By now, regular readers may have noticed that this here blog website looks a bit different. What a change a mere week can bring, and it has been remarked upon elsewhere that over the course of a person’s life, sudden downward lurches can be experienced. The WordPress software which sits quietly in the background, but forms the core of the technology, suddenly roared into my awareness with the update to version 6.9. Alas, this lovely corner of the interweb which had been running continuously for 11 years, suddenly screeched to a grinding halt. And things on the screen looked weird, like really strange. Updates are fretful experiences.
A day or two later, and six hours of effort, the deceased behemoth was resurrected into the format that you, the reader, now see presented today. The process could have been worse, might have been better, but it is, what it is.
Candidly, the website disaster this week was basically a method to force me to conform to certain interweb standards (which I’d previously ignored) for no good reason than I could ascertain. My best guess is that this may have something to do with making the text easier to extract for those arty-fish-al language programs people seem to be so excited about. But deep down, it reminded me of the long ago exhortations to ‘get big, or get out, of farming’. This sort of big stick approach suggests the behemoth that is the giant spiders web of data, might have peaked. Then the strident demands for change must have worked, because in Australia nowadays, something like only around 1% of the population is involved in producing the food that the rest of the folks on the continent eat.
I’m uncomfortable with that, but then so was my grandfather, him who introduced me to the delights of vegetables many decades ago. I doubt he trusted the modern approaches to deliver stuff because, despite working in the heady upper airs of the corporate world and having a salary to match, he resided in a house which had a huge edible garden out back. It had once been a more fashionable tennis court, proving that change is possible. I guess growing up in the Depression era left him with a wider view of future possibilities, than maybe people have now in these more enlightened days.
Tell you what though, they sure now don’t build inner suburban houses like the one he lived in. For a start the parcel of land was almost half an acre. Looking at the freely available aerial and real estate photos of these days, it’s not hard to notice that the house and garden have been split right down the middle. Even with that split, they’re still remarkably large sized blocks of land. Sadly, there’s no extensive vegetable patches to be seen either. It’s all grass and a few desultory shrubs. The old potting shed is still standing though, but was shown empty, and is most likely now used for the tenants storage of stuff.
It’s been such a long time since economic hardship was visited upon the larger portion of the population, that I do wonder if the possibility is seriously even considered by many. Having come to adulthood during the recession of the early 1990’s, the experience was so jarring that it cannot be easily dismissed from my plans for the future. It was a hard lesson to learn, but in some ways it was a valuable one.
On that note, I’d long had a plan B for this website should it ever crash, and a possible replacement WordPress theme (i.e. how this looks to readers) had been chosen. That plan was implemented this week, and other than one hectic day of behind the scenes activities, only the most churlish of readers would see fit to air a complaint. It’s nice to have a plan B, just in case.
Sandra was reading the news from an, err, progressive, left leaning, newspaper this morning. Apparently the claim was made that: “Outer-suburban residents generate 14 times more carbon emissions to get around than those in the inner city.” Far out! I guess the claim could possibly produce a nice glowing virtuous effect for those who live in the inner suburban areas. Such areas have a multitude of public transport options, some of which are free to use, being paid for by residents living in the rest of the state. In fact, I know a few people who live in such swanky areas who don’t even own vehicles, and that’s cool because they don’t need to.
Overall, I’d suggest that the carbon claim is probably true, but it’s only ever part of the overall story. There’s a theme oft mentioned in such heady rarefied inner city circles that somehow our civilisation can, as I’ve heard suggested: “Kick the fossil fuel addiction.” Sorry to be a total buzzkill, but try trucking big city sized quantities of food stuffs from where it is produced, to those same people without diesel fuel, and let’s just admit that it’s not possible. And with only 1% of the population involved in farming, well without diesel fuel, there’ll need to be a lot more human and animal labour involved in that process.
Life without fossil fuels has been tested historically for hundreds, if not thousands of years, and it looks a lot like 90% of the population working at subsistence agriculture. It’s pretty consistent that number. So that’s what kicking a fossil fuel addiction will probably look like, and candidly speaking I’m not into that outcome. It’s not lost on me that I’ve chosen to use fossil fuels to bring back an extraordinary quantity of soil minerals and other resources here for almost two decades now. That is not a task which can be hurried. Without fossil fuels, and growing edible plants here, I’d be facing soil mineral deficiencies of the direst sort, so I’m grateful for the energy.
People are remarkably clueless when it comes to the subject of energy. This is especially weird given it is basically the stuff which stops peoples lifestyles from reverting to the historical norm. One of the blind spots is a focus on only what can be seen in front of the nose, like obsessions about electricity, when the same lifestyles use an enormous quantity of un-seen diesel. With 90% of Australia’s oil coming from overseas sources, I’d say that’s something to be concerned about, yeah.
Electricity is such a small percentage of the energy used daily in Australia (around 15%, maybe 20% at most), but there’s a lot of virtue about the stuff, and anti-coal sentiment is rife in this country. That’s weird because we have huge reserves of the stuff which we seem happy enough to export. A lot of the generation capacity is nearing the end of it’s economic life, and not replacing the retiring coal fired power stations just seems like an ideologically driven choice. The population here is comparatively tiny, so why emasculate ourselves with technology which appears to be making the end product more expensive and possibly unstable? My experience with renewable technology is that yes it can be done, but can everyone else afford this outcome? That’s the deeper question which is blithely ignored.
I’d tend to ignore the rhetoric and defer to the engineers in this instance. The group which has to operate the grid on the east coast of this continent, says stuff which matches my own experience with the renewable energy technologies. You can read about their views here:Energy grid not ready for Eraring coal plant’s closure, AEMO says . We’ve been using off grid solar electricity daily for 15 years, and it’s good, but it isn’t cheap, and 3% of the days each year, we have to run a small petrol generator simply to get some charge back into the batteries. Let’s just say that based on this experience, I have some reservations that the people living in the swanky inner city suburbs making claims regarding fossil fuels, will be happy with the 3% or 11 days each year possibly without electricity. The screaming would be heard from here, 60km away where a car is a societal requirement. Maybe it’s time to construct some plan B coal fired power stations, just in case the glorious renewable future fails to eventuate.
It’s been a stormy old week. At times the rain was torrential, although not a lot of rain fell. The storms came and went quickly. Still, all good things come to an end, and towards by the weekend, the clouds broke and the sunsets were stunning.
Work on the new path project continued. As usual, we’d run out of large appropriately sized rocks, and so had to split some boulders.
The big yellow power wheelbarrow seen in the above photo was used to haul the large rocks back up the hill, using fossil fuels of course. They were then all dumped onto the higher reaches of the new path project on the basis that it is easier to roll them downhill, than back uphill. My logic in this instance can’t be faulted!
The above image shows that this section of the path is being widened about a foot. An electric jackhammer is used to dig into the clay on the uphill side of the path. A mattock, shovel and rake, plus my back, does the rest. The excavated material gets employed to shore up the soil on the downhill garden bed.
The path project has come quite a distance now, and the end point is the worm farm sewage system which can be seen in the above image as the black plastic upside down bin .
The recent work on the uphill side of the new rock wall can be more easily seen in the next photo:
The work was interrupted by more stormy cold weather. Fortunately the surface of the new path project was quite firm, despite all of the rain. Even so, we decided to add a layer of crushed rock with lime onto the surface, which given a bit of sun and then some rain, will firm up nicely. A trailer load of the material was purchased, but we also had a lump of the stuff sitting in front of the house. It’d been there for a long while, possibly two years, or maybe longer. That lot had to go too, so we used all of it on the path as well. Here the lump of crushed rock can be seen in the left hand side of the next photo adjacent to Dame Plum.
The pile has gone now, and the front of the house is looking clean and neat.
Unfortunately, there wasn’t enough material to fully cover the path. Oh well.
In breaking produce news:
The huge Babaco fruits are now becoming ripe. Each of those fruits provides enough for three days of breakfasts. When they’re mostly ripe, they’re yummo tasting and ready to eat!
The Alpine Strawberries continue to provide about 1/8th of a cup of fresh berries every two days. The aroma is superb, although the taste is about half that of the more usual larger hybrid strawberries. But! The Alpine variety of plants are so much easier to grow, and far more resilient. Hybrid strawberries are weaklings.
Warm and damp weather is perfect for citrus, but the ants sure are problematic. Those cheeky insects farm sap sucking aphids on the leaves. These in turn supply the ants with sugars. I’d be OK with that symbiotic arrangement, except the aphids leave their poop all over the place in the form of a sooty mould. Leaves and stems can be cleaned with warm soapy water, but it’s easier to simply not allow the ants onto the trees in the first place. A thick band of petroleum jelly (Vaseline) is smeared around the trunks of each of the citrus trees, and the ants struggle with the slippery surface.
Citrus is an important tree crop here, and we grow a lot of different varieties. During the winter months, despite what city folks may believe, there is no other fresh fruit to be had in this southerly clime.
Onto the flowers:
The temperature outside now at about 10am is 16’C (61’F). So far for this year there has been 811.2mm (31.9 inches) which is up from last weeks total of 802.4mm (31.6 inches)
Monday 8th December 2025
Comments
47 responses to “A Glorious Future”
Chris
Todays musings prompted me to send you the link below. Enjoy!
Kezza
https://www.fresheconomicthinking.com/p/fet-65-energy-economics-and-policy?initial_medium=audio&post_id=176607209&publication_id=281260&r=27vz95&triedRedirect=true
Yo, Chris – The blog changed? Hadn’t noticed. 🙂
I wonder if your grandfather got any flack, for digging up the tennis court and putting in a vegetable patch? Given what you’ve said about your grandfather, I doubt anyone would dare.
Economic hardship? Coming soon to a neighborhood near you. Inner suburban neighborhoods are all well and good, for mass transit. But who can afford to live there? And if you can afford to live there, would you deign to lower yourself to using mass transit? Looking at who uses those services, it’s usually “the help.”
Besides “get big or get out,” another agricultural saying is, “Make hay while the sun shines.”
That was an interesting article about coal plant closures, and alternative energy. That the system won’t be “up to snuff,” when the need becomes great. I also noticed the sidebar, about ending some energy subsidies. Apparently, the “cost of living pressures,” have ended. Yeah, sure.
We have a coal plant, here. For fifty years. It’s being wound down. And, the proposed hydrogen plant , that was on the drawing board, is apparently a dead issue. Government grants and subsidies dried up.
Your weather presents you with an ever-changing panorama. Often, quit beautiful.
Sisyphus would agree with you. Much easier to roll rocks downhill, than up. 🙂 Might have been worse. He could have ended up like poor Prometheus, with his liver (which grew back overnight) eaten daily, by eagles. Never mess with the gods. Their punishments are inventive.
The New Path is beginning to look like a superhighway. I haven’t got my invite to the ribbon cutting, yet. I bet the ficus and poppies will quit like the runoff from the crushed rock, and lime. Along with all the other soil additives you tossed on that patch.
Looks like the Babaco will provide you with breakfasts, for two or three months. More, if you alternate with something else. Just so you don’t get the dreaded Babaco Fatigue. 🙂
“How do you like them lemons?” Opps. The saying is actually, “How do you like them apples.” Source? Shakespeare? The Bible? Ben Franklin? Mark Twain? Nope. WWI soldiers. As they sent mortars called Toffee Apples, at the Germans.
I bet those citrus flowers are really fragrant. Geraniums amaze, with their varied shapes and colors. The Canary Island Foxglove are really striking. Rhododendrons, we hardly knew ye. Lew
PS: Prof. Mass has another post on possible flooding. On top of the flood warnings, our local forecast also has a high wind warning. From 7am tomorrow, to 10pm. 15-25mph with gusts up to 45mph.
He also has a link to the NW River Forecast, site. I’ll be watching the Cowlitz (though that’s mostly an east county problem) and the Chehalis, Newaukum, and Skookumchuck rivers, which effect different parts of our two towns. Their forecast to hit flood stage, and might even set records. They don’t even cover local drainage, by Salzer Valley Creek, Coal Creek, and China Ditch. Those also create a lot of problems.
Hi Kezza,
Thanks for the link to the podcast. What was your opinion of the discussion? I’ll have a listen over the next few days as time permits.
Cheers
Chris
Hi Lewis,
Hehe! Very funny, and the look may have changed, but all of the characters here remain the same. Given the sheer volume of change foisted upon us all, it’s nice that some things stay the same, like the good chats here.
You know, funnily enough, outside of family, I don’t reckon the old bloke was big on entertaining at home. He had his clubs and connections and usually headed outwards. It’s possible that his many business and social connections never knew about the huge edible garden he tended. But there is that side of the story which you mentioned – Would anyone dare say something about it, even if they knew? I doubt it, he had a commanding personality.
The old place has been divided down the middle, in what is called a duplex, and rented out since his wife (my grandmother, the odd one) died back in 1991. It was surreal to see photos of the insides of the potting shed now as if he’d just cleaned it out.
And I’m absolutely 100% with you about the housing affordability issue, and it’s especially cruel in those swanky locales. That story is completely off the charts crazy. It’s like someone came up with the idea of segregating a city upon economic lines, it’s gotten that bad. It’s easy to not have a car and avoid being held to account for the pollution, when a person utilises private taxi services where the drivers are probably doing it tough on minimum wage with debt on the vehicle.
Well, yes, that old saying reflects my outlook: Make hay whilst the sun shines! On that note I did a shandy of paid work, and work around here today. Up a ladder in the full afternoon sun, and the four sun blinds were installed. Oh, my, gawds! They’re so amazing, that a decision was made to obtain another two of the blinds so as to provide more complete window coverage. Where the double glazed with almost half an inch thick glazing (with argon gas in between the two panels) had the sun shining upon it, that was warm to the touch. Yet, in the shade of the blinds, the same glass was cool. This is an old school idea with legs! Far out installing them in the full summer sun was a hot experience though.
