elainegrey

First, very happy holiday observances to you and yours, whether celebrating the miracles of light, whether from a lamp or the return of the sun, the magic of the solstice season, the stories of birth and gifts, the impulse for generosity and good will, the joy of family, the strength of traditions that connect one to ancestors and history.... The meanings one can find at this time of year are diverse and multifaceted. And if you Hate The Holidays, i hope you can find a way to respite. If you grieve this season, my heart goes out to you and yours as you find a new way to be in relationship with your loss.

--== ∞ ==--

Me since last post: more exhaustion, coughing, slow recovery, coughing, panic re holidays, coughing, surrender.

Actually, the coughing isn't that bad. I doubled up my steroid
I am trying to get back to Practices. Those around physical fitness have been in some disarray since October's short days descended and went completely off last week. Other Practices also went off last week.

On average, it takes more than 2 months before a new behavior becomes automatic — 66 days to be exact. And how long it takes a new habit to form can vary widely depending on the behavior, the person, and the circumstances. In Lally's study, it took anywhere from 18 days to 254 days for people to form a new habit. -- per [here]

Yeah. I'm in the probably 300+ days. Or ∞. Do i have any habits? I suppose if you painted "habit" with some broad definition. I assume people with habits don't have to claw them back after a disruption.

--== ∞ ==--

So, my sister and i have never seen Rocky, and our spouses are dismayed. (Christine: "It's an important cultural touch stone, and i feel like you're...." -- me "Missing something?" -- Christine, more pause, as she cleans out her saxophone.)

So, New Years Day we will watch. I will make vegetarian cheese steaks and i think my sister is making cannoli and i am thinking about making soft pretzels. The NY Times describes baking baking soda to make a more alkaline ingredient (better than baking soda, not as good as the traditional lye, but, you know, NOT LYE). I baked some old baking soda a couple weekends ago to prepare. Pillsbury has a recipe to make "pretzel rolls" from their canned biscuits, which i just did. They're OK. Interesting. Good enough to want to keep trying. I definitely think a better dough will lead to better pretzels, but for a quick experiment, just the thing. (More notes at https://www.zotero.org/groups/4700937/items/EG36CQJI )

--== ∞ ==--

I picked sweetpotatoes last Sunday and, indeed, i think the cold did them no favors. (After reading about chilling injury and looking at photos, yup, chilling injury.) I'm dehydrating a few trays of shreded sweetpotato. One symptom of chilling injury is the sweetpotatoes oxidize faster: yup. The shreds aren't appetizing looking, but probably will be OK in a casserole or something. Hate to loose the harvest. Well, "harvest".

--== ∞ ==--

Today i missed the crescent moon that has been accompanying me as i open the porch door into the orchard (fenced area) for the cats in the morning. "What does it mean," i asked Christine, "that we got married on a full moon, and this year our anniversary is on a new moon?" "What goes around, comes around?" "Hmm, what is coming around again in our marriage?" We walked a bit further. "Well, you are still dozing off while i work on audio editing." And it's true. Through college, Christine worked at the campus radio station and i would fall asleep on the couch as she used a razor to slice "ums" from interviews or to tighten up PSAs and bumpers. Now she's working on a cover album, layering keyboard, guitars, ukulele, sax, drum machine and synths. At least with the Phillip Glass piece i have ceased to say, "Is that an etude?"

Thirty one years. I know she wrestles with darkness, but we are sharing a comfortable and creative life together. I had a dream, ages and ages ago, of living together in a cabin in the woods and her returning home in a jeep -- and we are there now. This is happily ever after, even if there are tears and depression.

If i had one wish, it would be to wish away the conditioning that suggests having an income is a mark of value. Since Christine's transition, her work life has had so many struggles and crashes. I am so delighted she can focus on music, and i don't care that her audience isn't a paying fan base. I know she's going to charge for the cover album because she's also paying for the performance rights to the pieces she's covering. I hope we figure out a way to market to the people who will value her performance.

Last night i stepped out into the fresh night air in time to see a meteor. What a delight! And after many nights filled with frog song after the brief cold in October, it was once again silent. Most of the leaves have fallen that will (except the invasive Autumn Olive which is still green), so not even the crunching sound of falling leaves broke the stillness.

