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Wednesday, August 31, 2011, 9:30 a.m.
66 degrees, breezy, mostly sunny
Another perfect late summer morning has unfolded, crisp
and clear and filled with snails.
Yes, snails. I can’t walk on the dewy lawn in
sandals any more because every step traps
one of the small golden gastropods between my sandal and
the bottom of my foot, and it is
really yucky. We strolled down to the potato patch
yesterday to dig some spuds for supper,
and I finally ditched the Chacos and proceeded barefoot,
as it is less disgusting that way; at
least the shell doesn’t make a sickening crunnnnnch,
as when trapped between my sole and
a hard footbed. We never had these little golden snails
at all until about six years ago, and it
seems like they have increased in numbers at a dizzying
exponential rate. When I bring in
greens for the table, after I toss them in a basin of
cold water to rinse off the soil, there are
always a dozen or more snails floating on the surface,
even if I remember to give the produce
a good shake before putting it into my gathering pail. I
place them into the compost bucket, but
if I don’t empty it soon there are snails all over
my counter making a break for it. Occasionally
there will be a small army of them crossing the Smith
Road, and it is impossible to take a step
without treading on whole legions of them. I have tried
to find out what kind of snails they
are, but haven’t had any luck. If anyone out there
has a clue, please let me know,
using the Contact
Daisy prompt at the top of this article. For as many
of them
as there are, they do surprisingly little damage to our
garden crops.
Have a great day,
Daisy
Tuesday, August 30, 2011, 8:30 a.m.
62 degrees, windy, mostly sunny
Another gorgeous morning is laid out before us like a
wonderful gift, with fresh clear air
arriving gently from the west and the first hint of
autumn color showing up in a few trees of
the distant hedgerows. When we were riding on the Smith
Road yesterday, we passed a couple
of swamp maple trees that have already begun their
transformation from ordinariness into scarlet
beauties, and a few random leaves were already decorating
the brown dirt of the road. Evidence
of the hurricane was limited to puddles, gurgling
drainage ditches, and many branches, twigs, and
leaves that littered the road; we rode over most of the
tree detritus but moved the largest out of the
way for those who ride ATVs in the dark. Downhill runs
were lovely, but the climbs were made a little
more difficult by the softness of the road surface. There
was no other traffic for the entire duration of our
ride, which was wonderful. We were turned back by a pack
of dogs at a residence who were outdoors
unsupervised, and one of them was being extremely
aggressive. We have ridden by the others many times
in safety, but this new dog was big and did his job as a
watchdog entirely too well. I need to take the truck
up there and meet the dog when the owners are home. I
assume they wouldn’t let a truly dangerous dog run
loose, but since I was bitten a few months ago by a
fairly harmless looking mutt I have been extra cautious.
We rode past thousands of ripe apples hanging on the
trees and scattered on the ground, a patchwork of
windfalls; it is a great year for apples. We also scouted
out a few elderberry patches, and it seems that the
birds have beaten us to the bulk of the harvest this year.
The berries still in the clusters are dead ripe, but
there are only about 20% of them remaining. We stopped at
the corn patch on our return to pick some
fresh ears for lunch. Raccoons must have thought that we
knocked the stalks over for their convenience
(when in fact, it was Irene that did it) and had eaten a
dozen ears from the row farthest from the road.
Last night we put a transistor radio in a ziploc bag and
tuned it to talk radio, as well as setting up the
Havahart trap. The trap was empty this morning, but no
further damage has been done to the corn.
I guess Rush Limbaugh is good for something after all. I
plan to pick what is ripe today and pre-
pare it for the freezer, as well as saving some out for
our next few meals. This corn is so sweet
and tasty that it doesn’t require anything more than
a gentle steaming for a few minutes.
Butter and salt are not necessary when the corn is this
good !
Have a great day,
Daisy
Monday, August 29, 2011, 8:00 a.m.
