Author: admin

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

 

Sunday, Nov 6, 2011 — Nice morning and we drove to Cle Elum, meeting our friend Morris at 9:00 a.m. at the Cottage Cafe.  We had a great visit (over 3 hours, starting with breakfast), and presented the memory book to him.  I told him there were additions coming, and we will take them to him later, or mail them to him if he is gone from Roslyn.
I have 74 student entries and 7 colleagues.   I know he will cherish the memories.  He said he will start reading it tonight, and he will cry.
I imagine he will.  John did just proofing them.  John also had tears in his eyes today just listening to Morris’ stories.  It was really neat.  I only teared up once, but several times while putting the book together.
He’s a good fellow; that much I know and he was very appreciative of our friendship (John’s and mine) over the years.  As we were leaving he hugged each of us and told us each, “I love you.”  We love him too, and we will keep up with him wherever he goes.  He knows he can call on us if he needs to.  It’s still on my camera but I took a picture of him with the book, outside under a tree.   I should send it, I think, to everyone who put a letter in the book.  I only wish I had been able to find more people from his past.  There is still time to add to the book.  I will just format them, add to the table of contents, and send him the copies and a new copy of the content names (now at two pages, soon to start a third).

John did more work this afternoon (in the cold) on the inside of the cat house.  I stayed inside and worked on music and emails, pretty much.  I’m tired and will try to go to bed early tonight.  John fixed some good dinner with ground beef & onions, cheese on top, a baked potato, and I had two types of tomatoes.  They are thinning out.  I will miss them when they’re gone.

Monday, Nov 7, 2011  Loose cows in the front yard of our neighbors out by our mailbox.  John went and helped herd them back into the fence, with the help of two other neighbors.  He’d make a good cow dog or cutting horse.  Neither were with him.  He saw our horses upset with the bawling cow sound from up on the road, and went to check it out.

We went to town for lunch, and then John dropped me off for exercise class while he ran some errands.  We had to get our Absentee Ballots . . .

[John says: Absentee?  Nancy is showing she needs to pay attention to current developments.  Washington State voters vote by mail. Our county switched for the 2008 elections.  Most others earlier. Pierce County went from 90% to only-mail this year.]

. . . turned in to the Courthouse pickup before tomorrow (Election Day).  He got an electrical outlet for inside the cat house.  Also, he checked the price on some boots he wanted.  We are back from town and just ordered  $69.98 worth of boots and slippers for John with free shipping from Blair in PA.

[John says: Blair Corp. was founded as the New Process Company and is still headquartered in Warren, PA.  John’s dad’s family is from Warren and some relatives worked for the company when it was a simple hometown affair.  Things are considerably more complicated now!  See the section titled “Continued Growth” on this site:

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

He looked in town for the same thing (the boots) and similar things were $115 – $250, plus would have had 8.1% tax added.  The slippers are $20.00, and are the about same as obtainable in Yakima but he’s not found them here in town.  A local store had slippers starting at $60.  Maybe they were made of real sheep wool?]

Tuesday, Nov 8 — It was another crazy day.. I was gone most of the day to 3 things:  foot care at noon, back home briefly,  4:00 Acupuncture, stayed and ate in town, and then played music at 6:30, not getting home till 8:00 pm.  Now my feet are cold and I need to check the fruit in the dehydrator.  John and I spent over an hour loading one up while it was still early and cold outside.  We put in banana chips, a pear, Gala apples and a Rome.  I need to go turn them.  I looked at them and had to ask John for his opinion and to help put it back together.  There are some plastic clamps on the sides I can take off but not put back on.  I have to concentrate the next time I take them off so I can restore it.  I think I have before, but tonight, I wasn’t making the connection (literally)!

Wednesday, Nov 9 – John and I got the dehydrator unloaded and reloaded with a couple of pears and mostly Gala and a couple of Rome apples.  We only got 6 ounces of apples dried from the bunch ?? (how many John?  >10 ) yesterday.  Maybe that’s why dried fruit is so expensive.  I went to town for music and food at the Food Bank Soup Kitchen. Over 40 there today, so not enough food to go around.  We eat last because we play music through their lunch.  We had a tomato basil soup, with a very few oyster crackers, a small serving of meat loaf (and the servers didn’t get any! (sad).  A little fruit cocktail, the garlic bread toast was all gone, and there was a small piece of apple pie.  I didn’t need any more.  I took cans of V8 tomato juice for me and the banjo player.  Then off to check the price of gas, and to exercise class.  Home now, and need to put together our Veteran’s Day music to practice tomorrow at the rehabilitation facility where I was last year for 7 weeks.  It’s practice for the next day at a downtown stage next to the library, where there will be a meeting for ice cream sundaes, honoring the veterans who also have a morning parade and a free BBQ at the downtown fire station.  My group is playing from noon for 50 minutes, and we will do a few patriotic songs, mixed in with songs about America.

Thursday.  Nov 10  I ended up spending most of last night on music (U.S. Army Air Force Song).   Was going to transpose for the clarinet player, but the fellow who wrote the score had about 5 notes wrong.  I figured it out by playing on a virtual piano keyboard.  (uses a Java Script).  Boy, it is so cool what can be done nowadays.
However,  I don’t want to take the time to write in the Chords and the words, so will just print them in, and then make copies on my printer.  That didn’t work.  This morning while John was cutting apples, I cut and taped the words onto the “new music”.  Then I wrote in the chords by hand.  I finished just an hour before I had to leave and made copies to give out (and punched 3 holes in everything).  Meanwhile, John finished putting the dehydrator stuff (apples and pears) out so we could load it this morning with apples.  Earlier he put up the applesauce (beautiful dark red from the Rome’s skins) into freezer containers.

Playing went well this afternoon, even though were very short on players.

We had only two violins (and it was just me when the other one played his mandolin).  We had a guitar, banjo, and a bass fiddle.  Plus a singer joined us.  All there today, except the banjo player will be there tomorrow at the Veteran’s Day playing.

Chili for dinner and a tiny bit of ice cream with cashews.  That’s the end of our ice cream from a major sale a few weeks ago. Waiting now for the next sale (on large plastic tubs).

Friday, Nov 11 – Happy Veterans’ Day.  We went today to town for the Veteran’s Community celebration and played music from noon till 12:48.   We included America, America the Beautiful, This Land is Your Land, and Anchors Aweigh, Battle Hymn of the Republic, The Marine’s Hymn, God Bless America, The U.S. Air Force Song.  Our group did really well, and got lots of applause and appreciation as we were leaving.  We did some patriotic songs mentioned above, and played lively regular old time music such as Five Foot Two, and Jambalaya.  We ended with You Are my Sunshine, and everyone sung along.  Several people I know from exercise class at the senior center and also people from nursing and retirement homes and one person from the community we know were there.

Then visited and watched other performers (cute little girls doing jazzercise), and then some Peruvian dancers.  John came in after I was done and had an ice cream sundae.  I had a root beer float.  He had filled his Subaru with gasoline, and gone to the grocery store for a few things.  Then we went to Burger King for a Whopper we halved.  We had a coupon entitling us to a free one if we bought small fries and a small drink.  So we both ate lunch for $3.43.  It is overcast (was sunny earlier), and cool.

Now John and I have had a pork roast dinner (he bought it today on sale), and then we looked out and it was SNOWING big flakes.  We are not ready.  One western mountain reporting station had a foot of new snow today by early afternoon.  We won’t get much as the air is coming from the Northwest and moisture doesn’t cross the Cascades well. Ellensburg is within the deep red area near the center of this map:

http://www.wrcc.dri.edu/pcpn/wa.gif

However, the ground is covered in white.  Welcome Winter!

We will post this tonight (Fri.) because Saturday evening we are going to a music potluck and jam session.

Hope your next week is wonderful.

Nancy & John

on the Naneum Fan

Sunday, October 30, 2011.  No in-town projects, but lots of out of the house (and in-house) projects.  Same ole; same ole.

Monday, October 31, 2011    —    HAPPY HALLOWEEN        Off to town for a scholarship luncheon.  We were each fed a baked potato (Yukon Gold) grown in one woman’s garden.  She claimed the plants are special because they don’t come from “eyes on seed potatoes.”  That’s not exactly true but these potatoes do have an interesting history.

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

Their shallow eyes have a rosy pink coloration:

http://homecooking.about.com/od/foodhistory/a/yukongoldhistry.htm

So they say.  We have not raised them and photos don’t show much.  Let’s all buy a few and have a look.

The luncheon with the Yukon’s was a two-hostesses affair.  There were many different toppings provided, and the table was lovely with orange and black plates and many decorations, and a little bag of candy corn for each person to take home.  Pumpkin pie was for dessert.  I went on to exercise class and then to visit our Geography department secretary (who was there when I arrived in 1988), and before she left, she had in 27 years of service ).  She lives in one of the retirement centers where our music group plays.  I took her picture with her cat and picked up a note she wrote for the memory book.  I added it and the pictures to her page.  We had a very nice visit.

