Since I’m still working from home, I had on my “uniform” yesterday of jersey shorts and a tank top. I threw on a nicer top for a client call and never took it off. At noon, YA and I drove down to Walgreens to get our drive-thru covid tests (since we’d been to the fair so many times). When I got into the car, YA looked me over and said “you’re not wearing THAT, are you?” I replied that since I wasn’t getting out of the car and the Walgreens technician would only see the top 1/3 of me, yes. YA rolled her eyes.
On the way home (both tests negative, by the way), as I was waiting at an intersection to turn right, a man with his two white/cream golden retrievers was standing on the corner until the “walk” light came on. The dogs were gorgeous, so I rolled down the window and called to him that his dog were beautiful. He said thanks; I turned right and drove on. “MOOOOOMMM” said YA.
I purchased a thing-a-ma-gig at the fair that makes it easy to put my hair in a bun. I’ve been playing with it and when I got home I put my hair up, making the bun pretty high on my head. Then I had a client call. A bit later YA came into my studio. “Did you have your hair like that during your call?” I replied yes and she responded “It was already bad enough that you’re wearing that shirt” and then she proceeded to show me a picture of an anime character (see above) and although she didn’t say it directly, the implication was that I look like Zeniba.
So I’m three for three in embarrassing my child in one day. Not sure I can best that record without seriously trying.
Tell me what cartoon character you look like? Or would LIKE to look like?
My stomach is just now starting to feel “normal” after four days at the Fair. I don’t go to the fair just to eat but I will say that a lot of eating gets done anyway.
YA and I always purchase two of the fair coupon books and we go through them carefully. This year YA put post-it stickers on the things she didn’t want to miss. And we both spent time on the fair website on the “New Fair Foods” page. YA takes this much more seriously than I do; on the last day we went together we had a map with all the places she wanted to make sure we got to marked in red!
Here are some of the things we consumed:
Hawaiian Shave Ice (they took the competitor’s coupon!)
French Toast Bites (with pop rocks – better than you’re thinking)
Cheese & Potato Pierogies with horseradish sauce (for breakfast)
Waffle with Ice Cream Sandwich center, kettle corn, whipped cream & sprinkles
Siracha Cheese Funnel Cake Bites
Sweet Martha’s Cookies (of course)
Roasted Corn
Mac & Cheese Bites (better the first day I had them)
Cheese Curds (of course)
Tipsy Pies (yummy by not very boozy)
Sota Sandwich (almond butter & blueberry jam on toasted sourdough)
Pretzel with Cheese Sauce
Chocolate Malt
Potato Cheese Crepe (this is YA’s hands’ down favorite every year)
Mocktails (our favorite new food this year – over 4 days we tried 4 of them)
Paneer Pakora (OK but could have been so much better)
Cream Cheese Wontons (also could have been better)
Mac & Cheese (absolutely could have been better)
I know this seems excessive, but remember it was over four days. And two of us. But while I love the fair, I don’t think my digestive system could handle too many more visits!
Our son and daughter-in-law are moving into their first home this Friday. We won’t be able to get to see them until October, over the long weekend for Indigenous Peoples’ Day. As usual, my job when we get there will be to hang the pictures and other decorative things on the walls.
I don’t know why they always want me to do this. They say I know how to center things so they look good. I just make a point of measuring and marking where the hangers should go. It isn’t that hard, but they appreciate it.
Husband is the family go to guy for landscaping advice. Son and his wife have a huge yard at the new house with no plants or trees or flowers. Son has been asking for landscaping advice already, and Husband has some ideas for him. We plan to bring all our flower and seed catalogs. It should be a fun visit.
What makes you feel needed? What skills do you want to teach others so they aren’t lost? How do you go about hanging things on the walls?
Both YA and I love to spend time at the Pet Pavilion and Dog Meet/Greet booths at the Fair. The other place we always hit is the Stunt Dog Show that features dog dock diving as well as some trick dog demonstrations. It’s amazing to me what they have taught these dogs to do.
I’ve had dogs my entire life but for most of that time, I didn’t think much about tricks. All my dogs went to basic obedience but the basics for me have always been sit, down, come and off. Growing up my folks never even did basic obedience. YA’s dog, Guinevere (who has issues) has been to a LOT of obedience, mostly just to have her around other dogs and people. Because of this we’ve managed to teach her some tricks (roll over, double dance, shake, high five, bark) along with the basics.
