Sunday (Oct 9) \u2013 Slept in this morning (Nancy did) because of yesterday\u2019s wipe-out day.\u00a0 Then after breakfast and John\u2019s exercising the dogs and feeding the horses and outside cats, I worked on washing dishes, and then clothes.\u00a0 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.\u00a0 After a small lunch, John is going to package up the carrots and put in the big shed in the frig there.\u00a0 He found some very large carrot bags (with holes in them), which we have gotten carrots in from Costco. \u00a0Now what?\u00a0 Blanch and freeze, maybe. Then he packed up about 20 pounds of potatoes and carrots to take to our neighbors.\u00a0 We did, and then we \u201ctraded\u201d her for 5 packages of her newly frozen peaches. \u00a0John\u2019s out shucking Carpathian walnuts.\u00a0 He eventually came into the house, and has been working on apples for making applesauce.\u00a0 We had a long telephone conversation with our friend from California with whom we have not spoken for many months.\u00a0 We are both tired and wanting to go to bed early, but the applesauce is still cooking.\u00a0 Before we hit the hay, Rascal brought in another little frog, this one was green and smaller than the last.\u00a0 We retrieved him alive and put him out near the \u201cpond\u201d in the back.\u00a0 I don\u2019t think the pond has any water in it yet, but it is a shaded depression.\u00a0 We\u2019ve been hearing croaks all summer.<\/p>\n
Monday.\u00a0 Up very early after a restless night, to a rainy day, and the need to take John\u2019s Subaru to town for the body repair.\u00a0 Got there after dropping off John to pick up his pick-up from the place who fixed my Subaru\u2019s axle on Friday.\u00a0 I delivered his Subaru and he picked me up for the trip home.\u00a0 Strange–they said we were a day early, that we were scheduled for tomorrow morning.\u00a0 I KNOW I wrote down Monday, Oct 10th<\/sup> on our calendar and we were thinking we would not have it all week.\u00a0 Oh, well, as long as it is done by Friday (they said yes), because John has to take off for WTA trail repair.<\/p>\n Today will be mostly inside work (probably fruit for sure), as it is raining outside still.\u00a0 Actually, John ended up outside, but inside the barn, moving a ton of hay.\u00a0 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.\u00a0 I was dead tired from not sleeping last night, so I slept for the couple hours he worked.\u00a0 The rain finally stopped about 4:00 and the sun peeked through the clouds for just a few minutes.\u00a0 Rascal had slept with me and he awoke, ate, and went out to play with Woody.\u00a0 They are still playing.\u00a0 Guess they like each other.\u00a0 They look somewhat like siblings \u2013 Woody\u2019s coat is shaggy while Rascal has smooth and shiny hair.\u00a0 Later I looked and Rascal had climbed the ladder and was looking out the top of the hay (under the roof). \u00a0Then later John looked out and saw Big Sue stalking Rascal, so he called Rascal in the back door.\u00a0 She has chased him in the doggie door window before.<\/p>\n Dinner (spaghetti and sauce) early tonight and now it\u2019s too early to go to bed, so we will put up some more fruit in the dehydrator.<\/p>\n Tuesday, whoopee, awoke after a good night\u2019s sleep. John\u2019s 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.\u00a0 Not reloading the dehydrators yet.\u00a0 I have to go to an acupuncture treatment later in the day and play music in town afterwards.\u00a0 I\u2019ll just stay in town for that.\u00a0 Did and all went well.<\/p>\n Wednesday.\u00a0 Today was music at noon and exercise in the afternoon.\u00a0 I also went by Geography at CWU.\u00a0 We had many phone calls tonight, from Vermont, Oregon, and Thorp.\u00a0 Throughout the phone calls John shucked Carpathian (English) walnuts from our trees that he picked today while I was in town.\u00a0 They come out of the green covers a whole lot easier than Black Walnuts.\u00a0 Now after a lot of email work, it\u2019s time for dessert and beddie bye.<\/p>\n Thursday.\u00a0 Stayed up way too late last night (12:30) so slept in this morning.\u00a0 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.\u00a0 Then John and I are going to the \u201cpocket\u201d [see note below] to pick Romes and maybe some pears that didn\u2019t go to market.\u00a0 John\u2019s car is ready so we can pick it up.\u00a0 WHOOPIE.\u00a0 He says it\u2019s mine now.\u00a0 I broke it, have to claim it.\u00a0 The trip for apples was awesome.\u00a0 They picked a large box of Romes, and then some Galas, Red Delicious, Jonagold, and \u00a0Winter Banana:<\/p>\n http:\/\/www.applejournal.com\/gal009.htm<\/a><\/p>\n These last were a favorite or settlers because they would \u201ckeep\u201d well into the late winter.\u00a0 More info here:<\/p>\n http:\/\/www.vintagevirginiaapples.com\/apples\/winterbanana.htm<\/a><\/p>\n 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:<\/p>\n http:\/\/www.nyapplecountry.com\/redrome.htm<\/a><\/p>\n Also they picked Red Bartlett pears \u2013 they are beautiful:<\/p>\n http:\/\/usapears.com\/Recipes%20And%20Lifestyle\/Now%20Serving\/Pears%20and%20Varieties\/Red%20Bartlett.aspx<\/a><\/p>\n While still hanging in the tree, pears are often damaged by birds and then yellow jackets enlarge the wound.