Yeah, being off grid, we never saw any of those energy subsidies you mentioned, but they’ve added up to $75 a quarter for a few years. I’m not sure people will be happy when the largess is removed. Man, I’m not schilling for coal, but far out, I’ve learned the reality with the renewable energy technology that nature will provide only when she is good and ready, and not one moment earlier. When playing in that realm, we’d be best advised to listen to the lady, and not ask for seconds like some Dickensian orphan. Cost of living pressures are only building.
Thanks, and how cool was that photo of the heavy storm rolling in? The wind really blasted the side of the house when it hit along with brief heavy rain, then calm and the sun returned. Air from that frozen continent way to the south often produces such storms.
🙂 One does their best to ensure that the gods never notice ones presence! Heracles, is Hercules, is Conan the Barbarian. Such figures arise when the need for myth of epic deeds is great, or just basic courage.
The run off from the crushed rock with lime will certainly produce some good plant growth in that new bed with the ficus and Californian poppy seeds. None have germinated yet, but they’ll get there. Quite a few yellow and cream poppies are growing strongly about the place.
A good point about Babaco fatigue, although I’m not easily bored. Looking back over how things were last year, we had heaps of raspberries, but this spring has been rather cool, so far. Although today felt hot at 86’F, especially when out working up a ladder in the sun.
It’s a good saying that one about the apples, although it has a strong touch of the gallows humour about it.
The citrus flowers have a really strong aroma, which is very pleasant to encounter, yup. The bees, and other pollinating insects are very busy when the sun shines with the force with which it did today. The hum is audible, and sadly when the bees decline due to the mite pest, it’ll be only the early pollinating varieties of plants which struggle. And they’re marginal anyway. The rest of the growing season, the place jumps with life. I’m still of the opinion that the European honey bee will be fine, eventually. They’ll adapt their cycle to thwart the worst deprivations of the mites, but they may not be as docile as they are today. Beekeepers over the centuries pushed the insects in that direction. Hmm.
Thanks for mentioning the Professors blog, and 15 inches is a lot of rain in anyone’s language. Seems like some areas will cop it far harder than others, Hopefully H and your good self avoid the worst of that monster atmospheric river. Is that a pineapple express? Dude, it’ll be problem central for a while with that amount of rain, and wind. Be especially careful around trees in that weather.
No worries at all, and I enjoyed the article on the egg, although we’re all left with mysteries, like who sold it (possibly the character in a bit of alleged trouble A, something or other) and who bought it? A lot of mad cash sure changed hands.
Yeah, I got to see a factory which made boots, shut down back in the rocking early neoliberal days. It was an awful moment, and the quality of the boots was pretty good. My grandfather had a buy Australian made stuff outlook on life, and he’d have been livid by what went on. The old timers used to have a quaint, but disturbing saying about changes which would make the dead roll in their graves.
Oh yeah, that update drama was extensive, and one clever critic described it as the most problematic experience ever. Honestly, after what happened here, I’m inclined to agree with the observation. Makes me wonder what they were thinking. And by the way, I tried some of those helpful work around suggestions. No dice. There’s almost a level of implied contempt for users in how it all rolled. Not a fan.
🙂 Most likely a deer bone. It’s elementary my deer Watson! Sorry for the bad deer pun…
Oh, I’d not considered your social security or medical system in that light, and it all seems rather devious and shifty. The South Park cartoon on the medical system we discussed a while back had an almost Kafkaesque wearing out of the individuals caught up in that web.
Having a nice salad for dinner this evening, with a chunk of tasty cheese (yellow, sorry), fresh greens from the garden and a couple of boiled eggs. Yum!
Go the Chex mix, and hope that it is well received.
🙂 True. Dunno about other households, but I’m fastidious about serving size, listen to the body, and don’t always get it right. Street scenes of everyday people from four or five decades ago look very different to the people today, but I reckon economics will sort that whole story out. A person can only afford to eat as if they’re celebrating, when they can afford to do so, and maybe a little bit beyond that.
But yeah, there’s a lot of food waste going on.
Cheers
Chris
Chris
Commentary via above link is relevant to your musings re energy needs/usage etc. Cameron Murray argues that solar energy is free at source, as is coal, oil & nuclear for that matter, but the costs of solar energy transmission via an enlarged grid are already quite burdensome, will be ongoing, and will impact mainly on those who do not have home solar installed. The question then is: is this an unfair arrangement?
(More to the commentary than that though)
Btw: Not wanting to tell you how to suck eggs but the following info may be of interest or even useful. I use a set of JLab Sport Bluetooth earbuds to keep up with the blogosphere while working outside – they don’t fall out and are good value at around $60 odd. (JBHifi). Aldi have roolly cheap earbuds on sale (<$30) this coming week.
Hi Kezza,
Ah, thanks for the additional information on the podcast, and you may have heard of the Ausnet transmission lines cutting through huge swaths of farm land in Victoria? The build out of transmission lines may be more expensive than the population wants to afford.
I’m not sure I follow the argument about home solar somehow making life cheaper for end users. I’ve heard many electricity plans are now offering free electricity between say 11am and 2pm, possibly in a bid to improve grid stability by increasing demand during peak solar generation hours? Dunno, but nobody wants to experience what Spain went through, and control of the grid on the supply side of transformers (which solar feeds into) is notoriously complicated.
No stress at all, and how good is JB Hifi? 🙂 Can’t do Aldi, sorry it’s a personal thing. The machines make a lot of noise when working outdoors, so my preference is music. I tend to prefer podcasts when sitting behind the wheel.
Cheers
Chris
Chris
Used to frequent JB when a single scungey store in Elizabeth Street. And look at them now!
Kezza
Yo, Chris – “…segregating a city among economic lines.” So it has always been. Seems like more fashionable (and expensive) neighborhoods have always been with us. Gives the proles something to aspire to. 🙂 I hear New York City, is pretty much only for the rich, these days. Heights, have always been desirable. So you can look down on the rest of humanity, and catch a breeze. There’s been some new work, in Pompeii. They’re beginning to think some of the posh residences had towers. Great views of the Bay of Naples and the aforementioned breeze. There were these grand staircases to nowhere. And then they started looking at wall paintings.
Sounds like the blinds are really working out. Another stroke of genius, from The Editor and Chris. 🙂 Do they come up and down, fairly easy? Might have to remove them in bad weather.
Our high yesterday was 55F (12.77C). Our overnight low was a steady 50F (10C), all night long. The forecast high for today is 56F. Oh, it is bucketing down. Around the Institution, the lawns and some of the walks are flooded. We got VERY wet, when we went out for our morning walk. The high winds haven’t materialized, yet. A gust or two at 18mph. But it’s a long way to 10PM, when it’s supposed to slack off.
It was an oatmeal and fruit making morning. Enough for about three days. I never get tired of it, either.
I think the wild bees, and European bees that go bush, will be ok. As long as they keep themselves, to themselves. 🙂 As long as there’s plenty of flowers provided. As your good selves do.
Speaking of rolling over in graves, Sam Walton who founded the Store of Walls, was “buy American” all the way. He was much beloved, by his employees. He used to travel around, sort of incognito, interacting with ALL his employees, on a personal level.
Speaking of graves, I should be getting an interesting book from the library, fairly soon. “To Die For: A Cookbook of Gravestone Recipes.” (Grant, 2025). Who knew? I certainly didn’t. Might have to add that one, to my cookbook collection.
What were the blog platform people thinking about? Certainly not the end user.
That South Park episode about our health “care” system, was totally accurate.
There’s a serving size trick I picked up, somewhere or another. Use small plates and bowls. Makes it seem like you’ve got a lot. I noticed, when I had breakfast at that cafe, that the plates were smaller, than what we used, back in the “old days.” Made the smaller portions, look adequate. When I have my two squares of dark chocolate, every other day, I break them into eight pieces. It really extends the experience, time wise.
I ran into Kenna, yesterday, and gave her a small bag of the Chex mix, and some Anzac biscuits. She said they were ideal for settling in with a cup of tea and a good book. I think there will be a lot of that, over the next few days. Lew
Hi, Chris!
That’s nice of you to offer us a Glorious Future instead of free hugs. I accept.
Hmm . . . Peak Internet is here, do you think? And do you think this last update mess of the blog is a blood offering to the AI vampires?
No complaints here about the new look. I think it works fine. You did a great job. Thank you!
There are railroad tracks about a mile away from us and almost every time I hear a train, I stop and listen to it go by and say “Thank you!”. I say “Thank you” for my car (which is snowbound again today), too.There is no public transportation out to our rural areas. Nor does a train stop out here as it did long ago. There are old stations all over the place that were turned into residential homes. I have known quite a few people who think it would be cool to go back to using horses again as transportation. I can only say that they must not have known any horses (I have). I suspect that in a per capita comparison, more people have been killed in the past by horse accidents than car accidents.
I am so glad that you have coal. We have it, too, though huge amounts of it have been exported over the years. That has made me very nervous.
You are closer to the Big Smoke than I thought.
Not just in the Future – Glorious rainstorms and sunsets are now. Thanks!
You know, you actually could be Boulderglade Farm. Where do they all come from? Real boulders are fairly rare at our house. And they are beautifully lined up. Yay! for downhill.
What does it look like inside the black plastic upside down bin?
In the photo of where the crushed rock pile near the house used to be, I see 3 paths. I expected to see signposts for each one.
I can’t believe how well the babacos are doing. In all of this lengthy subfreezing weather we have been having, my alpine strawberries still have green leaves and blossoms, but no fruit. There are certainly no pollinators out. What a great anti-ant (Aunty Ant?)idea: Vaseline.
What beautiful and dainty citrus flowers. They smell good, too.What could we call that color of geraniums? They are gorgeous. And it’s so nice to see elderberry flowers since I no longer have any, except that I am pretty sure that they are going to pop up again in the garden. They always have. I love the Canary Island Fox gloves. I like your other variety, also. What a big rhododendron; still going strong. Thank you!
From last week: I don’t think businesses here get a Christmas break, though I could see where accountants might get a small one before all hell breaks lose after New Year’s, when many people panic (raising hand) about getting their taxes done by April 15.
Pam
Hi Kezza,
No doubts about it, that lot are probably doing OK. Fun side story: way back in the day when 3XY ruled the Melburnian airwaves with almost a quarter of the listenership. So I went to the store in Keilor East to purchase an AM stereo tuner to listen to 3XY in stereo. The audio AM was pretty good and the tuner a real collectors item. Of course, 3XY moved to the FM band, became EON-FM, then MMM. Here’s the joke though: You can’t pick the market, because I sold the tuner recently for about $10, which was as much as it’s worth. There’s only maybe two AM stations in the entire country broadcasting in that old stereo format. And get this, the dude who bought it, lived outside the transmission area of either of those AM radio stations. Incidentally, the bright yellow, with hand painted sales signs on black plastic were a thing back then. 🙂 The Elizabeth St store is a blast from the past, because it looks the same, although the product mix is different.
Went into the big smoke today, and listened to the podcast. If they’re five years ahead, mate, I can tell you what things look like with fifteen years of everyday real world experience with the technology. I’m no fan of nuclear, mostly because those giant machines take way too long to build, and they’re always so far over budget that, let’s just say that talk is cheap.
Cheers
Chris
Chris
I grew up in Melbourne in the 50s & 60s Loved the place and the rather subdued pace back then, but left to find work interstate in 1970 and never moved back.
Last visited a couple of years ago. Too big for me now.
Kezza
Hi Pam,
Thank you for accepting the lovely invitation to the glorious future, but hey, I don’t mind hard work which is what a lot of that story looks like, although eventually it’ll probably be the end of me! 🙂 Hugs are nice too!
Interweb blood sucking vampires taking control of the software. Sounds like an horrific short story, which ends badly. The blood offering was made last week, but Pam, are the AI vampires truly happy?
Thanks so much for the lovely feedback on the new and improved website. It’s all very flash looking. Tell ya what though, it was a real kick in the guts that morning to see that the core update brought the interwebsite to it’s knees. It sure looked strange to me at this end, but you knowwhat plan B’s require, is implementation at a moment of crisis. More hard work…
Those old unused stations could be repurposed for passengers and freight, if needs be. It’s like opening the national forests in the US to firewood collection during the mid 1970’s oil crisis. Unthinkable change can happen. There are a few unused railway stations on this line as well, although they’re abandoned, and not used as houses. Dunno about you, but the freight trains usually run at night, and they’d disturb my slumber. It’s about 6 miles from here to the nearest railway station, which has fast trains into the big smoke every hour.
Ha! I’m with you in relation to horses. Oh yeah, it’s an idea which seems nice in theory. They can be cantankerous creatures with strong wills. Respect for having spent time handling the creatures. Those skills are outside of my experience.
Yeah, the export thing is necessary for countries who are dependent on imports. Stuff purchased from elsewhere, usually has to be paid for, thus the exports. It ain’t just you either. We’re a major gas exporter, and um, well, local demand for gas is beginning to outstrip the supply allocated to locals. People are cracking it about the export story, without realising that we also import 90% of our oil products. You can’t do one, without the other, and this is basic trading stuff. If a country was independent of imports, well, then it could keep whatever it had at home for local use and rudely give the rest of the world the middle finger. But this was not the option chosen by our elites in the 1980’s, no, they thought it was clever to become import dependent. And here we are today.
😉 Tell ya a little secret – this side of the big smoke is unfashionable. Winning. It’s pretty rural and remote around here, and likely to stay that way.
How good was the thick wall of water in that storm photo? It sure was intense.
Ancient outcropping of lava flows are where the boulders originate. During the last ice age, down under was not heavily glaciated, like your part of the world may have been. The ice sheets ground down most of the boulders into mineral rich soils where you are, at a wild guess.
