should be good to go!! Need to restart my machine before bed and after logging in, in the morning. Then things will be updated properly. I should have updated my Windows 10 this afternoon. It will take at least 30 minutes, which I didn’t have this afternoon. So, morning will have to work for that. The “rest of the story” is that everything was fine after time passed and I got all the stuff completed. So I have successfully been able to operate both browsers without problems throughout the weekend.
Also, unloaded the dishwasher from yesterday, and reloaded it and ran it this afternoon.
I spent a lot of time transferring videos from my Exilim camera because its memory was filled. I still have 2 years of work to backup, when the battery is recharged. I charged one today, but used it until it lost its charge. Have been recharging the 2nd battery, which will probably be charged in the middle of the night, so I can use it tomorrow. The second battery will need to be charged. Still have some more cleanup with that, but I’m making progress.
Supper: Fried sliced yellow summer squash, beans and pork, garden (to accompany our own summer squash). Dessert was apple crisp with strawberry ice cream.
Saturday, Sept 12
I actually slept in this morning. Lots to do.
We talked to a plumber who will come out to our place next week sometime to check out all that we need done, but he said he could handle it all, Kelly Hunter is his name.
I spent a lot of time finishing a long letter with photos to people we have known in Idaho for 40 years. We had 40 acres of farmland north of Southwick, ID, which we eventually sold them after they rented it for several years. It was to be our retirement home, but instead we left Troy, ID to move to Ellensburg, WA.
We kept our horses there and went riding in the hills while they were renters. They were originally from Iowa, and had a large family (5 kids).
Various snacks through the afternoon for each of us.
Supper: Beverage, orange juice, a cheeseburger with BBQ sauce, our homegrown onions fried, very hot oven baked scalloped potatoes, with strawberry ice cream for dessert. Orange juice.
Played cat rotation all day, and I just captured a mouse (dead) brought in as a gift for her dinner by Sue. Added it to the plastic bag in the freezer. She brought it in after John was already in bed, and wanted to exchange for a late dinner. I obliged her wishes and then went to bed myself.
We’ve run the fan of the air-handler all day and I stayed inside to stay out of the smoke. We have been socked in all day with only a ½ mile visibility with an orange tinge to the air. It may continue for a couple of days.
At 5:00 p.m. today, this was the extent of smoke in the PNW states: Not nice. Still, we are not threatened by fire, so we are lucky.
From the GOES west satellite from UW Atmospheric Science
Sunday, Sept 13
Still socked in at 8:00 a.m. on the GOES west satellite imagery.
This will be a premiere video showing this morning by Nick Zentner in ‘Nick from Home’ fall series on Exotic Terranes.
#77 – Exotic B: Basement Glimpses
Brunch: Bacon, eggs scrambled with cheese, fried {from frozen} hash browns, bowl of our own frozen (thawed a little) Bing cherries. We had no cherries at all this year.
We are eating old stuff out of our very old and inefficient chest freezer we bought in Iowa at an auction, and brought here. That makes it well over 50 years old. We are trying to empty it to buy a newer standup freezer that is more efficient and accessible to put in our new utility room. We need to empty this old one and take it to the dump. There are not any freezers available in Ellensburg until late this fall, as they are all back-ordered at every store. People bought them out when Panic2020 arrived.
Since March of 2017 we’ve had a big pan of Costco Chicken Alfredo in a freezer: 3.89 pounds at $3.99 per pound. We cooked it for supper. Some will have to go back in the freezer, ’cause four or five days of leftovers does not make for happy times.
Hope your week was fine.
Nancy and John
Still on the Naneum Fan