53 degrees, breezy, sunny
What a wonderful clear morning this is! After a day of
wind, rain and general mayhem,
all is exceptionally beautiful here on Gomer Hill. Our
rain gauge is broken, but there are
reports of about two inches total rainfall here at the
farthest edge of hurricane Irene. The
wind was the big story, and there are many small branches
littering the lawn. We were lucky
that all of the big limbs stayed put. At one point there
were so many shredded bits of maple
and ash leaf blowing about that it looked like Mother
Nature was tossing a salad in our yard.
The wind not only roared, it whistled, screamed, and
snarled like the Big Bad Wolf. South of
here, Utica, Ilion, Mohawk, and Herkimer had some pretty
major flooding from fast-rising
creeks. The Mill Creek in Turin came up just to the top
of its banks, but didn’t overflow,
which was lucky for the village people. Our sweet corn
has been blown pretty flat, but
since it is almost ready to pick we shouldn’t lose
too much. The new culverts and drains
worked well to keep all of the water flowing downhill,
even during the hardest pounding
deluge. We have a week of clear and sunny sailing ahead
for the most part, and since
it is too wet to work in the gardens I am headed out to
explore the back roads
on my bike with friends. We expect to find some surprises
left by Irene.
Have a great day,
Daisy
Sunday, August 28, 2011, 8:00 a.m.
62 degrees, windy, overcast, rain
The edge of the hurricane is just beginning to affect our
weather, but so far this is just
another ordinary rainy late summer morning. I dreamed of
this kind of slow steady rain
during the long dry spell earlier in the season, and
lately it seems that those dreams have
been answered over, and over, and over again. We dug two
rows of potatoes yesterday,
as the tops had died back on the yukon gold
variety and soil conditions were perfect for
using our antique potato digging machine. The spuds are
still lying in neat rows, getting
cleaned by the rain. We will pick them up tomorrow before
the sun has time to do any
damage to the skins. I picked so many beans that I
believe today will be the last time
I have to go through the steps needed to freeze them, and
they are heaped up in two
huge piles after I gave them a thorough washing last
night. I hope to get them into the
freezer before the brunt of today’s storm hits, as
the process takes quite a bit of water
to complete, and if we lose power the water pump
doesn’t work. We have the generat-
or standing by, mostly because we picked up seventy-five
day-old chicks last Wednesday,
and they need a heat lamp to survive until they grow
feathers, which takes about two weeks.
Time to get crackin’; will give the full storm
report tomorrow.
Tuck in,
Daisy
Saturday, August 27, 2011, 8:00 a.m.
66 degrees, calm, partly sunny
A thin crescent moon rose in the pre-dawn hour,
and I expect it will make its slow way across
the sky and set about an hour before the sun does. Keep a
look-out for it. We had a mostly clear
sky until just now, and a mass of thick pale clouds has
been blocking out the sun little by slow. We
are in for a pretty nice day, and then things will get
wet and wild for tomorrow if Irene makes it this far
inland. She is now only a level one hurricane, but her
reach is far. Campers in the Adirondacks have been
advised to pack up and go home, although I don’t
know how folks in the more remote regions will receive
this warning. We will draw off some water in buckets and
kettles tonight, in case we lose power during the
storm, but other than that the most we can do is park our
cars away from the big trees and tuck in with a
good book. Next week looks like a beaut, and we hope to
get our potatoes harvested during the dry spell.
Yesterday we caught a young raccoon in our Havahart trap
that was set in the cornfield. We sent him far,
far away, to a place where he can eat all of the
sweetcorn he wants, ride on clouds, and play a harp with
his creepy little humanoid hands. We used to release them
five miles away from civilization, but then we
marked one and realized that he came right back to our
cornfield. I don’t know how far they need to
be relocated before they return to their homeground, but
lately we have been dispatching them to a
whole different plane. It isn’t easy. A friend was
in the barbershop the other day and mentioned that
he has shot nine coons this summer, and he can’t
imagine the sudden rise in their population; they have
nearly wiped out his entire sweetcorn crop. The barber
told him that earlier that day, he overheard an-
other customer bragging that he had successfully
relocated a dozen raccoons to the Old Town Road,
which happens to be where my friend lives. Today I plan
to put the new crop of beans in the freezer;
they are young enough that I can process the whole bean,
with no cutting involved. There is spinach
to pick for dinner, and we continue to thin the
buttercrunch lettuce; soon there will be tight little
heads on the plants we have left behind. For now, we have
been chowing down on tender
baby greens, like the kind fancy-shmancy restaurants
charge an arm and a leg for. The
expanse of blue sky is growing larger, and I had best get
busy while the sun shines.