Tuesday, Nov 1 — Not much today.  I worked on the memory book; John worked outside, and I went for a massage, for my shoulder (and neck).  It seems to be helping.  I drank lots of water and was not in as much pain as two weeks ago.

Wednesday, Nov 2 –Today was a trip to town for playing music and eating at the food bank.  We had Salisbury steak, milk gravy on it and on mashed potatoes, corn, cut raw carrots, and applesauce.  John finished digging the ditch for the power cord to the cat house.  It might rain or snow soon and an un-dug ditch in nasty weather is a thing to avoid.

I transposed the Marine’s Hymn today for our Clarinet player.  We are practicing for Veteran’s Day performance coming up.  I looked up Anchors Aweigh and also transposed it for her. (Sadly she missed our play date today; oh, well, it will be ready for her next week.)

There is a big old HOOT owl making noise in the woods north of us.   Very loud.  Always makes me worry about the cats outside.  Well, the big old Hoot owl is very likely the smaller male (young or old ?) of a pair of Bub virginianus.

http://www.owlpages.com/owls.php?genus=Bubo&species=virginianus

I just put a blanket around my cold feet.  Jeez, and I have heavy socks plus down booties.  And the heat is up to  69 in the hallway.  However, I’m sitting here in the recliner next to the cold window (patio). Temp now is 42; was only 55 today in town. Going to 30 tonight, and they are calling for snow in the morning.  BAD—mentally we are not ready for cold – and some folks think the PNW will be colder than average for the next two weeks:

http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/predictions/814day/814temp.new.gif

. . .while average for the next 3 months through the end of January.  Are we to believe we will have early cold and then not colder than normal afterwards?  That will be nice.  One winter here it went to 17 below and did not get above zero for 3 weeks.

So back to goings on:  When I got home, I cut up and cooked 12 tomatoes.  John put them into two containers of 1.5 pounds each.  Our tomato seed pack has paid for itself.  Hurrah!  Got yet another letter tonight for the memory book and have processed it, but not yet printed it.

Thursday.  Nov 3 was John’s lucky day.  He found his black plastic lens cover in the pasture, before being covered by dropping leaves, snow, or deer scat.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/36722129@N06/3474320972/

Well, you do know what snow and leaves look like!  Next, he decided to clean up the freezer and other stuff from the garage to take to the dump (transfer station).  He found the keys to his Subaru that have been lost for at least 6 months.  They were in the freezer apparently having fallen from his upper shirt pocket while he was putting something down in the chest freezer.  They say luck comes in 3s.  At the dump, the guy next to him unloaded 7 pieces of unused plywood, each about 3’ by 4’.  John asked if he could take it and the guy in charge said, “This is my first day and I really don’t know but go ahead and I will look the other way.”  He wanted to go for 4 lucky things and buy a lotto ticket.  He didn’t have time so we still are not rich.  He did a lot while I was playing music–filled both tanks of the 1989 Ford truck, shopped at the grocery, taking advantage of a 12-hr. special sale.  Nice that he bought some sirloin steaks for only $2.98/pound.  And, he got some bananas for .38/pound that we intend to dry.  Some say sprinkle with sugar and cinnamon.  Sounds good.  Dinner tonight was the steak (tougher than expected), baked potato, and tomatoes (they are thinning out).  Fruitcake (frozen last December) with ice cream for dessert.

Friday, Nov 4 — Day that had much stuff happening at the house (yard) with John, and with Nancy in town.  Nancy went to a potluck at the Adult Activity Center, stayed over and worked with a gal on a puzzle (only found 3 pieces to put in), and then we both went to afternoon exercise class.  I had taken some of John’s homemade applesauce from the Rome apples so it is a lovely red color.  The Center fixed a nice bunch of spaghetti with meat sauce, toasted garlic bread, and people brought some neat potluck stuff, including a wild rice/tomato/celery salad, a Waldorf salad, a casserole with carrots, broccoli, cauliflower, pearl onions, made with two soups (one a shrimp soup, which gave it some color), plate of red grapes, & cookies and ice cream for dessert.  I missed the plate of veggies that came late with someone.  For our dinner, John cooked chicken breasts, and I cut up a tomato to have with mine.   It was neat that he put our Carpathian walnuts in brown sugar with our Acorn squash (bought; not grown in our garden).  Getting the walnuts cured was a task.  He has worked hard with them spread around the house in flat boxes, and turning them a couple times a day.  Now we have to package them up for the freezer too.  Perhaps we’ll figure out something neat to do with some of them — a praline candy type item maybe.  We still have much fruit to dry.

Saturday. Nov 5 — Waked up to temps of 21… now at 12:30 p.m. it’s up to 42 and John went outside while the temps are bearable.  He was going to do some inside work helping me on dehydrating bananas, but a friend sent a photo of rocks from one of her horseback rides with a “What’s this?” tag.  He gathered some ideas and photo links from the ‘net’ and then wanted to go outside where the sun was shining.  I will work on this blog and clean off the table, fill in my Absentee Voter’s Ballot, and wait for him to help with the drying.  We now have an extra dehydrator given to us. It is older, square, with metal screen trays, but not the older high metal ones.  This looks like a little microwave.  I have never seen one like this.

John just came in after working for 2 hours picking up black walnuts that have fallen in our driveway and yard.  They are too much trouble to try to keep, although he may pick out 50 of the largest to do something with later in the winter.  Problem is having to open them with a hammer; they are not as easy as the English-type walnuts he has harvested this year.  He wanted to get them off the ground so the Douglas squirrel will have to go elsewhere for food.  It may be she/he has already left or been killed by the owl we’ve been hearing.  We are thinking it has been two months since the critter was in the yard.  Meanwhile something has been snacking on the pine nuts from the Ponderosas.  Birds maybe? http://www.flickr.com/photos/44884897@N03/4448421360/

Hope your next week is wonderful.

Nancy & John

still on the Naneum Fan

Sunday, October 23, 2011.  Today was a busy morning for John finishing up the 22 year moving of the pump house to beside our house.  I got some more pictures this morning, and now have to take another in the house’s new location.  I have been working all morning on notifications about a Reecer Creek Restoration project (one canyon west of us), and I’m notifying students and others in the area about the need for volunteers to plant trees.  John is now cleaning out the truck and will next load with firewood to take to our neighbors.  I have actually also been sitting with a nicely warmed (in the microwave) bag of flaxseed on my left shoulder pain.  It is feeling much better.  I need also to clean up the kitchen before he returns and wants to dry fruit.  He just gave me a chore to cut the bad spots off some of our tomatoes and cook the rest to freeze for using in sauces this winter.  I did it, and then later when he returned he cooked them down and froze them.  Later this week he used some in a chili he made.  He also worked more on applesauce and fixed a great dinner:  pork roast, candied carrots, baked apples, and a baked potato we forgot to eat.  Will have it tomorrow night for dinner with leftovers.

Monday, October 24, 2011  Nothing much new today.  John made good progress on the “cat house” getting it off the skids.  He also worked on cleaning up beyond the walnut trees where we used to have a patch of raspberries.  He finished the applesauce, but we didn’t get to do any drying of fruit yet.  I started by going to my neighbor’s 2 miles away for a much needed haircut.  She was running late because she got a 4 point buck over the weekend, in a canyon east of us.  For Eastern folk that’s an 8 point:   http://www.ifish.net/board/archive/index.php/t-174943.html

I went to town and to exercise class, got  a couple of gallons of expensive gas to get us to Yakima tomorrow, to Costco and to Yakima Heart Center to see my Cardiologist.  I picked up my lab results from last week at the hospital.  Went by the P.O. to send two letters our postal carrier failed to pick up on Saturday morning.  I’m still upset about that.  Also stopped at a yard sale and bought two barely used captain chairs each in a heavy “nylon” sack and large umbrella, all for $5. The guy also had a lot of insulation unused and packaged, but we are not yet ready for that.

Tuesday, Oct 25   Somehow I was too busy to write anything in the blog on this day.  It started with getting up early to take off for my 10:55 appointment with my Cardiologist in Yakima.  We left our house at 9:30 and got to the chainsaw (Stihl) dealer in time to buy a couple gallons of the bar-oil for John’s chainsaw.  Then on to the doctor’s office just in time for my appointment.  I had to fill out the normal prerequisite form and was resting when called in at 11:12.  The nurse takes all the vitals and then leads you to the office where the doctor arrives in awhile.  He apologized for being late, but then spent over an hour with us.  John goes to my appointment with me.  We left there starved for lunch at Costco, sharing 3 things:  polish sausage, chicken bake , and a strawberry sundae.  Probably not the kind of lunch for a low cholesterol diet.   Ha ha.

Then a shopping spree which filled up our cart and the car.  I’m glad we didn’t have much to buy for friends (just two bottles of wine vinegar), or we would have had to pile the dog food on the luggage rack !!   On home, and we got delayed for a few minutes in a cattle drive on the road with no way around, 2.5 miles from our house.  Drove in the driveway quickly, not even stopping for the mail.  I jumped out, ran into the house for the keys, and back into my Subaru to drive back to town for my acupuncture appointment at 4:00 p.m.  John stayed home to unpack all the stuff from Costco, and to feed the horses, cats, and exercise the dogs.  I didn’t get back home till almost 6:00 p.m..  We had a late supper.

