Category: Random issues

Sunday, January 15 started as a nice blue sky sunny day, and we were surprised as we were expecting snow.  However, north of us now are clouds that suggest snow is coming this way.  Managed to take some photos of our Casio keyboard (gotten last Saturday) in its new spot, but they are still on the camera.  I also managed to type up some Peanut Butter Pie recipes from the family and a friend of the family in PA.  Now we need to get the ingredients and try them.

We made the trip to the Bluegrass Jam session at the Swauk Teanaway Grange just fine, with no snow, except a tiny flurry (very light) on the last 15 minutes to home.  It might snow some tonight, but the holiday tomorrow means we do not have to get out on the roads.  We took a canister of dried apples and banana chips, and I put them on the counter (with brownies and cookies others brought), and took a banana chip to check out.  I was just sucking on it, and dammit, I pulled off the gold crown again.  I knew it was not in the banana (my dad used to say he loved bananas because they had no bones).  So, I captured it and put in a plastic Zip-Lock bag I had brought along with me.

A huge crowd was there.  There were 22 instrumentalists and another 15 people (at least) in the audience (as John was).  We stayed till 4:20, so it was getting dark by the time we hit our driveway, and John went and fed the horses without coming into the house.  I brought myself and violin stuff in.  The dogs just got to go in the front fenced yard and not to help feed.  It was too dark.

Monday, Jan 16 is the MLK holiday, but not for our resident doe who was in the front yard again this morning, wanting to be fed.  We have never fed her there, except for her getting berries off the Mountain Ash tree.  I had a call from my dentist this morning and they will work me in tomorrow for replacing the temporary gold crown.  Good because we can combine with John’s trip there for his tooth.  Most of the day was spent on paperwork.

Tuesday, Jan 17 we awoke to snow and it continued to a little over an inch.  We took off for the dentist at 10:15 and didn’t return till 1:25.  That was because someone cancelled her appointment and they were able to put me in after John’s appointment to complete the work on my tooth, the installation of a stainless steel crown.  That beat a temporary glue-in job and having to wait for a Jan 31 appointment.  Only problem was after the anesthetic wore off I was in serious pain–my jaw, my tooth, my gums, my head, you name it.  I was hurting big time, so after I had taken 4 Tylenol over the afternoon and nothing was improving, I called my dentist and left a message at 4:20.  They were in a “class” and didn’t get back to me till after 5:00 p.m.  They decided to put me on Percoset and a Prednisone packet drug to help me over the hump for the next 6 days.  We had to drive back to town (24 miles r.t.) to pick up the pills, but I was very relieved to get them in my system with dinner.  The pain has not all subsided, but it is tons better.  I will take another Percoset with a piece of pound cake and go to bed.  It snowed another couple of inches, but then the wind blew most of it off the trees.  Yet we are not getting the amount of snow that others around us are.

Wednesday, Jan 18  Turned out I didn’t get relief on the pain until 4:00 a.m.  By the time 8:00 a.m. came I decided I would take one more Percoset just for the heck of it, because I didn’t have to go to town till after lunch.  I was much better after my meds for pain & the anti-inflammatory for irritation of the gum and jaw.  Apparently the decay cleaning was quite close to the nerves of the root and caused the severe pain.  Got a call from the dentist office this morning checking on me, and asking if John could come in today for finishing up his tooth #31 behind the one from yesterday, $250 for this today—higher cost than either of ours yesterday.  I dropped John off at the dentist and went on to SAIL class, but I didn’t have to lead it after all because my friend (our teacher) got excused from Grand Jury duty because she is over 70 and cannot drive in this weather.  After that, I went to the Post Office to load up on Forever Stamps before the price goes up this Monday.

Later tonight John took some time to web-search for the style of my Dulcimer, because both of us read parts of the new book I got by Ritchie (published in 1973) on the history, tuning and playing of the Dulcimer.  He took out mine and looked for anything written on it to see the maker, and the only name he could find anywhere was on the pegs holding the strings.  They are named Kluson pegs and are high quality.  Mine, however, is a different shape from most of the dulcimers.  We are going to take some pictures of it and put on the forum we have found to see if anyone knows anything about its origin.  I was never able to find out from the woman I bought it from.

I went on to my acupuncture treatment and it was a wonderful full hour.  He tried some different things to try to clear the shoulder pain by working with the edges of scar tissue (fascia) adjacent to the scar from the opening of my sternum for heart surgery.  All those nerves were disrupted and jumbled.

He used a Pointer Plus instrument along with massage (which I actually can do myself), but he added the Pointer Plus electronic gadget to assist in connecting the collagen and tissues across the scar.  I’m a little concerned and need to discuss it further with the acupuncturist, from reading on line about the Pointer Plus made in Texas.

http://www.texas-medical.com/modalities/pointerplusfeatures.htm

Some contraindications (not to be used with) include, among other things that don’t apply to me, some that do:  If fitted with pacemakers or internal defibrillators (which I have), or if there is any heart disease or condition (which I suppose I still have, with my replaced porcine heart valve, and I am on medication for atrial fibrillation and on Coumadin for thinning my blood).

We did discuss this when I heard it was electronic.  He put it on a very low power and also stayed away from the ICD.  There was never any interaction.

The overall procedure is called:  Myofascial Craniosacral massage, and can be read about below as it was applied to my scar tissue from the open heart surgery.  I really find this fascinating and believable.  I want so much for this to get me back to normal on my left shoulder and adhesive capsulitis in my rotator cuff on the left side.  I have highlighted below (bold) the things I think apply to my condition.

http://transitionalhealing.wordpress.com/2007/03/13/craniosacral-therapy-for-reducing-scar-tissue-pain/

Craniosacral Therapy for reducing Scar Tissue Pain.

Posted by Michael on March 13, 2007

The body has the ability to heal itself after surgery.  The body produces connective tissue, adhesions and collagen, to replace the damaged compromised tissue from the result of an incision to the skin.  This natural phenomenon causes the formation of scar tissue.  Scar tissue replaces damaged cells at the site of the incision or injury.  Skin scar tissue is different from deep fascial scar tissue.  Skin scar tissue lacks in pigmentation and hair follicles.  Deep scar tissue in the fascial layers of the body develops adhesions or spider-like web threads to help the body heal and recover.

There can be a potential problem in the development of scar tissue.  The problem lies when scar tissue and adhesions go unchecked over the years.  The scar tissue and adhesions start attaching themselves to bones, arteries, veins, nerves, and organs.  This phenomenon alone can cause dysfunction in the homeostasis of the body and possibly manifest into further complications in our body’s internal health as we age.

In addition I have witnessed in my practice patient’s scar tissue developing over periods of time causing spinal curvature (scoliosis), rotated hips manifesting in sciatic pain and lower extremity discomfort, shoulder displacement causing rotator cuff problems, and cervical or neck problems manifesting in a variety of neck and headache pain.  Scar tissue can and will cause loss of range of motion making simple job and home activities difficult to perform.  In addition there have been preliminary studies showing that manual therapies such as craniosacral therapy can relieve the discomforts and problematic symptoms in the Ureogential region after “C” section deliveries.  One of the most profound areas of relief from scar tissue is a patient who has had open-heart surgery.  I myself have recovered from open-heart surgery.  I [have] received scar and adhesion therapy once a month for the last 10 years.  My primary care doctor concurs that the manual therapy I receive keeps my body anatomically correct, allows my body full range of motion without pain and discomfort in the soft tissue.

Over many years in my practice I have found that craniosacral therapy has had a profound positive effect on relieving the discomfort of scar tissue formed in the body. In addition Craniosacral therapy has afforded my patients/clients increased range of motion, the reduction of adhesions and pain in the sub acute stage after a surgical procedure.  (End of quote).

Thursday, Jan 19   We awoke to snow and it is still coming down.  Over the last couple of days, we have had a little over 6″ according to averaging John’s 6 different measurements around the place this morning.  He had to clean off the walkways to the cat house and hay shed, where all the cats were hanging out this morning.

My music group canceled our trip to play music today in town.  All the snow plows have been in Upper County removing 2 feet of snow, and left us to deal with our own. Our friends over in Winlock (south of Chehalis) got 17 inches to deal with yesterday. Puget Sound area had ice and winds that brought down power lines.  Internal house temperatures are dropping into the mid-50s.  Glad we don’t live there or in Alaska!  For every inch in WA, they are getting a foot.

John’s working on his music theory today and just found more about the Circle of Fifths, and the first line of Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star.  Then the friend in the music group who had the 17” snow told me that Five Foot Two is the classic song with a run through from C on the Circle of Fifths.

Friday, Jan 20.  Staying home today, neither our driveway nor the road in front of our house has been plowed.  John may shovel a path, but our cars are so low and our neighbor will likely come down and plow us out.

We have nice neighbors, and we have no reason to go to town, so we can wait.  Oh my, it is 12:20 and starting to snow big flakes again.  John went back to take the mail to the mailbox, and to shovel out the approach for the postal carrier.  Guess the timing might be right; hopefully, the plow has come back down our side of the road.  John saw it go north earlier.  It has, John came back to report.  He got our mail in for pickup, and the snow has also stopped.  John can always take off the middle part so it doesn’t hit under our car, and the tires will plow through the tracks on the side (that’s in case our neighbor doesn’t plow us out).

While John was out, I stayed inside and used his computer.  I managed to transpose 3 pages of music for our clarinet player, for Willie Nelson’s, “On the Road Again,” which our friend found while he was in the UK over Christmas.  I managed to learn how to put in “slurs” (symbols for holding a note, connecting to others), and first and second bracket endings.  I had previously been filling them in by hand, and that was rather messy.  This is very cool and can be done at the time the notes are entered.  I have never completely read the manual (John says I never do), but I did today to find out how, by reading the manual!  Meanwhile, I had taught myself how to enter tempos, keys, notes (full, half, quarter, eighth, …), without the manual.  I also had previously figured out how to put in “repeats” and also crescendos.  And more!

I am busy now playing with pictures from two different cameras, and trying to clean off my digital camera (ExiLim) which has a 4 Gig card and takes good movies.  My Casio fills up way too fast.  This one hasn’t been used since I was last teaching before my heart attack in fall of 2009.  I need to clean it off, with the hopes of recording the concert at the Grange next Saturday.

Currently, I’m copying large files from my camera to my computer and then to a CD so I can free a bunch of space on my camera (for movies) and my computer for storage. These were movies I took at the time of the last class REM 515 (GIS in Resource Management, a Graduate Seminar) I taught in the fall 2009.  There are some really good ones in there:  Kevin Vaughn, LiDar at Mt. Rainier, Dan Church, Bureau of Reclamation LiDar Work in Yakima, Michael Wandler, on WSDOT work he does and has done with GIS, and Steve Rush on the history of GIS at Hanford.  Then this afternoon I decided to put them on my FTP site at CWU so folks could download which ones they want and save me mailing CDs.  I have one talk that is larger than a CD (over 702 Mb), and I do not have a DVD burner on my laptop.  Theoretically, I can use John’s computer for that one.  I will keep the CDs and DVD for my “files” even though I am not likely to ever need them again now that I’m no longer teaching.  But somehow I cannot just delete them and I want to back them up somewhere and give the authors a copy as thanks for coming and presenting to my class, even if it is two years late coming!

John is continuing to work on his music theory learning.  He is really making good progress and making summaries from multiple web sites to teach himself the information.  Every once and awhile, he calls me to get an interpretation or to play something on the keyboard to clarify what the information/lessons are telling him.  He actually found an error on a web site today and wrote the author, but also told him what a fabulous job he had done to clarify the meaning of the terms.

A side note about this music thing is that there were almost no family and friends from John’s Clarion-era that had or played instruments.  One older woman (great aunt by marriage) had an upright piano that was played once in John’s presence.  One neighborhood family paid for #1 son to learn piano.  #s 2, 3, 4 got zip!  OH! One nephew got a guitar somewhere and played Waltzing Matilda endlessly.  Then he took up art – thankfully.  Music seems to be more a southern Appalachian thing and there were major migrations from those mountain regions to the Pacific Northwest.  You can’t throw a stick out here without hitting someone with a fiddle, banjo, guitar, harmonica (harp), accordion (squawk box), mandolin, dulcimer, and a few others.  Hundreds of folks from WA State go to Weiser, ID for the old time music festival first held in 1953 . . .

http://weiserfestival.com/

Saturday, Jan 21 was spent at home with John doing a lot of shoveling, even after our neighbor came in the dark last night and plowed us out some; there is much to be done.  We should be able to get out tomorrow to go to Yakima, and we hope for no snow.  Today it is sunny and nice here, but we are in a pocket of good weather, with clouds surrounding us on all sides.  Some of the snow is melting.  But, in cases where it has not been removed it is a foot deep and deeper where it was pushed by the “skid-steer loader” last night.  Many folks call these things “bobcats” (a well-known make) but the neighbors use theirs for cleaning up cow manure and John calls it their powered-pooper-scooper.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skid-steer_loader

John took a break and came in to make some brownies.  I have been working most of the day between computers.  I’m ready for a brownie, but John said they had to cool first :- )

He’s back in now reading the news on the computer after putting a meatloaf together and, with potatoes, sticking them in the oven.  Now we wait.  I need to get this blog to him so he can post it.

The other thing I have been doing is working with music for our group.  As mentioned, I learned how to put in “slurs” and double repeat ending brackets, and then today, how to add chord designations to the music.  I can even add fret board notation, if desired.  I had to read the manual for those manipulations.  Also, have been organizing food & the menu for the potluck.  I send out lists of what people are bringing so we don’t end up with all desserts or all salads.

Tomorrow, we’re headed to the Yakima area to Costco, to lunch with friends, and pick up my classical guitar I had loaned out last year.  John may be able to use it to learn on in conjuction with the 12-string.

Hope you had a nice week.

Nancy & John

on the Naneum Fan

Sunday, January 8, my Aunt Marise’s 81st birthday, on the old Wilkins home place in Guyton, GA.  I had a nice visit by phone this evening – her time.  Pretty much this day was spent on the computer, either transposing music or working on the 2011 newsletter and the links to my trip to Atlanta in May of 2011.