Have a great day,
Daisy
Friday, August 26, 2011, 7:30 a.m.
56 degrees, breezy, mostly cloudy
Low-hanging clouds here on Gomer Hill are morphing into
thin fog as I watch,
and the morning air is damp and chilly. The northeast
wind doesn’t carry much promise
for creating the dog days that often occur at this time
in late August. There is a flock of turkeys
in our cornfield, which doesn’t concern me much;
they are probably eating little golden snails,
which have been all over the stalks lately. I picked all
of the ears that were ripe yesterday,
and now there are several bags of sweet kernels in our
freezer. This variety is spring treat,
which is not only excellent for eating fresh off the cob,
but also freezes exceptionally well. It
keeps its snappy crispness even in a soup or stew. I
added some to our bean and rice dish last
night, and it provided not only great color and flavor
but an interesting texture as well. Our second
sowing of corn should be ready sometime next week, and
for that reason we have set the Havahart
trap up near the patch, baited with apples and molasses
to try and catch the raccoon that has been
raiding our harvest. We are certain that it is a coon and
not a porcupine because the ears have been
removed from the stalk and carried into the windrows of
hay where the cobs were stripped clean,
as if a hungry hobo had stopped for a snack. A porky will
eat the corn as it hangs from the stalk,
and only munch as much as he can conveniently reach, not
having the clever hands of the rac-
coon which can peel back all of the husk and expose the
entire ear. It certainly is tasty
eaten raw, seconds after being plucked from the stalk;
just don’t eat too much.
Have a great day,
Daisy
Thursday, August 25, 2011, 8:00 a.m.
65 degrees, breezy, mostly cloudy
The sky is a mash-up of many kinds of clouds, all moving
at different rates of speed.
There is very little blue in the picture, and what little
there is has a washed-out pale aspect,
a distillation of the intense bluebird hue of earlier in
the week. A brief thunderstorm swept across
the Hill before dawn this morning, delivering such huge
raindrops that I feared our tender new greens
would be shredded by the sheer weight of water alone.
Some of the sunflowers across the road are
drooping sideways, but that could be from the increasing
mass of their many blossoms as the weighty
seedheads begin to develop. It is time to replace the
bouquets I picked on Sunday, as some petals are
starting to drop off, although the yellow scattering
looks very pretty against the slate grey tile of the kit-
chen floor. The newer varieties of sunflower have more
than one big flower; the mammoth russian var-
iety we used to grow had a single bloom atop a ten-foot
stalk, some as big as a pizza pan. One year
we grew many of these huge plants, intending to harvest
the seeds to use to feed the birds as well as
us. We spread out the seedheads in an old station wagon
to dry, using it as a natural solar dehydra-
tor. It worked very well, but when we went to move the
car after the heads were dry, it wouldn’t
start. Mice had harvested their share of seeds, and
stored them all throughout the car’s engine and
exhaust system. Lesson learned. For the past several
years we have planted a mix of varieties called
sun ‘n’ fun which provides an assortment
of colors and sizes of blossoms. Our earliest flowers
come
from volunteers that appear each spring from seeds that
were tilled into the ground. We cultivate around
these as we plant the rows of vegetables, and transplant
some of them into other gardens, sowing newer
seeds a few weeks later so we have sunflowers blooming
for a period of several months, right up until frost.
The more we pick them, the more new flowers appear. The
winter-hardiest of the mix seems to be a plain
yellow flower with a big dark center, the kind Vincent
Van Gogh memorialized in his paintings. The sun looks
like it may shine through the clouds, although more rain
showers are in the forecast, ushering in another cold
front. I will dash over to the corn patch and pick the
rest of the first crop to put into the freezer. The
second
sowing should be ready next week, which is perfect timing,
something we aim for but often miscalculate. In
spite of all of the strange weather that has graced the
summer of 2011, our gardens are doing very well.