People may blush if I showed the insides of that bin!
Thanks for the signpost suggestion, and it reminds me of the MASH camp.
Alpine strawberries are super hardy and robust plants, unlike their featherweight hybrid cousins – whom I simply don’t understand. Good to hear that they’re doing well at your place too, even now, although not producing – which they wouldn’t here either. Repurchasing the hybrid plants every single year, sounds like a scam, and it rarely makes economic sense. So Alpine strawberries it is.
Aunty ant has reported back saying that the ant collective are rather annoyed with me. Should they be pacified?
Did you move your lemon into the basement before the snow? It’s red, no, purple, no mauve. Far out! Words are not well purposed for such naming activities. Elderberries are weedy, and how good is that! The insects and birds love those plants.
It’s summer here, thus the Christmas break, although retail is only usually closed on the public holidays. Things were very different on that front when I was a wee-young-laddie, as was probably the case in your country, maybe?
Cheers
Chris
Hi Lewis,
Ook! Perhaps my simple throw away by-line didn’t quite convey the segregation situation as it actually is. It’s no longer just a case of well, there’s an upmarket and downmarket area to neighbourhoods. No. Vast swaths of the city, are now unaffordable, so the downmarket areas have been pushed to the outer areas. We certainly could no longer afford to live in the area where we sold back in 2008. No way. The median house price there is now something crazy like $1.6m, and it takes a big household income to pay for that story. If I may put it bluntly, the help have been swept clean from those areas. Probably not a smart move.
Way back in the day, suburbs had good and bad areas, and the rich often lived cheek by jowl with poor folks. What’s going on now, is a vast social experiment, which will probably end badly. All it takes is for housing supply to outstrip demand, and prices will fall to a new lower equilibrium. The average age of owners around these parts is not young, and there’s a lot of property for sale at the moment.
That big city you mentioned would leave me feeling neurotic, and who wants that? 🙂 There were probably eras when it was a super fun place to live.
Oh wow! The House of Thiasus representation looks awesome, and would not be out of place today. Thanks, and it makes sense that the wealthier of the Roman folks would want to sample the upper airs.
Went into the big smoke for work today, and on the way back, picked up another two of the sun blinds. The collection is now complete! The Romans probably had sun blinds given the hot environments that lot lived in. The blinds go up and down quite easily through a simple (detachable) crank mechanism. Wind will be a problem with them, although they’re really only for use during the late afternoons of hot days. If I’d designed the house better, the verandas would have been deeper, and the bushfire shutters would sit on the outer edges of the building. But alas, insight often comes after much cogitation and experience. Oh well.
It was another day of 68’F here, and gloriously sunny. Of course I was hard at work banging away at a keyboard and looking at a screen. Didn’t even really talk much today.
Yikes! That’s a lot of rain, and I don’t recall you mentioning puddles and standing pools of water before. How’s the local creeks and rivers coping with the deluge? Fingers crossed you dodged the worst of the wind. It’s not a comfortable combination of weather events what you’re experiencing. Have the souls of the damned hiding in the elevator shaft been quiet?
🙂 Takes one, to know one! Food sometimes surprises me, and not always in a good way, but it’s never boring. Long ago I used to have a friend who’s mum ran a restaurant kitchen. Can you believe, he once complained to me that his mum only knew 30 dinner recipes and he was bored with them all. It took a while for the shock to wear off before I could confirm that he’d said what he had. Try eating a lamb chop and three boiled (badly) vegetables for days on end, and he’d be singing a different tune. Novelty can be tiresome, and I found that to be the case when travelling. I always longed for the comforts of home.
Yeah, exactly. The bees will be fine, eventually. How many farms requiring the service of those bee pollinators lock away some of their land for growing flowers to attract, feed and maintain colonies of local insects?
I noticed the bloke you mentioned also used to encourage the local management to invest in the stores. A sound strategy, as people are noticeably less careless when it comes to the prospect of losing their own mad cash. Wonder if that happens nowadays? It’s pretty clever to simply walk around and talk to people on the ground. Hmm. Most of our current leadership in politics and business, insulate themselves from that act. Hmm.
Well I’d never heard of recipes being preserved on gravestones either. Food is a lovely way to recall the departed who once shared their culinary skills. Unless they were awful in the kitchen, and then perhaps there may be a guilty element of relief? That’d make for an interesting book, or follow up. Gravestone recipes I wish I’d never made!
The blog platform folks were probably thinking about the bots. Certainly my own concerns were hardly on their minds.
🙂 Worn out and defeated, was how the South Park kids ended up looking.
Thanks for the handy tip, and yeah presentation is important. Some swisho restaurants put tiny serving sized on very large plates, and that seems weird to me. The dogs are handy for reducing portion sizes and sharing food, like say, muffins. 🙂
A cuppa of tea, and an Anzac biscuit sounds ideal. Kenna is onto something there for sure. The addition of the book and a relaxed calm space is perfection. One could of course ask for more, but there is little better than perfection, is there?
Cheers
Chris
Hi Kezza,
Yeah, Melbourne was pretty chill up to a point where population pressures and wealth disparity changed the underlying culture. I used to outrage my neighbours by drying the clothes in the front yard of a Fitzroy North terrace house, just because it had the best afternoon sunlight. They were probably happier after we left!
I hear ya about that, but visit it often enough that it doesn’t become unfamiliar. Sometimes the difference between the bush and city can be quite jarring, so I work at minimising that. Yeah, I hear you.
Cheers
Chris
Yo, Chris – Some interesting historic photographs. Check out #34. The Forestry Building. My school class took a field trip there, the year we were studying local industries. Before it burned down in 1964. It was, I think, the last building left over from the 1905 Lewis & Clark Exposition. That might have been the year we went out and planted trees, in the Tillamook Burn.
https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/35-absolutely-fascinating-rare-historical-165155782.html
Though I’ve never been, I’ve always been enamored with the idea of New York City. Until I realized the New York I yearned for, was the New York of the 1940s-60s. 🙂
Well, weather. Our high yesterday was 57F (13.88C). Our overnight low was 46F (7.77C). The forecast high for today is 53F. It rained very hard, all day, yesterday. I don’t think it let up, once. H and I got wet, several times. The high wind didn’t really materialize, at least here. I think the worst gust was 18mph. There are high wind warnings, for tonight, but only in the mid 20s.
Not much flooding, so far. Some farmland. A couple of towns in the east county were cut off, due to road flooding. But most roads that had a bit of water on them, were still listed as “passable.” But, they’re talking about a “double river crest.” We’ll get some run-off, today, but a worse storm is coming in tomorrow, and the river levels are forecast to really run up.
I ran down to the yuppie discount store, last night. to stock up on a few things. There was a lot of standing water, nearby.
I’m going to make banana muffins, for the library kids, tonight. I hope they’ll be open, so I can deliver them, tomorrow.
I think we’re seeing more employee owned, businesses (socialism!). Bob’s Red Mill, Winco … etc.. The big new here is The River is to open a warehouse, here. But I don’t think it’s a done deal. The country is already salivating over the tax income. And, there was some loose talk about 500-1,000 jobs. Housing is so tight, I don’t know where we’d put them. Although, a lot of their workers are itinerant old people, who live in RVs. Sometimes, they even provide parking. See the movie “Nomadland.” Or, read the book of the same title.
In other, sort of local news, a big fertilizer company (Nutrien), is to build a big transit facility, at the Port of Longview. That’s 45 minutes down the freeway, from us, on the Columbia River. They’ll be shipping potash, which is mined in our SW.
I forgot. Pineapple Express is what they used to call atmospheric rivers. A rebrand. 🙂 Either someone didn’t want it associated with a drug fueled movie, or, maybe the Dole pineapple people, objected. 🙂
I must admit, sometimes I’m at lose ends, as to what to make for dinner. Not that I don’t have plenty of options. It sort of depends on how many other things I’ve done, during a day, and how much effort I want to put into it.
I saw my buddy Scott, last night. Tough times. His wife is in the hospital in Olympia. 8 days in the ICU with blood clots in her lungs. So, he’s spending a lot of time, running up and down the freeway, in this weather. She seems to be getting better. They moved her to a regular room. He’s been her primary caregiver, since September, and needs a bit of respite. Lew
Chris:
Ah, well – best, perhaps, to die in the saddle.
The AI vampires cannot be happy, nor can they be sad. They can only drink blood. And more blood.
You are so good about having a Plan B. I do try.
Here is the catch, I think, about repurposing the old train stations that are now dwellings: The land in this county is so expensive, especially with a house on it, that could the county afford it, or even the state? Or would it be national as it is a railroad? Ah – you are thinking Eminent Domain. Here is an excerpt from Wiki, so you don’t have to go through the whole thing.
“Eminent domain,[a] also known as land acquisition,[b] compulsory purchase,[c] resumption,[d] resumption/compulsory acquisition,[e] or expropriation,[f] is the compulsory acquisition of private property for public use. It does not include the power to take and transfer ownership of private property from one property owner to another private property owner without a valid public purpose.[5] This power can be legislatively delegated by the state to municipalities, government subdivisions, or even to private persons or corporations, when they are authorized to exercise the functions of public character.[6]
The most common uses of property taken by eminent domain have been for roads, government buildings and public utilities. Many railroads were given the right of eminent domain to obtain land or easements in order to build and connect rail networks. In the mid-20th century, a new application of eminent domain was pioneered, in which the government could take the property and transfer it to a private third party for redevelopment. This was initially done only to a property that had been deemed “blighted” or a “development impediment”, on the principle that such properties had a negative impact upon surrounding property owners, but was later expanded to allow the taking of any private property when the new third-party owner could develop the property in such a way as to bring in increased tax revenues to the government.”
But what gets me about the exporting of something like coal is that it is a non-renewable natural resource and thus should belong to the people of this country, or at least to the state it is in. And we should all be able to vote on its use. Oops, that would mean that we are a democracy.
Was your area unfashionable when you moved there or is it slipping back? Actually, I gather that it was once fashionable and has already slipped backwards.
I got you about the bin. Yuk.
I had to look up about glaciers and Virginia. Apparently, they stopped just north of this state.
I had forgotten about the MASH camp. I haven’t seen that show since it came out.
I don’t know about pacifying Aunty Aunt and her crew. Could you make a deal with them? Yeah, sure – just like with all the other wildlife. I almost stepped on a squirrel on the back porch today who was looking through a black plastic trash bag. I saw his nose through a hole in it. There was only soil in the bag, so I wondered why. Ah ha! Maybe he had buried a nut in it. I couldn’t get out yesterday or today because of the snow. My son could in Mr. Musty. Tomorrow should be okay for my old car.
Yes, the lemon tree is in the basement and covered with what appears to be ripe fruit. I almost picked one today, but decided to wait a bit longer.
In my youth, retail was certainly always closed on Sundays – that was law – and holidays. Lots of places were closed on Saturdays, too.
“By trying we can easily learn to endure adversity. Another man’s, I mean.” Mark Twain
Pam
Chris,
Things have been a bit weird the past few days. And the carving club meeting Saturday was extra active, meaning the official part of the meeting over which I preside lasted far longer than I like. I am still in “restore myself” mode and am somewhat unfocused. Nothing bad happened, it was just long.
Meanwhile, the storm systems came in much warmer than was initially forecast. Almost hot, they were. ALL of the lowland snow was disappeared by noon Saturday. We have been setting record high temperatures most days starting Saturday. And rain. Rained more all day Monday, then the winds hit with even warmer temperatures. The peak wind gust was 56 miles per hour. Interestingly, the temperature peaked overnight at 56F. Yes, one of those “winter” storms we get in which the highest temperatures hit during peak wind, overnight in this case.
No storm damage here, but some areas of town were without power for most of the night.
In other news, Killian the Red, Giant Doberman, is unwell. He got into something, whether a spider or some plant, and had some sores on his nose. He was fine when I was with him last Thursday, but it really took off after that. He’s been on several medications since Friday. His snout has swollen a lot and the sore needs some type of surgery first thing Wednesday morning. His human is understandably distraught. It doesn’t help that her furnace is experiencing some hiccups AND that her electric range/oven just quit. Not a good week at that house. At least they had no damage from the wind.
I found this interesting rendition of a Christmas poem a few months ago. With that season nearing, here is a version of Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer in Old English. Yes, a literal translation of the Anglo-Saxon poetry into modern English is included also. https://allthingslinguistic.com/post/135936899661/rudolph-the-red-nosed-reindeer-in-anglo-saxon
Scatterbrained. Yes, that might describe how I’ve felt since Saturday. At least the zombies haven’t arrived. Yet. Twas somewhat breezy Sunday morning when I was walking Dame Avalanche. That breeze kicked up my allergies. As I told Killian the Red’s human, “my nose ran down my face. A gust of wind blew it off my face, whereupon the nasty little nose started running around singing, ‘Run, run just as fast as you can, you can’t catch me, I’m the gingerbread man!’” Where my running nose got the idea that it was the gingerbread man, I have no idea. What I DO know is that I don’t run, so my nose completely ran away. Maybe one of the local crows or ravens had a snack. Anyhoo, that means that I was Nebless DJ for most of Sunday. 😉 Fortunately, my nose grew back and looks just exactly like the one that was running away. Now if my brain would just get itself together and unscatter! 🙂
DJSpo
Hi everyone!
Just some website admin.
Now you may not be aware, but the various bots, crawlers and scrapers are sucking data off this website for training of arty-fish-al programs. Alas, I have to pay for the bandwidth, and these pests never thought to ask permission or throw me some change.
To that end, I have now immediately throttled their access. To bad, so sad for them. Now, get lost you pesky chunks of bits and bytes. Take that – said in best pirate voice! 🙂
Honestly, who knows what may happen to humans who actually want to utilise this interwebsite, but I guess we’ll all find out. But at 50,000 hits a month and rapidly rising, they’re bleeding this server dry. I’d just had enough of them.