Monday, Jan 9  It’s a slow day today and we must do some paperwork and dehydrate the bananas we got last week.  Banana chips are really good, and good for you.  Dehydration concentrates the radioactive potassium – read about the BED:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banana_equivalent_dose

Most of the day was spent on computer chores and organizing music.  Mostly I worked on trying to complete the details of the 2011 newsletter (never finished).

I got a nice surprise email from Complete Computer Services, our computer gurus, who also provide our service for our account we have had since 1995,   nancyh@ellensburg.com   .  The surprise is our cost is going down to $2.99/month, and our service is being enhanced with unlimited storage for mailing files.  That has been a drawback and caused me to turn many friends away from using that account, because of the storage limitations.  I still don’t wish to encourage people to send large files, but at least now we are not in danger of filling our account while away for a few hours.  John played cook today, and fixed a great pork loin roast for dinner and for meals for the next few days.

I tried searching the web for a guitar like one a friend has for sale, but I cannot locate much information, and neither could John, but he went and unpacked my old 12-string (1 string is broken, so it’s an 11 string), Gibson:

http://www.guitar-museum.com/guitar-8455-1967-Gibson-B-25-12N-Guitar-Vintage-12-string

He managed to find information about that on line and one for sale in a bidding process.  The price has been bid up to $798, but the owner says it is worth a lot more, and that one like it fetched $1200.  I paid $300 for mine in Iowa City, IA sometime around 1970, lightly used.  John found a serial number on the back and from the Gibson site learned it was made in 1967.

This new found interest in guitars is a result of John’s deciding he wants to learn to make music on something.  I suggested he not begin on a 12-string.  We also have a 6 string classical that I loaned out to a friend in Yakima but he hasn’t had a chance to start lessons yet with the teacher he wanted.  So we are going to go down and visit a future weekend and “borrow” it back, so that John has one to learn on.  I want him to get his own, however, and that’s why I’m trying to work with the friend in Montana, to find out what the one she has is worth, so we can give her a fair price for it.  I haven’t found out much yet, but intend to do some more looking.  All we know is that the sticker inside the guitar says “The Classic Guitar”– made by Kay Musical Instrument Company” and a stamped number says: L 4384.  I finally found one tonight on eBay, and they have a start bid of $145 but no one has bid.  It must be the same as the one she has .. especially considering looking at the pictures and relating to the description she has given me.  (I’m adding to this Saturday night Jan 14, before this is posted.  The owner lowered the starting bid to $115, but no one ever bid on it.  It had nice pictures and was described as an Acoustic Kay of the 40s & 50s.  Our friend followed the links and agreed it was very close to the one she has, which we hope to get.  We just have to settle on a price.  The ad was removed today from eBay without selling it.

Tuesday, Jan 10   Up earlier than wished and did some emailing and then burned some CDs to share with friends I was to see today.  I went for a tour of the CWU Archives at the CWU  Brooks Library, and got a 15-minute tour of the new parts of the library by the “new” Dean (hired in 2010).  I was invited by Jim Brooks, for whom the library is named.  He is 85 now and in really good shape.  He was CWU President for 17 years, and taught before and after that term in Geography.  He was still teaching a couple of courses when I arrived in 1988.

I squeezed in a trip to the Dollar Tree to trade in the clip-on watch that wasn’t working and to grab some canned cat food.  I made it with little time to spare to a 3:00 massage.  Also, I ran our tree order (Grand Fir and Ponderosa Pine by the Kittitas County Conservation District, where John has donated time (prior years) sorting plants in the spring for the community sale.  After many years, the scale of this sale requires more work than volunteers could provide so they now get an AmeriCorps crew.  Our driveway is lined with Ponderosa Pine and our property has a dozen types of trees not here when we arrived.  John went with me tonight (for me to play music at 6:30 with The Connections group) because we wanted to show my guru-music-friend who plays in the group the 12-string guitar and a newly acquired viola (free).  He really liked the guitar and recommended the owner of the music store here in town for installation of  new strings — having experience and a special stretcher-tool.  Otherwise, here is a description we would need to follow:  [Who knew you can get hurt doing this?]

http://www.mediawebsource.com/guitar/12-string-guitar.htm

The temps are going to 15 tonight, so I don’t know if John will want to work outside in the day as he did today.  We were quite late eating dinner tonight (9:00) — biscuits and beans to go with our leftover pork loin.  We are both really tired and may hit the hay earlier tonight.

Wednesday, Jan 11 was another busy day.  Played at the food bank, and they gave me some almond drink (not milk) to try.  Nice meal today.  Chicken Enchiladas but not with all the tortilla stuff like I don’t like.  MUCH chicken and very tender.  I took the 12-string in and the owner of the shop knew the model.  Good sign!  He respectfully oohed-and-awed —

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fiTejNnV6UE

over it and looked it up in his book — finding it is valued at $1,150.  I left it to have new Extra Light strings put on it.  Then off to exercise class and our teacher was not there so I guided the class, and we went for 50 minutes.  It was probably more of a workout than I normally get, having to call out instructions and keep all on task.

John fixed a good dinner of leftovers: Chicken & pork Fettuccini with fried   cauliflower.   He’s been working on the computer on his guitar music theory learning and creating charts and symbols for when he has a guitar with which to practice.  I spent a lot of time tonight setting up music for members of our group.

Thursday, Jan 12  John went with me to run errands while I played music at the Rehab center where I was incarcerated so long back in 2010, and it was so great to see people who remember me and are very happy to see me back on my feet, and walking down the hall on my own.  I remember when it was a real struggle to push myself in a wheel chair, even pulling along the rail along the wall.  Then when I moved up to a walker and how much trouble it was to go down one very long hallway to another longer (I think) one to get to Physical Therapy.  So, now when I walk down the hall and a nurse says, “Nancy, it’s so good to see you,” I always reply, “Thanks, it’s good to be seen.”  From there we did Burger King for a rushed hamburger & fries, because we were going back to town for a bluegrass jam session with Julie Henigan, the Celtic Music presenter tomorrow night at CWU Music building recital hall.  15 people came including John who went along just to enjoy the music.  There were a couple of mandolins, an autoharp, 6 violins, 2 dulcimers, 3 banjoes, and the rest guitars.  The Dulcimers were second instruments of guitarists.  And one of the mandolin players also had a violin.  The people there were from around the valley.

Friday, Jan 13  Started off the day by talking to a friend about an old CTK 510 Casio Keyboard passed down by his wife’s father, and no one else has used.  John is interested in having a music keyboard adjacent to his computer while he is learning music on the guitar.  This is an old model (CTK 510) but there are still a few being offered on the Web.

Tonight’s Celtic Music Performance was interesting but not totally clear completely to me and John.  The lecture part started at 6:30. She explained some of the history, geography, conflict and character of the Irish people and how the poets and songs developed.  See here, sections “Music for Singing” and “Caoineadh Songs.”

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Folk_music_of_Ireland

John’s grandmother was from Ireland [http://www.ballinamore.ie/about/ ] and so he has some personal interest in the subject.

We got there early to have good seats which we got and we were hearing fine.  Sadly however, 120 people arrived at just before 7:00 for the concert and they moved us to the bigger auditorium, with those late arrival people getting first choice of seating.  That was a big bummer.

The microphones were not working well in the larger hall, and there was a buzz that was irritating through some of the performance.  John and I liked the lecture better. Then she sang and played for more than an hour.  She told stories about some of the songs, and they were audible.  However, some of her lyrics were not understandable by us, yet people closer to the stage would laugh occasionally, so one has to imagine they were hearing a bit of Irish humor that we missed.

She sang with and without instrumental accompaniment (called Sean-nós  (Irish for “old style”)–a highly ornamented style of unaccompanied traditional Irish singing.

http://juliehenigan.com/mp3/06-Adieu.mp3

She also sang while playing her guitar and used her violin between the verses of a couple of songs.  Mostly she just played instrumentals on the violin. That’s not the way I sing and play the violin, but I am clearly different from most.  I will sing and play the melody, or the harmony, and do one on the violin and sing the other.  My group gets a kick out of that and don’t know how I manage it.  I just tell them it’s because I was an only child and had cover both parts.

The lady who we took along with us, (who is hard of hearing), heard most of the concert, probably a little less than John and I did, but she heard enough to enjoy it, and that’s all that matters.  She has macular degeneration and can no longer drive, so she really appreciates being given an invitation and ride to events around town.  She’s a trooper, living alone.

Might snow here tomorrow and some or all days for a week, they say.  It is damned cold out there.  The temperature went to 11 last night.   When we came out of the music building just around 9:00 it was 28.  We were parked on the front row (staff parking), but it is still a few hundred feet walk up and down.  John said it felt as if it was minus 28.  It was chilly in the building, and I was glad I had on two jackets over a blouse, and still had an outer coat to put on outside plus a winter pull-down hat that covered my ears.

It was a not-so-all-right Friday the 13^th.  I lost my temporary gold crown again this morning (eating toast)–not even anything gooey, but got into the dentist and had it repaired (no cost).  Also got to my exercise class and, later, picked up the newly strung 12-string guitar.  They charged me $26.46, so must have either been expensive strings and no charge for putting them on, or $6.00 for the strings and $20 labor.  I only got the total charge, not an itemized bill.

Then off to Les Schwab (tire & battery place) to check the Ford Truck’s battery.  John charged it the past two days and put it in the truck but it wouldn’t start, so I took it to town and went by to have it checked.  Turns out it is fully charged and in good shape.  The switch on the steering column is flakey so we will have to try again and get it to town for a fix.  When it warms up some.

Saturday, Jan 14   Today was an interesting day, and it was too cold for John to check out the battery and truck ignition.  Most of our day was involved with music, and we are adding yet another instrument to our growing collection.  We spent morning on the computer and doing chores, and I put together a book order for Hamilton Books (which has a special NO shipping charges on orders through Feb 8).  They sell “remainder books” for about one-third the original price; sometimes better.  John found a kit that teaches the Harmonica, with a CD, DVD, instructional book, AND a basic Harmonica.  He also found a book, “How to Play the Guitar.”  I found 3 books with scores of music (notation w/ chords), for singing while you work, 100 sing–along favorites for around the Campfire, and some “Negro Spirituals” of the Jubilee Singers (originally published in 1892).  I dropped the order in the mail at the PO when we went to town on our way to Thorp to look at our friend’s Casio Keyboard.  We visited for a couple hours and came away with the instrument.  John has set it up back in our computer room.  As best we can figure it was made in the 1980s and except for a small “buzz” it does everything it is supposed to, and we even have the instruction manual.  While in town we bought 50# whole oats because our bird food has been depleted.  The little devils get hungry when it is this cold.  Arrived home and retrieved the mail, which had the book on the Dulcimer (written in 1974) and it arrived in perfect shape.  Not a mark on it, or bent page.

Hope you had a nice week.

Nancy & John

on the Naneum Fan

Sunday, January 01, We awoke to a doe INSIDE our front yard (4 ft fence) looking at the front door.  She stayed around awhile and ate some berries off the Mt. Ash tree.  We don’t really think they like them, but she tried, twice.  Finally I got out my camera and took a picture through the front door (has glass panels on the top).  I didn’t get her while she was nibbling the berries, but did get her looking straight at me, and then a going away picture of her leaving over the fence.  The tree is in the way, so all you see are feet and head.  Funny–life on the Naneum Fan.  While she was waiting to leave, about 2 dozen quail came in to under the feeder and were eating fallen seeds.  We got a nice look at them, but no pix.

We have no plans except to try to clean a path to under the sink in the kitchen for a Culligan repairman to check the water filter.  One guy was here back in Sept and replaced filters under the sink but did not have a “big blue” one to replace at the softener unit in the garage.  A month or so after he was he here, we quit having any fancy filtered water.  At my first complaint, they said it was past the warranty on the work and we would have to pay for a service call.  Considering we paid a couple thousand (I think) [incl. a replacement for a 22 year old unit and the new under-sink 4-filter pure water gizmo] for the unit in Aug 2010, that seems unreasonable.  I called to complain and the woman on the line in Spokane, said she would check with the service mgr., but it probably was not covered.  She was supposed to get back to me that afternoon and did not.  A week later I called again and asked for her by name.  She claimed she left a message on my phone the next day, but I failed to receive it.  So while I had her on the phone, I requested to have the Service Manager (Scott) call and talk to John about what he might do to trouble shoot it.  We didn’t get a call for 2 weeks, but then he did call and luckily while John was in the house, and he talked to us both.  He agreed to send a repairman at no cost to us.  John was ready to write the company a huge complaint.

Continuing with this morning.  John added some bird seed to the garbage can outside my window, and put apples on the other side of the fence (6’).  In not too long there was a visitor doe.  I got a picture of her behind the garbage can and there were some birds on the feeder.  One of them is reddish (purple finch).  Very pretty.

Monday, Jan 2 Nothing new at the Rock ‘N’ Ponderosa.  We had 4 deer back behind the fence in the backyard early, lots of birds at the feeder, and then the doe returned to the front yard.  John went out and shooed her over the fence and threw her three apples down the driveway.  I’m afraid that will be considered a reward and she might return for more later.  Nothing on tap today but cleaning up the den for entrance by the repairman tomorrow.  Many more deer around the back fence several times today.  We just counted 7 we were watching after eating a late lunch.  John’s gone out to move the horses to their other pasture and he turned off the heat in the cat house.  It is warm outside today.  I’ve been alternately working on a graduate reference letter for a former student to go on for her Ph.D. and on the 2011 greetings.  (Link to latter will be at the bottom of this newsletter, finally).

Well, we never cleaned up the den as planned, but while I was doing dishes, the doe came back to eat more Mt. Ash berries by standing on her hind legs.  She was doing such a neat dance that I decided to take a movie.  Now have to figure how to get it on my web site, somehow.  I’m not sure that I can, but I might try.  Figured the easiest way was to put it on You Tube, and then link to it from my web page.  Only problem was I was holding the camera vertical to get her all in the picture frame, so the movie is sideways.  At least I have it documented.  Pretty cool.

Tuesday, Jan 3 began early at 8:00 a.m. with a call from my bakery lady friend that the Apple Fritters were just like I like them today.  Then we worked on the computer and eventually did a little to get ready for the repairman coming.  I actually left the house at 11:00 and he called a few minutes later telling John he was south of town (about 20 minutes away).