Growing up my folks never even did basic obedience with any of our dogs so “tricks” is outside of my experience, although one of my dogs as a kid was really smart. Princess (named by me when I was 5) was a shepherd collie mix who came to us as a small puppy. My mom and sisters and I started to call her Princess the Wonder Dog after she was gone because my father’s stories about her just got wilder and more inventive. He used to tell folks that she was so intelligent that when he told her to go get his slippers, she would run upstairs and come down with them. Of course the only problem with that story was that my dad never wore slippers in his life!
Princess did actually know one trick. If you had her sit and stay, you could put a treat on her nose; she would sit patiently until you said “OK” and then she would deftly toss the treat up a bit and then catch it. We didn’t ask her to do this much, but she could do it – no exaggeration from my dad needed. So when the elementary school that my middle sister and I were attending had a family fair with a pet contest, Sally (said sister) really wanted to enter Princess and have her do her one trick.
Sally, who was in the 3rd grade, practiced with Princess for several days before the fair. She packed up bologna, a really high value treat; she was convinced that Princess would win hands down. When the time came for Princess to strut her stuff, there were a lot of people, a lot of other dogs and she was nervous. Sally dutifully had her sit, stay and then put the bologna on her nose. Sally stepped back and it didn’t take long for Princess to jump back, drop the bologna on the ground and then promptly scoop it up and chow it down. Sally was absolutely mortified. I can still hear her say in her trembling angry voice “bad dog, bad dog”. Princess hung her head in shame. Sally never volunteered her to do that trick every again.
Fall is in the air this week. It’s good weather for sleeping; I love it. The soybeans are starting to turn yellow, and they’ll be losing their leaves soon. And with the recent rains the pastures have greened up again. Another inch of nice, slow, steady rain here recently.
Remember a few months ago I left the top lid open on the feed bin and had to spend an afternoon clearing out the rotten corn and gunk. And it was almost empty, thankfully, and there was still a bit of rotten corn stuck to the sides at the bottom. Since I needed to order more feed, now was the time to clean it all out. I wanted to knock loose a little more good corn so I’d have enough to feed the chickens and ducks for a couple days.
First thing I did was drop my long stick into the auger and jam it up. Belt squealing and I’m 15’ feet up the bin so I carefully, hurriedly, scramble down and turn off the breaker. Then I turn the auger backwards, back up the bin to remove the stick, back down to turn on the breaker again, and back up to finish knocking some corn down.
The bin has an 18” opening at the bottom and then a transition angle attached to that which turns it vertical, and then the auger attaches to that. I removed a clamp and the auger attachment, and the auger slid down and out of place. That’s going to be a problem when I get to putting it all back together. The auger is 4” diameter and about 10’ long and goes up through the wall of the feed room with the electric motor attached to the end of the auger in there. I removed the clamp and transition attachment, and then I put a tarp under the opening and climb back up the bin with my stick and start knocking corn off the walls. I’d knock some loose, pull the tarp out and dump it in the loader bucket, then put the tarp back down and knock more corn off. Took 4 cycles. It wasn’t as bad as I thought it might be. But getting it all put back together took two people, a strap, some C-clamps, a stick, some muscle, and some time. It might be the first time I’ve cleaned the bin out in 20 or 30 years. Good for another 30 years.
Kelly helped me get the seed cup put back on the grain drill and the 44 bolts reinstalled, so that part is ready to go. I still have some other work to do on the drill, but I can manage that on my own. The 44 bolts took two people with one inside holding the wrench on the head, and me outside tightening the nut. Replacing the seed cup means I don’t have an excuse for leaving gaps in the field anymore. Next year if there’s a gap between the rows it’s my fault for not driving straight.
The next thing to repair is the ‘big spinny thing’ under the brush mower. I got the blades and broken shaft off the spinny part. Now I need Kelly’s help again to get the 8 bolts off the gearbox and take that off the mower itself. Maybe this weekend.
The former oat fields are getting a lot of weeds growing in them now. Bailey and I got them dug up. It needs to be done before they get too big (and before they go to seed) or they will plug up the digger. I try not to go the same way across the field every time I work it up. My fields are not square, and while I’m still trying to follow the contours, it helps to start on the opposite end of the field sometimes and just break up those ridges underneath the soil.
I had the co-op come and take soil samples off the oat fields. Normally you need to do that either in the spring or the fall after the crop is off. Can’t test during the growing season of course but since the oats is done, it was a good time to do those fields. I haven’t seen the results yet.