Wednesday, Oct 26  –another day another $1.  Not really, I collected some money today but didn’t spend any.  Went to the Food Bank at noon for playing music in exchange for a meal from the Soup Kitchen.  It is really a nice community effort for those who need the help.  It is free.  Today’s lunch was homemade Turkey Noodle soup, salad (greens and all colors of pepper, and about 7 different dressings to choose from), garlic bread, and a little piece of chocolate cake with choc frosting.  Nice meal, oh, and tomato juice (a large cup) to drink.  On from there to Exercise class.  Good time there.  Home to work on the computer.  It is getting colder, having gone well below freezing last night. The already yellow leaves of the black walnut trees . . .

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

had a peak “abscission” event – leaves separating from the stems —

http://www.absoluteastronomy.com/topics/Abscission

and covered the ground.  Most of the nuts are still hanging but we have 5 gallons (Want some?) John collected to keep away from the resident Douglas squirrel

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

who makes such a mess of our big shed (insulation) and car motors if he gets underneath the hood from below).  Without the luxury of so many walnuts perhaps he/she will return to the nearby pine trees.

Thursday.  Oct 27  Hopefully getting caught up with drying fruit before any more spoils.  Well, if tomatoes are a fruit and not a vegetable, then I caught up by cleaning up 15 of them and cooking down for sauce use.  Then music in the afternoon and while I’m busy John will go shopping for a few things.  They had a tea / apple cider and cookies for us at the end of playing.  Then off to the University to deliver the ¾ bushel basket to the prof now teaching Economic Geography.  Kids nowadays do not know what a bushel is, and many of the agricultural statistics are still reported in bushels. Pictures of bushel baskets often show them heaped but, in fact, for shipping they had tops. Shown on this site:

http://housmancrabbingsupplies.com/default.aspx

And the filling of a railroad car with stacked bushels is described here:

http://www.cumminsnursery.com/reefers.htm

Today apples and other fruit is shipped in corrugated cardboard, as shown here:

http://www.globebag.com/corrugated.html

On home to more emails and John had more outside chores.  Nice late dinner of chicken alfredo

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fettuccine_alfredo#Alfredo_sauce

with pork, bacon, and cooked Rome apples added.  John bought a little oil heater, electric, small one to put in the outside cats’ house to keep it warm for them this winter.  The cost of the small heater was only a bit more than a heated water bowl and that alone would not keep the space warm.  Searched for cat and dog heat pads and related items.  $$Ouch!

Friday, Oct 28  Got cancelled out of today’s scholarship luncheon; put off till Monday because the two people in charge have the awful bug that is rampant around campus and town.  John worked a bit on the cat house.

He pulled off the 30 year-old shingles and replaced those with cut pieces of metal roofing we took off of the hay shed (barn) when it got a new roof.  I went to town late for a 4:30 party/dinner at Briarwood, of two soups (both very good), and cornbread, rolls, and several desserts.  I filled up for sure.  Just drove in and back — 17 mi roundtrip.  They were happy to see me.  So, I’m glad I went.

Oh.. I forgot to say, that my favorite cousin (always thought she was my aunt, because she was older), that I got to see in a nursing facility in Marietta, GA while there in May, died today.  She had pneumonia for the past couple of weeks, but she was really in bad shape with dementia, Alzheimer’s, and not (for some time) communicating very well.  Her eldest daughter is 74,  so she must have been in her mid-nineties.  I held her hand and told her about my memories and I thought she recognized me and smiled and responded.  I was glad I made the visit.  Most of the family couldn’t stand to visit her in such a deteriorated condition, but I’m very glad I did.  Her house was where I learned to ride horses when I was a youngster.  They took me in as family when my dad was ill and my mom had to work.  I was there for 2 weeks with the Chicken Pox.  I had a light case and was out riding horses.  “Blackie” liked to swim and took me into a nearby lake.  I didn’t have any scars from the wetted pox.

Saturday. Oct 29   It is sunny and cool.  We have had to destroy (give to the deer), a few pears that went bad before we had time to dehydrate them.  We still have some left and many apples to work on.  John will be finishing putting screws on the metal roof of the cats’ house.  He’s worried at not seeing the cats this morning, after all the time he has spent moving the old pump house it into our backyard and refurbishing and.  While he is outside, I will go back and print off a bunch of letters for the Memory Book.

Last night we both had terribly realistic dreams that kept us from having a decent rest.  Must have been the chocolate covered cashews and ice cream?

There is a snow storm back east where we have family and friends.

Here in Washington the snow level has not yet gotten down to our (2,240 ft.) elevation.  Hope your weekend is wonderful.  Snow if you want.  Or none, if that suits you.

Nancy & John

still on the Naneum Fan

 

[Well not exactly.  Procrastination is said to refer to doing low-priority things so as to avoid doing things that need doing.  This week we accomplished something that we first attempted 22 years ago.  Being difficult and of low priority it did not get done.  What’s the word for that?]

Sunday, October 16, 2011.  Today I was still tired from yesterday’s many activities.  John left again for trail work at Stirrup Lake, and I slept in.  Finally got up and fed Rascal, and John had uncovered the tomatoes and fed the outside cats before taking off at 7:00 a.m.  I managed to clean up some dishes and load them in the dishwasher.  Finally, at 12:55, I left for my friends again to ride up with them to the Grange for the Bluegrass Jam Session.  We had a few different new people join us, some several returns, and several who didn’t make it up from Yakima or over from Eatonville this time.  We had a much larger audience this time and they joined in and sang along or clapped with the songs, and also gave us applause at the end of songs.

It was nice.  They had cookies and brownies (of which I brought some home to John).  I hope to make some Toll House cookies next month to add to the food fare.  They also brew coffee.

Monday, October 17, 2011.  Well, another week began and I had several afternoon meetings, plus several things to finish in the morning before leaving.  Went to exercise class and then to the University.  Visited several people there, and then went to a presentation in the Cultural Museum in Dean Hall.  They had fancy food, little crisp wafer things with Feta cheese, blue cheese (I love), pita bread with humice (I don’t like and didn’t have), and chocolate covered LARGE strawberries.  Water to drink.

Tuesday.  We need to put up a lot of apples today, but haven’t started.  And, I have a massage appointment at 2:30… then must go to town for 6:30 music date at a nursing home.  Instead, John has been shucking walnuts and I have been doing emails.  Maybe later in the afternoon or evening on the fruit.  Nope.  John took fire-wood to the neighbors and I went to town for music, and while I was gone, the entire time he cut apples for applesauce, which is now cooking.  I’m sore (very) from my thorough massage today.  Have been working on emails for the memory book of retiring colleague… off and on all day.

There is a story that happened this afternoon just before I left the first time.  John came in the front door and saw an orange cat inside our house (by the doggie door).  He thought it was Little Sue but now is not sure.  It jumped up on the window and bounced back on the floor and then got up on the boxes and went through the doggie door.  We don’t know where Rascal was at the time.

Wednesday, another crazy day.  Had to be at the Food Bank Soup Kitchen for music and then to exercise class in the afternoon.  I was still pretty sore from yesterday’s work-out.  Ran by the Geog Dept on my way home to pick up some letters to add to Morris’s memory book.

Thursday.  Slept in late and lost most of the morning.  On to Curly’s in Kittitas for a Taco Thursday special with people from the KV Trail Riders club.  Four horses with 3 riders made the trip from Ellensburg to Kittitas using the John Wayne Trail.  This is a very flat section of the old Milwaukee Road.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicago,_Milwaukee,_St._Paul_and_Pacific_Railroad

In this section of WA State, the trail is part of the Iron Horse State Park:

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

The riders tied their horses at the hitching posts near the Old Milwaukee Train Station.  It is less than 100 yards from the trail to the “Taco Thursday” eatery.  I had a large Taco Salad, minus olives and onions, but with tomatoes instead and additional sour cream.  John had two tacos, nice looking, and he ate a little remainder of mine I couldn’t finish.  Then I rushed from there to play music at Dry Creek, and John went home to work on yard chores.  He is moving a small shed (looks like an outhouse, with a 5 inch concrete base) from back by the creek.  It was an old pump house from about 1983 to 1986; we moved here in 1989.  He is going to get it over closer to the house and fix up with a light or heat tape for the outside cats to have shelter this winter. The bottom half will be used for tool storage, plastic buckets, and gold doubloons.

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

Friday started early going to the hospital for a blood draw (a fasting one) so I was starved when walking out of KVCH.  We went to Super One shopping and got a dozen apple fritters and shared one on the way home.