\u00a0 We were warned by the matriarch of the family to look at the whole pear before grasping.\u00a0 Good advice.\u00a0 John saw one with about a dozen yellow jackets in one wound.<\/p>\n We are invited back for more if we wish.\u00a0 These trees have been sidelined by changes in the operation and changing tastes of consumers.\u00a0 Most of this fruit will not be harvested for commercial sale, if at all.<\/p>\n Friday.\u00a0\u00a0 John left to work on the PCT near Stirrup Lake:<\/p>\n http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Pacific_Crest_Trail#Washington<\/a><\/p>\n Doing these work trips John figures he has walked about 20 miles of the PCT and has only 2,643 miles still to do.\u00a0 But, he has walked back and forth on the few miles carrying tools, rocks, and a considerable number of mountain blue berries:<\/p>\n http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Blueberry<\/a><\/p>\n This isn\u2019t a good year.\u00a0 They are late, not very sweet, and the bushes, while numerous, are sparsely covered with berries.<\/p>\n While John was away I had lots to do on the computer on the Memory Book.\u00a0 I was too tired to spend an hour driving to town for an hour of exercise, when I was not feeling great.\u00a0 I knew I needed to rest up for this weekend of music.\u00a0 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.<\/p>\n Saturday.\u00a0 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.\u00a0 On my way to their house, only 6.5 miles, I saw 15 deer, and then drove into fog at their house.\u00a0 It was 31 degrees when I left home and 34 at their place.\u00a0 We drove to the Grange and went in for a Hunter\u2019s Breakfast.\u00a0 Ours was free because we donated our music, from 9:00 to noon.\u00a0 We actually ate ham, eggs, and pancakes before starting to play.\u00a0 It was nice and we were appreciated.\u00a0 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.\u00a0 Four of us who went to the Grange, made it back to the afternoon session.\u00a0 That is a small contingent of our normal group, but we did well.\u00a0 At the end, they fed us choices of different desserts, including bread pudding with whipped cream topping, 4 kinds of cookies (homemade) \u00a0and homemade frosted brownies.\u00a0 Also there was peach cobbler and vanilla ice cream.\u00a0 We did not go hungry today.\u00a0 We were invited also to a special dinner at the Food Bank for Search and Rescue that started at 5:00.\u00a0 I didn\u2019t want ham twice in one day, with all the salt, so I didn\u2019t grab John up and take him in when he got home right before five.\u00a0 He needed to feed the cats, horses, and run the dogs, and I was quite tired and wanting to rest.\u00a0 I didn\u2019t even turn on my computer till 6:00 p.m. so I\u2019m a little late getting this draft to John for polishing and posting.<\/p>\n The \u201cpocket\u201d:\u00a0 Local place names can be fun.\u00a0 In this case our Valley is shaped like a canoe oriented from the SE to the NW.\u00a0 The SE end of the valley is known as the Badger Pocket and the northeast facing slopes have numerous orchards.\u00a0 These slopes get very little solar energy input in the spring of the year so the trees do not leaf out and flower early.\u00a0 They are still in bud form during early frosts.<\/p>\n Zoom in and out at this map and check out this protective environment.<\/p>\n http:\/\/washington.hometownlocator.com\/maps\/feature-map,ftc,1,fid,1503111,n,badger%20pocket.cfm<\/a><\/p>\n <\/p>\n Nancy & John still on the Naneum Fan.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Sunday (Oct 9) \u2013 Slept in this morning (Nancy did) because of yesterday\u2019s wipe-out day.\u00a0 Then after breakfast and John\u2019s exercising the dogs and feeding the horses and outside cats, I worked on washing dishes, and then clothes.\u00a0 After John got through catching up on headlines (on the computer, we cleaned peaches, pears, apples and … Continue reading “SATURDAY — Still harvest time”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-875","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-random-issues"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p72iNf-e7","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/rocknponderosa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/875","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/rocknponderosa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/rocknponderosa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rocknponderosa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rocknponderosa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=875"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/rocknponderosa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/875\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":877,"href":"http:\/\/rocknponderosa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/875\/revisions\/877"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/rocknponderosa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=875"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rocknponderosa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=875"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rocknponderosa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=875"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}