. . . but it was only the grape vine.
Okay, that’s not going to get by anyone’s BS detector, but years ago, we had a cat that learned to stand on a block by the front door, stretch, and ring the bell. An accident the first time, for sure. But he learned and continued to get let in by doing so. That was in Idaho, and one evening when we were sitting with guests at the dining room table having dinner, he came to the door and rang the bell. Knowing all our guests had all arrived, John said, “It’s just Skeeter.” So I got up and let him in, surprising every one there. We still get a good laugh remembering that.
About the grape vine climbing our front door here — it’s coming from about 20 feet, and that has become the bed for a little frog (or toad?). We’re not sure of his pedigree, and while we can find a White tree frog, it doesn’t look the same as ours, which is more tan, with brown spots and a line on his head. John rescued him from the inside of a 55 gallon barrel, we use for capturing roof water which otherwise would spash into our front door entrance (poor house design). He moved him under the grapevine. Soon, he was back again to sit on a plastic container under the doorbell, probably grabbing the numerous grasshoppers this year. John moved him again. He returned, and the morning we were taking photos of the grapevine, he was up on top of a white plastic bag, where I took his picture.
I’m happy here.
Large image will be rotated — Why? — Who Knows?
Sunday, Aug 18
Just about spent the whole day working on the blog and related issues. We didn’t get it posted until after most readers in the eastern US were asleep. The next morning we had a call from John’s sister, happy to see it was posted, because she was worried when it still wasn’t there Sunday night when she went to bed. Of course, we are 3 hours earlier. The wind blew hard all day. Also researched the pictures of the vegetation where John worked yesterday and we posted, not knowing what it was. We’ll add it here, about the plant called, Pinedrops.
John heard someone on the trail mention a name that had coral in it. When he started looking on the web nothing seemed to fit. We sent the photo off to a friend with an interest in butterflies that involves knowing plants and so on. Here is her response:
~~~
I don’t know the mushrooms, but I do know this one, and by funny coincidence, I just saw a beautiful 3-stalk cluster of it yesterday about 3 feet tall, when I was out huckleberry picking in the Gifford Pinchot!
It is called “pinedrops” and is a saprophyte, which is why it’s not included in most general plant books.
The person in the trail crew probably was thinking of coralroot, which is a type of orchid that is similar in growth and color, but the flowers are more “orchid-like” for lack of better description, rather than the round ball-like flowers of this.
Cait
~~~
I’ve reduced her photo but it has red huckleberries in the background.
So then, I looked for both:
So “coralroot” here:
http://www.wanativeorchids.com/Corallorhiza/index.html
And “pinedrops” (with a slide show) here:
http://sagebud.com/woodland-pinedrops-pterospora-andromedea/
With “saprophyte” described here:
http://www.botgard.ucla.edu/html/botanytextbooks/lifeforms/saprophyticplants/index.html
Both of the above named plants are mentioned on the last webpage above.
WA’s wet side.
Monday, Aug 19
Again, I’m staying home to see what I can accomplish. John just picked a full large box of squash, which won’t be delivered until Wednesday. He’s been picking up plums blown off the tree with our 31 mph winds. I’m in the process of eating two because John was ahead of me with three thus far today. Surely are yummy, but they do not last, so we will share some with the neighbors later today, when it cools down. Gosh, we have a lot and probably still a bushel on the tree. I don’t have time to want to do drying when we still have some in the freezer from last year. Winds have been high all day, and just climbed to avg 30 mph, with 38 mph gusts. Some appear to be greater, guess that’s what an average means. Now as fast as they started and went all day, they have stopped. Interesting. We delivered plums to 3 neighbors and picked up two more once home. Had salad and our own corn tonight, and John had a bunch of panko breaded shrimp. I have decided I don’t like them anymore, after eating a lot once back from the hospital.
We cleaned new strawberries John picked tonight, and will have them on ice cream.