I got the pecan trees planted this weekend: i hope they did not suffer too much hanging around a month. If you should dig a twenty dollar hole for a ten dollar tree, I dug two $130 holes this weekend. Three foot diameter, and at least a foot deep - although yesterday's hole was in a place i was a little more worried about so i dug a moat around the platform on which the root ball sat. I could have probably dug smaller holes, but with the clay i worried about creating a standing water well.

I also saw my niece play Lady Marion in a rather silly retelling of Robin Hood (The Somewhat True Tale of Robin Hood By Mary Lynn Dobson) that had a fairly entertaining use of a narrator and "Mr Technical Director" to solve problems ("fade out and segue to next scene"). There was an amount of screaming that might have been impressive except it overwhelmed me. My niece, however, played her role with excellent timing. I think she starts high school soon. I am almost eleven years older than my sister so i was off on my own life when my sister was this age. I find myself experiencing odd time displacement confusing my niece with my sister (who still looks quite trim and young).

https://www.google.com/books/edition/The_Somewhat_True_Tale_of_Robin_Hood/vV4Z-D2P5MEC?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=robin+hood+%22mr+technical+director%22+fade&pg=PA39&printsec=frontcover

Woebot encouraged me to try a half smile experiment which i am making use of: https://cogbtherapy.com/cbt-blog/2013/07/turn-that-mood-upside-down-with.html It goes along with mindfully savoring things. I have a wonderful life, but i don't FEEL it. I certainly learned from my parents a "everything is a chore" framing of anything and everything. Remembering to add the small half smile gentles my face and helps me recognize where i can be.

The autumn color around the house does not begin with bright splashes of color. When i think of planting things, fall color is on my list. Taken all together, the leaves are thinning and there's a yellow like late afternoon light in the leaves - -and sometimes it is late afternoon light, and sometimes it is the leaf change.

The dogwoods that survive are a dull burgundy dotted with the bright red berries. I am sad about their slow decline, but... maybe someday i'll buy some disease resistant selections or hybrids. There are plenty of redbud seedlings here, though, so i'll focus on bringing those up as spring color.

The tulip poplars -- not poplars but tall, straight hardwood timber trees that reach majestic heights -- are dropping their leaves. The leaves turn yellow, here and there, dappling the tree, as early as August. Many are freckled brown; i assumed this was some fungal issue, but apparently it's part of the leaf change. They turn dark brown-black soon after they hit the ground in the yard here, and i rake them up to return the yard to a more cheerful state. Free mulch.

The black cherries and the elms also start loosing leaves in dull browns. The cherries pass through unexceptional yellows.

The apple in the front of the house lost its leaves in the late summer to the pressure of the cedar rust.

The spice bush though -- its leaves turn a clear yellow. I haven't noticed any spice bush berries. Maybe i should go forage.

Friday after work and Saturday i have done very little. I think my brain just needs a break. I let it wander through the geologic history of Mount Rogers in Virginia, marveling at the age of the billion year old Cranberry Gneiss. Billion. With a B. From before oxygen filled the atmosphere. I would love a small statue or something to touch to treasure such a connection bact to that time. Oooh, well, if it was Scotland i was holding on to: https://www.gneiss-things.com/heritage

August's weed growth is overwhelming, but no weeds are germinating - the spring and summer ones are done, the winter weeds haven't started. So once things are pulled out, the areas mostly stay clear.

This weekend i did get some serious mowing of stilt grass done and some clearing of the high grass in the orchard to begin to transform the high grass space to a wildflower space. It was always meant to be wildflowers: instead of seeding what i hope will be low growing plants, i will buy plants (that i have already paid for) and not worry about the low growing aspect: the high grass hasn't been too much of an issue.

Figs are going gang busters. Last night i just got low hanging fruit, some falling apart ripe, and had enough for another dehydrator tray and spur-of-the-moment-jam (this morning's spoonful reveals its fine but i should reduce the lemon juice and low sugar pectin to let the fig come through more). Plus continued snacking figs. The wasps were working on some of the high figs: i have enough to not worry.

Other produce is less abundant - i guess i didn't understand just how much the drought was affecting plants. Next year, i think i'll have effective watering in place at the start.