The remodeling work at one of the local theaters continues and there’s been a good crew in helping with that. If we ever get the flooring done (Thanks to Wes for advice), the bathroom stalls will be the next major job. They came in two dozen pieces and multiple bags of bolts.
In class this week the lab was on topographical maps and reading the contours and an online test on seafloor spreading and continental plates. I learned about Earthquakes, Volcanos, and the Earth’s magnetic field being generated in the core of the earth and that the magnetic field has changed polarity multiple times over the years. The last change was about 1 million years ago.
The only thing we are managing to produce out of our garden is cucumbers. I make a lot of refrigerator pickles. Neither Kelly or I learned how to can things or preserve things and it’s probably not hard, but it is hard to find the time. At least I can grow cucumbers. Something has gotten in the garden and ate all the potatoes and kohlrabi. All summer something has been in there and I can’t find a hole in the fence, but they leave the cucumbers alone.
And the ducks. They’re getting real nice ‘poofs’ on their heads and some are off to the side like a jaunty little chapeau. I spend a lot of time just watching the ducks play in the water. They are good jumpers being able to hop into one of the water containers. I spend a lot of time watching the ducks.
Got any stories about magnets? Our son stuck one on the TV and messed up the picture and we had to buy a new TV.
Have you been in an Earthquake or seen an active Volcano?
Two days ago I got the following text message from Nonny:
P a little surprised what a sweetheart I couldn’t remember the old Club was asking her about her interest but they seem to only be about the lieutenant who was across the room at the time she told me she thought you was hot start I agreed you could look at it and then she asked if I’d ever fantasize about sleeping with him sorry the TV is is making this I’ll hang up.
Now Nonny struggles with technology so as I began to read, I was trying to guess what she might be trying to say. It wasn’t until I got to the fantasize part that I was really confused. Then the last line about the tV made me laugh out loud. She couldn’t figure out how to make the voice recognition stop recording when she realized it was picking up the tv. Phew… my mother has never asked me about fantasizing about sleeping with anyone – and I don’t want that to start!
Then the same day I started VR for something and didn’t realize I had my phone set to Italian; normally it switches on by itself for my daily Italian lesson and then turns itself off when I’m done. But I must have accidentally changed to Italian. I don’t even remember what I was trying to say, but this is what I got:
Anonymous game ex fan Week and Hugh know Cost Wearing Nice T-shirt il Renzi stasera mangiare cioè stop period and Best me va bene anche a me Kiss Snapchat Giusy shorts T-shirt c’è in CAPS ormai Favorites schiena biologico Birthday Office
It must be a voice recognition foul up kind of week. Two more on Wednesday that I caught on the blog right before I hit Post.
“And jam is also easier to make” turned into “And Jim is also easier to make”.
“I’ve never had a guy stand at the end of a row with a stick. Turned into “I’ve never had a guy at the end of a roller coaster”
I’m a little worried about what VR is thinking about me… fantasizing, making Jim and having a guy at the end of a roller coaster. Yikes.
But when you think about the technology involved in these little tiny circuits being able to hear your voice, search the database for a match and then enter it as text in your application – it’s amazing that it works as well as it does. What I really need is some kind of a cattle prod to zap me right before I hit “Post” to make sure I doublecheck what VR has done for me!
Ever since April, 2020, Husband has stayed at home, seeing only a few psychotherapy clients a week and filling his time with volunteer work and gardening. He was relieved to be done working on the Reservation. He had his pension and Social Security.
I noticed over the last year, though, that he just didn’t seem to be getting much done at home, and his typically solemn demeanor became even more lugubrious.
Since he was hired at his new, part-time job last week, everything has changed, the world is full of new and exciting possibilities, and I can hardly keep up with him. It is really good to see. He really was deep in the doldrums, and I didn’t realize just how deep. He feels he has a purpose again. A ten hours a week job made a huge difference! His new found exuberance has partly taken the form of cooking, however, and I worry we may need to get a new freezer.
What helps you to feel really happy? What helps to get you out of a funk? What gives you purpose?
The high school football season has started here. Both the high schools in our town play their games in the local college stadium. As I drove past the college football grounds this week, I saw two high school teams getting ready to play, and four striped shirt referees walking onto the field. I thought immediately of my father.
My dad officiated high school baseball, basketball, football, and volleyball for 68 years. He absolutely loved it. He umpired his last high school baseball game at the age of 88 in the Metrodome. Once, he started having chest pains during a baseball game in Iowa between Cherokee and Sheldon. Since it was the last game of the season, he didn’t want to call the game, so he downed eight nitroglycerin tablets and hoped for the best. The next day he had cardiac bypass surgery.