Now John’s out working again on the pump house moving.  We will wait to do fruit drying for darkness.  I don’t want to do it alone.  I’m thinking of taking a nap too, but probably need to stay awake for my phone call from my doctor’s nurse with the results of the blood draw tests this morning.  I should have napped.  It is 5:07 now and still no phone call yet.  Sometimes they call me after 5:30.  Long days for a doctor’s office and nurse, especially on a Friday.  Finally, she called at 5:40, with the news my INR is 2.4 which is fine, and so there is no Coumadin dosage change and I don’t have to be tested for another MONTH.  Nice, because I get tired of being poked every two weeks.  I did put in a bunch more time on the memory book for Morris.

Also had a funny thing happen with Rascal.  He has been helping John eat his morning toast and he will eat some of my apple fritter too; when we are having dinner he usually begs with the dogs.  Last night I put some toast, with cheese, and spaghetti sauce on top cut up on his plate and he had two servings.  This cat doesn’t act like a cat, but more like a dog.

Saturday.  Awoke to rain this morning.  Been sending out checks for bills and managed to walk up the driveway to put them in the mail before pickup.  Last year I wouldn’t have been up to the walk.  I got really upset when John found the “Saturday substitute” postal carrier did not take my mail.  That is the second time we have had that happen on a Saturday.  John says there is no incentive for him to bother with it, and horror, the US post office will likely be stopping Saturday delivery and other strange things as it tries to remain relevant in a digital world.  Nothing on the schedule today away from home (for a change).  Actually, I was ready to shut this down, but John is making applesauce from our own apples, so I’m back working on this blog and other computer needs.  We never got to the cutting and drying, but instead John moved the pump house into the backyard.  Fascinating how he created a “travois” to ease the task of sliding the rough concrete bottom across the rocky place between the creek and the house.

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

The November issue of Scientific American magazine mentions the possible use of travois for dogs within the cover story about recent discoveries of the “First Americans.”

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=first-americans-researchers-reconsider-peopling-new-world

[Scroll down to the Supplemental Material” and click on the tiny photo and have a look at the interactive section. Okay, so it is not a WOW! thing, but still it is nice.]

So John pulled with a 1980 4×4 pick-up rather than a mangy wolf-dog while I took a few pictures.  A movie would have been better.  It was getting dark toward the end, so I didn’t get the finished location by the side of the house.  Perhaps in the morning, before he disconnects the truck from the “sled”, I can get a decent photo.  It started to sprinkle (again).  We are having a water-sourced supper – fish and shrimp.

Hope all is wonderful for you.

Nancy & John,

on the Naneum Fan.

Sunday (Oct 9) – Slept in this morning (Nancy did) because of yesterday’s wipe-out day.  Then after breakfast and John’s exercising the dogs and feeding the horses and outside cats, I worked on washing dishes, and then clothes.  After John got through catching up on headlines (on the computer, we cleaned peaches, pears, apples and plums and cut, pre-treated and filled two dehydrators.  After a small lunch, John is going to package up the carrots and put in the big shed in the frig there.  He found some very large carrot bags (with holes in them), which we have gotten carrots in from Costco.  Now what?  Blanch and freeze, maybe. Then he packed up about 20 pounds of potatoes and carrots to take to our neighbors.  We did, and then we “traded” her for 5 packages of her newly frozen peaches.  John’s out shucking Carpathian walnuts.  He eventually came into the house, and has been working on apples for making applesauce.  We had a long telephone conversation with our friend from California with whom we have not spoken for many months.  We are both tired and wanting to go to bed early, but the applesauce is still cooking.  Before we hit the hay, Rascal brought in another little frog, this one was green and smaller than the last.  We retrieved him alive and put him out near the “pond” in the back.  I don’t think the pond has any water in it yet, but it is a shaded depression.  We’ve been hearing croaks all summer.

Monday.  Up very early after a restless night, to a rainy day, and the need to take John’s Subaru to town for the body repair.  Got there after dropping off John to pick up his pick-up from the place who fixed my Subaru’s axle on Friday.  I delivered his Subaru and he picked me up for the trip home.  Strange–they said we were a day early, that we were scheduled for tomorrow morning.  I KNOW I wrote down Monday, Oct 10^th on our calendar and we were thinking we would not have it all week.  Oh, well, as long as it is done by Friday (they said yes), because John has to take off for WTA trail repair.

Today will be mostly inside work (probably fruit for sure), as it is raining outside still.  Actually, John ended up outside, but inside the barn, moving a ton of hay.  It had not been packed in properly, and he needed to move what was in the breezeway, so the horses could step inside out of the bad weather and all be under the cover of the barn.  I was dead tired from not sleeping last night, so I slept for the couple hours he worked.  The rain finally stopped about 4:00 and the sun peeked through the clouds for just a few minutes.  Rascal had slept with me and he awoke, ate, and went out to play with Woody.  They are still playing.  Guess they like each other.  They look somewhat like siblings – Woody’s coat is shaggy while Rascal has smooth and shiny hair.  Later I looked and Rascal had climbed the ladder and was looking out the top of the hay (under the roof).  Then later John looked out and saw Big Sue stalking Rascal, so he called Rascal in the back door.  She has chased him in the doggie door window before.

Dinner (spaghetti and sauce) early tonight and now it’s too early to go to bed, so we will put up some more fruit in the dehydrator.

Tuesday, whoopee, awoke after a good night’s sleep. John’s been making more applesauce (13 pounds now in the freezer) and I have been loading the dishwasher, cleaning out the dehydrators, and washing the trays.  Not reloading the dehydrators yet.  I have to go to an acupuncture treatment later in the day and play music in town afterwards.  I’ll just stay in town for that.  Did and all went well.

Wednesday.  Today was music at noon and exercise in the afternoon.  I also went by Geography at CWU.  We had many phone calls tonight, from Vermont, Oregon, and Thorp.  Throughout the phone calls John shucked Carpathian (English) walnuts from our trees that he picked today while I was in town.  They come out of the green covers a whole lot easier than Black Walnuts.  Now after a lot of email work, it’s time for dessert and beddie bye.

Thursday.  Stayed up way too late last night (12:30) so slept in this morning.  Now working more on the Memory Book for retiring colleague Morris and will go to play music this afternoon at the Rehab place where I spent so much time last year.  Then John and I are going to the “pocket” [see note below] to pick Romes and maybe some pears that didn’t go to market.  John’s car is ready so we can pick it up.  WHOOPIE.  He says it’s mine now.  I broke it, have to claim it.  The trip for apples was awesome.  They picked a large box of Romes, and then some Galas, Red Delicious, Jonagold, and  Winter Banana:

http://www.applejournal.com/gal009.htm

These last were a favorite or settlers because they would “keep” well into the late winter.  More info here:

http://www.vintagevirginiaapples.com/apples/winterbanana.htm

We wanted the Red Romes (they are sort of hard to find) because of their good baking character and because of the solid bright color:

http://www.nyapplecountry.com/redrome.htm

Also they picked Red Bartlett pears – they are beautiful:

http://usapears.com/Recipes%20And%20Lifestyle/Now%20Serving/Pears%20and%20Varieties/Red%20Bartlett.aspx

While still hanging in the tree, pears are often damaged by birds and then yellow jackets enlarge the wound.  We were warned by the matriarch of the family to look at the whole pear before grasping.  Good advice.  John saw one with about a dozen yellow jackets in one wound.

We are invited back for more if we wish.  These trees have been sidelined by changes in the operation and changing tastes of consumers.  Most of this fruit will not be harvested for commercial sale, if at all.

Friday.   John left to work on the PCT near Stirrup Lake:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pacific_Crest_Trail#Washington

Doing these work trips John figures he has walked about 20 miles of the PCT and has only 2,643 miles still to do.  But, he has walked back and forth on the few miles carrying tools, rocks, and a considerable number of mountain blue berries:

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

This isn’t a good year.  They are late, not very sweet, and the bushes, while numerous, are sparsely covered with berries.

While John was away I had lots to do on the computer on the Memory Book.  I was too tired to spend an hour driving to town for an hour of exercise, when I was not feeling great.  I knew I needed to rest up for this weekend of music.  John got home before 5:00 and we did go pick up a 50 pound-bag of onions we had ordered and paid for last week from the same person we got large baking potatoes and carrots.

Saturday.  John left again at 7:00 a.m. for his WTA trail work at Stirrup Lake, and I left 40 minutes later to go to get a ride up to the Swauk-Teanaway Grange with friends.  On my way to their house, only 6.5 miles, I saw 15 deer, and then drove into fog at their house.  It was 31 degrees when I left home and 34 at their place.  We drove to the Grange and went in for a Hunter’s Breakfast.  Ours was free because we donated our music, from 9:00 to noon.  We actually ate ham, eggs, and pancakes before starting to play.  It was nice and we were appreciated.  I drove home the 6.5 miles to check on the dogs and cat and turned around to make it to a 2:00 play date at Briarwood Commons in Ellensburg from 2 to 3:00.  Four of us who went to the Grange, made it back to the afternoon session.  That is a small contingent of our normal group, but we did well.  At the end, they fed us choices of different desserts, including bread pudding with whipped cream topping, 4 kinds of cookies (homemade)  and homemade frosted brownies.  Also there was peach cobbler and vanilla ice cream.  We did not go hungry today.  We were invited also to a special dinner at the Food Bank for Search and Rescue that started at 5:00.  I didn’t want ham twice in one day, with all the salt, so I didn’t grab John up and take him in when he got home right before five.  He needed to feed the cats, horses, and run the dogs, and I was quite tired and wanting to rest.  I didn’t even turn on my computer till 6:00 p.m. so I’m a little late getting this draft to John for polishing and posting.