Good news on the Culligan repair story.  The technician who came was the one who put in our original new system in 2010.  I missed all this so it is indirect from what John told me this afternoon.  The problem with no water was related to one of 4 filters, and one of them was clogged, and kept the water from coming through.  The tech had a special little tool for putting into the line to bypass filters one by one to see where the problem was.

He was kind enough to leave one with John so if it happens again, John can determine which one to replace. [It is just a piece of molded plastic – about 19¢ worth.]  It may have been a defective filter to clog so soon after replacement.  He also replaced a large filter on our big softener which was full of brown gunk, and left a replacement one for John to check and possibly replace in 6 months.  There was no charge, which has made us have a renewed faith in the local office (if Spokane can be considered local).  Culligan supplies the equipment but does not own or operate the local places.    We were ready to broadcast widely about the poor service and complain but the folks in Spokane must have sensed the frustration and irritation we were having, and decided to override the policy.  The Culligan “guide” that comes with the system is a totally useless piece of parrot barf (John’s injection).  Most of 60 pages is quite technical water quality stuff of no practical use.  Under “troubleshooting” one can find several totally blank pages.  The paper was worth something before they printed this nonsense on it.  Now it is bird cage liner.  Good Grief!

While John was home helping with the Culligan system, I was having an acupuncture.  It was one of the best I have had.  There is a definite progress from what I could do with my left arm and shoulder movement several months ago.  The combination of it with massage seems to be helping.

After that treatment I took the Subaru to the Collision Center for an evaluation and estimate of damage costs and to schedule it in for fixing.  While there the manager cleaned all the glass shards out of the back seat and floor, and also the front seat.  He replaced John’s cardboard insert with plastic but I do not like it at all.  It rattles loudly in the wind, and so much that inside the car one has to turn the radio volume to 22 to hear it.  John will replace the cardboard to cover the plastic, or else replace the card board and put the plastic over it to protect from rain and snow.  He ended up taping the cardboard over the plastic for fear once he removed the plastic he might not be able to reapply it.

On home to a call from my doctor’s nurse–the mammogram images appear to be all right when looking at the magnification ones, but I need to go back in six months to be sure all is well still.

Wednesday, Jan 4 (John’s Birthday).  Let’s see.  Wow, what a day.  It was filled up from early, fighting with a Ford Foundation Fellowship letter of referral I had to do for a student to enter a Ph.D. program with this request for funding.  It was not your normal letter.  It has taken me forever to write it.  I had to respond in a nontraditional way to 10 different paragraph questions with multiple parts, and I had to submit the results on the web.

My first attempt this morning went fine, but I reviewed it (at their suggestion) on line before submitting it.  When I found a mistake I corrected it and went through the process as defined, but it wouldn’t accept.  Rats.  I needed to leave the house at 11:15 and I was running out of time.  I went through tech support and finally at the last minute got it submitted.

Then I played music (and ate) at the Food Bank Soup Kitchen.  Always a very good meal.  We play from 12 to 12:30, eat, and then I go to exercise class at 1:30.   While there the guys that work there heard it was John’s birthday and offered me a Red Velvet Chocolate Cake to bring to his evening birthday party.  They know he has delivered apples there to donate in the past.  Also he went with me once and helped set up chairs for the Wednesday lunch.  I received a phone call from John that he had chipped off a part of a tooth while eating a cracker at lunch.  He was able to get an appt to have a temporary put on at 3:00.  I left the adult activity center and dropped a check by the dentist, and went on to pick up our pizza.

It really was a wild day today, filled with activities.  In the evening, we went to a birthday party dinner for him across the street at our neighbors.  We had the pizza that I picked it up on my way home (reheated at their place).  I had ordered special donuts (chocolate old fashioned with nuts), but when I went to pick them up the lady said they are not the usual ones John likes.  The cook made them with a lighter milk chocolate that almost looked like maple.  I told her I would pass.

Nice birthday party with our neighbors for John:  The lady of the house made lime gelatin salad with pears to go with the pizza.  She also gave John homemade chocolate-nut fudge.  We had a nice party, and she served the cake with ice cream.

Thursday, Jan 5  The wind is howling today.  Rained last night, but the day was nicely overcast with some sunshine.  We had only one trip to town, and John let me off to play my music at the nursing home on the hill (Royal Vista), where we had 10 musicians show.

The nicest part of the day was that our new guitar player, Minerva, gave me her Viola.  It was given to her 50 years ago, by her dad, and she took a few lessons but didn’t stick with it.  She now is learning the harmonica to play along with her guitar.  She says she has been carting this all over the country for all this time, and wanted to find it a good home.  She did not want to sell it.  Her dad is still alive at 84.  She has no one in her family to give it to, and she wanted to give it to a friend.  I’m very pleased to be the recipient.  It’s a beautiful instrument, made in Mittenwald, Germany, and distributed by William Lewis & Son, Chicago, Illinois.  I tuned it and played a couple scales on it.  It is similar to a violin, but has a different lower string (C), and the same strings as the lower 3 on a violin (G, D, A), but no high E string.  It’s pretty cool and I think I will start alternating with it.  I love playing the harmony on my violin with the group.  The Viola is recognized for being written into harmony parts in orchestras, and interestingly, many composers played the viola.  “Dvořák played the viola and apparently said that it was his favorite instrument:  his chamber music is rich in important parts for the viola.  Another Czech composer, Bedřich Smetana, included a significant viola part in his quartet, “From My Life”: the quartet begins with an impassioned statement by the viola.  It should also be noted that Bach, Mozart and Beethoven all occasionally played the viola part in chamber music.” (From Wikipedia)

While I was playing music, John delivered a package to our clarinet player who, with others, was in the atrium of our grocery store seeking donations for veterans.  He also visited the Dollar Tree.  There he got two $1.00 watches with clip-ons so he can connect them outside on his jackets.  He has lost the recent wrist band one he got for $1.  Turns out one is broken and can’t be set, so we will have to take it back for exchange.

Friday, Jan 6  I was off early to attend and perform at the Adult Activity Center free potluck.  Food is on at 11:30.  It was Baked Potato Soup with ham and made by the staff at the center.  All participants brought potluck items and it was really generous and varied today.  There were homemade muffins, cornbread, slaw with red peppers, deviled eggs (my favorite), various fruit salads, including a Waldorf one.  Tons of desserts and the center provides ice cream.  At 12:15, an accordionist and I sang and played old time songs from 1900.  I was on the fiddle.  Everyone in the audience has the words and sings along, enjoying themselves immensely.  We even had two requests near the end.  Visited with a few of the people, and then we had exercise class.

Then afterwards I took one of the ladies in my class to run some errands around town, and then dropped her off on my way home.  She has macular degeneration but lives alone and does amazingly well.  She normally rides the Hope Source bus, but today she needed some short stops to a couple of places which Hope Source does not prefer to do.  I was more than willing to help her out.

Then on home where John took me on a walk (with the dogs) through the pasture to see all the brushing work he has been doing over the past couple of months.  I had a feeling of what he was doing from his description, but seeing it first hand was quite enlightening.  He has extended the pasture by clearing out a bunch of overgrown bushes and trees.  He has created a couple of tall brush piles for quail cover, and he has cut some of the larger trees and “bushes” for use as firewood.  He is cleaning up a real overgrown mess which would be a fire hazard, should one get started.  He will be cutting through a path to the creek and to the other side, so it will serve as a fire break and be a nice training ground for us to ride our horses across a creek to train for trail riding.

Saturday, Jan 7  I had a much needed haircut by my neighbor (around the block, Celia), who has cut my hair since I moved to town in 1988.  John spent time brushing again, and I washed dishes and worked on the blog.  Also we talked to John’s cousin and sister, both in PA.  The neatest thing is that I finished (I think) the final draft of our 2011 newsletter, so you will be able to check it out before most people know about it.  We realize that only a few diehards still follow the blog, but those of you who do, thanks, and for letting us know you do.  It gives us incentive to keep it up.

A link is below to follow to the 2011 newsletter from us, and within it are a bunch more links to follow for enlightenment to our exciting lives.  There is even a You Tube link to a movie I made and put out there of the doe in our front yard on her back legs eating Mountain Ash red berries from the tree (inside a 4-foot fenced yard).  She is dancing and it is rather neat.  Only problem is I was holding the camera vertically to get all of her in the view finder, and so the movie comes out sideways.  Also, adjust your browser window to have proper placement of pictures and text.

http://www.elixant.com/~nancyh/2011Greetings.html

Hope you had a nice first week of the year.

Nancy & John

on the Naneum Fan.

Saturday, Dec 24   This was a relatively quiet day because my laptop computer was compromised, and I had none to use in the morning while John was using his (our home computer).  I spent the time well, however, going through months of receipts, organizing them, and filing.  I’m still very behind, but made an amazing dent.  Then after John’s running the dogs and feeding the horses and outside cats, we got a call from his sister in Ohio and talked for an hour.  An hour later, we called his brother in CA and talked to him and his wife for almost 3/4 hour.  Both were really nice visits.  The rest of the afternoon I spent on John’s computer creating the web greeting for 2011 from us, but cannot do anything with it till I get my computer back, which has all the software I need to create necessary files and then to get them on the web.

Sunday, Dec 25   Today is a day with our neighbors.  John is making a dish of Yams to share.  They are making a Turkey.  It is a smaller group than usual (only 5), as we had a huge Thanksgiving there with 19 people.  It is not a white Christmas, is beautiful, sunny, and around freezing temps.  Now at noonish, however, it is clouding over.  Actually we got to our neighbors at 12:45 and it started spitting snow and then snowing BIG flakes.  When we left at 4:45 the car was covered with a couple inches of snow.  Guess we ended up with a white Christmas after all.  We had a nice turkey dinner and a good visit.  They presented us with several jars of jam, and containers of frozen strawberry jam, and canned pears (I think the latter was because John helped pick them).  Their son gave us a boxed Amaryllis bulb.  Add water.  Wait.

Monday Dec 26   Cleaning kitchen counters, working on greetings newsletter, continuing to clean off disk of virus-infected laptop –all filled up my day.  Today was a day for lunch and dinner of leftovers, but all were quite good.  John went to bed early because of needing to get started early in the morning.  No reason to go to town, so we didn’t.  The Adult Activity Center is still closed for Christmas weekend, so no exercise.

Tuesday, Dec 27   The farrier is coming this morning.  John fed the birds, cats, and horses, and set them up for getting their feet trimmed.  I spent time on the phone with computer guys and have been doing more repairs on my computer laptop, trying to get it back to “normal”, whatever that is.  Later today, I must take off for acupuncture. — I’m back and I’m sort of beat from the acupuncture.  Today I got it on both sides.  Started on my back lying face down (hate the pressure with the weight of my head on my face); then turned over on my back with a pillow under my head.  My left top arm was still hurting at the end and I complained, so he rubbed on a very smelly oil (Woodlock).  I looked it up on the web, it has turpentine (hence the smell) in it. It’s supposed to be an external analgesic (for pain).  Well, it did minimize the pain, but not the pain of pungent smells I hate.  It rained a lot while I was in the office but not on me getting back to my car or driving home.  Late night success freeing space on my laptop.  However, still have two pop-up windows, apparently harmless.  At least the speed is dramatically increased and my software applications are all working again.

Wednesday, Dec 28  early to rise, but not enough time.  Cleaned up more on my computer, and got ready to roll for town for playing music at the EBRG Food Bank, where lunch was nicely baked BBQ chicken, a great cold slaw*, beans (several kinds), and apricots with cottage cheese.  Went around town doing errands, and then to exercise class.  Been doing computer stuff and we had a small dinner of leftovers tonight.

[*The term “coleslaw” arose in the 18th century as an Anglicisation of the Dutch term “koolsla”, a shortening of “koolsalade”, which means “cabbage salad”.  It is originally from Ireland and was made from leftovers.  So says http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coleslaw  ]

Thursday, Dec 29   Today began early because of needing to take Nancy to Yakima for a device check (routine every 3 months).  John let me off and a favorite tech took a wireless readout of my ICD, printed lots of charts for my file, and pronounced me most copacetic.  Meanwhile, John went down the hill to Costco to shop. It was good we did it this way, because we wouldn’t have had enough time to eat lunch in Yakima and get back in time for me to play fiddle with the group at 2:00 p.m.  We made it but only because I had driven my car to town and left it at a friend’s, so John could drop me off and continue home to unpack, run the dogs, and feed the horses.  I stayed in town after music, going to the post office and then to my massage therapist.  It was dark and raining hard as I exited.  Better than snow at this point.

Friday, Dec 30   We received a 7:30 a.m. phone call from our neighbor Kenny that 3 of our horses were out along the road.  John got them to come back.  They followed him down the 300’ driveway and through a gate he had opened.  A bit later he went to warm up the car for me – then came back to get keys for a different car.  The one I intended to take had a broken side window. (more below)

This morning is the follow-up mammogram to check out the micro-thingies mentioned last week.  Foggy and cool.  Icy roads going to town and in town and in the parking lot at the hospital.  My nine X-rays went all right.  I had a different person who is much more considerate, careful, slow, and with a gentle touch.  I complimented her at the end and told her it was much better than I had anticipated, based on my experience last week.  She thanked me for telling her, and also said, “I feel it is important to take time with each patient.”

Back to the horse story–Sometime overnight, they were running around our front yard and down/up the driveway.  There was a bit of low fence and my big Frosty will sometimes lean into such things and then carefully step over.  Others, if they are watching, may follow – less carefully, and in seconds the fence gets flattened.  Three were out.  In the dark and fog one horse turned in the narrow space between our recently repaired white car and the front fence.  Something, a knee, head, or rump, bumped into the back door passenger side and bent it in, and broke the window.

One of our friends, when he heard about the car injury, and that I hadn’t tried to reach my agent in Spokane, WA suggested I call the 24/7 number for the company.  I looked up and called the claim’s number for Safeco and told what happened.  He said “no problem” (even asked if the horses were okay), and gave me a claim number, and I will go by to get an estimate next Tuesday.  It will cost us $100 (the deductible for our comprehensive policy).  This follows the encounter with the deer back on September 12 – same car, same side.

On a brighter note, I am sitting here enjoying watching birds feeding on top of a garbage can turned upside down about 25 feet from where I sit.  John spreads seeds there.  There are Purple Finches (Cassini, I think), sparrows, black capped Chickadees and Oregon juncos.  The occasional Blue Jay will come.