If anyone has any issues accessing here, please do send me an email at info @ ferngladefarm.com.au (remove the spaces).
We now resume more fun matters.
Cheers
Chris
Hi Pam,
Sorry, I’ve something of a fatalistic outlook, which on the other hand, means that I just get on and enjoy the many good things going on in life. Is that stoicism? Probably more of a coping mechanism 🙂 , but rest assured in between a lot of paid work today, I took time to enjoy a book with a lovely coffee and a small chunk of passionfruit cake. It’s not all work here, just a lot of that stuff. Although in late afternoon I took a different break and installed the remaining two sun blinds. Looking sharp, and cool!
Ook! They sure wants bloods, them vampyric infestations. But I delved into the anti-undead software tool kit about an hour ago, and dealt the pests a harsh blow – see the previous admin comment. Take that ye undead bits and bytes things, and get ye back to them soily graves from whence ye came.
To be honest, if that doesn’t work, I might leave them with a complete nonsense page just to totally mess with them. Truly it doesn’t take much to destroy the training. It’s always polite to ask for permission, and they’ve chosen not to do so. It’s always an option.
It’s hard thinking about possible horrid futures when constructing plan B’s, and that activity brings me no joy. That work is really done, because life has taught me that it is easier to do, than be caught out. I dunno Pam, if there were an easier way, I’d take it. I hear you, try is all but any of us can do.
I absolutely agree with you in relation to compulsory land acquisitions. And in fact, in rural areas now (not here, and probably never going to happen for all sorts of valid reasons) there’s a massive fight going on about running very high voltage transmission lines through farm land – which is being forced. My gut feeling is that the state government possibly has lost the support of the rural areas because of this issue. Also such compulsory acquisitions have occurred after flood events. Hmm.
All very true, but you and I have no rights or voice in relation to those sorts of matters, and well, both of our countries import a lot of manufactured stuff (plus oil, rare Earth minerals etc.) from abroad. It makes us weak and pliable to geopolitical shenanigans, but I have some serious reservations that the folks down under would cope with oil availability of only 10% of the current supplies, with possibly little if any, heavy fuels. Starvation would rapidly ensue, so forget about smart phones and other imported tech… Those’d be the least of our problems.
Ah, great questions. The western end of the mountain range has an almost perfect south facing aspect, so it has always been an enviable place to reside due to the cool climate with luxurious gardens. Mind you, it was wiped out in the 1983 Ash Wednesday bushfires, but forget about that, because the gardens bounced back due to the excellent usual conditions. I’m in the centre of the mountain range which has a different south westerly facing aspect, so weirdly we get slightly more rain, but a whole lot more sun in the summer months. But between a century of logging, potatoes, berries and a return to the natural forested environment, this part of the range is less desired. The soils have been depleted of minerals, and there is very little infrastructure other than dirt roads and an electricity grid which would alarm readers in the more wealthy US – the dreaded single wire earth return system (SWER). After WWII, there was only a single person living in this particular area of the mountain range, so what does that tell you? Former farms returned to forest.
🙂 The bin experience is reserved for visitors, and despite the yuk factor, the lack of odour is what I hope to surprise them with. Worm farm sewage systems work really well.
Oh! Just a wild guess about the glaciers in your part of the world. Presumably the snow / thaw annual cycle would have had similar effects on your rocks? Although, do you know if your soils are any good? Forests generally grow on poor soils.
🙂 A year or so back I watched the final episode of the MASH show, and enjoyed it as much then, as back in the day. However, as an adult, I disliked the Hawkeye character because he was a nuisance. I’m more of a Radar O’Reilly kind of guy, but that character was long gone by that time, replaced by the confused Klinger character.
🙂 Oops, well critters have to be careful of us lumbering humans! And that’s a lot of snow. Hope some of it has since melted, and you can now get out?
Nice work, and hopefully the basement smells nice with the citrus. No hurry there, the fruit hangs on the trees all winter here, and hopefully the same is true for you?
Hmm. I’m of the opinion that people were more social when the retail was closed on Sunday’s and public holidays. And yes, it was the law down here too. I lived not too far away from a bloke who challenged all that way back in the day, and it was quite the uproar. If you’re interested I could send you an article link? People working retail looked stressed to me now possibly because of the unrelenting hours, not to mention customers unrealistic expectations. I try to not stoke such fires, ever. Hmm.
The old timers used to quip that the cheapest advice was second hand, and perhaps Mr Twain was hedging around that point?
Cheers
Chris
Hi DJ,
Oh, poop! Hope you get some decent time out. Dunno about you, but I’m always hyper-alert for social mischief at such meetings, and have been known to put the chairman hat on and stomp a stop on long winded and/or argumentative folks. Many people have such personality traits hard wired into them, but need the rest of us pay the price and provide an audience? You may laugh, but there are people who will debate issues, simply because that’s what they do. Whilst others will be long winded, because they are thinking out loud and have yet to gather their thoughts in a cohesive manner. Dunno about you, but what I do is give them some room to do what they do, but then if that leans into the indulgence scale, I cut them short. Meetings really have to wind up in a reasonable time scale lest core members depart and never return. That’s a serious risk and I’ve seen that play out. This is always a difficult balancing act, and rarely wins friends, but the leader sometimes is a lonely path. If your gut feeling suggests that the meeting was too long, it probably was. Sometimes a long discussion can be curtailed with a vote. And not every item is worthy of inclusion on the err, list. 😉 Good luck!
Whoa! That’s almost a 100km/h wind gust, which is usually experienced nearer to the coast, or in elevated locations. Holy carp! How did your house cope with such winds? Hardly surprising that the winds brought warm air and moisture as well. That is a strong atmospheric river. Did you get much rain in the gauge?
Good to hear that you survived the storm, and also that the weather was warm during the power outage. It could have been worse.
There have been some unpleasant bushfires down here in other states (to the north and south of Victoria). Anywhoo, people in the news reports were saying they were ready to fight the fire and defend their properties, except they were also complaining about losing the power, town water and they couldn’t get anyone on the emergency phone number (000 down here, but 911 in your country). What did they expect would happen? I’d not describe any of those choices as being ready to defend their properties.
Oh my! Fingers crossed that Killian the Doberman recovers from whatever caused the serious inflammation. It’s unusual that critters would be active at your time of year. Anyway, I’ve mentioned the appalling inch long bullants here which are horrifically predatory, but the bites are the whole next level of total pain. Poor Dame Scritchy used to occasionally be bitten and she’d swell up like a puffer fish with all of her short hair standing on end. I’d slip her a good dose of antihistamine’s and that would knock her out and reduce the inflammation. But yeah, hmm, first aid and washing and cleaning sores is a good strategy in most circumstances. We went and got our tetanus boosters maybe a year or two back. There’s a lot that can go wrong, and people have gotten lax on that front, and possibly they’ve simply forgotten how things used to be. Hope Killian recovers and the furnace is repaired quickly. We had that problem with a failed pump in the hyrdonics system earlier in the winter, and now have a well tested plan B.
Hopefully I can follow the old English version of the song. 🙂 Oh my, that’s funny and the Vikings would have slammed their mugs of mead on the great wooden benches and yelled for more! adorned rapid-wagon was a hoot of a description!
I’ve now decided to tackle the bots, crawlers, scrapers, and general interweb low life bottom feeders lurking here. The demands on the website are within tolerances at the moment, but! At the rate they’re increasing, it may not be sustainable. So I’ve limited their access, and maybe one day they’ll politely ask for permission, or pay the extra fees for bandwidth? As of now, that lot ain’t said nothin’ and are suppin’ mightily for free. I’ve cracked it with them. Please do let me know if the interwebsite acts strangely from your perspective?
The warm air brings with it much pollen from err, warmer climes! Hopefully your nose and brain has returned to you in good order without undue spoilage? Winds can do that to the sinuses, yeah, it happens. Hope you’re feeling better today, and that the weather calms down a bit. Sounds feral. It was another lovely cool and cloudy summers day with a top of 17’C. Crazy weather here too. No doubt, by New Years day it will be 40’C, and then you’ll really hear some sooking.
Cheers
Chris
Hi Lewis,
Ah, I note that the font, Times New Roman is very much now back in vogue. Funny how these things change in and out of fashion. It does look more formal.
What a building! The timber posts are enormous, and I’ve never seen anything like it before. Talk about imposing, you were very lucky to have visited and seen for yourself the extraordinary work. Some sources say that the untreated timbers were riddled with beetles under the bark. Whatever the case may be, it was a sad waste of some very large trees.
Hehe! Yes, that city may have been more bohemian in those heady days, and far cheaper to live in. As property gets more expensive, the character of a place leaves via the nearest exit. In some ways it’s kind of like people moving next to a live music venue that’s full of life, then getting it closed down due to excessive noise complaints. Kills the very thing which attracted people to the area in the first place.
That’s pretty warm for almost mid-winter! We had the opposite problem down here, with a maximum of 64’F, although I may have mistakenly told DJ that it was 62’F. Whatever, it’s still a cold summer’s day. But my, you’ve sure got some serious rain there. What do you mean by the words: ‘double river crest’? Anyway, it’s always safe to not drive through flooded roads – hard to tell what’s lurking under all that water, or sometimes even where the road is to be found. Could even be an entrance to the underworld – you read it here first. How’s the flooding today? Was it as bad as expected? Hope no old duffers ended up in the drink having been washed off a flooded road.
20’s m/h for wind gusts isn’t too bad. A stiff breeze in anyone’s language. 🙂
Did mostly paid work today, and finished late this evening, although I took a break to head out and check the post office. Also spent an hour and half outdoors (which was very nice) mid afternoon, installing the two sun blinds purchased yesterday. It’s not warm today, but surely will get there before too long.
Wise to keep the stocks up for the pantry. And hope the elevator is continuing to work. Any reports about what potentially took it out?
That’s a really lovely thing to do with the muffins, and well, you’re in the lap of the weather gods there as to whether the library will be open, or otherwise.
Got more paid work tomorrow, so it’s been a very busy week, and no doubts I’ll finish up late again. I’m trying to wrap things up early so as to take a well deserved few weeks break from paid work over Christmas. That’s the plan anyway, reality might dish up something else altogether, and thus have other ideas in store. We’ll see.
Yikes! They’s socialists!!! Hehe! You can only hope so, and you may wonder why I work in small business nowadays. 🙂 The owners of such enterprises are usually also the management. Tends to sharpen a persons mind that scenario, and suits me just fine. Nobody really cares about that socialist label down here, or at least doesn’t talk about it. Man, I saw some Bob’s Red Mill products for sale which could be delivered down here on eBuy. As you do. This country is usually a grain exporter, but not a major one. I’ll bet the flours are good.
I dunno whether I’d want to work for the River, I’d heard some stories about what it’s like for the warehouse pickers. I’d say allegedly not leaving staff enough time for toilet breaks is a bit mean spirited. Mind you, I once turned up to a business where they expected me to work for eight hours and didn’t think about providing access to a toilet. That was weird, and I cracked it about that. I can’t hang on all day… What the heck!
Is there much unemployment in your area?
Yeah, well, potash is a useful mineral, and shipping it up the coast is better than trucking it. I thought a lot of potash used in the US came from the country to the north of you.
Ha! A rebrand which is also a form of gentrification. Pretty funny stuff, and I can’t imagine the reach of that stoner film was all that great? I thought the name was a joke, but no, it’s a real thing. On an amusing side note, the word ‘dole’ down here refers to unemployment benefits. Pineapple is pretty tasty don’t you reckon, and I feel nothing either way about the whole pineapple on pizza thing. No big deal. I stopped buying pineapples long ago from markets though, mostly because they were picked too green, otherwise the fruit wouldn’t travel this far south. They grow them up north, similar conditions to Hawaii.
Yeah, exactly. Always best to be flexible with meal planning. I’m into that, and if I’ve had a long day, the last thing I want to do at night is make a splash up dinner. The Editor headed into the big smoke tonight for a comedy show, and so I making a big dinner extravaganza was not part of my plans. Had linguine with a batch of sauce we made up and froze into portions for such situations. Added in some fresh capsicum, mushrooms, a bit of tasty cheese – bam, gourmet pasta. Yum! The dogs like it when I cook, because I give them little portions in their respective food bowls.
Sorry to hear that about Scott’s lady, and here’s hoping for a speedy recovery, although you’ve mentioned the many ongoing conditions on that front. It’s true too, nothing wrong with a bit of respite.
Almost midnight here, and the Editor is very late. A very girls night out kind of thing. Oh well, sounds like it was fun, and the show was televised I’m told.
Took the big stick to the arty-fish-al bottom feeders earlier this evening. That took up more of time. Hmm. They were taking things too far for my comfort. Please let me know if the interwebsite goes weird at your end?
Cheers
Chris
Yo, Chris – Some people are in love with their own voices. 🙂 Recovery meetings are run with a five minute limit on “sharing.” Adhering to that often depends on the strength of the moderator. If everyone gets a chance to talk, that wants to, then people can “double-dip.” All that is usually covered in the opening. Oh, and turn off your cell phones!
The bottom feeders permission might have been asked in those fine print, “rights and permissions” that no one ever reads. Or, more likely, they just told you “this is the way it’s going to be.”
“…the character of a place leaves via the nearest exit.” A very nice turn of phrase. Gentrification is boring. Nice if you want your life totally homogenized. I need a certain amount of grit.
Well, weather. Here’s an article from our local newspaper. It might take awhile to load, as there are lots of pictures and river gages. I haven’t seen one yet, but usually, there’s a picture or two of large salmon, swimming across roadways.
https://chronline.com/stories/flood-central-lewis-county-declares-emergency-rivers-again-on-the-rise,392418
Our high yesterday was 48F (8.88C). The overnight low was 48F (8.88C). The forecast high for today is 58F. H and I actually hit a dry spot, on her walk this morning. Looks like the action moved further north of us. But, it will be back.