The “pocket”:  Local place names can be fun.  In this case our Valley is shaped like a canoe oriented from the SE to the NW.  The SE end of the valley is known as the Badger Pocket and the northeast facing slopes have numerous orchards.  These slopes get very little solar energy input in the spring of the year so the trees do not leaf out and flower early.  They are still in bud form during early frosts.

Zoom in and out at this map and check out this protective environment.

http://washington.hometownlocator.com/maps/feature-map,ftc,1,fid,1503111,n,badger%20pocket.cfm

 

Nancy & John still on the Naneum Fan.

Sunday (Oct 2) – we attended in the afternoon the beginning REM (Resource Management) potluck at the chair of Geography’s house.  The weather was fine (no rain as last year), and the turnout fine, and the food great.  Our host cooked BBQ Elk ribs, smoked a turkey, and fixed antelope/deer chili.  There was also a Minnesotan’s made soup with carrots, chicken, wild rice, and it was really yummy.  There were large baked potatoes from the same place I got mine on Saturday.  We ate so much we didn’t need any dinner.

Monday brought good news from my Cardiologist’s nurse, via email:

Nancy,

Just sent the ultrasound report to Dr. Schmitt. Looks great, no renal artery stenosis, no abdominal aneurysm.

CEM

John and I put fruit (Honey crisp apples and large yellow Shiro plums)

http://www.grandpasorchard.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=trees.plantDetail&plant_id=49

and 3 Roma tomatoes for good measure to fill the last small part of the last tray.

John is working on a note to a friend about the photography elements of the dragonfly picture.  I worked on cleaning dishes, handling emails, looking for receipts to be reimbursed for department purchases, and we ate leftovers from yesterday: baked potato and Smoked turkey, adding our own tomato (very tasty).  It is a hybrid Big Boy and our first this year to ripen.  John checked and he paid $1.79 for the seed packet.  We hope for more before the “end” of the season.  We have not yet had a freeze and have our fingers crossed that we don’t.  John cut up some cheddar cheese to sprinkle on the heated potato, and also we put some parmesan/garlic cracker chips on the plate.

Now we have just cleaned up another dehydrator I got at the yard sale last Friday.  We have put peaches & apples in it so far.  I sat down to rest while John finished coring apples.  My hands were getting too cold in the ice water lemon juice we are pre-treating them with.  He finished and now two are working.  We still have one other we borrowed from a friend, so one of these days we will have to load it.

Tuesday.  Was a busy day from the get-go.  Started with getting ready to go to the family physician in Cle Elum.  I missed breakfast, so John stopped at the Cle Elum Bakery (renowned for great baked goods), and we got a plate with donuts and apple fritters on it ($3.00 for five).  Two chocolate bars, a donut with yellow crème in the center hole, and 2 fritters.  I didn’t have my drink along, and John doesn’t like coffee, but I got a cup of brewed stuff to go with mine, putting in half and half and sweetener.  It was quite good. The place has two small tables – both tilt a bit if bumped.  We tried both.  Sloshed coffee twice.  Told owner.  Fix promised.

We had made the trip with time to spare for getting to the 10:45 appt.  John went along because he was also going to get a flu shot (as I was), but I had an appt. to talk about various recent tests and rashes I had, and the need for an inhaler.  All was taken care of with good results.  Cost of the inhaler was a surprise:  $40 and that was after my insurance paid $10.  If it works it will be worth it.

After the appointment we went to BK for a Whopper; had a coupon, buy one, and get one free.  We didn’t get any fries or drink to go along with it.  We don’t think they made much money on us today.

Got a phone call from the Internet tech support here in town, after my complaint this morning to Kansas about our DSL service being impossible (slow, intermittent, zip) starting at 4:30, and still not working at 10:00 p.m. last night.  They finally fixed it.  It was a problem with the DSL connector box 1/3 mile from our house.

I went to town by myself today to my massage therapy session, then to the pharmacy for my meds, and by our car repair garage to schedule my Subaru in for an oil change.  We will be without John’s Subaru all next week while it gets repaired following the kiss & run by the deer.

John went over to do work for the farm family across the street.  He was gone for several hours after I got back home.  I never asked him what time he left.  The dogs and cat were happy to see me.

I put some more tomatoes in the dehydrator, fed the cat, and started working on emails and cleaning up an account that is filling up.  When John came home, it was just before dark, so he fed the horses, outside cats (now he climbs a ladder and puts the food up at the top of the hay shed on the hay, where the 3 cats sleep (and now eat).  The skunk, we assume, will not manage to get up there to steal food.  Then John went and picked strawberries.  I fixed them after dinner, and we will have them on ice cream for dessert.

John fixed our dinner:  leftover Rainbow Trout (from last night), baked potato with cheese, a cut yellow plum, some of his homemade applesauce, and some little crackers.

We decided to wait on putting up fruit till morning (into the dehydrator), and just after I sat down to work on the computer, in comes Rascal with something alive.  I followed him down the hall to the computer room, telling John he had something again.  Turned out it was a brown frog! (small one).  John took the cat and put him outside and I got a paper towel and picked up the little frog.  Took him out to the front yard and released him, alive and well.  Boy, we have quite a little hunter, but I wish he wouldn’t bring them into the house through the doggie door.  It is nearing too-cold for snakes.  Little favors.

Wednesday.  Unusual that it rained all night and most of the day.  Usual stuff for this day; played music (just two of us) at Food Bank Soup Kitchen, and we had Ham/noodle (more like dumplings) soup, green beans, a biscuit and fruit (canned) on sponge cake.  Personally, I didn’t enjoy the fruit at all, after all the fresh fruit we have been eating the past 2 weeks.  At 1:00 p.m. I thought I had time to get to the bank following my blood draws, but they were busy and I had to wait a half hour.  I decided to stay and wait.  So, I was late arriving at the exercise class by about 12 minutes.  It’s okay.  They were happy to see me and Jan had already starting leading the class with my CD of Fifties songs.  After that, I picked up some clothes from a friend, and came on home.  I’m going back in tonight for a Cancer Donation Bingo game, from 6 to 8:00 and searched through the leftover rainbow trout for bones, and have a clean dish of fish.  Rascal had some too.  He loves to eat people food.  Also threw in some leftover pieces of apple fritter and he ate those.  In the mornings, John shares his buttered toast with Rascal.  We will add the remaining fish to spaghetti sauce and I will eat when I get home.

I’m home and just finished eating with John.  We had his homemade applesauce with dinner.  In town, I won one game and picked out a nice red nylon sweatshirt type with a V neck, and an emblem on it saying City of Ellensburg, Adult Activity Center.  Pretty nice for all the time I spend there.  I brought John some toll house cookies from there tonight.  It is still rainy outside, and cool.

Thursday.  Still overcast and now very windy.  Jeez, I hope it clears up before Saturday when we have to play music at a Farm Festival in a field southeast of us!  Just checked the future weather and it claims no rain, light wind (really), and temps at 62.  We both went to town and never got lunch, so I’m sitting here at 5:45 p.m. munching on dried fruit.  John has gone to the neighbors to pick pears.  We are having rib eye steak (was on sale today), and baked potato.  There will be leftover steak he can take tomorrow for his lunch.  He is going again to do trail work at Foss River.  Okay–today, we dropped my car off at Royal Vista and he drove me to get some more of the potatoes and carrots (that come from east of us over past Moses Lake).  We bought probably 40 pounds of potatoes, 10 pounds for a friend, and maybe 20 pounds of carrots.  I lost track because I was in a hurry to get back to play music.  They gave us a box of culled carrots for our horses (broken pieces or really strange looking ones).  After John helped me get into the nursing home with all my stuff, he went shopping.  Came back for me about 3:00.  He took my violin and the vegetables home.  I went over to a Museum presentation at Dean Hall (where I used to teach), on Tall Tales via postcards from all over the U.S.

http://funnypagenet.com/tall-tale-postcards/

http://www.cwu.edu/~web/cwu_news/News.php?ArticleID=2903

It was interesting.  They were going to have a folksinger and someone doing some storytelling, but I just looked at the Museum “show” and introduced myself to a few people, and left.