Okay.. We are doing apples.  I just sat down for John to catch up.  He washes and slices, cleans out the seeds, dips in lemon juice, and then I take them and put them on the shelves of the dehydrator.  Two of the bottom ones are filled with “banana” apples, which are good “keepers”.  We will try to get more of them next year… because our time is limited getting to these chores.

Snowed tonight and now we have had very high winds for the past couple of hours.  The highest gust at the airport 5 miles southwest of us measured at 47 mph, and in the last hour it has gone down to 38 mph.

Saturday, December 31   Happy New Year’s Eve!

After a bunch of work over the past several weeks, and recently this week giving a lot of attention to putting it on a web page for inclusion as a link in our 2011 newsletter (still under construction), here is a story for you to check out at the end of the year about our construction of a Cat House.   What a run on sentence that last was!

http://www.elixant.com/~nancyh/2011cathouse.html

I spent most of the day writing letters and filling out forms for 3 of my prior students, and I’m only done with one of them.  I need to print out a letter for another, get it in an envelope and mail it next week, and the other I have an hour or so of work left on, but I talked to her on the phone today, and she is gone until tomorrow afternoon, so I have more time.

John went out to feed the horses.  I was working on the computer and got a phone call from Atlanta, GA from the 52-year old daughter of my 3rd cousin (77) who is dying of cancer.  Really very sad.  What a wicked disease.  Happily I visited her while in Atlanta in May.  A newly made friend in my exercise class since 2010 just died from the same disease.

Now John is working on slicing apples again (all Red Romes), and I will join him in a minute to place them on the shelves of the dehydrator.  Now I’m finishing this blog for  this week, and then I will have to work on our news and holiday (digital) newsletter.  It will not be done tomorrow, so I might as well just wish people a Happy New Year and leave out the Christmas stuff, or change it (from what I intended), to say instead, hope you HAD a Merry Christmas or Happy Chanukah.

Happy New Year’s from us on the eve thereof.

Nancy & John

On the Naneum Fan

prohibiting radio stations from playing any Christmas music before December 13^th .

Sunday, Dec 18  The Frost Spirit moved on.  Sun and wind took care of the white crystalline landscape.  Pine trees went from white to green, fence posts to brown, and the fence wires are again dull-metallic.  As close to magic as anything gets.  John took the dogs for two runs today and also filled and dumped a PU load of pasture stealing brush.  I traveled 15 minutes to a friend’s house in Ellensburg, then another 30 minutes from there to the Bluegrass Jam session at the Swauk-Teanaway Grange.  We took her car and next month I’ll drive one of our AWD Subarus.  We’ve had remarkably little ice and snow on the roads.  Can that last?

Monday, Dec 19   I’m not going to town today, but will tackle the mess (these messes) on the counter, after I load the dishwasher.  It is nice and sunny so John is outside.

Tuesday, Dec  20   It was a long day, but went all right; did make it to the dentist, and they fixed my pulled-off gold crown with some sort of cement which has to be redone after Jan 1, when they return to the office.  Meanwhile, it has some decay that will need to be fixed and built up.  Turns out that is NOT the tooth with a previous root canal, so I’m fortunate it is NOT hurting me.  I’m just hopeful that it does NOT have to have a root canal.  Too much money recently spent on teeth, and we go to Yakima (50 miles) for roots, as recommended by our regular dentist.  EBRG docs do root canals but this fellow is an ‘endodontics” specialist.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Endodontics

Regarding the temporary repair of my broken tooth, it is a relief that the  roughness on my tongue and inside cheek is GONE.  Phew.  Then the hygienist cleaned my teeth & polished them.  Nice feeling.  Had 5 minutes to get to acupuncture, and made it.

Had my session with the owner of the business, who is an acupuncturist and massage therapist.  He figures there is a link between my open heart surgery – the “cracked sternum” and all that, leaving me with a stainless steel suture-job and scar down the middle of my chest — from heart surgery and the tenseness and muscle pains in my side and shoulder.  I really liked what he did, and he went 15 minutes over; was okay with me, but surprised us both.  He found my spleen was indicating to him through his pulse evaluation, combined with my clearing my throat, and phlegm heard throughout my body – that I might try eliminating dairy products; could be I have an issue with milk proteins. The key phrase seems to be “milk protein intolerance” or MPI rather than lactose intolerance:

(Warning from Nancy; when proofing additions, such as this link below, that John made, I’m turned off by the spelling in the Answers [and this is from a medical “free” dictionary].  Maybe it is a “foreiner” writing.)

http://medical-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/_/discussion.aspx?topic=milk+intolerance

I am going to cut out ice cream, cheese, butter, yogurt (haven’t had any recently), cottage cheese, chocolate milk and cream, and see if it will help me, even with joint pains, I have been having.  John found a nice link on line that explains this better than I have above.

http://www.livestrong.com/article/292715-muscle-joint-pain-from-milk-protein

However, my personal doctor didn’t think the tests mentioned in this link would really tell much.  Thus, the plan is to cut out milk and milk products and watch for any improvement – or not.

Grabbed a roast beef sandwich in town to eat, ending up at a nursing home to sing Christmas carols, and play my violin.  Tonight there was another violinist to help and a piano player.

Wednesday, Dec 21 THE SOLSTICE, complete with a party tonight, with food, song, and drink (which I cannot have).  The morning started all right and I got to the fasting blood draw and to the mammogram.  It was a little tougher than the last time because of my shoulder, but mostly because of my defibrillator that is in the way.  The technician had to retake one of them, on the left.  Then I got home and had breakfast.  I was all ready to go play at the food bank and got a call that my friend could not play today because she is in court.  I will still go to the Adult Activity Center for exercise and foot care and to pay my bill at the dentist from yesterday. (We pay by check and get a 5% discount)– better than nothing, I guess.

Then tonight is the solstice party and the hostess just sent me a song called Drive the Cold Winter Away, which I have to listen to and learn the melody to play along tonight.  John just printed the words and I will play the tune from the web.  Now I will have chili with him for lunch.  We made it … long evening, good party, nice people, and good music.
We stayed quite late – for old folks.  Weren’t the last to leave, but nearly.  Everyone liked our offerings:  apple cider, dried apples, and John’s red Rome applesauce… all quite a hit.  Good meal. We took the applesauce because the hostess always provides latkes (from Yiddish, from either Russian or Ukrainian apparently), also known as grated potato pancakes.

http://www.barrypopik.com/index.php/new_york_city/entry/latkes_or_latkas_potato_pancakes/

As with most things with a long history, explanations often get a bit complex:

http://nancyfriedman.typepad.com/away_with_words/2008/12/word-of-the-week-latke.html  [read the comments]

Anyway, the fare included latkes, as well as scalloped potatoes with blue Hubbard squash and chicken, asparagus wrapped in cheese and ham, roasted garlic bread, really great beets, hot, and spicy, but not pickled, pumpkin pie, lemon tart in a large pie pan (my favorite).  Regarding Blue Hubbard squash, we wonder if this is fact or fiction:

http://www.thebigapplefarm.com/bluehubbard.htm

More here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hubbard_squash

We are both really tired tonight, because this morning started out much earlier for me, having to be at the hospital early.

Thursday, Dec 22   John worked this morning in the yard, brushing on the edge of the pasture.  I cleaned off counters and washed dishes.  We  had an hour of music at Hearthstone, one of the neater places.  Today they gave our group a huge basket of goodies Mandarin oranges, candies, a gift of something, and probably some other stuff I missed.  One of the ladies in the group distributed some, and also was going to unwrap the included gift and portion it out for the rest of us.  We play next Thursday in town.  Today, we did almost all Christmas songs, and we have the lyrics typed out for them to sing along.  They sang and participated really well, and we had a good turnout also of players (ten!).  While we were playing, John visited the gasoline station (price has finally gone down some !) and the grocery store.  He came with me to attend another Christmas Open House at a couple in their eighties who are both in my exercise class.  It was especially nice because we have mutual friends who were there, and we had a nice visit.  There was also enough food to eat that we won’t need dinner.  We had ham and bread, little quiche like things, hot apple cider, many, many different kinds of cookies, and I did not try them all.  Also, some party mix of Corn Chex, Wheat Chex, pretzels, and more cookies (ha ha).  John and I carried a plate of fruitcake pieces and dried apples.  Today the fruitcake went better than the dried apples, (mostly Red Romes because they were so colorful), but our hostess took a few handfuls for them to have later and a couple pieces of fruitcake as well.  You just never know.

Came home to a call from my family physician’s nurse about my mammogram results yesterday.  It seems I have to go back in soon for a re-take with magnification views.  They assured me I was not to worry that it does not mean I have cancer, but they need to check further.  I am showing micro-calcifications in the upper and lower quadrant of my right breast, and in the upper quadrant of my left.  Here is what the Mayo Clinic says about this. On a mammogram, breast calcifications can appear as large white dots or dashes (macrocalcifications) or fine, white specks, similar to grains of salt (microcalcifications).  Microcalcifications are almost always noncancerous.  So, this will happen ASAP, and we’ll go from there.

One more comment from a different source:  Microcalcifications are quite tiny bits of calcium, and may show up in clusters, or in patterns (such as circles or lines) and are associated with extra cell activity in breast tissue.  Usually the extra cell growth is not cancerous, but sometimes tight clusters of microcalcifications can indicate early breast cancer.  Scattered microcalcifications are usually a sign of benign breast tissue.  Regardless, please say a prayer.

Friday, Dec 23   Awoke this morning to a call setting up a second mammogram with magnification.  This is scheduled for a week from today  at 8:45.  Yuk, an early start, BUT, it must be done and before the end of the year, so I should be thankful there was an opening and that the technician who has worked in “mammography” since the 1970s is not taking off.  She has been through much technology change over the years.  She said she started with “balloons” (must have been for support) in order to get the X-rays.  I need to look that up, or maybe just ask her!

In the news this morning:  A large metallic ball fell out of the sky on a remote grassland in Namibia (in Nov), and  NASA and the European space agency were contacted.  The hollow ball with a circumference of 1.1 metres (43 inches) was found near a village in the north of the country some 750 kilometres (480 miles) from the capital Windhoek.  With a diameter of 35 centimetres (14 inches), the ball has a rough surface and appears to consist of “two halves welded together”.  They have determined it is a helium (or other gas) container made of Titanium from a Russian Space satellite.  The tank is from a Salyut 7 – Kosmos 1686 spacecraft that failed in 1991.  So why did this interest John?  The geography secretary (Marilyn) and hubby (several years ago) were in that area on a hunting safari – Do you suppose they walked on this land where the space junk fell?  So, the connections are:  the USSR, space, Namibia, Marilyn, and us.

My laptop computer acquired (again) (how?) rogue anti-spyware program this morning while I was trying to download Auld Lang Syne.  This download entered and is keeping me from accessing the web unless I have it scan my pc.  So, this is being finished on the big computer in the back bedroom.  I was able to bring my text on a jump drive.

There is a “kill process” for this crap-program but it looks complicated:

http://www.2-spyware.com/remove-xp-home-security-2012.html

We are going to send this on Friday night this week.  Nothing is scheduled for Christmas Eve, and Christmas day we are going to our neighbors to celebrate.  It will not be a snowy Christmas here although late in the day there may be rain, with a change to snow on Monday.  Next week is shaping up to be a weather mess but not serious.

Hope your Christmas weekend is wonderful and your next week is a good one.

Nancy & John,

on the Naneum Fan

“Dentists are incapable of asking questions that require a simple yes or no answer.”

http://www.dentalindia.com/jokes.html#.Tu1LTLJFu7s

This link above does have some cute dental jokes, but the first one seems incomplete.

Sunday, Dec 11   Ice fog again, making pretty wintry scenes, so both John and I got out our cameras and took some pictures.  Maybe a couple will make it into our season’s greetings newsletter, if we ever make time to write it.  It’s been an otherwise lazy day, just entering phone numbers into our new cell phones, and cleaning up around the kitchen and counters in the den.  I’m so far behind, with many things to do, and no energy or desire to start.  John has decided it is time to inspect the apples stored in the dark and cold garage and make an apple pie or just slice enough to fill the dehydrator.   …   We never did anything with apples, but we did play with our new phones.  Now he’s back in the back bedroom/computer room talking to his sister on his new phone that I fixed with “speed dial” numbers. That’s cool.  She is number 3 so all he does is hit 3# — but it doesn’t work from our den, only from the southeast room of the house.  It operates from AT&T towers – the nearest is 10 miles away.  The phones are from the new Motorola and the provider is Consumer Cellular:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consumer_Cellular

If you read at the above link you will learn that this company markets to seniors (that’s the p.c. term for old folks) and keeps things simple.  Our roofer (as in shingles on the house roof) friend suggested this company and he is not a “senior” so we didn’t know.  We don’t text, or tweet, or bleat – although we sometimes snore – we have nice cameras, and buying and listening to music while birds still sing seems silly.  So, a simple phone, a simple plan, and less cost than before.

Two more letters for Morris’ book tonight; one from Japan!

Monday, Dec 12   What a morning.  I was on the phone to Culligan and to Consumer Cellular (CC) about our malfunctioning equipment (they –Culligan– said they would check and call me back in the afternoon; they still have not called) and about my transfer of John’s phone number to the new CC service.  Then John came in and told me to get out in the next 3 minutes to see the silver frost in the sunshine before it melted.  I was more than 3 minutes getting off the phone with the cell provider, but I made it out in time to walk around the inside pasture and near the round pens to see the beauty with blue sky backing the glistening crystals on all the needles of the trees and everything else.  Gorgeous.  He took many photos of tree cones and branches around our yard and also of Woody in his (her?) favorite place in the hay shed to watch the pasture goings on.  Then John left for town to get his teeth cleaned.

I just got a call from the lady who we took heaters to saying she wanted to bring them back — their propane furnace igniter having been replaced this morning.

With John in town, we are going to attempt a meet-up there with her and him to transfer the heaters.  We’ve been playing phone tag.  He was having to wait in long lines for gasoline at a place in town where their regular is priced 5 or 6 cents cheaper.  He met her in Safeway parking lot and transferred the heaters.  Now mine is back in my bathroom, and turned on low because it is so cold back there in the back of the house.  This house is L shaped and LOUSY (is that what the L is for?), for pushing air to the back rooms.  [John says:  The problem is the far corners cool first while the temperature in the central hallway (not a spot where one lingers) spurs the heat pump into action.  Thus, the thermostat has to be set to about 73 to keep the far corners comfortable.]  The second oil heater had originally come from the unheated garage, where we have another, turned on next to the water system.  In not too long, we will have a little dessert and go to sleep.  It is 10:10 as I write this.