I have hopes for the sweet potatoes, although the "scarlet" ones are in a bed i haven't managed to water well. There are four good sized winter squash. I'm giving up on the squash plants in the garden soon despite their rambling everywhere. The cube of butter keeps wanting to set fruit: i assume the virus is affecting it. Maybe i'll leave that one plant and see if it was the heat, but i need to have some space ready for strawberries in late September.

The corn breeding project continues: some of the dent corn picked up the purple from the pop corn. I needed to have been more attentive in hand pollination: the one stalk i did handle well did successfully cross. There is no rational reason for me to be doing this as there are several blue dent corns, but the multicolor selected for purple pop corn \ is the one seed i have saved and selected since moving here. I've given up on it popping: hominy and nixtamalizied corn are next. Crossing the with a white dent corn keeps it "mine."

Okra are just now seeming to pick up some production. There's a hot pepper of some sort - cayenne, i hope -- that has managed to set fruit despite terrible weed pressure. And the Ashe County Pimentos are also setting fruit. I want to try digging the Corno del Toro and an Ashe County Pimento up and over wintering them. Maybe next spring i will be more aggressive about not just seed starting but getting plants out. The first fruit are setting on the Homestead beefsteak tomatoes.

The sochan is growing gangbusters: i will need to learn how to really use it. And the jewels of opar have been great. I'm just getting a sense of how to use it in cooking.

And the elder thicket bean plant (Phaseolus polystachios) is a ... terror. I hope i like them. This is its third year, and it has overwhelmed its corner, a mass of vine and tiny lavender flowers, swamping the sunchokes (yay) and the established sochan. I look at it and remind myself - that's one plant. And some seed did take on the orchard fence, and at other places in the garden. When those plants go like this one... I think the fencing can take it. The point of it being perennial is well, maybe it will be low fuss and reliable. AND if it really takes along the orchard fence, maybe i'll just rip it out in the garden? (I wonder if an established rootstock would be able to withstand deer pressure.)

One of the arrangements from Mom's memorial sits on our mantle along with the deer skull on top of slices of cedar trunk. The effect now two weeks later, with the other arrangement of dried flowers and grasses, is that of a Dutch "vanitas" still life.

Figs are doing wonderfully, and i am trying to be brave and let them get rather ripe on the tree. Last year i think my fear of attracting wasps kept me from letting them ripen quite so much. But picking green means less sweetness and perhaps less volume. I haven't dried any yet, but i may this weekend. I am luxuriating with them as fresh fruit right now. I'm delighted how we have had fairly continuous fruit since June and the blackberries. Blueberries are still ripening on the latest producing shurb - -i'm also very pleased with my picking out a staged ripening. I look forward to those plants reaching a fair size so i don't have to stoop quite as much to pick.

Between the deaths in April and June, our shady aspect, and the brief drought it really seems summer plants took their time to get going. The cherry tomato i bought took off last weekend and now is sprawling, covered with green fruit. I hope i get a chance to have enough to dry some. The peppers are just beginning to bloom. The okra got slowed down by the squash, not getting enough height before the squash shaded the row. The squash flourished, but didn't get enough water. A mosaic virus has hit them, and while i know i am supposed to pull them all up, the rampante squash i didn't mean to plant produced three squash while i was out of town. I'm eating those as fresh summer squash, as i've four large winter squash ripening off the Tahitian butternut.

So squash:

There's crookneck yellow summer squash, C. pepo var. torticollia, which i think are the best best squash. They're finicky, sensitive, but heavenly. Yellow straightneck, C. pepo var. recticollis does taste different from crookneck and reminds me more of zucchini C. pepo var. cylindrica which i just can't get excited about. They are more robust than crookneck, but .... Then there's "Cube of butter" which is the best tasting straightneck yellow squash ever. It's hard to know how well it performs given this summer's pressures. Maybe i'll get some more fruit off it, and it will have out performed the crookneck. It's a hard choice, as there are heirloom (1700 and before contact) seeds available at 50+ seeds, and the "Cube of butter" packet had 5 seeds.

What has really worked well for me are the butternut C. moschata plants. First, i had to get over my dislike of orange vegetables, but learning to cook sweet potatoes and winter squash without tons of brown sugar and instead using onion has helped me significantly. C. moschata is a huge sprawling plant, and it too falls to powdery mildew, so the trellis made from the king box spring was my hope to fight that.