Have a great day,
Daisy
Wednesday, August 24, 2011, 8:00 a.m.
62 degrees, windy, mostly cloudy
After a fairly chilly night, the morning air is
not warming up very quickly.
It is hard to believe that the temperature will reach
into the eighties today,
but I suppose if the sun comes out to stay it may be
possible. Our tomatoes
and peppers would appreciate a warming trend, that’s
for sure. We pulled up
all of our onions yesterday, and now they are drying on
screens in the barn for
a few days before we remove the tops and roots. Their
final cure will be indoors
underneath the wood range, to form the dry papery outer
layers that will help keep
them sound during winter in the cellar. The foliage on
the yukon gold potatoes had
died back, and as soon as the soil dries out a bit we
will dig that variety; the rest of
the spuds could use another week or two to reach maximum
yield. Sometime soon
I have to dig up a few dozen strawberry plants and start
a new patch, as the current
one has become overrun with weeds. Every three or four
years we move the bed and
mulch it well with sawdust; it is easier than trying to
keep the weeds out, and even though
we will have fewer berries for next season, it is a trade-off
that pays out in a healthier crop
in the long run. We have kept the same strain of berries
going from just three plants that we
got twenty-five years ago. I forget what variety they are,
but they have given us some beautiful
berries that, while not the largest, are certainly the
sweetest I have ever tasted. Several crows
have just landed in the trees around the house, raising
their voices in unison over something;
perhaps they are keeping track of their youngsters.
Adults continue to look after their young
until next years eggs hatch, and often the previous
season’s kids will hang around to help keep
track of their future siblings. Bird activity in general
has been slow since we returned to Gomer
Hill; I think since the tall meadow grass has been mown,
there are fewer places to hide, so they
have been staying closer to the cover of the forest and
hedgerows. The goodthing about hav-
ing our hay cut so late in the summer, the bobolinks and
blackbirds probably had a chance
to clear their families away as they heard the giant
mowing machine approach.
Have a fine day,
Daisy
Tuesday, August 23, 2011, 9:00 a.m.
59 degrees, breezy, partly sunny
A vast array of clouds of every description fills
much of the sky; they move at various speeds,
or hang plump and motionless in their sea of blue. There
is a large grey mass moving swiftly across
the lower atmosphere that looks exactly like a whale. A
brief but hearty downpour earlier this morning
has postponed any plans I may have had to pick beans
today. It seems that the rain has moved on for now,
so I will finish unpacking and tackle the laundry
generated by nine days of leisure. I would like to get
out on
my bicycle for a little ride to the Smith Road orchard,
to see if any of the wild apples there are ready to pick.
Our own domestic tree, one of four left that we planted
when we moved up here, is loaded with ripe fruit.
Unfortunately, they are macintosh, which, in my opinion,
are only good for feeding to deer. I made some
applesauce yesterday, but I prefer the kind that has big
chinks of fruit, and macs always turn into mush
no matter how gently you cook them. Still, as an
ingredient in spice cake, or as a condiment served with
macaroni and cheese, this is still better than no
applesauce at all. My mother used to add cinnamon hearts
to canned applesauce to make it all pink and spicy; I
wonder how much toxic red dye I consumed over the
years, from that and also red Jell-o and M & Ms. Now
red food coloring is often made from cochineal, which
is derived from beetle shells; back in the 50s it was a
chemical dye that proved to be carcinogenic. The clouds
have shifted again, and now are the dominant feature in
the morning view, absolutely stunning!
Have a great day,
Daisy
Monday, August 22, 2011, 8:00 a.m.