“Double river crest.” Usually, an atmospheric river comes in, the rivers rise, and then fall. Done and dusted. But what with these back to back atmospheric rivers, with slight breaks in-between, they rise, they fall, and rise again. Higher.
What took out our elevator? I haven’t heard. It’s usually when someone smashes something into the control panel.
I do like Bob’s Red Mill products. I even use their nutritional yeast.
I see The River is experimenting with robots, in some of their warehouses. They never have to use the bathroom. 🙂 I read something recently, about someone hired to work in one of their warehouses. The entire process was handled by computer, and he never had contact with a breathing person, until he showed up for work.
Our current unemployment, in the county, is about 5%. We’re usually higher than the state average. During you know what, it hit 17%.
That country north of us was miffed, because they didn’t get the terminal. From the article I read, they just didn’t have the infrastructure. In other news, our local coal fired plant, that is winding down, is now going to switch to natural gas for power generation. It’s the last coal fired plant in the state.
I’m really not all that fond of pineapple. Unless it’s on pizza. 🙂
I baked up the banana muffins, last night. With cranberries, sunflower and pumpkin seeds. Topped with a butter / sugar crust. What to make next week, for the library kids? Maybe, Velvetta fudge? 🙂
At loose ends as to what to collect? How about …. nutcrackers!
https://www.npr.org/2025/12/09/nx-s1-5629014/nutcracker-museum-washington-leavenworth
Or, maybe … Victorian hair work?
https://www.kcur.org/arts-life/2025-10-31/leilas-hair-museum-closure-collection-saved
I have some bound copies of Victorian ladies magazines. Lots of articles on handicrafts of one sort, or another. Including, hair work.
I also saw an article about declining school enrollments have led to a lot of school buildings being declared surplus. And, that many of them are converted into housing. 2,000 last year. Up from the previous year. There’s an old school building, a block down the hill from this here Institution. It was going to be turned into apartments, but now I hear it’s going to be a “Christian Academy.” Lew
Chris,
The difficulty I had with the club meeting was the length of time it took. There wasn’t really anything hard, just a lot of stuff. Three different groups would like to schedule the club to do demonstrations and/or classes. These had to be discussed individually. Ditto making donations to the different nonprofit venues that host our main meetings as well as smaller groups. More officer things came up, as one club member/officer quit the club. Nothing hair raising, just a lot of stuff, all of which did needed to be discussed. Doing much better today, though.
Except my typing fingers decided that can’t spell. “Today” first appeared on the page as “tocay”. What is “tocay”? Some new small island in the Caribbean? A new shorthand for “tooth decay”? Maybe my typing fingers know, but my brain sure doesn’t! 😉
The house does fine in the winds. The houses built in the first 15 or so years after WW2 were very solidly constructed. It will need a new roof on the next year or two, but nothing has blown off the roof yet. (Knock on wood. Reminder to self: knock on wood does not mean my head!)
We’ve been averaging about 5mm of rain per day for the past 5 days. Today is another misty day after the first 4mm. And another windstorm, similar to the last one. Forecast highs: again 56 mph wind and 56F. Apparently, today’s conditions want to equal, but not surpass, the last windstorm.
I must note, however, the startling observation I made just a few minutes ago. I happened to look outside right when a nasty wind gust hit. A dog’s fur was blowing down the street without the dog. Yup, it is windy enough to blow the fur off a dog. Knowing that it is that windy appears to be the answer that is blowing in the wind today. 🙂
The title of this week’s post, “A Glorious Future”, reminds me of the long ago days of the interweb Tumshie War. A long defunct website was involved. One chap said that his family “had had a glorious past and would have an even more glorious future”. On a good day, he was rather a cheese doodle and an argumentative cuss. So some wiseacre (not me), revised that chap’s statement to “Haw, Numpty! Most like your faimlie had an inglorious past with a vainglorious future ahead o it!” So whenever the numpty said something ridiculous, he was met with a round of “Inglorious past and Vainglorious future” comments.
When living far, far from city amenities…If you need to rely on the grid to fight a wildfire, you are not properly prepared to fight said wildfire. That has been my observation for a long time. So I’m in wholehearted agreement with your opinion.
Breaking news. Killian the Red is home from his procedure. His human sent me a photo of him. He looks extremely unhappy and miserable. In addition, he has to wear a cone to protect his surgeried nose from everything. Big dog, and the biggest Cone of Shame I’ve ever seen. Poor guy.
We keep up on our tetanus boosters, too. That is one nasty illness that is easily prevented. Yet, most people have never seen a case of it, so don’t know how nasty it is.
“Adorned rapid-wagon” was my favorite, too.
Absolutely. Will let you know if the website has any hiccups, gurgles, snorts or other oddities. However, it must be said up front: if there is a Space Oddity, then all bets are off!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iYYRH4apXDo
These two latest huge storm systems reportedly originated in the Pacific somewhere near the Philippines.
Just saw the extended forecast that includes Christmas. It will cool down to more typical temperatures. Maybe 4cm of snow could fall Christmas Eve into Christmas. Maybe. Perhaps. Time will tell.
DJSpo
Chris:
I did see your note to everyone about the bots, crawlers, and scrapers. How clever of you to know how to throttle them. Hope they don’t bite back.
We had a huge fight in Virginia not too many years ago over a conglomeration of corporations just taking access through rural properties because of a 300 mile natural gas pipeline.
“The main fight in Virginia over natural gas pipelines through rural land centers on the Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP), where landowners and environmental groups (like the Southern Environmental Law Center) battled the project for years, challenging eminent domain authority and regulatory approvals, even taking cases to the Supreme Court. Landowners, including the Bohons, fought for fair compensation and input, arguing the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) improperly delegated condemnation power to the private company. Despite legal challenges and congressional intervention (the “MVP rider”) that blocked some lawsuits, the pipeline neared completion in 2024, leaving a lasting impact on rural communities and environmental landscapes.”
Besides ruining so much rural land, as always landowners were not fairly compensated. And some of that natural gas was being exported.
You are indeed the hinterlands! Not counting the various local pies and brews available.
I had our soil tested when we first moved in and I can’t remember a thing about it. I haven’t done so since. Sorry, Claire. No wonder I have such diverse results; it’s all guess work.
I didn’t much like Hawkeye myself.
The snow is all gone again – it’s amazing how fast it melts – and I did make it into town today, where 4 times as many cars were on the road (me, too, of course). I don’t know if it was Christmas stuff or the fact that another polar vortex is coming (did it ever leave?).
An article on what were legally called Blue Laws (businesses must be closed on Sundays – obviously certain ones were open) would be neat. Like you, I am as kind and as patient as I can be with store employees (well, all employees, yeah). I worked in retail long ago, for one thing.
Our house was originally built as a 3 bedroom house. Just before my parents came to live with us, my son turned the ground floor laundry room and a small study/office next to it into a bedroom for them. That made us a 4 bedroom house. Recently he tore down a wall between 2 upstairs bedrooms to merge them into one large “plant room” (a place for figs, and not just in winter). Now we are a 2 bedroom house!
He had run a hose through an upstairs window to the plant room, but the water is now frozen, so yesterday he asked me to please clear out all my stuff under my bathroom sink (it shares a wall with the plant room) so that he could get to the plumbing and install a spigot through that shared wall for indoors, unfrozen water. I did so. He installed the spigot (it looks very nice, if not odd), but it turns out that he didn’t have to go through under my sink after all. Oh, well, it needed to be cleaned out anyway.
Pam
Hi Pam,
Worked in the big smoke tonight, and got home late, so well, by default, the sun has just now set, and, it’s late! 🙂 By the way, another 1,000 hits to the interwebsite piled on today. Hmm. Those arty-fish-al program things are externalising their costs to us here, and let’s just say that I’ve now had enough. What can those things do? It’s not like their conscious and could take offence.
Ouch, the pipeline story is a very familiar one down here as well. The interests of rural locals get treated poorly. It’s not like the benefits are flowing into these areas either.
Fortunately it is a very quiet part of the world here, and the heavy hitters in the more fashionable western end of the mountain range seem to wield some influence. Some of course, is not the same as getting everything they want. And from my perspective, not all of those folks seem to share the same end goals.
🙂 Ain’t just you, I’d like to do soil testing as well, but economic considerations sadly enter the fray, and it would be probably more beneficial with the mad cash for me at least, to purchase bags of blood and bone meal. All the same, I have learned an enormous quantity of knowledge from Claire over the years and am forever in her debt for opening my eyes to this story.
Hawkeye was a blow-fish. I don’t know what that means, but it seems appropriate.
Definitely Christmas stuff for the roads, although I’d freak out about news of impending polar vortexes. Hopefully houses don’t get sucked away by the winds? And interestingly, the roads here were quieter today, and the drive in and out of the big smoke was uneventful and more importantly, at the speed limit – not always the case, I can assure you.
Even though the snow is now gone, was it cold?
Oh, here goes: Melbourne hardware store owner Frank Penhalluriack changed your work, your weekends and your life. I’m not a fan, people need down time. This constant over stimulation thing is not at all to my taste, but I’d probably be shouted down with that opinion.
Nothing can prepare a person for working directly with the public, say in retail, like you, Lewis and I have done. I do my very best to be pleasant to the people working those jobs. They’ve got it super hard.
Go the Fig room! And being at the top of the house during winter, they’ll enjoy all that heat which rises from the lower floors. I’m always envious that in your country you are legally allowed to do internal house plumbing. Hope the figs are snuggly warm up there, and also enjoying some water from the new tap.
🙂 A forced spring clean is always a good thing.
Cheers
Chris
Hi DJ,
If three groups want demonstrations and/or classes, that suggests the clubs star is rising, although you’d hope that there are some benefits to the club for performing those services? It may sound mercenary, but I dunno, my understanding of human nature is that such reciprocal negotiations are sound and expected. Ah I see, the nitty gritty of club finances were on the table too. Lots of meat to chew upon for your leadership team at the club.
Good to hear that you’re on the up today. I worked in the big smoke, so am feeling a bit tired tonight. Man, I’m trying to wrap up paid work so I can take a break from that. The profession exerts subtle forces upon a persons mind.
Torquay? That’s a coastal town off to the south and west of here. Quite famous actually for the Bells Beach surf rip, and who could forget the final scene of the original Point Break film (which was set there, but filmed in the US, Oregon, I believe). Hey, there may have been some other tocay explanations? 🙂
Oh yeah, and that’s so true. The timber used in those days was of a higher quality too – denser. There’s a lot to like about those post WWII houses. Has your club ever tried to do stuff with timber reclaimed from a demolished house of that era?
Do they use corrugated steel sheeting for roofs in your part of the world?
An enviable amount of rain, especially if it getting into the soil. Far out, those wind gusts are nearing 100km/h again. Probably ideal weather to spend indoors staying warm, and dry. It’s meant to be 31’C tomorrow.
Hard days man, ain’t it, when fur goes flyin’ by the window, and nary a person can do a darned thing ’bout it. Probably wants our jobs, or something like that. Hehe! Not sure what that means either… My brain is a bit cooked as well, but at least it is amusing itself, if not anyone else. Thanks for the visuals with the dog fur, and hey, you started this! 😉
You got me there. Nice shot. I’d not heard of the word tumshie, but yeah, we’ve all met someone like that.
Hmm. This topic of ill preparedness is on my mind. I guess they possibly weren’t raised right.
Yeah, it’ll happen that one for sure sooner or later. It’s in the soil, and people are very careless in relation to washing and cleaning wounds. Oh well. That one would be a very hard way to learn.
Sending Killian some positive energy, and hope that he is well enough soon to play with the Dame. Being a lady, she’d never dare laugh at Killian, would she?
That Bowie song is a classic. This is ground control to Major Tom…
Yep, the weather energy has got more energy, which can only ever increase the fun. I read about the atmospheric rivers, and they’re big. We get such storms too originating from the Indian Ocean, and they’re even biggerer and cross the continent from the NW to the SE.
A snowy Christmas will be fun. The long term forecast here is predicting rain for the day, but it’s a long way out.
Cheers
Chris
Hi Lewis,
🙂 Man, that’s a blunt assessment which is entirely accurate. Nice shot. Some people do need to think out aloud, but when diminishing returns are hit, bam, they get cut short. That’s so true as well about the role of the moderator, and I’ve found it to be odd that such positive group know-how is actively stomped out in society. You can see that in protests groups which get easily hijacked and end up standing for everything and nothing. Groups are one area where rules of engagement need to be communicated and enforced. I respect your club for those guidelines.
Probably both of those options you mentioned. We’re at 51,000 today. Not happy about this turn of events, and am monitoring the restrictions to see if they’re any good. You can force bots to behave, but then that’s possible only if the handlers of the bots want them to be well behaved and agreeable in the first place. Plenty of other folks just don’t care about that side of things. If these numpties aren’t careful, they could potentially bring the interweb to its knees by clogging up all the traffic.
Thanks! 🙂 Always nice to come up with a colourful turn of phrase to paint a decent picture of things. I’m with you, when the formerly bohemian inner city suburb gentrified and the locals took on airs and expectations, it was a step too far, for me at least. I hear you about that. What’s wrong with the washing drying out in the sun where the neighbours can see it? If they really cared about the environment, they’d have been more respectful. But then that is their dirty little secret.
Thanks for the photos of the floods, and seems like some people ended up with their vehicles in the drink. Oh well. Many of the people were lightly attired which surprised me given its winter. Glad you two dodged the rain. Meant to be 88’F tomorrow. That’ll feel hot. Fingers crossed that part two of your weather isn’t as dire. Oh poop, the Professor has something to say about that…
The bush telegraph in your place will get to the bottom of the broken elevator story, sooner or later, or you’ll get the amateur sleuth hour?