Then I called John and we met at the auto repair shop. He had the box of carrots and potatoes in the car and we dropped them off at our friends’ house on the way home.  There was only $1.25 worth, and she gave us $2.00.  Said it still wouldn’t cover the gasoline!  On home and my cell phone rang.  It was the fellow at the repair shop.  He had found already that the right-side drive axle was throwing oil and needs replaced. We had heard a funny noise, but had not said anything to him about it.  It was intermittent, and I don’t drive that car very often because it takes higher grade gasoline than our other one.  I had actually forgotten about the noise.  It occurred occasionally when backing out of my “parking” space in the 3-sided shed out front, and backing up to the left, to go out the driveway to the right.  Anyway, in the good ol’ USA we make sharper right-hand turns than left-hand turns.  That causes failure of the right-side drive axle sooner than the left one.  Who knew?  At 53,440 miles.

http://www.popularmechanics.com/cars/how-to/maintenance/1715877

Tonight before dinner Rascal brought in a baby Vole.  We didn’t thank him, but John picked him up and put him outside.  He dropped the Vole from his mouth as John put him out the door, so the door got closed with the vole inside.  John grabbed him up with a plastic bag, and I let Rascal back in.  We hope he gets the idea not to bring home live critters.

Friday.  Nice wake up call.  My Subaru is fixed and ready.  They found an axle last night to install and replaced it this morning along with changing the oil.  A boot on the foot of the axle was spewing oil on the inside of the engine and they found it upon an entry inspection when I took it in yesterday afternoon (at 4:15).  Good we took it in ahead of time because they had time to find and order the part last night.  We began doing business with this place in 1990 after the local Chevy dealer replaced belts but did not tighten the fan back into place.  On a trip to Yakima we had to stop and borrow a wrench to fix it.  21 years later we still haven’t been back to that dealer.

Off today for potluck at AAC (stuffed baked potatoes, KFC chicken, and lots of stuff brought as potluck), and exercise after and to Starlight at 4:00 to wish Morris well in his retirement for health reasons.  He is a wonderful friend, and was hired the same year as I (back in 1988).

John made it home safely from his trip to the woods again, and brought back more of the good corn on the cob, and 25 pounds of Gala apples at 68¢/pound.  While having lunch on the trail, he took a photo of two trees —  see here:

http://www.elixant.com/~nancyh/WTA-WestForkFossRiver/BigTree-WestForkFossRiver.html

It stays dry under the big one and the little “j-shaped” one in the middle of the trail presented a problem.  John cleared dozens of thorny Devil’s Club

http://www.flickr.com/photos/mlafleche2/3615853600/

from the up-hill side (behind the black & yellow rain jacket), dug out a new tread there, pulling the debris around and past the little tree.  Almost like a miracle, it seems the tree just moved to the right.

Saturday.  It was 35 degrees early in the morning before sunrise on the front porch post with just a quick frost away from the house. There was a little wind until about 3 a.m. and then none – Clear sky and no wind and the temp went down.  I was scheduled to be at a family farm 7 miles away to play music.  I dressed warmly in two pairs of pants (denim jeans on top),  and 4 tops.  A cotton ¾ sleeve blouse on the bottom, covered by a windbreaker type V neck shirt, a black sweatshirt with pumpkins embroidered on it, and over that a heavy vest.  I had a glove on my right hand to hold my bow (because it was in the shade and getting cold).  My left fiddle-fingering hand was in the sun, so that was nice.  I took the glove off after 2 hours.  We started playing music just after 10:00 a.m. — eventually there were 6 of us (3 violins, a viola, a guitar, and a banjo).  A couple of our group came in after 3 of us started.  We played till noon and broke for lunch.  They fed us a bowl of chili with all sorts of toppings, and a grilled hotdog, with chips, and an apple.  Drinks were coffee or pop or water.  We went back to playing after a half hour break, and played until almost 2:30 p.m.  That is much longer than we normally play.  We were all tired with sore fingers and arms.  It was volunteer, but they paid us with our lunch, and a Goat Milk Product.  I chose a bottle (canister) of goat milk cream (with other ingredients, such as aloe).  Would have cost me $12.95 if I had bought it myself.  They had soap and various products, including chocolate muffins, which I did not have one of.  John came and picked me up and visited a little with folks there.  While I was gone, he helped our neighbors pick pears and then loaded wood in his pickup and took it over to toss in their woodshed.  He will go back over later and stack it.

I did not sleep well last night, and this play day was tiring, so I came home and lay down at 4:15.  Last I looked it was 4:29, and then John came in from running the dogs and feeding the horses and I awoke (at 5:45).

This morning before we left, John took the dogs and our oldest (and smallest dog), Meghan, got chased and rolled by a coyote.  John saw it and went running toward it, yelling, and it peeled off back into the woods.  Then tonight, the same dog got chased by a deer, and John went toward the fence that Meghan came under and was only 6 feet from the deer.  Again he yelled and when it saw him, the deer ran back down into the pasture.  Annie (our youngest) saw what was happening and she started chasing the deer.  John called her off.  Rather a full day for all.

We had not see the outside cats for a couple of days, but tonight the younger cats (Woody and Little Sue) are back, playing and eating with Rascal, in the top of the hay shed on the side of our house.  We have not seen Big Sue.  We hope she stays away.  We wonder if she returned and took them along with her over to our neighbors across the street, where she had been being fed.  It could be they found their way back to our place where they feel more comfortable.

Once I was home, John picked yellow squash, and really spent most of his time while I was sleeping, picking and de-husking Carpathian walnuts from our 7 trees.   Now he has to find a cool dark place to store them to cure.

Guess I should get this finished and sent to John to put on the blog.  We hope your week has been a good one, and next week is even better.

Nancy & John

on the Naneum Fan.

Saturday night (9/24) at almost 11:00 p.m.  Rascal just brought into the house a live small black Vole (check this link for clarification: http://www.rogerbolger.com/Moles_Voles_&_Shrews.pdf

I got John to capture it, after chasing the cat and “mouse” into the back computer room, and then back to the den, where he had started.  Rascal was flipping him around, and when he would run, he’d grab him in his mouth and tote him around.  Once or twice I gently put my foot on him, and Rascal reached under and grabbed him out.  We froze him.  He was dead when we put him in the freezer (in a bag).   Oh my, we started out this morning with the Steller’s Jay.  Now he has gone back outside.  Wonder what he will bring in next.  I’m going to try to go to sleep.  What a Rascal! We surely named him correctly.  Luckily, he did not bring any more animals in the window, and slept most of the night in bed.  However, in the middle of the night or early morning, there was a cat scream outside the bedroom window.  John got up and looked and Big Sue was on the “veranda” – the entrance to the doggie door window!  He didn’t see anyone else.  He watched her jump down into the yard and sit for awhile.  Then he sent Shay out the window to check, and that made Big Sue move over to the cable table, where she stayed a long while, till John decided to stop watching.  Rascal was on the bed this whole time.

Sunday. “Morning has broken” (as Cat Stevens used to sing), without sun, with a little sprinkle, but cloudy and cool.  John decided to go out and work in the yard awhile after taking the dogs for their morning exercise, and feeding the outside kitties.   Check out this short video with gorgeous pictures set to the music, Morning Has Broken.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ESHjYat9rk

For a longer version with beautiful pictures set to the lyrics, check this 3-minute version.  This is craftily presented even to the footsteps in the sand, “where his feet pass.”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e0TInLOJuUM

Here are the lyrics of this “prayer for anyone that has some faith”:

Morning Has Broken, As Sung by Cat Stevens; lyrics by Eleanor Farjeon

Morning has broken, like the first morning

Blackbird has spoken, like the first bird

Praise for the singing, praise for the morning

Praise for the springing fresh from the word

 

Sweet the rain’s new fall, sunlit from heaven

Like the first dewfall, on the first grass

Praise for the sweetness of the wet garden

Sprung in completeness where his feet pass

 

Mine is the sunlight, mine is the morning

Born of the one light, Eden saw play

Praise with elation, praise every morning

God’s recreation of the new day

We never got to the dehydrator loading yesterday, and we decided to do it today.  I have hand washed the inner parts and the top and bottom, as suggested by the manufacturer for a new unit.  When John returns from outside we will work on filling it.

John finally came in around noon, and we did a few things checking out the peaches he bought, that were in a box on the clothes washer.  YIKES, he screamed, and I rushed to see what was wrong.  I was standing in the kitchen.  He had just looked at the box yesterday (peaches were individually seated in a plastic shelf), but one had gone bad and had black mold and hairy fungi all over it.  It had reached to 4 peaches surrounding it.  John picked out ones around it, and brought the bad ones in.  I cut off the bad part down to where the “brown meat” stopped, and then washed the remaining peach and the knife.  I cut up the remaining parts of the peaches (with skin) into a bowl.  Given another half day might have been disastrous.  John washed a yellow plum and we put half of it in a bowl for each of us, and then I spooned a few peach pieces into a bowl for our lunch.  Before we ate, I put some sugar on the peaches and John held a plastic bag for me to fill to put in the freezer for his next Peach Cobbler.  We took the last of the juice in the bowl, and spooned it over our small bowls of fruit.  After eating them, I heated bacon, and put together a nice BLT for each of us.  Now we are done, but relaxing before we put fruit in the dehydrator.  We need some lemon juice to pre-process the peaches, apples, and pears, and what we have is pretty old.  We imagine it will be okay, however, as it has been refrigerated.