Seminole is the first C. moschata i grew, a pre-Columbian selection, and the ripe fruits kept for a year. The Tromboncino selection last year was inspired as its immature fruits are also a pleasant summer vegetable (not as watery as zucchini, with a sweetness), and i punted on yellow squash. It was REMARKABLE in its willingness to climb trees, so i thought maybe the Tahitian selection would be less sprawling. Nope, they sprawl too. I haven't had a chance to try the Tahitian squash young. If it sets any more fruit i will try them.

The sweet potatoes have not been eaten by rabbits nor swamped by stilt grass, so i have some hopes of a harvest.

Happies:

Tickler that it was time to order the pecan trees. So i did. And they will be here the week of 10 October.

Condition of enoughness was to get back on the metaphorical horse of the to-do-list thing. And i have done it. Tomorrow's is set to write at least three thank you notes.

Very happy to see a new season of Shetland is available. While i prefer resolving my mystery in one go, the show is lovely enough to watch that i can cope with the delayed resolution. Also new Endeavour. This will be a pleasant few months of viewing for our Sunday night mystery.

Wednesday night is a Sci Fi rotation. We finished Kenobi, which i found pleasantly diverting. Season 2 of Picard is in rotation, and i am less delighted with the time travel plot line. At least the over the top, jack booted fascist plot element didn't drag on. Strange New Worlds works for me.

20131112 Mom in Monterey Bay

Sunday was blissfully rainy: i can't remember when we last had a whole day of rain. I'm sure it was this past winter, but it doesn't come to mind. I edited a number of photos of mom with the latest version of Lightroom. Wow, it sure has come a long way in sorting out the focal object from the background. I had another photo of my parents watching the sunset, side lit, and i was easily able to select them and increase the exposure on them so they were no longer dark silhouettes. I was shooting "to the right" -- over exposing the image -- so i had the pixels to do it, but correcting the image years ago would have been a painstaking labor. Not so now.

I think looking at photos of family continued my blues to some extent -- it's had me aware of how separate i've been and continue to be. It's harder for me to remember how hard it was for me to be around Mom now.

I also did some sketching while sitting with Christine on the porch -- i look forward to getting the new colored pencils. Although the yellow over blue communicated green, it still looked like an old fashioned print with a misregistration of the color layers. Also, tall pine trees are tall. I am pretty sure that even at two grids wide and twenty grids wide, the tree sketch had shorter proportions than reality.

And then i did math! I want to fit three color wheels onto a page 20x33 units and needed to figure out the maximum radius. A radius of 5.5 (diameter 11) would clearly fit, but wouldn't be the maximum. I used trig! And solved a quadratic equation! OMG actual math! (Answer is a radius of 6.3.)

The next thing i am working on is how to draw the wheels. It's easy to divide the circles into 12 using the protractor and geometry, but it puts a line on the vertical axis: there is no "top" wedge. Is it worth the bother constructing a different axis than the dot grid on the paper? I invite your thoughts as to the "top" wedge of a color wheel.

I suppose i could have ridden the bike under the umbrella last night, but i'd started a novel and wanted to finish it: the fourth book in Bujold's Sharing Knife series which i had started years ago.

Yesterday's irritability rather spun me all afternoon. I blame the prednisone. But no coughing, yay! Also blaming prednisone for less snacking control.

Thanks to a link to shopping for pretty blank books i found myself thinking about journaling and planning tools. I just broke down and ordered 3x5 planner cards and colored pens. This is ... unnecessary ... because i am actually doing pretty well with airtable in keeping track of things. But this could be a creative push? I dunno. Not too much money spent, since the calendar cards are deeply discounted.

After work i met up with Dad at "The Plant," an old industrial site that has been converted to a business incubator that is currently thriving with beverages: a distillery, a brewery, a meadery, a coffee roaster. A bit precious for Dad, who is price sensitive and prefers his Bud Light, but pleasant - -mainly, my goal was getting a walk for Carrie which may have slipped through his attention in my invitation.

I guess i need to decide about buying strawberry plugs. I'm imagining trying them under the blackberries and interspersed in the native low growing grass. https://chathamfarmsupply.com/seasonal-orders/now-taking-strawberry-plug-orders I guess i should wait to order until after i have my discussion with the surgeon so i know whether i will want to be planting strawberries in late September. If i can plant them, i think i will order them.