The rules for sports are fairly clear cut. The rules for human relationships off the field are not. I despise mediating. I refuse to provide marital counseling. I just can’t be that kind of referee.
When have you had to referee or mediate? Ever had any beefs with a sports official? Ever been thrown out of a game?
Actually, hasn’t been much farming the last few weeks…
I’m back at “work” work now, and I lit another show, and we moved my mom to long term care.
Here’s a theater space I was working in and the genie lift that’s my best friend because it means no ladders!
And the view from up there.
With the lights.
And the lighting console in the loft.
And some of the finished product. The colored lights? That’s what I did.
It’s a show called ‘Head Over Heels’, music of the GoGo’s (which apparently I only know two songs.
Mom is 95 and has just kinda lost her self confidence in the last few months. There’s been a few falls (nothing serious) and I think she kinda likes it when the firemen come to help pick her up. And I’m lucky I have siblings here and everyone is chipping in to pack and deal with things. Moving to a long-term care apartment was her idea so that makes it a bit easier; we were over there more and more and balancing the cost of more Visiting Angels or Assisted Living or LTC, she decided this was the thing to do. I can’t say enough good things about VA; they’ve been great.
She was already in a Senior place so we’re lucky that she’s just moving into another section and not across town or anything.
There is a large metal bin down by the barn that holds corn which I use for the chickens and ducks. I opened the top lid one day to climb up and check how much was left inside, and then forgot about it and left the top open for two weeks and that’s when we got 3” of rain. Oh fer….
I spent an hour one morning taking an access cover off the bottom and digging out about 30 gallons of wet, stinky, moldy, rotten corn. I’ll try not to forget to close that again. Thank Goodness it’s almost empty. I’ll be ordering 100 bushels of cracked corn to refill in the next few weeks.
They say August is bean month. Beans have pods, but how big they’re going to get depends on the weather in August.
I was just reading about how corn develops and how the yields are determined by the weather. It takes roughly 90,000 average kernels to make a bushel (56 pounds for corn, remember?). The guys who are winning the yield contests can get that down to 65,000 kernels (bigger, heavier kernels). Final yield started with how many plants emerged back in April. The girth of the ear was determined at the 5-leaf stage; If the plant was happy and it had all the right nutrients and moisture, it can have 20 kernels around. 12-14 is average so any more than that means everything was going right at that point. Now the kernels are there and it depends on the weather as to how much they fill and what the test weight will ultimately be. If it gets stressed now, it won’t develop fully to the tip as the plant sacrifices them to fill the bottom. A lot had to happen already, but the weather this month can still make or break a crop. It’s pretty fascinating.
The ducks have moved outside and now it’s all muddy out there (I swear; everything is wet when you have ducks).
Here’s some ducks!
Any Questions?
Boil or microwave your sweetcorn? Who’s done mud wrestling?
It has been an endless source of pleasure this summer to watch our son and daughter in law and their joy at the purchase of their first home. Son has sent multiple photos of the flowers, trees, and shrubs he wants to add to the landscape in their huge yard. The property is a quarter of an acre (or hectare for European and Canadian Baboons). Their new home is only three years old and they have rather nice, new appliances, all save for a washer and dryer.
Son researched all the best shades and grades of washers and dryers, who in his South Dakota town sold and serviced them, and who would reserve them for him until their closing and move-in dates in early September.
I advised him to go with a local appliance dealer, not the big box home improvement store, since they are neighbors and have to deal with them on a personal basis outside of the store. Son did his research and did as I advised, since the repair person for the big box appliances has to come from over 50 miles away, and the local dealer would set aside the ones they wanted until they closed on the house. The washer and dryer are really fancy-schmancy, and both have steam options for cleaning and dewrinkling. Who knew? We haven’t bought a new washer/dryer for more than 15 years.
There has been appliance excitement here, too, as Husband decided last night that we absolutely needed a grain mill attachment for our Swedish mixer, and that we would get it for our 38th wedding anniversary. This is slightly more romantic than the meat saw he got me for our 35th anniversary. He wants to make his own rye chops and coarse grain so he can make rye bread just like they did at the City Bakery in Winnipeg.
What is the most exciting appliance you ever purchased? What are your memories of you or your parents purchasing a first home
Trail Baboon 