Okay– all done and the dehydrator is loaded and drying.  John and I both worked hard, cleaning the fruit, cutting (mostly John’s doing) and de-seeding (mine), put into the lemon juice (except for the plums).  We started with a tray of Italian plums (halved); next were Honeycrisp apples, and then a tray of pears, two kinds (Starkrimson and Bartlett), finally a tray of peaches.  Hopefully this first load will be a success.

We sliced some of the peaches and put sugar on them to eat later.

John has been out putting up a barrier to keep the horses out from behind the hay shed where the kitties are eating, playing and drinking.  Woody sat up on top of the hay watching John dig a post-hole, and the other two yellow felines were at the top of the ladder in the hay shed, sleeping.  Rascal is in next to me on a blanket, while I type on my laptop.  I forgot to say we made some great cinnamon/sugar sticks today from the leftover pie dough.  We have enjoyed them throughout the day.

Well, what was for dinner?  Surprise; John bought some white/yellow corn on the cob at the fruit-stand stop, and we cooked one tonight for each of us.  They had small and tender kernels, both yellow and white.  I had some leftovers from the Scholarship luncheon (my lettuce/pea salad), and some little yellow tomatoes, and a piece of sour dough toast.  John had corn, toast, and grocery store-boxed fried fish.  I suspect we’ll have peaches on ice cream for dessert.  Meanwhile Rascal has been sleeping all evening; wonder if he will go out “catting” tonight.  Just so he doesn’t return with voles or mice.  We cannot lock our doggie door.  All we can do is close the window, but would rather not when dogs will go out on their own in the middle of the night to potty.

Monday.  Whoa, lots of hospital time this morning.  John carried Annie in to the vet.  She looked at her drain hole on the soft tissue place near her mammary glands.  She said to keep her from licking it and gave some meds, and put “diaper rash cream” on it.  John went to the grocery and bought more.  John loaded our dehydrator again this morning while I was at the hospital.  He put more peaches, pears, and apples in.

I went by myself to the hospital for my two tests.  The first was to get a  Holter Heart Monitor (24 hr.).  While there I was given another EKG, and it looked very good.  My heartbeat was 65 and in normal rhythm.  Then I took a Pulmonary Function Test.  Last one I had was Nov, 2010.  The technician explained all my results to me.  I asked him about the problems I was having with my voice, projection and singing.  He said I would probably improve with an inhaler and I needed to see my family physician ASAP.  I made an appointment this afternoon for Oct 4^th.  We need to go anyway for flu shots.   Afternoon found us both going back to town for my exercise class, and John went to buy us some stamps at the USPS, to the grocery for more things, and to fill the car with gasoline.  We were running on vapors.  We were both hungry from having no lunch, so at 2:30, we went to Burger King for a Whopper each.  I had a coupon for one free with the purchase of another ($3.49).

When we got home, John went over to check at the neighbors about getting them some firewood for the winter.  While there he brought home a few nice tomatoes (for our BLTs tonight with corn-on-the-cob).  Also brought some coats my neighbor gave me.  She has lost a lot of weight and now cannot wear the size I am.  So, rather than give them to Goodwill, she is giving them to me.  Anything I cannot wear, I pass long to my friends, in exercise class or in the music group.

Tonight, I made a CD of my 50s songs from my high school reunion to take to my exercise class this Wednesday.  I did NOT like the new music the staff of the Adult Activity Center made to replace our CD that was sticking some (but only near the end of the hour).  No one else in the class liked it either because there was no beat to keep up with.

Tuesday.  Our morning started with a small breakfast before I went (alone) to the hospital to have the Holter Heart Monitor removed, and then over to deliver some yellow squash in trade for tomatoes at a friend’s, and then off to my 2^nd acupuncture.  It was pretty intense, with me on my side and the treatment concentrated on my bad left shoulder.  He used heat, needles, suction cups, and massage.  I was a little woozy at the end and sat in my car for 20 minutes, resting, before driving home.  I believe it did some good.  The pain became less as the treatment went forward.  I really hope this will break up the scar tissue that is plaguing me and my rotator cuff’s surrounding muscles–affecting my movement and extension (reach) of my left arm.

While I was in town, John went to the neighbor’s, taking down a volunteer cherry tree they wanted rid of, because it unfortunately sprouted in the pathway to the back of their house and also it produced lousy cherries.  They let it get big enough to produce fruit, and when it did, the cherries were mostly skin and seed.  John cut it down and also used his truck to remove the root ball.  Then he came home and worked on weeds in our corral.  He was going to put in a fence post, but the wind was blowing too hard and would have blown up dust and dirt in his face.

Lunch — I fixed a meal from the fruits around.  Here’s what we had:  yellow and red cherry tomatoes, multi-grain crackers and cheddar cheese, a yellow plum and a red one too, and finally a yellow pear.  Fall colors all.

After lunch, we filled the dehydrator again.  Before I left this morning, I had washed all the trays.  John did most of the fruit cutting, and I dunked the fruit into the bowl of lemon juice, and then we shared putting it on the trays.  Things we included were nice large peaches and Honeycrisp apples he had bought on his way home from trail work last Friday.  He intends to go again this weekend and will buy more!  We also cut pears (both kinds), and then finished with 2 large Roma tomatoes.  We’ll see what they dry out tasting like.  I also put the previously dried fruit (peaches, plums, & apples) into two half pound freezer bags for the freezer.  We can take out what we need when we want.

Tonight John fixed a pork roast for dinner, along with onions, carrots, and corn-on-the-cob.  Leftovers went into a black plastic bowl (then frozen) for a meal for John sometime when I’m gone (say, Wed. – see next).

Wednesday.  Well, today was Nancy’s day to go to town to play music and eat at the Soup Kitchen of the Food Bank – aka FISH:

http://www.dailyrecordnews.com/news/article_ffb45f52-68eb-11df-aeb4-001cc4c03286.html

There were only two of us there today; a banjo player and me.  We did all right, considering.  Food was vegetable beef soup, cucumber (Yuk), onion & tomatoes salad, bread with butter, and a strange cobbler, made from Peaches (okay), Plums (okay), and Cantaloupe (WHAT THE HECK?).  From there I moved to the Adult Activity Center, and put in my fifties music to play for my exercise group.  My foot care had been rescheduled from 1:00 to 1:30, and that is the start of my class.  I went ahead and took the appointment because my toes needed attention.  So, I stayed in the class until the lady was done with the person in front of me.  She was running 20 minutes behind schedule because her first client was LATE.  That threw off everyone else the rest of the day.  Some people have no concern for others.  I got finished in time to make it back for a few exercises in class.  I came on home afterwards, and put together a music book for a new member (guitarist) joining our group.  Tonight we had BLTs and chips for dinner.  John picked strawberries and has fixed them, so we will have them on ice cream tonight.

Thursday.  Another strange full day.  Started with the normal stuff we do every morning, and then we both got to work on filling the dehydrator with fruit pieces.  This bunch had pears, peaches, apples and tomatoes.

Then tonight we realized it was no longer running.  So, we ate a late dinner (Chicken, veggies stir fried, tomatoes, and French fries), and called our neighbors 8.5 miles down the road to see if we could borrow their dehydrator.  Went in and visited an hour and brought it home.  It is now finishing our fruit.

Back to this afternoon.  We both went to town.  John dropped me off to play music at Mt. View Meadows and we had a nice bunch of residents who appreciated our being there for them.  They sang along (with words we gave them).  The new activities director made chocolate cookies with choc and white choc chips.  She is trying to entice us to come more frequently – the place was on our once-a month-list – but now only for the 5^th Thur. of the month.   The baking cookies smelled good cooking and then we stayed afterwards and ate them with the residents (many of whom had already eaten theirs while we were still playing music).  John had gone to the grocery store for my meds, and chocolate milk and some other things.  He met one of our players, and traded our yellow squash for pears and little yellow tomatoes.  He also went by the bank to get some money for us both.  He is going again to work trails west of Steven’s Pass, and plans to stop by the fruit stand and buy more fruit as last week.

Yesterday afternoon, when we got back from town, we checked and the dehydrator was no longer working.  In the morning, John had dropped the top power head and cracked the plastic around the switch.  He plugged it in and it worked.  We checked on it the next 3 hours and it was working fine.  Something must have shorted out during the afternoon.

Our trays fit the borrowed dehydrator, so that was good.  They have to be rotated and moved around (up and down the stack, because the heat is on the bottom with no fan).  The new, non-working, one had a top heater/blower (like a hand-held hair dryer).

John leaves at 6:00 a.m. tomorrow morning, for his trail work near the West Fork of the Foss River, south of Skykomish, WA up on the north side of the Alpine Lakes Wilderness.

Friday.  John took off and I had fallen back to sleep.  When I awoke the house heater was running and the cat was beside me, purring.  I went out to feed the outside (untamed) cats, and then fed myself.  Not much, because I was going to go to an assisted living home (where we played music yesterday), having been invited for Baked Potatoes and all the toppings.  I went and it was wonderful.  A real meal that filled us all up. They served us tapioca pudding for dessert.  Sat at a table with 3 gentlemen; two had been Marines or Navy personnel on carriers.  We asked the lady in charge questions and found out it costs $79/ day (“but it is negotiable”) to live there with 3 meals a day and laundry, plus nice things in the rooms (own bathroom, microwave, and frig).  That’s better than going to Holiday Inn.  They no longer allow animals there, however.  Left there and stopped at my friends to pick up some tomatoes.  I will trade her yellow squash tomorrow when I go back to town.