Thanks to you, we have added nutritional yeast to some meals. Appreciate you mentioning the stuff.
Ouch. 17% is noticeable, and interestingly down here the rate hovers just below the 5% number. Hmm. During the early 1990’s recession it was 10%, and that was a pretty horrid experience.
Ook, maybe it is just me, but energy grids probably should never be efficient, because there is an inevitable trade off with resilience. Gas is good, until demand exceeds the supply, like down here. There’s plenty of gas, it’s just that export markets demand the stuff, and we in turn demand oil.
We’re both going down into the underworld due to the pineapple on pizza business. The pizza puritans would speed on our journeys if they had half an opportunity. 🙂 Can’t say I eat much pineapple at all these days.
The butter is white and the cheese is orange, but the fudge looks delicious. The kids will love it. Had a small chunk of passionfruit cake yesterday which was quite good. An apple tea cake would be even better. Yum!
Nooo, a nutcracker collection may be the road to madness. Best avoided. And the hair art, dunno what to make about that, but would suggest that the creators had access to lots of cut hair. I’ve spoken to hair-techs (!) over the years and I’m told that the stuff is slow to compost. It mostly ends up in landfill. Thanks for the other collection suggestion, but I’ll pass on that too. 🙂
Interesting indeed about the declining enrolments. I hear things about that, and am observing a shift. It’s possible that during you-know-what, parents got to experience how much stuff their kids were actually learning. Hmm.
Worked in the big smoke today, and got home late. The Editor made it home about midnight last night, and of course this morning was an early start. Oh well, mustn’t grumble. I’m trying to wind up all of the paid work so that I can get a few weeks uninterrupted rest, but we’ll see.
Cheers
Chris
Yo, Chris – Torquay is also a town in Devon, England. Known for its quirky, souvenir pottery, with sayings inscribed on it. See: “Torquay motto ware.” I’ve had a few pieces, come and go, over the years. Another collectible. 🙂
I hope you don’t have to take those all out, by hand. On one hand, my e-mail service is complaining about storage space. On the other, I’ve been hit by a flood of spam. In the hundreds. I spent a good half hour, deleting a lot of them, this morning.
You mentioned fonts, recently. I saw an article yesterday, where the Secretary of State has decreed a return to Times New Roman, for all diplomatic correspondence. The previous administration had switched to Calibri. According to people with reading disabilities, easier to read. But, as all things from the previous administration, are bad, it had to go. 🙂 “To restore decorum and professionalism.” Whatever.
You’re lucky you didn’t have to deal with an HOA (Home Owner’s Association.) I see articles from time to time, where their demands are ludicrous, and even court battles have been fought. But, people with too much time on their hands, still find ways to stir the pot. My friends in Idaho got a notice, from the city, that their grass was too long. But, being a small town, they soon found who had made the complaint. Someone considered crazy, by the rank and file.
Our high yesterday was 59F (15C). Our overnight low was 48F (8.88C). Our forecast high for today is 54F. Yesterday and this morning, there were only a few spatters of rain, just enough to keep the sidewalks damp. It seems like most of the action is north and east of Seattle. And, east of Portland.
People get acclimated, to our climate. When I took H out for her walk, this morning, it was 48F. As it was not raining, I didn’t even bother to button or zip my jacket. I was quit comfortable.
Last night, I split three sourdough muffins. On the bottoms, I put chopped parsley and green onions, from the garden. Garlic. A diced tomato. Nuked it for a few minutes. Then I put Mozzerella cheese on the top and the sourdough tops, smeared with yoghurt and mustard. Nuked just enough to melt the cheese. Tasty.
One of the care givers, asked if I wanted a lot of DVDs that belonged to her father. I thought I was getting them, in their cases. Nope. Two binders with plastic sleeves. There must be around 100. Everything from a four disc “Bible” to a two disc “Lonesome Dove.” Not much horror or sci-fi. I’ll have to go through them, and watch a lot of trailers. Anything I don’t want to watch, I’ll take down to the Institution library, for the inmate’s movie nights. I’ll clean the discs as I go. Last night, I watched Dizzy’s “Hocus Pocus.” Great cast. I’m sure I watched it, when it came out. But had forgot most of it.
The muffins were well received by the library kids. Those DVDs might come in handy. I had one DVD, in transit, from Centralia. A 15 minute drive, If that. Used to be, there would be a courier box, for Chehalis in Centralia. And, the obverse in Chehalis. They’d be ferried over. Now, everything goes up to the service center, and THEN gets sent down to Chehalis. But then, a lot of things don’t make sense. Mail, mailed in Chehalis, with a destination of Chehalis, or, even Centralia, get’s sent to a sorting center in Tacoma. And then comes back. And we won’t even get into the madness, of the way food is shipped around.
Well, Victorian ladies had really long hair, some of which ended up in their hair brushes. Those 100 strokes, a night. 🙂 A lot of it ended up fashioned into hair jewelry. As remembrances or memorials. I suppose, a bit macabre. But then, these days, I hear cremains are turned into bits of jewelry.
Here’s a recent article about our health “care” system.
https://www.npr.org/2025/12/04/nx-s1-5629211/health-care-broken-costs-united-health-investors
One interesting data point is that the insurance companies are about to shove a million people of those Medicare Advantage plans. I knew it would come, sooner or later. If something is too good to be true, it usually is. Lew
@ DJ – I really like that song. It’s so … sad.
I saw an article, yesterday, that you might find interesting. It has to do with the Celtic languages.
https://greekreporter.com/2025/12/10/dictionary-ancient-celtic/
Coming soon to a bookshelf near you! :-). Lew
Chris:
What’s new in the big smoke? I’ll bet it involves food . . .
That’s exactly right – Hawkeye was a blowfish.
The odd thing about polar vortexes is that, though there may be some fairly high winds, they never seem to make a “vortex” here. Maybe they do elsewhere. It was warmer for one day and then it went back to being colder. It’s these rollercoasters that get me.
Thanks for the article.That’s the greatest story about the fight to keep stores open on Sundays. Why shouldn’t businesses be open on Sundays? I’d like to shake Frank’s hand.
How far from the sea are you, as the parrot flies?
You know the company that makes all those tools my son likes, the red one? They also make battery powered hand pruners/secateurs. The other day he had to make hundreds of cuts (maybe for cuttings to sell; I’m not sure) and I’ll bet he was glad to have those. I’ve used them a bit in the garden.
Pam
a glorious future, huh? That’s always the promise, but these days, some have started to think it might not be on the menu any more.
one of the more interesting artists working today had something to say about that.
https://banksy.newtfire.org/html/gallery_pages/graffiti/sorry_the_lifestyle_you_ordered.html
All the hazelnuts are husked and bagged now, will be hauling them off to be processed this week. Production was lower this year. Growing food is not as easy as ordering takeaway from a shop with a couple clicks on your favorite electronic device.
It pays to have redundancies. Our potatoes did great this year. We had loaded baked potatoes for dinner tonight. Is that a thing in Oz?
I’m fine with the new look. The words and images are the main thing, the overall arrangement and fonts and such are minor to me. Hopefully I won’t bump up against some weird functionality change, but all is well so far.
Steve
Hi Steve,
Banksy totally nailed that pithy observation, and on a related side issue has ventured at times to the big smoke, where some art was installed. One was allegedly destroyed inadvertently by a plumber. Ook! However, yes, the future ain’t all that bright, but shades may still be required. 🙂
Speaking of which, over the course of this week, we installed the six roll up or down, UV stable plastic shade blinds, and wow, they work a treat! It was way over 30’C today in the shade, and the blinds really stop the suns energy from cooking that side of the house. Windows, even the thick double glazed ones here are like a sieve energy wise. A nice and neat old school solution to living with a hot environment. Hmm. You can see that the plants are enjoying the sun’s energy today too. The sun loving apricot trees are sporting fresh new growth.
Nice work with the shelling of the hazelnuts. 🙂 And here I must add that I’m super-envious of your harvest. Some of the older hazelnut bushes here are sporting developing nuts in their husks, and that’s encouraging to see. Did you start with known varieties, or I was wondering if over time you’ve been tempted to start some from your grown seeds?
But yes, I absolutely agree with you. The outcome from agricultural pursuits are non-linear. Some years we have great crops of this and that, but in no one year has everything just worked. Far out. We lost most of the almond and apricot crop to a late spring morning which was 0’C. How do you deal with that likelihood?
I’ve seen baked potatoes halved and then filled with all sorts of goodies, but it’s not a common meal. Generally potatoes are served in salads (potato salad), or roasted and served whole with meat (baked potatoes). There’s actually a potato shortage down under at the moment, and the humble tuber (also known locally as a ‘spud’) are commanding good prices for growers. With this in mind, we shifted the growing area, and doubled production. They’re doing really well, and have convinced me of the benefits of crop rotation. Alas, I have to split my time between the farm and paid work, otherwise I’d construct a much larger growing space. Oh well, life is often a compromise.
Fingers crossed the website stays stable from here on end, for a while at least. The arty-fish-al training bots are giving me headaches in the background, so please do send an email to let me know if my defensive responses cause you issues.
Hope you’re not getting too much snow already?
Cheers
Chris
Hi Pam,
53,000 today, and going up! The blood suckers are hungry for data. Where is Van Helsing with his potent stake for when the un-dead are lurking and feeding on all of the interweb sites prose?
Hehe! It was mostly work in the big smoke yesterday, although, now you mention it… Kudos for perceptivity. Today I trialled a new mechanic in the nearest outer urban area on the edge of the big smoke. The electric trains end there, so the outer suburb has a lot of excellent commercial services, so why not head there to get the Dirt Mouse Suzuki serviced? And I’m very pleased with their work. The business has been in continuous operation for almost 60 years, and it shows. Oh,yesterday, right. On the way back home I decided to stop off at the manual car wash, and give the dirty vehicle a clean before it was presented to the new mechanic. So there was that little interlude.
Plus, before the paid work I stopped off at a café to grab a coffee and muffin, which were of course served in (and on) ceramic and enjoyed with a book. One must never be too busy, don’t you reckon? And the young lady who made them, just happened to be a big fan of one of my favourite musical artists. The tour tee shirt was a dead giveaway, and a delightful chat about the last gig in the big smoke ensued.
See, you knew, life is full of small stories. And the work day was intense, but seriously productive. My secret work enjoyment is the old school variety of my profession, which is very needful in small business, but most folks would consider it to be low status work – but what do they really know?
Pretty funny huh? From my perspective of that beloved show, Hawkeye brought enormous energy to the table, but if subjected to the emotional swings the actor displayed, well, that would tire me. Is there anything wrong with contentment? Although admittedly that situation in the series may be possibly an over stimulating environment. Ook!
Yeah, I hear you about the roller coaster weather swings, and dunno about you, but I find it hard to acclimatise to such changeability. Warm one day, and then cold the next, is very much par for course here. And it was 88’F here today, yet Sunday will be only 70’F. What I’ve observed from travels is that in tropical countries where it is hot all the time, people move at a better adapted to the conditions pace. We don’t do that.
Yeah, I remember Frank, and we lived only a few blocks from the store. For people who are younger, and who’ve never know anything different, it’s hard to remember what a big deal it was. But then the other part of me enjoyed the more social aspects of life back then when working hours where strictly enforced. Our civilisation and culture is hardly ever a fixed point in time, don’t you reckon?
Well, how far from the sea depends upon how the word ‘sea’ is defined. The closest connection to the sea is about 40 miles away. However, that’s where the big smoke is and it sits on the edge of Port Phillip Bay, which is positively enormous, and all the water flows in and out of narrow heads. The actual ocean is further away. You’d be heaps further inland than here, but, a similar distance here would lead to a very dry environment. Hmm.
Hehe! Go the red machines. More than respectable kit in anyone’s language. 🙂 Stihl has those power shears too, and for work at the scale you son is doing, they’d be awesome. A few years back I bought some manual shears from the Wolfgarten brand, and they’re excellent, but not in the same league as the battery ones you mentioned.
How are you doin? Are you dodging the snow?
Cheers
Chris
Hi Lewis,
Heroes was a great song too, with that same air of lost opportunity.
Your advice about new collectibles (that way leads to madness) is always at the back of my mind when your interweb rabbit holes lead in new directions. I must say that those Torquay motto wares were quite homey in a delightful way. Charming, but also equally made to be used and enjoyed.
Dude, you may laugh, but it’s serious and whilst the arty-fish-al demands so far are not outside the allowable services of the blog, at the rate the thing is increasing, it may become a problem. I’ll now provide updates merely for educational purposes. Today is at 53,000 hits for the month, and I’m reminded of the rolling death statistics in the cult film: Starship Troopers. Probably should re-watch that soon.
Spam is unkind to me as well. An unnecessary evil, and you’d imagine that the senders would work out that nobody is listening?
Whatever, is about how it looks to me as well with the font change. Although Times New Roman does lend a certain gravitas to communications. All very much painting the door whilst the house burns, but ain’t you or I who control that brush, is it?
A home owners association would send me loopy. Just say no. 🙂 But I know how your friends in Idaho may have felt after receiving the ‘grass is too long notice’, because that happened to me when renting nearby and constructing this place. Sure the grass was mowed, but we immediately gave notice and moved out into an unfinished home. Ah, the troublemakers walk among us. I’d force the complainants to do the work to a certain standard before having the grievances taken any further. That alone would save everyone else the hassles of their energy-with-no-outlet mindset.
Good to hear that you’ve dodged the second coming of the atmospheric river. An unpleasant business to receive additional rain when the ground is already water logged. And that winter weather you’re experiencing sounds quite warm to me too. Although I reckon any wind blowing on such winter days just makes things feel all that much colder. Hope your walks with H were dry today?