Tuesday, Dec 13   Today apples finally got put into the dehydrator, and I took off to drop off a check to cover John’s teeth cleaning yesterday.  We get a 5% discount for writing a check and not putting on a credit card.  Worth it, but John forgot and left his check at home.  I had to go to a 4:00 Massage Therapy (shoulder and neck) appt., so I dropped it off.  Then I grabbed my free 6” heated sandwich (not bad, but might not be worth the normal $4.59 price)– tuna, cheese, tomatoes & lettuce.  Then drove on down to the place where I was going to play music, and ate my sandwich, visiting with some of the residents, who were happy to see me.  We started about 6:35 and played and sang Christmas carols.  They love to sing along and do, and we had copies of music to give them, which made it nice.  There was an amazing participation.  I was the ONLY violin, along with a piano.  We did fine.  The rest of the group was just singers, and the piano player and I also sang.

Wednesday, Dec 14   John got up early and drove to Yakima to get his tooth looked at (possible root canal and ended up having one, to a tune of $1264, but that’s not the finish of it, just has a temporary filling in place now).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Root_canal

Also John took his Subaru in for servicing (free 3000-mile, as part of purchase contract), but another maintenance item that is required at 30,000 miles (costing $717, includes $54 sales tax).  He took a trip to Costco while there, and got off for a lot less money.

I played music at noon at the food bank soup kitchen and we were fed afterwards:  Chicken Teriyaki & veggies from scratch with Chinese noodles on top, salad, and a lovely dessert  — yellow cake with white frosting and a generous layer of raspberry jam/sauce.  Then off for exercise and after to deliver an envelope of letters for Morris’ book to his doctor’s office for him to pick up tomorrow when he’s in town.  Got to the door of the office and thought the envelope was rather “light” so I looked inside.  I had never put the papers in the envelope after addressing it and writing notes on the front for delivery to him.  So, came on back home to retrieve them.

I arrived shortly after John had gotten home and was unloading the car.  He left some cat chow in the car for me to take to my neighbor.  When I came to get the insides of the envelope, I also picked up a bag of paperback and hard books I had picked up at yard sales, which John either had read or was not interested in reading.  Packaged them up to donate to the Adult Activity Center and took them along with a CD for a lady who works there, and also I “loaned” them a stuffed reindeer with a bell and red/green tie around his neck and a red nose !! (I got it at a yard sale and they decorate the center really nice for every season, so he will have a special place somewhere (he’s on top of a tall bookcase in the main room, behind the “free table”).  He is over a foot tall, with big brown antlers.  I hope to get him back, but then would have to worry how to keep him for next year, so perhaps I should just donate him to the center.  Tonight John made a great dinner of roasted pork ribs, with a great piece of Rosemary bread toast, and seasonally-red Rome applesauce.

Thursday, Dec 15   Music in the afternoon, at Dry Creek, one of our favorite places, another assisted living place (serves meals), but the residents have their own apts and are quite with it (most of them).

John went with me to town today in my car, let me off to play music (almost all Christmas music), filled it with gasoline, and then he went to the store and to Goodwill where he found him a new wallet to replace his leather one that fell apart.  It cost him $5.  I guess that is not too bad, and it is brand new.  I only recently heard on the radio that they carried new gifts as well as recycled clothes.  My my.  [John: They have used books!]

We hadn’t seen a couple of the wild cats recently, but the food was being eaten.  Today John saw Woody playing with Rascal, and when he went tonight to add food and water at the cat house, out came Little Sue.  Later I saw Big Sue under the tamaracks outside the back computer room window.  I was back there getting his phone fixed to work with the ported number he has had for 2 years.  Few people have it and we already had 2  wrong calls on the temporary number he’d been using till this SIM card arrived.  Problem is there are limited phone numbers and they get recycled.

John is making a scalloped potato dish –extra large size — to have with our leftover pork ribs from last night.  The largeness is to convert raw stored potatoes into cooked frozen potatoes.

Tonight, we finalized the transfer of John’s number on his cell phone of the past two years, and when the reception seemed limited, the customer service rep on the other end in Portland, did something and sent a software request to the number, which allowed us much better coverage from our house (even to the den); we shall see if that continues.  Don’t know why it wouldn’t.  Maybe John will use his phone more, now that he doesn’t have to walk to the middle of the 7-acre pasture to dial out or receive calls.  [John: Wishful thinking on her part.  Why do I need to call anyone?  I’d have to stop what I want to be doing and bother someone that is doing what he or she wants to be doing.]

Friday, Dec 16   A lot to do today.  Scholarship luncheon at school, potluck.  I had a great meal and was eating a piece of candy for dessert that had chocolate over caramel and nuts, and sadly I pulled off the top of my gold crown (it is over my old root canal from Cincinnati back in the 1960s).  Now here we are – chose to go without dental insurance and both with a problem in the last month of the year,  but compared to John’s, mine shouldn’t be as expensive.  (I hope that too is not wishful thinking on my part !  Then I went to the Adult Activity Center where they threw a nice Christmas party for quite a few of the regulars.  I didn’t eat any food, but got to participate in choosing a gift and had my picture taken with Santa.  The gifts I got were butter cookies in 2 little canisters and a large number of small balls for decorating a Christmas tree (which I gave away this evening to our hostess for the potluck).  Then I did exercise class.  Came home and worked on a transposition of music (Shamus O’Brien:  here is a link to a less than professional effort)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_HKRwattyWw

for our clarinet player to be able to play with the rest of us.  Ours is in the key of D, and hers needs to be in the Key of E and each note pushed up a full note.

[Shamus O’Brien is a poem (1896) written by Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu and the following gives a sense of one more sad Irish tale . . .]

http://www.oldandsold.com/opera/opera-86.shtml

While I’m at the work of making music, John worked on making Acorn squash.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acorn_squash

http://simplyrecipes.com/recipes/classic_baked_acorn_squash/

For large gatherings, such as pot-lucks, John cuts the squash into chunks about as wide as a Peace Silver Dollar (1.5 in or 38.1 mm)

http://coinauctionshelp.com/page47.html

Interesting history and controversy here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peace_Dollar

The many small chunks cook easily and allow diners to select only what they want.

I returned from the cold computer back room and found Johni napping, and so I fixed the dessert we are also taking tonight.  It is another potluck with our music group at 6:00 p.m. and a jam session afterwards.  Nice to be busy.  Oh, today before I left, John looked out and saw a deer on top of a table (on top of two barrels where he has fed the birds).   He managed to come in and take out his camera and get the photo before she got down.  For sure, that will go in our 2011 greetings newsletter.

Saturday, Dec 17   Today at 2:00 is our playing Christmas songs at the Briarwood Commons Retirement facility.  This is definitely apartment living and they gather together only for special things, such as bridge, music, and soup dinners.  They always feed us afterwards, and it is quite a spread, so I won’t need dinner tonight.

It was an amazing fare:  two baked lasagna dishes, salad, rolls, and lots of different desserts:  cookies, candy, sweet cupcakes with cinnamon/brown sugar and nuts,  several different cakes (a popcorn cake I have never ever seen), check out the link below for the recipe, with pictures.

http://cookiesandcups.com/popcorn-cake/

This coming week brings the December Solstice:

http://www.timeanddate.com/calendar/december-solstice.html

Be sure to celebrate – days start getting longer.  In the link above scroll down until you find ‘Solstice’s influence on cultures’ and in the second line there is an embedded link to ‘various traditions’ that is itself interesting and, if you have more time to waste, on to related topics.

Hope your next week is a good one.

Nancy & John

still on the Naneum Fan

Sunday, Dec 4 found us doing normal morning chores, and taking off at noon for the Swauk-Teanaway Grange 35 minutes away.  We drove around the Swauk Prairie loop road to view the Bison herd, . . .

http://www.spbison.com/

. . . on our way to a lovely Community Christmas dinner, with turkey, potatoes, dressing and gravy provided by the Grange.  All the rest of the food (and there was MUCH), came with individuals.  John and I took a beautiful glass platter with a  Christmas canister in the middle filled with our dried apples and a bunch of pieces of fruit cake surrounding it on the circular12”-diameter plate.  We met friends from Ellensburg there, and the program included the upper county choir doing “Broadway” Christmas songs and there were a few sing-alongs as well.  There were slightly over 100 people there.

Just as we returned over the hill and into the Kittitas Valley, the sun was setting about 4:00 p.m.  By the time we got to our road and headed north back to the hills, it was gone, and John was beginning to be concerned about exercising the dogs and feeding the horses before dark.  We got home about 4:13.  He made it out and back before it was completely dark, as it was by 5:00 p.m.  We ate so much food that we will not need any dinner tonight.  At least I did and won’t want more.

Monday, Dec 5  Awoke to another day with a lousy night’s rest.  Must have been from too much rich food.

Very sad news arrived.  Abdominal cancer finally claimed the only son (at 50 yrs) of my first geography teacher and his wife.  I had been a sitter for him way back when.

Today I’m dropping off more letters for Morris’ Memory Book at his doctor’s office for him to pick up tomorrow–9 more new ones and additions (pictures and text) to 5 others.  Then on to my exercise class and I will meet John at the car repair shop at the end for him to drop off the old truck.  This morning I packaged up the moccasins that didn’t fit John and we put in a return bag for the mailbox.  I’m happy to report the package was picked up and sent on its way.  Got a bill in the mail for $8.97 for a couple hundred dollars worth of pulmonary tests they have to run on me every year (because of being on Amiodarone).  I called to question it, and was told not to worry that Group Health had screwed up their records on several peoples’ charges and just to wait to see if it got straightened out.  If still there next month, I’m to call it to her attention.  She has already reported their “overpayment” to them, and in adjusting it something went awry.  Never pay a medical bill without questioning.

Tuesday, Dec 6  Morning as usual except added to it was a call to my first geography professor/mentor and his wife about the loss of their son.  Now getting ready to go to town for a doctors appointment.  Nothing much new but my discontent with Subway.  They advertised a sandwich for $2 for the month of December.  I stopped for a late lunch, but they wanted me to buy it with a drink and chips for an additional $3.37.  That total ($5.37) was not part of the advertisement.  When I complained they said they were not participating in the national campaign.  So, I left the store and will not go back again.  That is false advertising to me if they have a franchise.  Lost my business.  I lodged a complaint on the national web site.  (More below.)

Wednesday, Dec 7  It’s sad to remember this is Pearl Harbor Day.  I awoke at 5:00 a.m. to a horrible very realistic dream (not about the bombing), but I am happy it was a dream.  I managed to get up, get something to calm me down, walk down the hall, feed the cat, and go back to sleep.  Today is pick up the PU day.  I dropped John at the repair shop, when I went to play music and eat at the Food Bank Soup Kitchen.  He has lots of cooked stew so will not attend with me.  Then I have to lead my exercise class because our normal leader is not there today.

Too bad John decided against attending the food bank lunch with me.  We had BBQ pork that had been donated (20 pound shoulder) and cooked all night.  It came with slaw and applesauce.  So yummy.

Tonight I have been busy baking the last of the cookies …phew.  Must have done 6 or 7 dozen tonight all by myself.  John has been working on searching for filters for our Culligan unit, among other web surfing.  I’m ready to call him to come take out this last batch.  He came out a couple of batches back (I only do a dozen at a time cooking about 12 minutes).  John ate some when he came out.  I don’t eat till I’m done.

I’m a good one to shell crabs too (from the southern GA beaches).  I don’t eat as I shell, but everyone else in my family did.  I prefer to have a plate and quiet and maybe a nice view, and a bowl of butter to dunk it in. HA HA.  Boy that takes me WAY back to when I was a kid.  I spent summers in Savannah, GA with my cousins, and sometimes a month on Sullivan’s Island, SC with more cousins.  I learned to ski and surf board (board tied on the boat and pulled behind) on the Intracoastal Waterway  – in case you were thinking Savannah is near the Atlantic Ocean:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intracoastal_Waterway

Got a phone call tonight from the Subway owner of 2 of the 3 stores here in town.  He apologized and told me they did not make as much as other franchises around the US and one of the reasons was because WA State has a higher minimum wage than any other state.  It is $8.67 here and $7.25 is the federal minimum.  I didn’t realize states set their own.  GA is below.  AL is the same (actually has none).  But then certain cities (Santa Cruz, CA) are even higher–$13 or $15 (without benefits).  CA State is $8.00.  Arkansas is really low at $6.25.

He also is going to send me 4 coupons for a free six inch sandwich.  I told him that was not necessary, but he said he did not want to lose my business.  He supposedly had told his employees if someone came in and asked specifically for that $2 sandwich they were supposed to fix it.  He said they have done it on several occasions, but he apologized they did not in my case.

Okay, it’s too early to go to bed, but both of us are really tired.  Oh, I have to tell you about dinner and biscuits made with a little chocolate milk.  John found some “old” Bisquick that had never been opened.  It was past the expiration date so we couldn’t give it to the food bank.  We had just bought a new package at Costco last week.  So, he decided to make some biscuits to go with our beef stew dinner that finally got cooked over two days.  The only milk we had in the house was chocolate (I use for taking my meds).  He split the liquid required into half choc milk and half water.  It made pinkish-brown biscuits but they were very tasty.

Thursday, Dec 8  We awoke to beautiful sunshine and blue skies, but the valley below us (just 6 miles away but 700 feet lower) was shrouded in heavy cold fog.  John had heard that on the radio, but we got a call from a fellow down the road saying he wasn’t going to be at music today.  He said it was socked in there at their house.

Today was music at the Rehab where I was for 7 weeks during early 2010.  Nice to go back on these terms, but sad to see people in there who are deteriorating.  For dinner John made meatloaf along with acorn squash.