64 degrees, windy, mostly sunny
It was nice and warm on the back porch this morning, but
hanging laundry out in the breeze
I find a fleece jacket to be welcome. We returned from
our seaside vacation late Saturday afternoon,
in plenty of time to peruse the gardens and organize our
jobs for the coming week. Our farmer friend had
been up on Friday to mow our meadows, but hasn’t
been able to bale the hay yet, so the sweet fragrance
of alfalfa, clover, and mixed grasses has been lingering
wherever we go. Yesterday I was able to pick two
full pails of green beans before a morning thunderstorm
hit, as well as a dozen long suyo cucumbers. Most
of the beans were the perfect size for cutting into
smaller pieces for freezing, but I also had quite a few
very
large ones, nine inches long and starting to seed up. I
put those through my hand-powered bean frenching
tool, which made long fat beans into long skinny ones,
perfect for winter casseroles mixed with creamed
mushrooms and a sprinkling of slivered almonds on top.
Today I will make some fresh sweet pickles from
the cukes, which won’t take long. There is a wealth
of swiss chard to cut and eat fresh or freeze for later.
The
spinach, lettuce, and chard that I planted a few weeks
ago is now the perfect size for tender salad greens, and
pulling every other plant will help the greens become
larger in the long run. Most of our first planting of
sweet
corn matured while we were away, but several friends
enjoyed the panoramic view from Gomer Hill as they
picked corn for their suppers. We have been able to have
some of the secondary ears, which have been ten-
der and sweet, if a little smaller. Tomatoes are just
getting going; I need to snip more blossoms from the
vines
that have appeared during the last ten days. Green pepper
plants have set many fruits, and it won’t be long
before they are big and blocky. All of the annual flowers
that I planted from seed are in bloom; I am par-
ticularly happy with the persian carpet zinnias,
which have a huge variety of small single and double
blooms in every color combination imaginable. I cut a
couple of dozen sunflowers and they grace
every room downstairs, with one huge single sunny yellow
specimen perched atop the wood
range, splendid in a fat cobalt blue bottle. Although, if
it doesn’t warm up soon, I may have
to move it to start a fire; the house is a little chilly
this morning. There is a decided hint of
autumn borne on the morning breeze. Late August, when
summer starts to show its age...
Have a great day,
Daisy
*Intermission*
Thursday, August 11, 2011, 9:00 a.m.
58 degrees, windy, partly sunny
When I came indoors to write today’s piece, it was
mostly sunny. Big clouds have moved in very quickly,
and it even looks like some of them may be carrying rain.
We had a little thunderstorm late yesterday afternoon,
with some pretty hard rain and a beautiful rainbow
towards the end, with the dazzling end resting directly
on a
friend’s farm on route 12D. I wonder if they found a
pot of gold. Yesterday’s weather was, for the most
part,
pretty darned spectacular, with a fine breeze and the
kind of rarefied air that accompanies a late summer storm
front. I was as happy picking beans as I have ever been,
and the task felt more like a celebration than a chore.
It was a beautiful afternoon; there were no pesky insects,
and the beans were perfectly ready, hanging like long
skinny jade earrings; in fact, jade is the variety
of beans we are growing this year. They do not germinate
until
the soil is warm, but once they get going, they are
prolific, dependable, disease-resistant, and the best
beans for
eating fresh, as well as for freezing and canning as
dillybeans. We have two more plantings that will be ready
at
the end of this month and into the first weeks of
September, so even if we miss a picking or two while we
are
on vacation, we will still have plenty to put by for
winter. This will be my last entry for a while. I will
miss our
beautiful place here on Gomer Hill, but will enjoy the
seaside as a nice change of scenery, just as our house-
sitters will be drinking in the beautiful views of the
Black River Valley and the Adirondack Mountains.
Have a great week,
Daisy
Wednesday, August 10, 2011, 8:30 a.m.
64 degrees, windy, mostly cloudy, showers
Yesterday we received over an inch of rain, and this
morning several brief showers have sped across the Hill.