Tuesday, Aug 20
Staying home to tackle things. Most of time spent getting stuff together for a Kittitas School Board meeting tomorrow night about the WOTFA summer fiddle workshop. Also, dealing with people about leftover CWU issues regarding former students. I’m attempting to get some music into my software program. Have to tackle another bunch of chores, was supposed to cut John’s hair, and never did. Not enough time in the day. At least I got a good night’s sleep last night. John picked up more plums. I spent awhile on the phone with two different people, the most exciting was hearing about our friend Sonja’s “rest of the story” after leaving here. She traveled over 3000 miles with her two Brittanys. She had cool stories to share.
Wednesday, Aug 21
I was busy on many things this morning, and forgot to set up my Crystal Light for the day. So, ran to the kitchen to get it done, and looked out the window to see a Goldfinch upside down eating seeds from the Sunflower (you saw 2 weeks ago in this blog).
Oh, now I remember.
John had seen him earlier and had cleaned off the window from the kitchen in case I was able to use my camera. I ran for it, and took a few seconds of video from the kitchen window. The mark is timed at 11:17, so I was really running late needing normally to leave by 11:20. Was in such a rush I forgot to turn off my computer and it wasn’t plugged in, but John heard it chirp (grouch?), and soothed it. Once I got home, I took the video from my camera, and even though it’s a little shaky (no time to set up a tripod, and no place to put one anyway–I was holding the camera over the kitchen sink). After it was processed, I uploaded it to YouTube. So have a look at one smart Goldfinch.
Not only the birds like our several patches of sunflowers, but also several varieties of bees. Here is a bumblebee out near our front “house” gate.
back off.
Interestingly, this photo was taken with my old Casio camera, not the new Nikon, but it did pretty well. Other honeybees were also involved in the flowers.
We have more sunflowers up the driveway near the road, about 300′ from the house. I noticed yesterday they were leaning over and drying out, and will feed more birds up there.
Went to the Food Bank (interesting meal today, Reuben Sandwiches, and I had them withhold the sauerkraut on mine, had 1/2 a Gherkin pickle, grated carrots w/raisins salad, another salad with lentils, cucumbers, onions and parsley, none of which I wanted but a nice fruit salad minus the redi whip topping. We had an appreciative audience today; always nice. On to SAIL class where I distributed a lot of yellow squash, and then home to rest for going to the Kittitas School Board meeting. I wore my purple old time fiddler workshop shirt to show my support for 21 years there, every summer. Purple and white are the local Kittitas High School colors, but the shirts each year at the workshop are different colors from the years before. Also took a 3.5# box of John’s handpicked plums to the workshop chair (from Shelton, WA) to compensate a little for her trip over. I spent some time during the afternoon following the Lolo fire and reporting maps of MODIS hot spots to our friends who are on an evacuation notice.
Thursday, Aug 22
Today for a fast lunch, we had sliced turkey breast, melted cheddar, & tomato sandwich. Spent time at Hearthstone today. I worked again on MODIS fire imagery stuff, went to play music, and came directly home. On the way I delivered plums and squash to my colleague who wrote the hay paper with me last year, then delivered more plums in the parking lot to our 12-string guitar player, some onions and plums to our banjo player (for her birthday), and went on in. Once we were done, I had a cooler with 3 yellow straight neck squash left, so I gave one to another player (fiddler) and two to the volunteer ladies who provide coffee, tea, and cookies to us and to the residents at the end of our playing at Hearthstone Cottages. John just picked fresh corn for tonight, several tiny orangish tomatoes (Sun Gold), some red Early Girl ones, and more yellow squash. Boy, we could feed the whole county. Friends in Lolo, MT are still safe and removing brush from near their house, and watering buildings and land.