Friday, Dec 9   Awoke to bright sunshine again today, but cold temps (18).  So it is reasonably cold and appears to be going to stay that way.  Ground’s frozen.  John started the mower and took the tops off the strawberry patch, then covered that and young aspargus with straw.  He tucked some into the base of the blackberries too. Our Indiania Berry booklet

https://indianaberry.com/index.php

arrived this week and our order is in.  Earlier this year we sampled some golden raspberries and Indiana Berry sells “bare root” plants for $3 each.  Compare that to this:

http://www.highcountrygardens.com/catalog/product/82807/

Last year he bought two types of strawberries and next spring he will add a third variety.  It is said that when men make plans, the gods laugh.  Anyway, John plans to plant another variety in 2013 and then start replacing any that start the expected decline:

http://strawberryplants.org/2010/05/growing-strawberries/

On this site, scroll down to the ‘renovation’ part.  (you will need to type in renovation in the upper right of the page that comes up)

Well, I had a neck ache yesterday after playing and shifting myself to get away from the sun glare coming through the blinds, and then awoke this morning again with a pain.  I found out that the other leader of the exercise class planned to be there today, so I stayed home.  Did manage to wash a load of dishes, and work on a lot of email chores.  I need to finish a letter for a student to go to graduate school.  Been working on more letters that came in for the Memory book too.  Oh my, I need to make arrangements for our music group potluck next week.  Always something.

Saturday, Dec 10  We got up and saw the lunar eclipse at 5:15 am, and then set a timer for 6:30; however, the expected orange moon

http://sharing.myfoxatlanta.com/sharewono/photo/2011/06/14/Lunar_Eclipse_20110614074800_320_240.JPG

was not real visible behind the pine trees.   When next up about 8:30 am, Moon was down and Fog was up — the area all was covered with fog and we have been all fogged all day – slowly freezing onto all surfaces.

http://farm4.staticflickr.com/3283/3157394060_7cfa92fbd3_z.jpg?zz=1

Sometimes called a ‘silver frost’, the words are used for auto paints and other things that make a search difficult.  We have many photos but they are not on the web or in the cloud or whatever.  This stuff is technically called “hoar frost” [O.E. har — hoary, gray, venerable, old]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frost

My morning was spent with two wireless providers, and a long wait for customer service both places.  Today our 2-yr contract with AT&T expired, and I was able to “port” the numbers from our old cell phones to our new plan with Consumer Cellular.  They have a much better deal and there is no contract required.  It can be raised or lowered at any time for no extra cost.  If you get to the end of your contract and wish to switch to this Portland-based firm, who uses AT&T towers, please tell me so I can recommend you.  That way we both get $10 credit to our accounts.

I also had to get instructions for how to load the SIM card in my phone, because I ordered (free) a new one for my new phone with my old number.  (Luckily, John was in the house and could assist; I could never have done it alone while talking on the phone with customer service.)  I also had to spend a bunch of time first with AT&T to be assured my contract indeed was able to have the number switched today, which terminates the contract, and that I wouldn’t be charged a penalty ($140).  I began the morning calls about 11:00 a.m. and was still on it when our neighbor, Kenny, brought us 10 bales of straw from his uncle’s farm.  They got it all loaded in the barn.  I stayed on the phone transferring (porting) his cell number to the new provider to set up another SIM card to be mailed to him.  Meanwhile, I will work on his new phone to make a voicemail message and store a few numbers.  He only occasionally used the phone once I got out of ‘rehab’, mostly to call me at home or on my cell, wherever I am.  I do need to put his sister’s number and a couple others in it for him to have.  Maybe he can be updated to the current century – but don’t bet on it.

We intended to do more apple dehydrating, but the other stuff got in the way.  Now John just fixed us a late lunch and decided to take a nap.  Then a friend’s heating system failed and so we are taking 2 oil heaters (ours bought at Bi-Mart, but not this exact one) . . .

http://www.bimart.com/skudetail.aspx?loc=k.605905_s.399A_c.93A_d.6&nm=Heating

. . . over for their use until they can get their propane furnace repaired.  With temps going to 15, some heat is necessary in a house.

Hope your next week is a good one.

Nancy & John

on the frost covered Naneum Fan

December 3^rd was the end of the run (1967) for a special train, see:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/20th_Century_Limited

and we (Nancy & John) had gone in two different directions from graduate school in Cincinnati!  He went for more graduate work at the Univ. of Iowa, and I went to Atlanta, GA to teach with my Masters at Georgia State University.

This morning (Sunday, in 2011, Nov 27^th), I slept in, and John worked on the computer till he decided to go get some yard work done before it rained.  Now the sun is out and he is napping after lunch.  He did all the morning feeding chores, and cleared out brush on the path through the woods over a natural spring (path does go right over it).  He found a headless quail and lots of feathers.  That’s under the owl tree-hangout on riparian land [“the swamp”] on the south side of our acreage, and where John took pictures a few years ago of Great Horned Owls roosting.  They must be back for feasting, although he didn’t see them today.  I need to have him find the pictures on his computer so I can put them on a link to give you in the blog.  Maybe I will put it in the Seasons Greetings newsletter for this year because it never went into one in the past, and the owls are still around our place hooting, hunting, and whatever else it is that owls do.

I have been working on in-house chores; feeding Rascal, cleaning the dishes, learning more about my new cell phone (which I guess I have used too much and wore down the battery), writing a letter of recommendation which is a huge chore on line to the Univ. of Minnesota, for a student first in my classes starting in 2006.  It supposedly is easier to do it on line, but it is really not simple to fill in all the evaluation forms, and also write a narrative letter with specific topics they want covered personally, and then uploaded.  Here are the items requested to be covered in the letter:  unique positive factors, potentially negative factors, comparative strength of record, relevant research or other scholarly experience, rigor and reputation of the undergrad college and major, rank in class, professional promise, ability to express views orally and in writing, ability to conceptualize and integrate knowledge, any other factors or considerations that you think should be brought to the attention of the admissions committee.  Jeez.  Like I’m supposed to know all these things from 5 years ago.  Doubt I would have been able to respond at her graduation in 2008.  I would not cover all these in a typical letter of recommendation for entrance to a graduate program that I might write on my own.  Some of the requested evaluation criteria I don’t have a clue about.  We don’t measure college students on their “rank in class,” for example.

Dinner tonight was leftover thin slices of last night’s tender loin roast, with beans added (nothing like pork n’ beans, I assure you); very good, and a baked potato,  John’s home-made  Rome applesauce, and pieces of Jarlsberg cheese (Swiss-like) of Norway, bought at Costco.  We took time to put up another 48 ounces of sorted walnuts (into halves and pieces) for the freezer.  Still have several bags to go.

Monday, Nov 28  Spent the morning doing email chores, and John did outside chores, plus did a neighborly thing for new people who are primarily Spanish speakers.  While he was running the dogs and feeding the horses this morning, he heard someone chopping on a log with an axe.  It was not a normal splitting sound, so he grabbed his chainsaw and went to see if he could help.  The woman speaks English but the man does not (he might understand some), but John found out that they had a month-old chain saw (Poulan) from a local store, that had quit working.  They had another small one that was electric (meant for the end of a pole) :

http://www.acehardwareoutlet.com/LargeImage.aspx?SKU=7214562&Image=7/7214562_090209l_gv.jpg

but it was dull and small, and he had a log about 12” in diameter he was trying to cut through.  Their heating bill is really expensive (this month $280, and ours was only $122).  That house they are renting has a history of high electric bills.  They have a small wood stove in one room.  John cut up what the fellow had dragged from the woods (old Aspen, mostly).  John went to the downed trees and cut more and the fellow carried it to an old shed.  During this time I went to town for my exercise class.

We plan to make chocolate chip & nut cookies tonight for me to take to my massage therapist tomorrow.  Guess shrimp are on the menu for tonight.  Also need to sort some more walnuts.  Whoopee.  We did the dough and cooked 9 cookies tonight.  Will do more in the morning.  Smells so good in here now.  Warm cookies! Eat your heart out.

Tuesday, Nov 29  I spent the morning baking cookies (they have our own walnuts).  I took away 3 dozen to my Natural Health providers (acupuncturist, massage therapist, and the office gals).  I went in today for my massage.  It was mostly on my neck that flared up last week.  There were other things done as well in the hour.  It was really worth the time.  We could both feel the tenseness of the muscles around my neck.  I really haven’t completely recovered, but the worst of the pain, especially turning my head to the right, has gone.  This treatment today I believe really helped.  I came on home, forgetting to get canned cat food at the Dollar Tree store.  We used the last can last night.  Rascal started eating both kinds again yesterday.  He must have had a wild critter filling his tummy for the past two days.  I saw him going after a grasshopper/ cricket type insect today as I was leaving for town.  When I left, John was over at the new neighbor’s again cutting wood.  He was pretty much alone today, but the son came and introduced himself as he was leaving for town and told John his dad and mom were both in town.  I had been too busy this morning before leaving and so I skipped lunch.  Got home and John cut me some Jarlsberg cheese, which I had with some good crackers, several pieces of dried pear, and a couple of cookies.  I had left about 2.5 dozen for us.  There is still probably a third of the dough left, so at some time I must bake some more.  I can only do a dozen in the oven at one time because I tried earlier last week putting two cookie sheets in, but the circulation was not right and I overcooked them and had black bottoms and soft centers.  Live and learn.

Tonight we had chili for dinner, and John added home fries to his, but I passed.  However, we did sort the rest of the walnuts and I finished making the rest of the cookie dough into cookies.  I didn’t count how many I made and probably can’t now because John was eating them as fast as I baked them.  Okay, time for beddie-bye.  We kept 12 ounces of the walnut halves in the frig (rather than freezing with the rest), in hopes to try to make some glazed (sugar coated) pieces.

http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/ellie-krieger/maple-glazed-walnuts-recipe/index.html

(It’s now Saturday as I reread this to give to John to post on the blog, and we have yet to make time for doing that, maybe tonight?).

Wednesday, Nov 30  I left for playing music and eating at the Food Bank Soup Kitchen.  Wow did we have a good showing today (end of the month?) and a fantastic meal.  It was Lasagna (made with ricotta cheese) and quite good.  I had a huge serving.  My friends all went back for seconds, but I didn’t.  We had a soup bowl of applesauce and a salad.  Really a great (free) meal, and then off to exercise class.  It’s nice they serve us a meal for playing music for the crowd.

I went to the bank to close a savings account (it had made a whole 4¢ interest over the year–and on to the dollar store.  John worked on brush removal down near the large Ponderosa pine tree, up from where the owls hang out.  It was a nice day with temps around 50.  I had a fun cell phone conversation with the fellow I’m doing the memory book for.  He is doing well.  That’s great news.

Thursday, Dec 1  John went with me to town and took the OLD ’80 Chevy truck for gas, and had loaded it with boxes of old magazines and papers to be recycled by the Elmview folks in town.

John let me off to play music at a nursing home, and it was the 80th b.d. for one of our musicians.  Another group member got a cute card-reprint of “The Music Man” by  Norman Rockwell with a young boy (singing?), beagle, and sister with ears covered.

http://www.angelartco.com/artwork/The-Music-Man-13052.htm

The boy isn’t actually playing the guitar in the painting but our birthday boy can play one – and about 3 dozen other instruments.  Rockwell used this theme another time:

http://www.best-norman-rockwell-art.com/images/1919-05-The-American-Norman-Rockwell-cover-Boy-Musician-400-Digimarc.jpg

We all signed the card.  Then we sang happy birthday (joined by a number of the residents) at the start and then again at the end.  It was cool, and the home provided cookies for the celebration at the end.  We mixed in some Christmas songs with our normal old time repertoire.

While John was stopped unloading the paper, he saw some fluid leaking out of the truck.  He took it by our car repair guys, and they were too busy to fix it then, but found out it was a water pump gone bad.  They added coolant.  Also, a belt that will have to be removed when they replace the pump will be tightened or replaced and take care of the power steering problem he also was having.  Well, this truck is 32 years old and we bought it new.  Much of it is deteriorating; especially the inside upholstery (on the dashboard), and the seals around the doors, and a back window (1 of 4) is broken out (but John has taped it up), and one of the latches on the front vent windows broke and it cannot be fully closed.  Still, it is a 4WD and a good “farm” truck.  He seldom drives it to town, except to fill up with gas.  He uses it deliver split wood to our neighbors, carry brush around the place, and occasional to move hay from the barn or shed, and down to the lower pasture (particularly when the wind is howling).

Tonight we went to a lecture at CWU on the Missoula Floods that scoured off central and NE Washington.  The area most affected by the Ice Age Floods is called the Channeled Scablands. (scablands comes from the landscape being stripped of all its soil down to the basalt bedrock).  It was from an ice blockage of a river in Northern Idaho that backed up a huge lake in the valley where Missoula, MT now sits.  You can see old shorelines there, still today, particularly when the snow falls.  The ice dam broke (probably over 89 times) and released all the water down and into the Columbia River eventually and then ran out across the eastern part of the state, on its way to Wallula Gap, down in the southeast, where it backed up again, and then drained on into the Columbia down between OR and WA, including into the Willamette Valley and eventually went out to the ocean – scouring, carrying, and depositing loads of rocks.   It was carrying ice bergs with large granite pieces (from Canada) and deposited it on the high elevations when slowed down and backed up into lakes.  The speaker was Richard B. Waitt (now nearing the end of a very long career) whose name appears in reference #16 (and several others), here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Missoula_Floods

Friday, Dec 2  I didn’t get to sleep till very late last night (this a.m.), and so I slept in, and was awakened by a phone call from an accordionist with whom I used to play all Adult Activity Center first of the month potlucks and sing about 25 songs.  She’s been busy this fall and we stopped, but today she didn’t have her grandkids to care for, and we were able to play and do Christmas songs.  I took John’s very red Rome applesauce (cooked with skins) and stayed for exercise class.  Then home to pick up John to go to the annual Christmas party with the combined departments of Geography and Anthropology.  It is the University event of the year and has been for 25 years!  One is supposed to take finger food.  We took a Christmas tin canister of our dried apples surrounded on a bright red plate with fruit berry candies from Aplets and Cotlets.  Good stuff.  We just bought several boxes of the candy.   It is made here in WA State in the town of Cashmere.  I have taken my class (summer one) there for a field trip before to see how they make the candy, and looked at all the geography of from where the ingredients come.  It is a neat place, and they let you walk right through the whole process, from mixing, cooking in big copper boilers, to assembly, adding nuts and powdered sugar, and packing into boxes.