I believe the sky shows some signs of clearing, but just
now the gentle shower has shifted into a hard downpour,
which pretty much kills my plan to pick and freeze beans
this morning. I also have a few loads of laundry to hang
out, but I think I will cave and toss much of it into the
dryer, just to get it out of the way. The sun is shining
through
the hard rain, and if I knew where to look I might see a
rainbow. We hardly ever have rainbows in the morning;
they are frequent in the eastern sky late in the day,
especially this time of year. I am glad I dug some
potatoes
before the rain started. Some varieties are nearing the
end of their life span. Yukon gold vines are already
turning yellow, so that is what I dug. They show a fine
yield, with a dozen spuds in each hill, most of them
larger than a baseball. The reds continue to gain in size;
although they were the first ones ready to eat,
they are still going strong, with big healthy vines and
as many as twenty potatoes per plant. Now that
they have received a good dose of water, they should be
ready to dig in another ten days or so.
That is our next big garden chore, made a bit easier wit
the help of an ancient digger pulled
by a tractor. We still have all of the work of sorting
them and picking them up to put
into bags for storage. Never having to buy potatoes from
the store, priceless !
Have a great day,
Daisy
Tuesday, August 9, 2011, 8:00 a.m.
65 degrees, breezy, mostly cloudy
A pair of catbirds is busy with something in the
forsythia hedge; it almost looks like they are building a
nest.
That doesn’t seem possible at this time of year. It
is more likely that they found a sweet hatch of some
tasty
bugs in that particular location. Catbirds form
monogamous pairs at the beginning of each nesting season,
which is normally in early spring in this neck of the
woods. However, we did see a group of three new
robin fledglings last week, so apparently this is an
anything-can-happen summer here on Gomer Hill.
I saw a very young fawn over near the woodlot as we
walked the paths yesterday; it still had spots,
but was steady on its feet; I would guess it was about
ten days old. Most of the fawns are born
in late spring, not during the dog days of August. Now
that we have had some decent rain
(with more on the way later today, I reckon) our tomatoes
and peppers are beginning to
show signs of a good future harvest. So far we have only
had four ripe tomatoes, but
many of them are displaying the first blush of color,
which means it won’t be long
before we can enjoy their fresh juicy goodness with every
meal. Every day
in August brings new discoveries, some familiar, and some
surprising.
Enjoy your day,
Daisy
Monday, August 8, 2011, 9:00 a.m.
67 degrees, breezy, mostly cloudy
The morning is cool but quite humid, but a stiff north
breeze should be bringing us some relief
from the moist tropical air, a good blast of canadian
high pressure is on the way. it will be nice to
have the salt flow from the shaker holes once again. The
fog that swirled around the meadows earlier
has lifted and the sun has peeked out several times,
spotlighting small areas of goldenrod and burnish-
ing the flowers with a gleam that would make King Midas
look twice. We are quite busy getting
everything ready for our annual trip to the Maine coast.
It looks like our sweet corn will be ready
just in time for the housesitters to have a real feast or
three while we are gone. Just as we look
forward to a change of pace by visiting the ocean, so do
our good friends enjoy a week here
on Gomer Hill watching the sun rise and set, caring for
our furry friends, and keeping up with
the fresh veggies that abound this time of year. A little
change of pace is good once in a while.
Still, as much as I enjoy a little vacation, there is
truly no place like home!
Have a great day,
Daisy
Sunday, August 7, 2011, 9:00 a.m.
68 degrees, calm, mostly cloudy, fog
A wall of dense fog rolled up the hill a little while ago,
and is now thinning out a bit.
It was a bit chilly and damp in the house, so I lit a
small fire in the range, just to take the
edge off. This is the first fire I have kindled indoors
in many weeks, as the mere thought
of adding extra heat to the swelter of days was beyond my
comprehension. But it does
feel good this morning, and also provides a warm place
for a batch of bread to rise. We
had a few hours of gentle rain yesterday, and another
little shower during the night, and I
can already see a difference in the color of our lawn.
This was the first real rain we have
had in a long time; I can practically see the ears of
corn swelling in their husks from here.
I picked a five gallon pail full of green beans yesterday
and froze them, as well as a nice
bunch of swiss chard. The second planting of chard has
caught up to the first, and since
the whole plant isn’t harvested at one time, the
third planting will only add more to the
greens pot by the time it gets ready later this month. We
froze chard for the first time
last year, and it became a favorite ingredient in ham and
bean soup during the
winter, so we plan to freeze a lot more this year. Of
course, while it is fresh
from the garden, we enjoy it cooked with a little bacon
and onion, then
topped with romano cheese and browned under the broiler.