It was 88’F here today and I felt pooped, so took it easy. Still, stuff happened! Took the Dirt Mouse Suzuki to a new mechanic today, and was favourably impressed. Things cost more down here, and as well as the service, the brake rotors needed machining with new pads installed, but I checked over the work afterwards and was really pleased to see the quality of the what was done. I always check nowadays. There’s more than one story there…
The place was in a nearby outer suburb, and so we picked a big 44 pound bag of dog kibbles (tops up their breakfast) and visited the big box hardware store to pick up some stretchy cord with which to anchor all of the new sun blinds. Being big 7ft x 7ft sails, they do flap around a bit in the wind. 🙂
In the hottest part of the day, Ollie jumped up onto the couch with me, and we had a bit of shut eye. Always nice to recharge the batteries. Earlier this morning watering the various plants took quite a lot of time, but was pleasant, and the dogs were running around like crazy, until they over-heated, then sat in the shade. Dogs…
Might schedule in some more quiet time over the next few days.
The muffin innovation sounds pretty tasty. You know, it’s not all that different from a vegetarian pizza, which was err, dinner here. Quite nice. How good are the preserved tomatoes? I find that they provide a really sharp taste to dishes. Yum!
Oh, is the Bible on DVD? Well, you learn something new everyday. No, please do not send me those discs! 😉 It’s thoughtful of you to clean the discs before donating them to the library (which I note that you have not mentioned in a while, so presumably conditions are the same as before?) Did you find any gems in the collection?
Heck yeah! The kids would love the treats. Went to the post office general store late this afternoon and there were kids everywhere having some sort of party, which was in the process of breaking up as we arrived. It all seemed very sweet, and surprisingly fun with no hassles whatsoever. Nice to see, and it was a bit hot for coffee, so got a non-alcoholic ginger beer soft drink with a dollop of ice cream, known for some reason as a ‘spider’. A lovely experience.
Hey, I’ve worked at businesses which had their own dedicated courier box which was picked up once per day. All very organised. Costs get cut though, and such services have disappeared in my more recent experience.
With the courier arrangements you described, it kind of looks like madness, but people quest for efficiency, whatever that means. One of the interesting things about tracking online, is that you can see when the process goes wrong. Some postal items have travelled far interstate distances before arriving here – and one didn’t even start from that big a distance away. It was weird watching the packages journey across states.
Ah, I see, yes, the Victorian 100 strokes of the brush per night. One must not enquiry too closely as the historical opportunities for bathing, thus the need for err, continual personal maintenance.
If your health system is broken, why does it continue to do what it does? The word broken suggests a past tense. What I’d suggest instead is that the behemoth works for some, and there is a tipping point where the excluded folks may not want to see further resources going into it. If they’re outside it already, then they have nothing to lose, and that’s a dangerous situation.
Cheers
Chris
Yo, Chris – I spent another chunk of time, this morning, removing stuff from my e-mail account. I have to be careful not to send stuff I want to see, to the spam file. Not that any spam filters seem to be working. I also didn’t realize that stuff piled up in a “sent” file. I’m taking those out, 500 at a clip.
The burning house was a nice metaphor (?). Burning down the house! 🙂 Rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic. A lot of the follies, in DC, are just manufactured distractions from important stuff.
Blue sky and sunshine, today and tomorrow. Prof. Mass says we’re going to get another atmospheric river, next Wednesday. But, at least not three of them, back to back. Other than a few spatters of rain, it was dry, yesterday. Hmmm. Locally, no frost yet, not much rain. I wonder if it’s the Napavine Triangle Effect? We’re right at the edge of it.
https://cliffmass.blogspot.com/2012/01/bermuda-triangle-of-northwest-weather.html
Although it seems to create bad weather effects, I wonder if it also creates a lack of some events?
Our high yesterday was 50F (10C). Our overnight low was 46F (7.77C). Our forecast high for today is 57F.
“I go here, I go there. I do this, I do that.” (Frank O’Hara.) Even days when I stay in, there’s the minutia of everyday life. Empty the dish drainer, get another poop bag off the roll for a walk with H, fill up the water filter pitcher, shake vitamins out of their bottles to have with lunch, etc. etc..
LOL. My Idaho friend was totally appalled by the “secret sauce” I put on my muffins. I told her, a.) don’t knock it til you’ve tried it, and b.) she has no sense of adventure.
I greet a lot of people with “Hi, kids!” If I showed up at Fern Glade Farm, that’s probably the greeting The Editor and you would get.
Ruth Goodman (she of the historic farms series) wrote that book, “How to Live Like a Victorian.” A lot of information on how the Victorians kept themselves and their clothes clean. Modern liquid shampoo wasn’t invented until the 1920s.
H seems sort of needy lately. I don’t know what that’s all about. Maybe because I left her home when I went to Winco, and, abandoned her at the groomers. Spent a couple of hours cleaning up the garden. All in a couple of day span.
Oh, I suppose there’s some gems in that batch of DVDs. It’s sort of hard to tell without the cases. There’s a three disc “Leading Ladies Collection.” Not a clue on the discs, as to who the ladies are, or what movies. I see “African Queen.” Worth another look? Probably. “Karate Kid?” No. There’s a two disc, “Lonesome Dove.” I’ve never read the book, or saw the series. Will I? I’ll check out the trailer, and then decide. Lew
Chris:
Apparently they are not going to let up. Besides which, it is going to take more than a stake, unless we are looking at one for the whole internet . . . What would Sun Tzu say about it?
That is very good news about the car repair shop. Good mechanics (and honest) can be scarce as hen’s teeth. I knew food was involved! I won’t ask the band’s name because if it was Aussie, I won’t know it. Of course, somebody else here might.
88F is HOT!
I did just mean until you could touch salt water. That is enough ocean for me! So – you are actually quite close.
No more snow – yay! I don’t see any in the immediate future except for maybe a flurry. I once knew a dog named Flurry. It was a Cocker Spaniel.
Pam
Chris:
I just realized that I can’t find any sidebar or access to the other blogs you had on offer for us.
Pam
@ Pam,
The links are still there, however…when yI first get to the Fernglade page, I have to go to near the bottom of the page to see the links. If I click on the “read more” button, then I access that particular article written by Chris and those links do not travel with me to the article.
Hope that makes sense and helps. It’s not as user friendly.
DJSpo
@ Lew,
Thanks for the link to the Celtic language article. It was interesting.
DJSpo
Chris,
It is rather nice to have the club in demand for classes and demonstrations. It has been many years since that happened except for the annual Spokane Interstate Fair. We are a fixture there. I’m the most excited about the group of homeschooled young people. Maybe we can get some of the younger generations interested.
The family home in tiny Desautel, Washington, has a corrugated steel roof. There are a few in this neighborhood also. They are expensive. However, they make a lot of sense to me in snow country. I will be looking into that possibility when I start getting estimates for a new roof.
I know of nobody who has tried carving old housing timber. It may be too dry to carve. If it was from an evergreen tree, it’s very difficult to carve in the first place – the grain splinters too easily.
Heck, I did one pyrography project on a pine board. There were a lot of pitch pockets in the wood. Every time the burner hit a pitch pocket, the pitch flared and spattered, creating a deeper spot where the pocket had been as well as some odd dots wherever the splatter had landed. Fortunately, I was able to turn those into features rather than problems. It had an octopus in it, as well as other undersea critters. Young neighbor has a very nice octopus tattoo. I gave that woodburning to her, as she seemed to like it.
Today started out foggy. Thick at places. We’re in a “dry spell” until later in the weekend. Sun might even shine on Saturday. Maybe. No snow, no sun, 50 shades of grey. Spokane. 😉
One of the late-night pundits was talking about one of the currently ongoing large media mergers. He said that if it goes through, we will be able to see such wonderful new films as “Fifty Shades of Gandalf the Gray”. Included was a fake movie poster showing a very buff and shirtless Gandalf. The Princess and I had a good laugh.
Tumshie. Gourd or turnip or something. It’s definitely used in a disparaging manner. It’s akin to the Spanish “calabasa”, or “gourd head”, loosely translated as “pumpkin head”. I once wrote a blues song for voice and banjo. It started with “Que pasa Calabasa, what you doing Pumpkin head”. It was a blues song about how the singer had been jilted by a girl who kept calling him calabasa.
When the fur flies. Sounds like a book or a movie. During one of our windstorms eons ago, I looked at our tiny clerical supervisor and asked if she needed some bricks for her coat pocket “to weigh you down so the wind doesn’t carry you away.” She said that she didn’t but asked if I had a long string to tie to her ankle, fly her like a kite, as the wind was from the correct direction to blow her home. She figured she could cut the string at just the right time and land in her yard.
As of yesterday, Killian was starting to eat and drink and need outside. However, in true canine fashion, he was also not happy and was very needy. He kept butting his cone into his human. She was getting scraped by its edges. I told her that it’s a good thing it’s raining and not snowing. Send him out in the snow with that giant cone of shame and we’d have to call him a snow cone. 😉
Now the longer term forecast for Christmas is that the temperatures might be just a tad bit too warm for any snow accumulation.
DJSpo
Hi Pam,
The blog links can be found on the bottom of the home page.
It’s not as pretty as the old sidebar used to be, but that original thing cost me an annual subscription to a WordPress plug-in chunk of additional software. The license runs out in June next year, so we’ll see what can be done over the next month or so to sort that situation out, but dunno. Candidly speaking, because the links aren’t in the side bar, I’m not seeing them either which is not ideal.
On the other hand, at the moment, my brain is contemplating the arty-fish-al nuisances. And by the way, today now reads 54,000. It’s an unrelenting mess out there, and I may just call for some assistance with this matter. Sun Tzu would suggest to do something unpredictable in this instance. 😉
The female music artist is English, so may not be played much in your country? Dunno, but the lady tours in the US, although doesn’t seem to have any plans to visit down under again in the next year or so. Oh well. The mechanics did some fine work, and agreed, that is rare. Unfortunately due to past experiences with mechanics, I have to look over what they did, just to be certain that nothing was messed up. The things I’ve experienced over the years troubles me, and I’d personally not leave work in that sort of a state. There’s basically little trust left on that front, probably why your son does most of that sort of work himself too.
It’ll get hotter. Thursday is forecast to be 97’F. The external sun blinds are working very well, but I’ve had to devise a way to anchor them down so the wind doesn’t blow them around. Cleats and rope will do that trick. Have to laugh, I knew what a cleat looked like, but not what it was called, but eventually worked it out late this afternoon.
Yes, salt water is about 40 miles from here at the nearest spot. You’re a lot further inland, but the storms at least make their way across the intervening countryside to where you are.
It rained here a little while ago, but now the sun is back out again in force.
Flurry the Cocker Spaniel! Was the name well deserved? Those are some high energy dogs, or at least the spaniels I’ve encountered were.
Cheers
Chris
Hi DJ,
I see, and just a wild guess, but the trick perhaps with the home schooled kids is making the classes and demonstrations relevant to their needs. It is good that your club is in demand again, and when I was a wee young lad, clubs formed a much bigger part of society than they do in these more insulated enlightened days.
Whoa! I’ll bet Disautel looks different nowadays to when you were there? If not but for the elevation… Beautiful and quiet country, with a sort of elevated plains feel to it.
It was warm here today at 28’C, with a brief rainstorm a while ago, although the sun is now shining and fierce. There’s another storm band not too far away, and you can hear the thunder claps.
Might do some firewood tomorrow before the season heats up too much.
Steel sheet roofs are worth the cost, but it all depends upon the economics of the situation. The cheaper option down here are ceramic tiles, and my experience with them suggests that those things leak air like a sieve. Due to the bushfire building codes here, I’m guessing that tiles would never be allowed at this location.
Fair enough, and the old timber would be super dry and hard to work with. Hmm. Years ago in another house project we ordered 19mm timber floor boards made from old bridge timbers. When sanded, the raw surface had a lovely dusky pink texture to it, and then we oiled the stuff. It turned seriously dark brown, almost a Japan Black colour. And sanding the boards flat was a painful job due to the grain density. The tree species was Karri (Eucalyptus diversicolor). Super hard uniform stuff. The boards weren’t end matched with tongue and groove either, so there was a lot of waste. At the end of that job I wondered whether the effort was worth it.
Thanks for the pine pitch pocket story, and I can see that happening. Glad to hear the project worked out in the end, with adaptions to the materials. That happens here too with the local timber. Despite seasoning, sometimes there can be deep pockets of accumulated sticky sap which is blood red and has the consistency of honey. That stuff is hard on steel tools.
🙂 Enjoy your grey winter weather! And truly hope you get to enjoy some winter sunshine.
Yeah, well, all good things come to an end, and large corporates are not generally known for their abilities to take a chance. I doubt the movies will be even that risqué. Once long ago I enjoyed the Pixar creations.
Tumshie is about the same thing as a numpty, perhaps proving that all cultures enjoy such characters. Pumpkin head as a disparaging remark needs to be reclaimed. Mooncalf is another goodie old timey negative observation about folks who dream the day away. And by the way, the lady ain’t worth it if such is her shtick. Who needs to be beaten around the head verbally? Far out.
Wasn’t ‘fur flying’ and old timer observation for a fight? Oh, there was also a Fur of Flying short video with Willie-E-Coyote and the Road Runner. You learn something new everyday. 🙂
Ramming speeds! Yes, some dogs react to the dreaded cone of shame as if it were a personal affront to their canine dignity, and that’s when the new ramming use for plastic is put to the test. Hmm. Glad to hear that Killian is recovering and hoping with all that ramming activity that he doesn’t injure his nose. Very funny too, yes, a large super sized snow cone! 🙂
The forecast is too far out here to be accurate for that day, but we’ll see how it goes. Down here is meant to be cool at 24’C. By the way, Thursday is forecast to reach 36’C. That’ll be fun.