Saturday,  Dec 3  Nothing happening today, for a change.  So, now the sun is out, we are through with pizza for lunch, and John is going out to work on chores while the temperature is bearable.  It was supposed to cool down below 20 last night, but it didn’t.  He’s reclaiming the edge of the pasture (20 feet or so) from encroaching brush; among others

http://www.calyxflowers.com/Floral-Library/Content/Red-Osier-Dogwood.aspx

I have computer things to do and will take a break and try to deal with some of the other stuff needing attention.  First, I have to fill in a recommendation on line (includes a digital letter and answers to a form for one of my former students (mentioned earlier) to go to a Masters program.  I completed it while John was formating this!  As soon as I finish that, I must do another for a former REM masters student from here whose committee I was on 12 years ago, who wants to go to a Ph.D. program in Montana.  Even though retired, I’m still involved with university matters.  Last night while in at the department Christmas party, I had to sign the title authorization papers for a thesis I served on before I became ill.  The paperwork was just coming through.

Hope your next week is a good one.

Nancy & John

still on the Naneum Fan

Sunday, Nov 20  This morning I spent much of my time cooking chocolate chip and walnut cookies that we had put together the dough for last night.  It took a lot of time.  Didn’t have lunch — just a few cookies, and left at 1:00 p.m. to drive 7 mi. down the road to catch a ride with friends to the Grange for the Blue Grass session, for which the cookies were baked.  Once there, we had several others who brought cookies, and one person brought brownies.  They made pots of coffee.  We had 12 musicians, and a relatively large audience.  Some people joined the group and sang along.  I didn’t get home till after dark (about 5:20).  The snow on the road was not too bad for me and my Subaru, but my friends were not pleased, even though they drove their 4WD truck.  Came home to soup that John made with turkey, carrots, barley, lentils, tomatoes, and spices.  We haven’t eaten yet as I’m writing this.  Smells good though.  He is shelling walnuts again.  Ended up with the work before and after supper, with 1.5 pounds of walnuts.  He figures he has about fifteen pounds of walnuts in the shell left.

Monday, Nov 21  Awoke with a neck/high backache.  Hummm.  So, will just rest today and not go to exercise.  I did cut John’s hair—a much needed chore.  Now he is out checking on things prior to a trip to Costco. We just decided on the trip because of good weather and clear roads today but questionable weather tomorrow.  We didn’t get home till 4:00 p.m. and bought a lot of stuff.  A lot.  Should have gone for an INR but didn’t.  May not go to town tomorrow just for that either.  My neck is still aching, so I’m sitting in the recliner with heat on it.  I couldn’t turn my head to the right to help with looking for traffic for John today.  This is unusual.  I hope I just slept wrong last night, and that it is gone by morning.  Then I ended up laying on the heating pad tonight and burned by back.  John had to doctor me with a special salve.  Jeez.

John’s been sitting across from me shelling walnuts.  He got 1.25 pounds done tonight.  He has a couple of recipes we are going to try with them, to cover them with a sugar glaze.  We did buy 8 fruitcakes today.  The price went up from last year, but it’s still way less than any place else in the country.  They are 4.28/pound.  Our grocery store here in town sells little pieces at 8.98/pound… more than twice as much, and not nearly as good.  Fancy fruitcakes from Claxton, GA (since 1910) cost $10/ pound.

http://www.claxtonfruitcake.com/page.php?page=story

This small town is just southwest of where my mother’s family came from; that was the country near Guyton.  Anyway, here is a picture of the Costco fruitcake posted on the web – with a chunk missing on the right side:

http://static.flickr.com/144/317634168_dd14ca66fd_z.jpg

John just brought a piece with Blue Bunny’s ice cream (Bunny Tracks®)

http://www.bluebunny.com/Products/d/Original_Ice_Cream_Bunny_Tracks

on the side (vanilla, with chunks of chocolate).   I just said to John, we really don’t need it with the fruitcake, and he said, well you can give it to me if you don’t want it.  Ha — I kept it.  It is tasty.  But, I ate the ice cream and am finishing with the fruitcake by itself.  I’m glad I’m not diabetic.  That would really change our eating habits.  Still, I’ve gained weight since hitting a very low point more than a year ago – and need to hold it now.

Tuesday, Nov 22 – Glad we are not going over the pass to Seattle.  It is closed westbound at Easton, and chains are required eastbound.  John’s done all the chores and I’m sitting recovering from my neck pain.  It’s raining here.  We think Rascal has decided John built the cat house for him.  He is spending a lot of time there.  John is cracking walnuts again.  No trips needed to town today.  Pass opened at 2:00 but still looks awful to me.  Closed again one direction till after avalanche control is done after 3:00 some time.  No thanks.  No pass travel for me in the winter.  If I had to fly anywhere, I would go out of Yakima, even at $100 more.  It’s too dangerous and unpredictable on this mountain pass.  Others (higher elevations) are driven on by drivers who know what they are doing in snow.  Not so with Snoqualmie.  People drive like maniacs, and cause needless accidents hurting innocent people.  It’s getting dark, and John has to feed, exercise the dogs, and get the mail and paper.  I’m working on my “jobs list” and clearing off the stacks of bills, mail, that has stacked up over the past couple of months.  As I find something that requires a response, I’m stopping to do it.  Should have started this activity months ago, instead of letting them stack up.

Dinner tonight: John fixed pork roast (bone in) and a baked potato, plus a Rome apple.  Guess we’ll have fruitcake for dessert.  We never froze them today.  I was still feeling lousy from my neck pain, but I’m beginning to improve.  Thank goodness.

Wednesday, Nov 23 –I went to give some cookies to our computer guys who fix our computers when needed, and they were closed.  So I took the bag of cookies down to the hospital lab.  Had my blood draw to check the INR for my Coumadin dosage.  Before going to play music, I went to Bi-Mart and bought a large desktop calendar we hang on our wall in the kitchen to keep track of all the appointments and events.  It was on sale for only $ 3.74.  Amazing as the same thing at Fred Meyers was 9.99, and probably more at the university bookstore.  It gives us squares for each day that are about 4 inches on a side to keep our activities straight.  Our “Fiddlers & Friends group” played music at Hearthstone at 2:00 and they provided cookies/brownies and a hot beverage at the end.  So many of the residents came up and spoke or called me over to their table to thank us.  It is a joy to provide entertainment for such an appreciative audience.   Then we all went to the Moose for the community turkey dinner in the afternoon (didn’t need supper).  John doesn’t go with me to that event, but each year I go with my music group after we have played a day early at the retirement home (because normally we go on Thursday afternoons, but cannot on Thanksgiving Day).  One year I took two residents with me, but I won’t this year.  As it turned out, I met one of my friends (86) from the exercise class there and she had come via Hope Source bus.  I called and cancelled her return trip and gave her a ride home, saving her a 30 minute wait.  She lives right on my way home.  She was so happy.  They had a nice plate of food for us.  They gave us a lot of good tender turkey, dressing (but I didn’t like the seasons used), mashed potatoes (with gravy), a great bean combo (peas, lima beans, and corn), plus a large roll with butter.  Cranberry sauce (but I cannot have that with my meds I take).  Pumpkin pie for dessert.  No dinner required for me.  John is putting up fruitcakes in the freezer.  We are saving two out to take to potlucks in 3 weeks.  John continued shelling walnuts this evening.  He is nearing the end and that’s good, because he has seen enough walnuts for one year.  Reminds us of this story:  (a bit of not so nice language)

http://www.guy-sports.com/humor/christmas/funny_snow_shoveling.htm

We called his sister in Ohio to wish them a happy thanksgiving a day early.

Thursday, Nov 24    HAPPY THANKSGIVING.  We called another couple of relatives in PA this morning and had a nice phone visit.  We will be joining our neighbors for 4:00 p.m. dinner.  Nineteen people are expected.  We will take carrots and butternut squash dishes (each made with our walnuts caramelized with brown sugar and cinnamon).  John is our cook.  His mom would be proud.

John has been shelling the last of the walnuts, and I just picked out two cups of the best for putting in the butternut squash dish.  He has been keeping track of the pounds of shelled nuts.  We got 15 pounds shelled.  Not bad, but John is very tired of shelling them.  At least they are Carpathian (English) and not black walnuts – those we gave away.

I spent the morning figuring out how to use our new Motorola cell phone we got with our new service, consumercellular.com  It is less than half the cost / month for us with no contract required moving from AT&T’s two phone required two year contract.  And, we can change at any time if we need more (or less) minutes.  One problem is that I have to re-enter all numbers in my phonebook.  (John: Me too – all 5 of them!)

It just started snowing at 2:55 p.m.  Had been sunny this morning, and then clouded over.  The pass is all snowed in again, but not closed.  The pass north of us (Blewett) is also covered in snow.  Try this link during day time:

http://www.wsdot.wa.gov/Traffic/Cameras/default.aspx?cam=1138

Not sure which way our neighbor’s son and family are coming from the north.  Just called and found they had arrived, and come over that pass.

We got back around 8:00 p.m.  It was a lovely dinner feast and great visiting with everyone there.  Too much food.  Many leftovers.  We brought home ½ of each of the dishes we took (squash and carrots).  We’ll freeze the squash, but have to eat the carrots because they already have been frozen once.  The fare included:  turkey, dressing, mashed potatoes and gravy, ham, salad, two squash casseroles, two types of rolls, and several desserts (cranberry/pear pie, homemade almond roca [also called toffee],

http://food.sndimg.com/img/recipes/10/66/41/large/picKSf6mG.jpg

and mint brownies).  We stayed and talked after eating and then played charades.  Had an enjoyable time.

[For Almond Roca®, see http://www.brown-haley.com/

and here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Almond_Roca

you can learn that “roca” is Spanish for “rock” and the little tiny log-shaped pieces rolled in almond pieces are widely sold in a tin can:

http://imagethumbnails.milo.com/001/622/362/290/1622332_239362_290.jpg

Note the unwrapped piece in the front that looks a lot like this:

http://www.bear-tracker.com/newimages/coyotescat91008.jpg

and explains why the homemade flat sheet preparation is preferred!]

Friday, Nov 25  I gave thanks today because today marked the two year date of my heart attack that started all the illness in my life over the past two years.  We are not participating in Black Friday, in store or online.  Sunny and bright blue sky, but it did snow a touch overnight.  We emptied the compost garbage this morning, and ate breakfast; John fed the cats and the horses and exercised the dogs.  I have worked with my new cell phone.  I’m still learning how to use it.  I did manage to get the voice mail message on mine changed yesterday.  I intend to stop this computer stuff soon, and attack the paperwork on the tables and counter.  Need to make some progress there.

Whoopee, I’m back.  Spent several hours working on going through months of paperwork that have piled up and not been filed.  In the process I found a large white and dark chocolate candy bar and a $20 bill!  We had a late afternoon snack with little pieces of candy with mixed nuts.

Also found my box of refill checks I had bought, (they were mailed), and then hit the table and got buried.

I realize this will sound amazing and crazy to most of you, but I have been taking care of the bills that needed paid, and leaving the rest of the materials for future sorting.  I made good headway but still have four months left to organize.  Also, I have put off arranging medical insurance reimbursements, except when I am told I owe some money.  Since last year my Medicare and Group Health medical insurance has paid pretty much everything, except for isolated co-pays (for example, $25 for 45 minutes of physical therapy).  I found out I could get free exercise at the activity center 3 days a week for an hour each time doing most of the same exercises.  The only thing I cannot do there is machines.

Had dinner (spaghetti w/meat sauce) and applesauce (John’s homemade with Red Rome apples) and am back to settle some bills and cancel some subscriptions to free academic newsletters and magazines I no longer need.  Okay.  Today was Friday and I missed the contest with a local Rock N- Roll radio station.  But I finished an entry with 4 Bob Dylan songs.  If they choose mine, I will get a special tee shirt from Quake 102.1 (scroll down):

http://www.thequake1021.com/pages/8436917.php

Saturday, Nov 26 – Slept in this morning as my night’s sleep was interrupted.  The morning started out clear, but has clouded over.  John has run the dogs and fed the horses.  We need to go to town today for meds.  Before we left, I took my camera out and took some inside pictures of the cat house.  The wild ones were not there, but Rascal came out and demonstrated entrance, inside, and exit for me.  Then we got to town and went to Bi-Mart only to find the boots they had on sale were not in a size for John, and the quality didn’t look as good as the ones he bought mail order from Blair.  I looked at a pair of zip-up snow boots, but there was only one pair in my size, and it didn’t feel right, plus the zipper was stuck half way up.  So, we left them and bought only some candy (for gifts – near local company that we got heart-shaped boxes to take to the ICU nurses and doctors in 2010):

http://www.libertyorchards.com/?sicontent=0&sicreative=472246371&sitrackingid=3382441

The standard “famous originals” seem to be sold in the local stores as loss-leaders at about 1/3 of the cost shown on-line.

http://dealicacy.com/?p=216

The store also had their already cheap jeans marked down so blue jeans for John got added to the cart.  Lots of people shopping, and in the grocery too, but we bought only a few things in addition to the meds I needed.  We did take a little time to sort out our walnuts into halves and pieces.  Now I’m getting ready to give this to John to post, although it is getting dark, so he will need to go feed the horses and run the dogs  — deer were here as we came in the drive so it is likely he will have to detour around them.

Hope your next week is very nice.

Nancy & John

on the Naneum Fan

This week started with more morning dehydrating activities of apples (many) and pears (fewer).  John has worked on getting the heated horse trough set up and filled almost, and fixed us some lunch, and now is putting on a turkey (breast plus a little) to take to a potluck tonight with my music group; we will “jam” afterwards.  We got it fixed and John took some plum sauce we had been given (in return for providing the plums), and he added some cornstarch and simmered, making a lovely sauce to put on the turkey.  I also put some on my piece of Bundt cake (Caramel-Apple).  We had a nice spread of food.  The hosts fixed a huge Rainbow trout they had caught this summer.  Someone brought nutritious cookies with oatmeal, walnuts and raisins.  Also there was a wonderful potato salad and apple crisp.  Oh, and another person brought tamales; another calico beans.  We had a good jam session afterwards too.