That is a side dish fit for royalty !
Have a great day,
Daisy
Saturday, August 6, 2011, 8:30 a.m.
70 degrees, calm, mostly cloudy
I would like to think that this is the calm before the
storm, as there is an 80% chance of rain
forecast for today. But when I look at the Nexrad map, I
see that, unless there is a significant
shift in the storm track, most of the precipitation will
pass south of Gomer Hill, as it has for almost
every rainfall since early May. Every one of our garden
crops would benefit from a good two-day
soaking, and our lawn would once again be emerald green
instead of army khaki. There is a music
festival in Old Forge today, so it will probably rain
over there for sure. Our corn is nearing maturity,
but the stalks are only three feet tall, and the ears are
all on the small side. Our shell beans are finally
climbing the poles and strings, but had to be coaxed to
grow upwards instead of spreading out along
the ground. I don’t know if there is enough time
left in our growing season to get a good harvest of
dry beans this year. The tomato vines are heavy with
green fruit, and there has certainly been enough
heat, but they seem slow to ripen. The zucchini is more
prolific that ever, and every day sees another
dozen beautiful green and golden squash, picked small and
roasted or steamed to perfection. I put
two bigger ones into lasagna the other night, sliced thin
and layered right in there with the noodles,
cheese, and sauce, and after it had baked for an hour you
couldn’t even tell they were an ingre-
dient. If you have family members who are picky, this
would be a good way to serve any
mild-flavored vegetable. No finicky eaters here,
it’a all good !
Have a great day,
Daisy
Friday, August 5, 2011, 8:00 a.m.
68 degrees, breezy, sunny
The morning air is comfortably cool, so it would be a
good idea to accomplish our outdoor work early,
before the heat moves in. We are in for some tropically
sultry air, with a possibility of thunderstorms tomor-
row as the front moves through. The valley sits in haze
this morning, but the air up here is clear and alive with
starlings on the wing. We were trimming shrubbery around
the yard yesterday and startled some young robins
in a nest hidden deep in the forsythia. They are nearly
full grown, but the momma was agitated as we trimmed
away the leafy cover, which led to our seek-and-discover
of three fledglings. I didn’t realize that robins
would
raise a brood this late in the year, but apparently
anything is possible this summer in both the plant and
animal
kingdoms. There have been some pretty major solar flares
recently, so I have been wandering around out-
doors after dark the last few nights to see if there were
any northern lights. So far, the predominant feature
in the night sky ha been a bright crescent moon traveling
towards the western horizon as it prepares to
set. Stars have been sparkly and bright as well, and the
air has been cool enough to require a light
jacket. This is a very busy time of year for many of us,
and it is good to remember that walk-
ing early in the morning or late in the evening are
wonderful options to get some exercise
as well as a chance to enjoy a different perspective on
the everyday view.
Have a great day,
Daisy
Thursday, August 4, 2011, 7:00 a.m.
61 degrees, calm, mostly sunny
Fog is lifting from the Black River Valley and forms a
misty curtain in the southeast sky.
It looks like the lowlands are still socked in, but all
is bright here on Gomer Hill. The town road
crew has just arrived with the final culvert for the
Smith Road restoration project; this one looks like
a baby compared to the two that have already gone in. Our
town and state highway workers have not
been lacking for projects this summer, because of all the
damage that occurred as a result of spring flood-
ing. It seems like we got all of our rain for the whole
season in just one deluge over two months ago. We
had some slow soaking rain yesterday, but less than a
half inch overall; still, this is better than no rain at
all.
A little shower passed through last night as well, but by
the time I got up to close the windows, it was finish-
ed. A chance of rain is in the picture for the weekend,
so fingers are crossed and rain dances will ensue.
Have a great day,
Daisy
Wednesday, August 3, 2011, 8:30 a.m.