This morning I started by calling the NESCO people in Wisconsin to see what the cost was of a replacement power head.  It would be $15.99 plus $6.50 postage and handling.  Yikes, I’d be better off to get another from Bi-Mart.  It was on sale and the 30-day sale ended two days ago.  I called them and asked if they would consider selling me a new one at the same sale price I had back on September 18^th.  I told her what had happened, and the cost of a replacement, and she said I should just bring back the unit and get a replacement; that they have a 30-day guarantee.  I said, “Well it’s our fault; we dropped the power head unit (it fits on top down into the center of the trays,” but she said she would ask her supervisor.  She did, and they said to bring it back in, and they would just give me a replacement.  Amazing.

I will clean it up tomorrow and repackage it and take it back for a trade.   Meanwhile, today, before going to my exercise class, I stopped at a yard sale at a lady’s house where I bought a lot of clothes last year.  She recognized me and said how much better I looked.  Actually I knew her niece at CWU when I worked there.  As I walked in, I asked if she happened to have a dehydrator for sale.  She did!  Said she never used it and decided to put it in the sale.  I checked it out (on the far back table), and she had a $10 price tag on it.  Obviously, that was a good price, but I bargained anyway, and she dropped it to $8.  It will work fine to help us get through all the fruit John plans to bring home.  Also got 4 paperback book s for John for a quarter each.  Then on to my exercise class.  On the brink of not going, thinking I was tired, but still . . . I went and neither of our regular leaders was there, so I led the group.  They were very happy.  There were only 8 of us there.  Wednesday, there had been 18! (our largest group ever)

After that I took my pills back to the Pharmacy, requesting they halve them.  They are not “scored” and it is a pain for us to do it.  They were willing and have a little implement that does it.  I will pick them up tomorrow.

On to one last yard sale, out south of town in the rural area.  There were lots of clothes and most stuff I really don’t need.  I have many blouses from yard sales, and a lot recently from my neighbor (including the coats and sweaters).  I just browsed and found some wooden frames for a quarter each, that I can give to my artist friend who likes to frame her small paintings.  Coming back around the center table I found a Christmas vest.  It has never been used; still had the tag on it.  It will be perfect for playing music at Christmas events, of which we do many.  There was also a nice white silk blouse to go with it (on another rack).  Each was $1.00.

Then also there were some sweatshirts for certain holidays:  Christmas again, and Halloween, and a nice navy blue Lake Mead Cruise sweatshirt (We wonder – does the company provide these for workers?  Otherwise, why do they exist?)   Each in excellent shape.  Each a buck.  Nice finds.

On the way back home I passed by some friends of friends we have known awhile, and they are moving.  They were having a “farm” sale.  I stopped and went in and reminded them who I was and our connection.   Looked at their stuff but wished John was along to pick out books for himself.  Then I saw some metal fence posts marked $3.00 each.  I’m sure they are worth that, but I said, “If I bought them all, would you make me a deal?  The wife said, “Yes, if you take them all, we’ll sell them for $2 each.  I accepted.  John says we really don’t need that many, but I know he’s always putting up fences to separate the horses, so he will use them.  She also offered me a Fence Post Driver for $5 and I took that too.

We will go back Monday probably to pick them up.  Need to take our old truck, because I don’t want to mess up my Subaru.  As I was leaving I told him where John was and about him getting some yellow plums.   They said they had a yellow plum tree (called Greengage), . . .

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

and they didn’t have time to be moving and pick the plums.  So, they picked a bag for me, and threw in some Macintosh apples.  Wow.  Nice.

John was quite late getting home tonight, because he had to stop by the fruit stand again.  He brought more Honeycrisp apples, some Galas, more yellow plums, some purple plums, more Starkrimson & Bartlett pears, and a box of peaches (harder than those last week), and they gave him a half dozen corn.  Last week he bought $27 worth and this week he bought $47 worth.  She gave him the same excellent price on all species at $1 / pound.  One of the Honeycrisp apples almost weighs a pound, so is probably a 90 cent apple.  All the fruit is beautiful.

Saturday.  Good Lord, Grand Central Station at the Naneum Fan and Rockin’ Ponderosa.  Started at 4:45 a.m. with dogs going out and finding a skunk on the opposite side of the fence, who was returning toward the pasture from eating the outside cat food.  No more leaving food out overnight.  Meghan and Annie (less so) got drift-spray so fragrance came through the doggie door window and then into the house also on their coats.  John turned on the fan to make the filters work to remove some of the aroma.  It’s still in here.  He took off at 5:45 a.m. for his day working on trail again at the West Fork of Foss Creek south of Skykomish.  I turned up the heat a degree and tried to go back to sleep, but it was not meant to be.  A wrong number awoke me at 7:00 a.m.  (This woman calls here a lot; I wish she would get her act together).  About 7:45 a.m. I got a call from a lady in Oregon (there for a funeral) who is planning a big shindig at their farm this Saturday, Oct 8^th, and she has invited our music group to play for the Farm Festival.  She’d like us for all day, but we will get there at 10:00 a.m. and play as long as we can taking breaks.  They will have recorded music to play while we break.  They have a sound system rented with two microphones, and a connection to the pre-recorded music.  But they want us to play tunes of old time music and gospels.  We have invited the Cle Elum (with Yakima players) Bluegrass Jam session folks to join us.  There are also a couple of young violinists from EBRG planning to come.  Perhaps the Anderson’s granddaughter will play Boil them Cabbage Down with us (or we will back her up).

They are planning for us to get there by 10:00 a.m. to get set up

You can go to the BLOG on this site to learn more about the farm.

http://www.andersonfamilyfarm1979.com/gotmilk.html

They have advertised all over the region, at Starbuck’s on the west side, and all over Ellensburg are flyers.  They are expecting a LOT of people.

Maybe as many as 800.  We will be playing on a truck bed with bales of hay and chairs for those who want.  There are rocking chairs if someone wants.  We will get a free lunch (BBQ) and sides.

Okay, back to Saturday.  I went to town for several errands.  Stopped first by the lady’s house who puts on the Scholarship luncheons, to drop off some plastic black dishes that frozen foods come in.  They are dishwasher safe, and she brought a stack to the last luncheon to serve John’s desserts in.  When I stopped, she offered me some fruits: plums, apples, pears, and tomatoes.  I graciously accepted them even though we have a house full of fruit now from John’s carting stuff home.  We also have more dehydrators we can hook up and dry some of this stuff, after we clean and prepare it.  We are both too tired tonight from our long day, so we will do it in the morning.

Left there and dropped off some fruit for a friend on Mt. View, and forgot the reason I was going in to her house.  Duh.  The fruit was an add-on by John, but I left in the frig the requested yellow squash John picked in the dark last night, and I also forgot (in the car), wooden frames I bought for her.

Went on down to Bi-Mart to trade in my broken dehydrator.  Now I have a new one.

I was hungry, so I went for a hamburger.  Then back to the grocery to pick up a dozen sweet things (6 apple fritters & 6 chocolate old fashioned donuts); also got my pills the Pharmacy had cut in half for me.

Off to north of town to a place where I was able to get potatoes (HUGE ones) from the Columbia Basin, for 10 cents/pound.  I got 20 pounds.  Then I got 20 pounds of VERY LARGE (but sweet) carrots for a nickel a pound.  On my way home I passed very close to some friends from the exercise class, where John and I had dinner a month or so ago.  I called and asked if they would like some and they were thrilled.  So I drove by, got her to come out with two bags, and she grabbed six large potatoes and probably as many carrots too.  They have guests coming next weekend so she said they would feed them then.  I should take pictures of these carrots and put them on line to share with you.  They are big and fat, and they are what the local Twin City Foods uses for their cut carrots frozen under many names, such as Belair, and sold across the U.S..  I used to talk about their operation in my Economic Geography class.  I had a blind student once who I got John to go down and a lady went to the top of the pile of carrots outside the plant, and gave him three of the largest.  We compared them to the skinny carrots we get in the grocery store, and passed them around the classroom, so he could feel them and others could see them.  I also had taken a photo with a quarter for scale, some of the large and small carrots, plus an apple.  It is in my PowerPoint I used in the classroom.

John got home at 6:00 p.m. and we spent time unloading both our cars.  His stuff got very wet from working in the rain some today – not all day, luckily.  John didn’t bring any more fruit, but he went to our garden and brought in a RED tomato!!  Our first.  If we get 2 more that size we will have recouped the $1.89 paid for the packet of seeds.  No freezing forecast for the next seven days here high on the Naneum Fan.  Valley low spots hit 31 degrees a few nights ago.

Okay—this is a day late arriving to you.  Hope your next week is a good one.

Nancy and John,

on the Naneum Fan