Sunday, Nov 13, 2011  Awoke to no phone service.  The winds have been really high all night and must have caused the lines to go down.  Sustained winds have been above 28 mph with the largest gust recorded at 40 mph.  John used the old Chevy PU to cart a bale of hay down to the end of the pasture behind the trees to allow the horses to eat.  They do not like the wind.  Things move and make noise.  That makes it hard for them to sort out the sounds of approaching predators.  We got our phone service back around 10:00 a.m.   While the phones are down we also do not have any connection to the Internet.

We are trying to give away boxes of Black Walnuts to get them off our property.  We have found one taker thus far, who is aware they are still in the hard shell.  Last night’s winds finished dumping the last that were on our largest tree.  The taker is the woman who works in the bakery where I get apple fritters.  She called this morning, starting at 8:00 a.m. (when we had no service) to tell me they were the form/shape (flat) I like.  She’s going to put a dozen in the freezer, because we had no reason to drive to town today.  At the price of gas, we’ll wait till tomorrow.  We can combine trips.  We still have to make two trips.  I have to have blood tests at the hospital for my doctor’s appointment the next day in Cle Elum.  While there for that, we’ll deliver walnuts and pick up fritters.  I will skip exercise because there is not enough time to get ready to go to the potluck and be across the valley by 4:00 p.m.

John worked outside today and I worked inside.  Now he is shelling Carpathian (English) walnuts, now dry, from our trees.  They are going in a carrot dish we are taking to a potluck with 14 people tomorrow night.

I just worked on my computer jobs list I maintain and run for almost 500 people.  I succeeded today in washing a load of dishes and of clothes.  Only problem was that John also filled the horse tank.  So, tonight our tap water was running dirty brown.  Too rapid withdrawal and thus flow through the rocks down below does that.  And also tells us the filters need replaced.

Monday, Nov 14   Full day, running to hospital for blood draw for a routine doctor’s appt. tomorrow morning.   Then to deliver black walnuts (two boxes) to a lady mentioned in yesterday’s post.  I worked on finalizing the letters received for the memory book, since Nov 6 and printed them up to give to Morris at the potluck.  John fixed two bowls of carrots for dinner but we had one bowl left over to bring home.  I think he said he cooked 7 pounds of carrots (with walnuts, cinnamon, and brown sugar).  Other things brought included broccoli, a red, orange, and yellow pepper salad with garnish, shrimp / macaroni salad, homemade rolls, and a chicken rice casserole.  For dessert, apple pie with ice cream.  Appetizer: Cougar Gold cheese (made at Washington State University, Pullman), served with a number of different crackers.

Tuesday, Nov 15 – Very Long day.  I didn’t think we could top yesterday, but we did.  Up at 7:30  a.m. and off at 9:50 for Cle Elum to our family physician.  John had been taking an antibiotic since last week to get rid of an infection (tooth/root ?), but I noticed a swelling in his face last night at dinner.  It was better this morning, but he called the dentist to see about going in and I was going to drive myself to the doctor (it is 31 miles up the road, toward the pass and bad weather), but today was a gorgeous day.   However, the secretary answered the phone and said the dentist was not in, had gone to Montana, and wouldn’t be back in the office till after Thanksgiving.  John was given another stand-in dentist to see.  Well that didn’t make him happy going to a completely new person who doesn’t know us nor we him.  We have had our dentist since 1989 and we are very comfortable and trusting of him.  So I suggested John go with me and go into our doctor with me and ask him.  My appt. was not supposed to be long at all.  The wait, however, was.  There was a person in earlier with signs of a heart attack they had to take care of and so they were running late.  My appt. was 10:45.  I no longer remember when I was called in & John went along too.  The Dr. looked at John’s swelling and suggested the source was the submandibular saliva gland and, as it was already going down, he thought it best to ignore it – unless it got worse again. As a medical event this is typically what happens with John.  He mentions a pain or whatever, the doctor or nurse shrugs and says something like, “Ya, that happens.”  Then, “If it doesn’t get better, let me know.”  It always gets better.  Go figure!

I did get a prescription for Lipitor, and came back by the grocery to pick it up.  It really was only $4.00 with the co-pay card I got from Pfizer (the pharmaceutical company).  It was going to cost me $70/mo, without it.  I started it tonight.  I really hope it works and that my muscle/joint pain ceases.  Simvastatin supposedly has that as a side effect.

After the doctor, the banker.  Same one since arriving in Ebrg in 1988.  Small town banks where they know you by your first name are really nice.  This one is home based in Spokane, WA.  Got hugs upon entering and before exiting.

On our way there we stopped at the vet to get Thyroid pills for Shay, a 4- month supply, which costs us $21.60.  She’s worth it.  She was 11 this year and still going strong.  She has not lost her hearing as her grand mom did.  A couple of years ago she began tilting her head to the right as she ran through the pasture.  She had gained a little weight also but it was the head-tilt that prompted John to have her health investigated.  Many older dogs have subtle symptoms of an under active thyroid gland.  The solution for Shay was easy and cheap.

Then we also ran into two friends at the grocery store and visited.  It was really a multi-purpose trip, but it lasted longer than we had anticipated, so there was only an hour for me to be home before I had to run back to town for a massage therapy treatment.  It went well.  Then I took myself to dinner, and sat in front of a fireplace to warm up, having a large piece of Hawaiian pizza and a pop.  I brought a little of the crust and a layer of meat next to it, home to John.  After that I trudged over to the nursing home across town (on my way home), and played music for an hour there.  So, thus ends a long day.  I have been working on the jobs list and emails since getting home.

Wednesday, Nov 16 –Supposed to do more fruit dehydrating, but instead, did other things.  I left at 11:30 for the Soup Kitchen music at the food bank, and ran into snow about 5 miles down the road!!  Drove in it all the rest of the 8 miles to the food bank.  Didn’t have my boots on, so had to be careful walking.  We played music for ½ hour and then ate.  There were 48 people there today.  The food was excellent.  Mashed potatoes with gravy around beef cubes (that were tender and very good), corn,  apple/plum cobbler, and hot spiced apple cider they had made there from apples donated to the Food Bank.  It was scrumptious.  It was snowing hard when I left, but I went ahead up the street several blocks (to a fellow who plays music with me) to deliver 7 boxes of Black Walnuts (about ½ full so I could lift them).  Luckily I called before I got there and he had swept the walkway and had a hand dolly to load onto.  I loaded them and then walked behind him, and helped lift as he pulled up the steps.  Then I went off to exercise class.  There were only 10 there today, but we had a good time.  After that I drove home by way of my neighbors to pick up some summer sausage (deer) she is giving us, but they were away from the phone working on ground venison from their recent buck.  Now I will wait and trade her some of our English walnuts.  She wanted some of the black walnuts but I heard too late, after I had already delivered the ones in town.  Came on home in the snow and John was working on the cat house.  He has two entrance (exit) doors cut out, two shelves, electricity inside, and set up the heater.  Put some food and water inside, but the cats don’t yet know it is there, even though there are little walkways, and they have been on a couple of the segments.  Okay; time for dinner.  It smells really good.  I do not know what’s on the menu.  John says it is a potato pie.  That must be the smell I like of the crust.  Wrong, different kind of potato pie.  It had turkey, carrots, green beans, cauliflower (a stir fry mix) and the bottom was fried mashed potatoes that were browned first in a non-stick frying pan.  Then John topped it with shredded cheese and moved it to a pie pan in the oven to bake everything.  Now he’s emptying the dishwasher that I have to go fill up and make room on the counters to dehydrate some pears.  Didn’t get to that tonight, instead, he’s been shelling walnuts and I have been on the phone or on the computer, sitting with heat on my left shoulder.

Thursday, Nov 17    Music this afternoon, and John went in with me to shop.  Besides the normal grocery purchases, he went to the Dollar Tree store (one of the few national chains found in Ebrg) and got a bunch of waxed paper, a watch (he misplaced his a couple months ago).  Wow a watch that works for a buck.  Amazing.  Also, got some other stuff we needed.  We had broken our plastic spatula.   The same canned cat food we get for Rascal (not for the outside cats) is 18 cents/can cheaper there.  Wow.  Also, you know the cost of spices in grocery stores.. pretty high.  John got a nice bottle of chili powder for a buck.  We also delivered some black walnuts and Carpathian (in shells) to our neighbors (a couple miles around the corner SW), who presented us with 3 summer sausages from their last year’s deer.  John roasted turkey hind-quarters for dinner.  They were bigger than he realized and took more than twice the cooking time suggested.  Best thing of the day was a lead on a cell phone carrier more reasonable than AT&T we have been with since 2005.  They really (I think) screwed John two years ago December, when I was in the ICU and he needed a cell phone for himself added to our plan, just then up for renewal.  I think it should have only been a $10 or slightly more increase in our rates, but it was over $40. (John: It was a new plan with more minutes, a new phone, and she was on life support.  I could not add myself to her plan – it was expiring in a week.  It did, she didn’t.  Anyway, I wasn’t comparison shopping!)  So, I have been searching for an alternative.  We found it through a friend of ours with a Portland-based firm, consumercellular.com.  Still have to set it up, but it is half the cost. (We’ll see.  She hasn’t added up the taxes and fees.)

Been another crazy day; not as much as usual, but enough.  I didn’t get home till almost 3:30 (in the mail, got a book I was expecting from a friend that I proofed for her; also John’s boots and slippers arrived).  I started working on some music transposing I must finish before tomorrow, called Molly’s Waltz.  John and I started out the morning by putting pears and apples in the dehydrator.  Wow.  I love the apples, but I REALLY love the dried pears.  That is the end of them, sadly they spoil fast and some we didn’t get to; however, we still have more apples to dry.  Better keepers – apples.

Went to a scholarship luncheon at noon and then exercised afterwards.  The meal was super great, and I received two recipes for two of the things there in Email this afternoon.  The main dish was lasagna (easy to make without cooking noodles, and made with Italian sausage), put overnight in the frig, and then cooked for an hour.  We had graham crackers with something called Pumpkin Fluff (made with Cool Whip and vanilla pudding (powder only) & a can of pumpkin.  Who thinks these things up?  You can also serve the pumpkin fluff with apples.  I believe that dried apples are the way to go!!

John found Woody and Rascal on the hay “bed” in the new cat house.  GOOD.  We figured Rascal would teach them.  John is still putting food out on the hay in the shed across the fence from the new house.  The water outside froze but the water in the house with the heater, is fine.  Obviously the heater is working now.  Also, John put an LED night light inside.  What a luxury hotel.  The younger kitties are getting tamer, and let John within 4 feet of them, although today when he opened the door and saw Woody and Rascal up there, Woody ran out the window/door access.

It was 38 here when I left today.  The next two days, however, it will get REALLY cold, down to 13 maybe.  Glad John has the cat house fixed up.  It has two doors, so that if Big Sue comes in and chases Rascal, he has an escape route.  Any of the cats can use both entrances.  He has put pieces of hay up next to the doors to block the wind.  Also, has a metal roof overhang over the window openings.

I have a new pair of moccasins.  John’s are too small, but with a large pair of socks, they fit me just fine.  Nice, now my feet are WARM, finally.

We have to order a larger size for him, however.  Turns out I got a good helper at Blair in PA, and she is sending two pairs with free return shipping for John, and a new pair for $5.00 less for John, and mine are priced at $13.33.  She gave us free shipping to send back these for him that don’t fit, and suggested she would send two different sizes for him to pick from and send the other back in the same bag with the ones we got today that don’t fit.

John has been busy shelling Carpathian walnuts while I finished the music transposition.  I’m done and he is still shelling.  Years ago (in Troy, ID) a church sold 50 pound bags.  We would buy one each year and John would watch TV and work on shelling.  No TV now.  He listens to a classic rock station.

Saturday, Nov 19 – Will be going this afternoon to play music at the Briarwood Community center where they feed us.  So I won’t need much if any dinner.  It is snowing.  He fed the horses and took the dogs for their morning run.  I put up the dried fruit but we haven’t finished reloading more apples yet.  John just fixed us a great lunch at noon of crackers, cheddar cheese slices, dried pears, and Fritos.  That will get me by till 3:00 food.  It’s still snowing.  We now have about 4 – 5 inches on the ground and John is clearing the car of snow. I’ll leave early and drive slowly.  Subaru is AWD.

I’m back and we had a great turn-out.  We were very much appreciated, and we all appreciated the food they provided.  There was a big bowl of Tortellini soup with carrots, lots of turkey, & celery.  There were rolls w/ butter, salad with two dressings, and many different desserts.  There were little cinnamon rolls covered with a sugar sauce, peanut butter cookies, chocolate cake with white frosting, and cherry pie.

I  came home and got here before dark, and John met me and took me through the back gate to the backyard to show me the window in our computer room he had winterized.  He had cat food in his hand, so we walked over to the cat house, and he said, as we approached, “Are you guys in there?”  Out came little Sue, and he opened the front door, to find two more, Woody and Big Sue, who scooted out the top entrance.  He filled the food, checked the water, and he had turned up the heat earlier today, so all is well.  They have all figured it out.  Little Sue went over to the wood pile, and Big Sue and Woody went back up the ladder to the top of the hay shed.  They didn’t stay long.  I came on in the house and petted Rascal on our bed, and watched out the window as Woody came down the ladder, walked across the chain link fence top, and into the house.  Big Sue was still up watching John feed the horses.  When he was back in the house, he looked out the window and saw her coming down the paths John built and over to the bridge to enter the house.  We assume Little Sue went back too.  So, they will be warm and toasty, with food and water, away from the elements.  Good night to be snug.  It is supposed to drop to 13 tonight.  Our friend in Clancy, MT (we never heard of it either) had morning temp of 3.  Too cold for my liking.

I won’t need any dinner, but John plans to eat something.  When he heard about the soup I had, he said he had been planning to do the same thing with our leftover turkey.  We have carrots but no celery.  Guess he can add barley and pine needles.  (yeah.. John inserted that last one while making this ready to post.)

I do need to throw some chocolate chip cookie dough together, with John’s help, and put it in the frig overnight to chill.  Then tomorrow morning I can make cookies to take along to the Bluegrass Jam Session up at the  Swauk Teanaway Grange, where we meet tomorrow at 2:00 for a couple hours.  [This interesting web site has a picture of the Grange hall and lots of other local stuff – NW of us about 30 miles:

http://willworkfordecor.blogspot.com/2010_02_01_archive.html

Scroll down about half way for the picture of the building.]

Hope your next week is wonderful.

Nancy & John

on the now white Naneum Fan