Friday, Aug 23
John had picked a bunch of yellow squash last night, and this morning picked strawberries and blackberries that I have started cleaning and fixing. While I was doing that, he picked a large box (probably 7 pounds) of plums. We needed to go to town, and I’ve given most of our friends and neighbors and folks at the Adult Activity Center stuff all week, so he said, we’ll just take them by the Food Bank on our way to the store, bank, and CWU surplus sale. I laughed and said, well yesterday we were invited to come today to the food bank by our friends (two sisters who look like twins, named Marilyn & Carolyn) from the trail riders club, who volunteer fixing meals every Friday. I had not told John, because I know he doesn’t usually want to eat there, even when I play the fiddle every Wednesday. However, he surprised me and said, let’s go; I’ll go shave. So, we did, taking a large box of squash and the large box of plums. I handed some out to my acquaintances there and offered some to the folks waiting in the front room to come in for the meal. Many of them know me as the fiddler; in fact, several said, what are you doing here today, it’s not Wednesday! The folks managing the food bank were happy to receive the fresh fruit and vegetables. We had a nice visit with two others who occasionally play music with us (a singer and a harmonica player). It was a good meal, more of a brunch than lunch. A ham/cheese omelet, hash browns, sausage, and a fruit salad, but we were at the end of the line and missed out on the fruit (– like we don’t have enough at home!). It surely looked good from watching early folks who sat at our table: fresh black-skinned plums (not like ours), peaches, pears, and maybe something else). We had plenty. From there to Super 1 for a few necessities (lettuce, cola, meds for me, and cat food — on sale for 1/2 price!). Then by the other grocery in town, Safeway, for a special on Pepsi, and while there John found blueberries at a good price (ours, being young only had a few ounces on each plant), plus he bought some little dessert items (strudel, they called it) with cheese and strawberry filling. We priced all the produce we are growing in our yard and gardens, and were pleased, with not only not having to pay the price, but also comparing the quality of ours with those. Stores carry the yellow straight-neck but it usually looks like it ought to be thrown out rather than sold – it wants very gentle handling. Our tomatoes are starting to come on and are beautiful. The little orange Sun Golds, now are producing more than just 2 or 3. The grocery had something similar at $4 for 10.5 ounces. Ouch! And their expensive plums were rock hard. Double ouch! From there to the bank, to cash two small checks, and get their Friday afternoon offering of donut holes. On by the CWU Surplus sale to bid on wood pallets, probably didn’t bid high enough to get them, but it’s worth a try. They have them availalbe in every sale. Used to be a fixed price item of 50¢ each, but recently they have put them on bid to clear out all they have. Over 60 were stacked up in this week’s sale. Also, while there, John bought 4 yellow 5-gallon ex-paint buckets (50¢ each). These are separated. Last time two pairs (4 total) were stuck together, not having been sloshed out. They are in the irrigation ditch and eventually will come apart. Once home, I finished fixing the strawberries & blackberries I had been working on when he went to pick the plums. Then checked the digital version of the local paper and found an article on the meeting in Kittitas I went to Wednesday night. I captured it, made some comments, and got it back to the representatives of the WA Old Time Fiddlers, who came over for the meeting. One is from Shelton and the other from PortTownsend — both early small towns in the western part of the State near water (for transport) before railroads, big trucks, and airplanes.
Friends in Lolo, MT are feeling a little more secure. Their closest fires this afternoon are 6 miles away. About 40% of the fire is under control. Locally our fire got a bit of rain and cool on it last night – it is in the remote western part of our county about 30 miles away. Officials think this one will not grow into a big deal. That’s good.
Saturday, Aug 24
Good reports early from our Lolo, MT friends. They sent a nice video about using helicopters to aid in wildfire suppression. Here’s a great link to follow for the MT FIRE story.
We’re happily doing our best to get this posted today, for a surprise to our readers, and also so we can tackle other things during the daylight hours. As I send this final copy to John at the computer in the back of the house, he just came in to start bacon for our BLTs for lunch. I’m in charge of that.
Hope your week was fine.
Nancy and John
Still on the Naneum Fan