67 degrees, breezy, partly sunny
Blue sky, white clouds, and a gentle west breeze are
perfect conditions for bean picking,
which is the first of many jobs to be done today. There
is a good chance of rain later, so I
will put all of the indoor work on the back burner and
concentrate on the weeding, pruning,
bean-picking, and flower gathering that should take most
of the morning. Last night was cool
and clear, and several night sounds drifted in through
the open windows. I haven’t heard coyotes
in quite a while, and last night the neighborhood dogs
filled that gap with a brief fit of barking that
traveled from yard to yard; there must have been some
interesting wild critter out and about to
evoke that kind of reaction. I heard the far-off call of
a barred owl, so faint I thought I dream-
ed it. Just before dawn, there was the loud scream of
some animal that I had never heard
before, not a fox, cat, or coon, but something that
seemed to be in distress. It was close
to the house, but there was no moon so I couldn’t
see anything when I peered out
of the window. Perhaps I will find some clues as I walk
the paths today.
I wonder if all of the nightsounds were connected in some
way ?
Have a great day,
and an interesting night,
Daisy
Tuesday, August 2, 2011, 8:30 a.m.
70 degrees, breezy, sunny
The breeze has shifted to the east; yesterday was
blustery with a very strong northwest wind,
so by the time I hung the last of the laundry on the
lines, the first sheets and towels were already dry.
They snapped and flew like flags, and were imbued with a
fragrant softness that only Mother Nature
can provide. We were quite comfortable as we picked
raspberries, with the wind chasing away the
morning heat as well as most of the biting insects. I was
stung by a bee the other day, which is twice
in the same week, after twenty or more years of peaceful
coexistence. I don’t believe that bees are
more aggressive than usual; rather I take it as a sign
that there are more bees around, which is a
good thing. The first one got me on the ankle; I had
mistaken it for a deerfly and tried to swat it
away, which resulted in a retaliatory sting. On Sunday, I
was in the woodshed and a carpenter
bee got tangled in my hair; I brushed it away and was
stung on the finger. Male carpenter bees
cannot sting, and females usually won’t unless
manhandled, which I suppose I was guilty of doing.
I was stung right on the knuckle of my pointer finger,
and boy, howdy, did it ever hurt! I didn’t see
a stinger, but scraped the area with a knife anyway, then
applied a paste of meat tenderizer and baking
soda to the site. The enzymes in meat tenderizer helped
dispel the venom, and the baking soda soothed
inflammation. After a few minutes, I rinsed it under cold
water, and then smothered my entire finger with
arnica gel. Now it really itches, but I guess that means
it is healing well. I am headed out to thin and weed
our current new seeding of greens, and I’ll bet by
the end of the day my grandpa’s remedy for a bee
sting
(rub dirt on it ) will have been fully tested as
well. This site will give you some more home remedies to
try:
http://www.home-remedy.org/bee-sting-remedies.html
Have a great day,
Daisy
Monday, August 1, 2011, 9:30 a.m.
75 degrees, windy, partly cloudy
It is an anything-can-happen morning here on Gomer Hill.
Clouds scurry along like big fluffy freight trains,
and have brought a couple of very brief showers to the
neighborhood. There is a slight chance of rain, and
maybe even some thunder and lightning, for all of today,
but it is so very unlikely that I am going to go ahead
with all of the outdoor jobs that are planned for the day.
There are more raspberries to pick, of course, and
our second sowing of beans is taking off nicely just as
the first bunch is winding down. The little bit of rain
that we did receive last week has really brought on a
whole onslaught of weeds, and we are trying to keep
ahead of those. There are big jobs which are obvious (laundry!),
but the smaller tasks will take the lion’s
share of my time; these include deadheading all of the
blooms in our flower boxes and outdoor pots,
watering the new greens, snipping tomato suckers, guiding
bean runners up their strings and poles,
and replacing the stinky strips at the edges of the
gardens to repel deer. We have seen raccoon
scat on our pathways, and as the sweet corn nears
maturity, we will have to set out our
Havahart trap to try and lock the barn door before the
horse is stolen.
How’s that for mixing my metaphors?
Have a great day,
Daisy
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