Cheers
Chris
Hi Lewis,
Say, that’s a lot of spam, in anyone’s language. These tech shenanigans are real time wasters. Free email addresses are rarely free, with your good self being the end product. Those folks sure want stuff and data, yup. Such an annoyance, but we must find some good grace when walking in these new territories. Hey, one benefit of the postal service is that such spammers would soon go broke with all of the postage costs. That’s something don’t you reckon about the old school way of doing things? By the way, the arty-fish-al nuisances are at 54,000 today, and going up. Might have to get some assistance from the server end folks for this problem.
Stuff does pile up in the sent mail folder, yeah. Running a business means being on top of all that electronic filing, and you’d be amazed how often being able to find stuff when required has been of practical use – especially when the gentle art of blame allocation and misdirection is used as an attempt to drop my good self in the poop. I don’t think so, but nice try… 😉
Is it a metaphor or an aphorism? Or maybe neither! Who doesn’t like the band Talking Heads? And that was a very ear-wormy song – Burning down the house. 🙂 Rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic is another fine aphorism. Paints a solid picture, just to keep in theme here! Agreed, the performers sing, dance and fight all the while tragic events lurk just off stage, in the dim background.
Another atmospheric river? Holy carp, or more correctly, salmon as the case may be in your part of the world. The concept of tasty salmon swimming across a flooded road was a memorable one, and such things had not occurred to me as a possibility (floods being rare in this corner of the world). Just read the Professor’s essay, and 15 to 17 inches on some of the westward facing mountainous areas is way too much already. Fingers crossed that the coming storm is not too bad. Floods can be worse when there are King tides which back water up the estuaries.
Just had a slow moving storm roll through here. Quite nice as it cooled the air and dumped about a quarter of an inch of needed wet stuff. Thursday will be 97’F but fairly calm (a good thing) with a late storm. It’s a bit early for rain forecast models 10 days out, but they’re sort of hinting at a damper end to the year.
It was warm here today at 82’F and we headed an hours drive north to replenish the honey and apple stocks. Had a quality cheese, ham and salad sandwich for lunch and did a pleasant walk. Still nice and green about the place, which isn’t always the case for the summer months. I was surprised there weren’t more people out and about, but then they may be doing big family stuff in the lead up to Christmas. Nice being an orphan.
Yes, Chehalis was mentioned as being close to the triangle. Some places just get weather from all sorts of directions, and that is the case here as well. It’s an inversion of that triangle though, in that the mountain range is a thumb sticking up from elevated plains catching all of the prevailing winds. The Napavine triangle had some pretty extreme weather events. Yeah, it does make you wonder if that area also dodges a lot of other weather extremes in the surrounding area?
The minutiae of life is all that yeah, and also the stuff which brings colour and drama to existence. All those things get done here each day as well, plus there is occasionally a lot of watering required some warmer days. Speaking of which… The lush park was as good a spot for lunch as any, except a Raven was jumping onto the table, being swished away, bouncing back, only to then dare me wear out first. The clever bird scored a small chunk of quite good quality tasty cheese (yellow, incidentally!) for effort. Just to spice up the avian’s life, the Akubra hat held in one hand was pre-emptively swashed before said critter could bounce back onto the table top. Such training keeps the Corvidae mind on a sharp learning curve to expect the unpredictable. 😉 Then there was the bloke with the bright multi-coloured shirt and Santa’s hat heading towards a family Christmas picnic on the grass. Had he been drinking or not? The lurch was suggestive of festivities. Frank’s right, stories are everywhere. What a horrid ending for the poet.
Hehe! Fun stuff, and you do know you created a hybrid muffin pizza. Could make our fortunes with the idea? Sure, early focus groups reacted poorly – but had they sampled the wares – as you pointed out? 🙂
I’d take the greeting in the friendly manner that is conveyed. Better than what my grandfather used to call people.
Wonder if the Victorian era folks had access to white vinegar? That’s a really decent cleaning product.
Could be the weather too with H. 50’F is on the colder side of things. Has she regained her usual composure?
Here we must politely disagree, Karate Kid is a classic film! 🙂 A shame the labels on the discs don’t provide more details. It happens, much like completely losing plant tags naming the specific variety. Lonesome Dove has a pretty decent cast. How did the trailer hold up?
Cheers
Chris
Yo, Chris – I finished cleaning out my primary e-mail account, today. Turns out, I could clean out the “sent” file, at one whack. Nothing in there I need to save. I have two other little used e-mail accounts, that will need attention. 🙁
LOL. I get plenty of junk mail, from our post office. In other tech news, more revenge of analog.
https://www.npr.org/2025/12/10/nx-s1-5601901/why-a-classic-wide-screen-movie-format-from-the-1950s-is-making-a-comeback
Simile? 🙂
Our high yesterday was 50F (10C). The overnight low was 46F (7.77C). Our forecast high for today is 57F. Another sunny day, but rain will come back in the early am. Dairy and blueberry farmers are doing it rough, up north.
https://www.nwpb.org/local/2025-12-12/flooding-in-northwest-wa-leaves-dairies-and-blueberry-growers-scrambling?utm_source=npr.org&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=local_headlines&utm_content=homepage
Here’s a short video of salmon swimming across a flooded road.
https://youtu.be/83nIn9rSvkU?si=7iqxGt6oNijVaeEj
Lack of holiday shoppers? Probably, maybe, hold up at home, doing on-line shopping.
Even outside the holiday season, it seems like at least once a day, I have the thought, “Glad I’m an orphan.” 🙂 The stories I hear. Saw an article yesterday about “almond moms.” Apparently, they hover over people’s food choices, and comment on them.
That raven will probably remember you. And expect a handout, next time around. What have you started? 🙂
I should have kept my secret sauce, secret. I should know better, with my “meat and potatoes” Idaho friends. Maybe a bit of it, on my part, is “shock your mama.” I know I can always get a rise out of them.
White vinegar. “White vinegar, as we know it today, was developed through industrial processes in the 19th century, particularly with the invention of the packed generator by Karl Sebastian Schüzenbach in 1823, which significantly reduced fermentation times.” I wonder what a “packed generator” is? It doesn’t sound like something you’d have laying about the house. Maybe a better question would be, when did white vinegar become cheap and available?
“White vinegar became cheap and widely available in the 20th century due to the invention of the submerged fermentation process, which significantly reduced production times to just 1–2 days. This innovation allowed for the mass production of vinegar, making it more accessible to consumers.” Another mysterious tech term. “Submerged fermentation process.”
Yes, H seems to have mellowed out. I guess she likes her routines.
I dipped into the film collection, last night, and watched “San Andreas.” Nothing cheers me up, like a good disaster flick. 🙂 Not the first time I’ve seen it.
Later today, H and I will hit the library, stop by the Club, and then it’s up to the independent grocer for the makings for the Velveeta fudge. It takes 7+ cups of powdered sugar! Lew
Hi Lewis,
Good shot, and those folders can be cleaned out in one neat right, then left – one, two, knockout – clicks! Dunno about your system, but what I tend to do with emails requiring to be kept (they are legal correspondence after all), is to move them to various sub folders. And none of that stuff is held on the cloud. Is it safe out there in virtual land, probably not. 🙂 Plus we are old school and physically back that lot up regularly to encrypted removable drives. The recover from crash system has been tested under a crisis scenario, and found to be good.
Your wet and cold weather is perfect for house cleaning, like what you are doing with the emails.
The lead photo of Emma Stone sort of glowering at the VistaVision camera was quite something. And the neatly mowed lines in the lawn reminded me of a local bloke I knew who passed away recently. Anyway, a few years ago he told me a story about how he got his tractor and slasher out to do a mowing job for a wealthy local. The paddocks were mowed to within an inch of the grasses life, and the wealthy bloke refused to pay because apparently the guy I knew didn’t re-produce the nice neat line trick in the turf. My friend was rather put out by this sudden unexpected turn of events, and he had a short temper, although honestly to his credit it was meaningfully directed if you know what I mean, i.e. I was in no danger of annoying him. Anywhoo, there’s a trick to the lines in turf where one pass is cut at a different length to the adjacent pass. I’ve been casually observing the clean up of the guys estate.
VistaVision – revenge of the analogue!
Oooo, I defer to your greater command of this ‘ere language. If smiley it be, then simian it is! 😉
Oh, I’d not properly explained myself there, when I was out and about yesterday, other than the bakery to nab a quality lunch, I’d not ventured near to shops. It was more of an observation about those third spaces we occasionally speak of. Those were quiet. The Editor suggested that people may have been doing their Christmas shopping runs, thus why it was quiet.
The question which needs to be asked is: Would you want an Almond Mum with you in a knife fight? The answer is obvious. The Editor and I spent about five or six hours of work on the firewood today. The reality is that hard physical activity requires a person to eat well, and nobody can be super thin as they age with that work regimen. I’ve encountered such ladies in the past, and politely told them to ‘f#$k off’. One of those self-imposed-food-police long ago said to me (of all people): “Tut, tut, calories” as I chomped into a super well made apple cake. Left an impression on me. It’s been my observation that a person is no more popular if they are on their leanest liveable weight. 🙂 My grandmother (the crazy one) was rake thin, but far out, her days didn’t end well as eventually she was institutionalised and died there. My other grandmother lived to 94 and gave not a hoot to such matters and my memories of her were of a warm and loving person.
I know! The raven will remember, and yes, they do live for a couple of decades. As mentioned previously, I do have good relations with the Corvidae birds here.
Hehe! Yeah, if you knew about the meat and potatoes thing, I’d suggest that perhaps you were stirring the Idaho vegetable pot!
Oooo, I do so like white vinegar, but all this talk of industrial processes leaves me feeling like eventually this super cheap and most excellent product, will no longer be available. I hear you… On that note, I did check out the shed, and didn’t find such a contraption. Oh well…
Oh my gawds, the stuff is harder to make than I even thought. A person must be flexible and in this case there is a substitute product in the form of high strength ethanol.
H is a dog after my own heart, for I like routines too! 🙂 As do the dogs down here. Far out, Dame Plum chased off a stag this morning to the forest edge. I’m a bit annoyed about that because she doesn’t appreciate the risk. The routines will now be changed so that this occurrence does not re-occur. Plus I put on order a proper night time trail camera so as to find out exactly what is going on in the orchard in the dark hours. Should make some interesting short videos.
🙂 What’s not to like about a massively huge earthquake? Sends a strong message I reckon. Although after the 5.9 here, let’s just say that the thought of them makes for some discomfiture. The risks are biggerer in your part of the world, although I’m perched upon a super volcano.
Freak out! 7+ cups of sugar is intense in any recipe. Prepare for ignition!
Cheers and better get writing…
Chris
Hello Chris,
Another good week almost finished. Thanks for the laughs about inner-city-low-carb-lifestyle.
It is also true that most of rural country has become a dispersed suburb, where people drive in and out of town for work. I talked to an oldtimer here, who said that her grandparents lived rural and worked rural. Walked to church on Sunday. No need for driving in those days.
Also good to know about those fishall scrapers. I need to check the stats, to see if my sites are also assaulted by that madness. I have not yet got any notification from the hoster, but it could become expensive. How do you block/limit their access? Do they respect the robots.txt system or do you use a plugin or other wordpress or apache setting?
The website works fine. I can live without the comment numbering. Your words are what really counts.
Peace,
Göran
Yo, Chris – Our high yesterday was 59F(15C). Our overnight low was 46F (7.77C). Our forecast high for today is 54F. We’re under flood watch, all week long. I think we had some rain, late last night, but are in a clear patch, right now. Subject to change.
Well, that kind of a reputation will stick to the rich guy, to the grave. And, beyond.
I drove up to Centralia, last night, to pick up the makings for the fudge. I had forgotten (or underestimated) the impact of the yearly “Lighted Tractor Parade.” It’s an annual Christmas event. Can’t get more “rural” than that.
Apparently, quit a few people used the grocery store parking lot to, well, park and walk up to the parade route. But, it was emptying out when I got there. Driving back to Chehalis, was fraught. My knuckles were white. It’s a two lane road, and people were driving at high rates of speed, and weaving in and out of traffic. At least I didn’t have to dodge any salmon, swimming across the road.
I decided I needed comfort food, when I got home. Had my monthly dose of Mac & cheese. I tossed in some garlic, peas, broccoli and dried tomatoes. Then settled in to watch season four of “Harry Wild.”
Harry, is a retired literature professor, in Dublin, Ireland. Jane Seymour. She and a young sidekick (who snatched her purse and broke her arm in season one … not an auspicious start), solve crimes, much to the bedevilment of her police detective son.
I then finished reading “Winston and the Windsors.” Pretty much a history of the first half of the 20th century, told through the lens of Churchill’s relation with the royal family. All in all, he served the royals, in one capacity or another. From Victoria to Elizabeth. There were ups and downs. 🙂
Hmm. Almond Mom in a knife fight. At least she’d be distracting to one’s opponent. With all these new weight loss drugs, body image is a topic, again.
Ah, it’s that time again. Large deposits going into the Firewood Bank of Fernwood.
Maybe the vinegar making contraption is behind the couch? Which reminds me. There’s a new movie out, titled “Dust Bunny.” I think it’s a horror movie, but maybe not. Little girl hires the retired hit man, next door, to kill the monsters under her bed. Or, something.
What do you do? Dame Plum’s actions were sort of good / not good. I’ve copied out a list of fruits and veg that you can feed dogs. I’m trying to vary H’s diet. We tried bananas, last night. I put a slice on her kibble, and she carefully ate all around it. Later, I noticed it was gone from her dish. Success? Not so fast. She had carefully deposited it, on the living room carpet. Well away from her food dish. I guess that’s a fail.
Off to the Club this morning, to chat with Carl and have a cuppa. Lew