Sunday (Oct 9) – Slept in this morning (Nancy did) because of yesterday’s wipe-out day. Then after breakfast and John’s exercising the dogs and feeding the horses and outside cats, I worked on washing dishes, and then clothes. After John got through catching up on headlines (on the computer, we cleaned peaches, pears, apples and plums and cut, pre-treated and filled two dehydrators. After a small lunch, John is going to package up the carrots and put in the big shed in the frig there. He found some very large carrot bags (with holes in them), which we have gotten carrots in from Costco. Now what? Blanch and freeze, maybe. Then he packed up about 20 pounds of potatoes and carrots to take to our neighbors. We did, and then we “traded” her for 5 packages of her newly frozen peaches. John’s out shucking Carpathian walnuts. He eventually came into the house, and has been working on apples for making applesauce. We had a long telephone conversation with our friend from California with whom we have not spoken for many months. We are both tired and wanting to go to bed early, but the applesauce is still cooking. Before we hit the hay, Rascal brought in another little frog, this one was green and smaller than the last. We retrieved him alive and put him out near the “pond” in the back. I don’t think the pond has any water in it yet, but it is a shaded depression. We’ve been hearing croaks all summer.
Monday. Up very early after a restless night, to a rainy day, and the need to take John’s Subaru to town for the body repair. Got there after dropping off John to pick up his pick-up from the place who fixed my Subaru’s axle on Friday. I delivered his Subaru and he picked me up for the trip home. Strange–they said we were a day early, that we were scheduled for tomorrow morning. I KNOW I wrote down Monday, Oct 10th on our calendar and we were thinking we would not have it all week. Oh, well, as long as it is done by Friday (they said yes), because John has to take off for WTA trail repair.
Today will be mostly inside work (probably fruit for sure), as it is raining outside still. Actually, John ended up outside, but inside the barn, moving a ton of hay. It had not been packed in properly, and he needed to move what was in the breezeway, so the horses could step inside out of the bad weather and all be under the cover of the barn. I was dead tired from not sleeping last night, so I slept for the couple hours he worked. The rain finally stopped about 4:00 and the sun peeked through the clouds for just a few minutes. Rascal had slept with me and he awoke, ate, and went out to play with Woody. They are still playing. Guess they like each other. They look somewhat like siblings – Woody’s coat is shaggy while Rascal has smooth and shiny hair. Later I looked and Rascal had climbed the ladder and was looking out the top of the hay (under the roof). Then later John looked out and saw Big Sue stalking Rascal, so he called Rascal in the back door. She has chased him in the doggie door window before.
Dinner (spaghetti and sauce) early tonight and now it’s too early to go to bed, so we will put up some more fruit in the dehydrator.
Tuesday, whoopee, awoke after a good night’s sleep. John’s been making more applesauce (13 pounds now in the freezer) and I have been loading the dishwasher, cleaning out the dehydrators, and washing the trays. Not reloading the dehydrators yet. I have to go to an acupuncture treatment later in the day and play music in town afterwards. I’ll just stay in town for that. Did and all went well.
Wednesday. Today was music at noon and exercise in the afternoon. I also went by Geography at CWU. We had many phone calls tonight, from Vermont, Oregon, and Thorp. Throughout the phone calls John shucked Carpathian (English) walnuts from our trees that he picked today while I was in town. They come out of the green covers a whole lot easier than Black Walnuts. Now after a lot of email work, it’s time for dessert and beddie bye.
Thursday. Stayed up way too late last night (12:30) so slept in this morning. Now working more on the Memory Book for retiring colleague Morris and will go to play music this afternoon at the Rehab place where I spent so much time last year. Then John and I are going to the “pocket” [see note below] to pick Romes and maybe some pears that didn’t go to market. John’s car is ready so we can pick it up. WHOOPIE. He says it’s mine now. I broke it, have to claim it. The trip for apples was awesome. They picked a large box of Romes, and then some Galas, Red Delicious, Jonagold, and Winter Banana:
http://www.applejournal.com/gal009.htm
These last were a favorite or settlers because they would “keep” well into the late winter. More info here:
http://www.vintagevirginiaapples.com/apples/winterbanana.htm
We wanted the Red Romes (they are sort of hard to find) because of their good baking character and because of the solid bright color:
http://www.nyapplecountry.com/redrome.htm
Also they picked Red Bartlett pears – they are beautiful:
While still hanging in the tree, pears are often damaged by birds and then yellow jackets enlarge the wound. We were warned by the matriarch of the family to look at the whole pear before grasping. Good advice. John saw one with about a dozen yellow jackets in one wound.
We are invited back for more if we wish. These trees have been sidelined by changes in the operation and changing tastes of consumers. Most of this fruit will not be harvested for commercial sale, if at all.
Friday. John left to work on the PCT near Stirrup Lake:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pacific_Crest_Trail#Washington
Doing these work trips John figures he has walked about 20 miles of the PCT and has only 2,643 miles still to do. But, he has walked back and forth on the few miles carrying tools, rocks, and a considerable number of mountain blue berries:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blueberry
This isn’t a good year. They are late, not very sweet, and the bushes, while numerous, are sparsely covered with berries.
While John was away I had lots to do on the computer on the Memory Book. I was too tired to spend an hour driving to town for an hour of exercise, when I was not feeling great. I knew I needed to rest up for this weekend of music. John got home before 5:00 and we did go pick up a 50 pound-bag of onions we had ordered and paid for last week from the same person we got large baking potatoes and carrots.
Saturday. John left again at 7:00 a.m. for his WTA trail work at Stirrup Lake, and I left 40 minutes later to go to get a ride up to the Swauk-Teanaway Grange with friends. On my way to their house, only 6.5 miles, I saw 15 deer, and then drove into fog at their house. It was 31 degrees when I left home and 34 at their place. We drove to the Grange and went in for a Hunter’s Breakfast. Ours was free because we donated our music, from 9:00 to noon. We actually ate ham, eggs, and pancakes before starting to play. It was nice and we were appreciated. I drove home the 6.5 miles to check on the dogs and cat and turned around to make it to a 2:00 play date at Briarwood Commons in Ellensburg from 2 to 3:00. Four of us who went to the Grange, made it back to the afternoon session. That is a small contingent of our normal group, but we did well. At the end, they fed us choices of different desserts, including bread pudding with whipped cream topping, 4 kinds of cookies (homemade) and homemade frosted brownies. Also there was peach cobbler and vanilla ice cream. We did not go hungry today. We were invited also to a special dinner at the Food Bank for Search and Rescue that started at 5:00. I didn’t want ham twice in one day, with all the salt, so I didn’t grab John up and take him in when he got home right before five. He needed to feed the cats, horses, and run the dogs, and I was quite tired and wanting to rest. I didn’t even turn on my computer till 6:00 p.m. so I’m a little late getting this draft to John for polishing and posting.
The “pocket”: Local place names can be fun. In this case our Valley is shaped like a canoe oriented from the SE to the NW. The SE end of the valley is known as the Badger Pocket and the northeast facing slopes have numerous orchards. These slopes get very little solar energy input in the spring of the year so the trees do not leaf out and flower early. They are still in bud form during early frosts.
Zoom in and out at this map and check out this protective environment.
http://washington.hometownlocator.com/maps/feature-map,ftc,1,fid,1503111,n,badger%20pocket.cfm
Nancy & John still on the Naneum Fan.