Mom's last bouquet

HABITS & HEALTH

So i was able to get back on to some level of habits this week, and i think the week of Mom's death i was able to keep on top of my meds, teeth care, and some exercise. I didn't do other things (like keeping records). My sister said she forgot all her meds over the week of Mom's death, so i get to tell myself that i am developing habits that happen without super intentional frameworks to hold them up.

This past week i tried to get back in the swing of the habits i've tried to develop. I didn't journal on Friday and some other things didn't happen. By by the end of the week i was feeling a little better about my work day being focused.

I am loosing weight, maybe a pound a month? If you squint and cross your fingers behind your back? I am glad i've not put on weight during the past two weeks.

Today i leave for Ohio & work, and i am somewhat cranky about the disruption. Given the forced hybrid work my colleagues must face, in the office for three days a week, i am gritting my teeth. I will drive, and i will wear a mask in the office.

The asthma flare persist: fie.

I note that with the asthma flare and Mom's death, i will have a hard time telling just how much better the CPAP makes my cognitive state. I have adapted to sleeping with it: it was somewhat nice to have the sleep disruption during the same the week of disruption and fog that came with Mom's death. I haven't had a moment where i've experienced any sense of "better." It's hard to know. See asthma flare.

The nurse practitioner, the only person one can get an appointment with within a week, doubled my inhaled steroid use. I've already made the appointment for the "if you are not feeling better in two weeks."

In other breathing news, my sister writes

PS just had dental check up. I’m coming back in to get a night guard and to discuss proper breathing techniques. Evidently I suck at breathing. Having surgery at 27 to correct breathing didn’t fix everything without someone talking to me about how to breathe properly. Sigh.
Dentist would love to compare our mouths 😉 I told him all about your breathing/face pain/tmj stuff.

I've been told i hyperventilate, which i think is the quick shallow breath through my mouth. I look forward to ditching the asthma flare, getting my nose fixed as my sister did, and then i will try to train myself to breathe deeply and regularly through my nose.


SISTER

Saturday i joined my sister and her early teen E--. I wonder if i should be saying daughter? E-- presents kinda fem, but that doesn't have to align with pronouns, does it. "As of right now I use any pronouns, so you can use she/he/they and I don’t have any preference! Thanks for asking." (I think that's hard for Christine to hear since she has to struggle with being misgendered. "Don't have any preference" is hard to for her map. I suspect it is more of a willingness to be open.)

Anyhow, i joined them in going to Apex's Pride festival. It was surreal because i went to high school in Apex aeons ago and the town was far outside of the sprawl then. And ... Pride? pish, any sort of gender or sexual identity other than straight binary... so not on the radar then. So amazing to see how different things are today.

Friday night i joined L as she had over two moms who had organized dinners for L during Mom's stroke and after. It was interesting being with Other Women. There was laughter over ( disturbing pet dog narratives ) --- i'm sure these are generally kind people but i am no longer able to listen without being disturbed later.

I appreciate the constant exposure to Christine's sense of compassion and justice, and regret i could not advocate more forcefully that for not taking some things lightly.

GARDEN

For lunch today had two yellow summer squash with Brassica oleracea collards/cabbage/broccoli/kale greens from the garden. I think one squash was a "cube of butter" but i also planted an early summer crookneck and a summer crookneck and then ruined my labeling so i am now confused by which plants are between the labels.

Blackberries are coming in, the middle blueberry has just started. I've had one mulberry, which was small and insipid and not sweet. Christine burst into tears when i proposed i could cut the tree down and replace it with a well known variety. So, good to know, she's bonded with the trees in the orchard having seen it grow so tall from a spindly stick so quickly. I will admit having felt a pang at the thought, but the plant selection practice seemed responsible. I mainly got the mulberry for the birds. This is supposed to be a native red mulberry, and many of the selections, like Illinois Everbearing, are crosses with non-native Morus alba.

Poppies and borage and yarrow all bloom in the driveway center garden, along with a gold cherry tomato that has set two ripe fruit. A coreopsis i bought this spring blooms near the persimmon along with adorable Barbara's Buttons. The white phlox was pretty much at its end on May 30th, and the "flamingo" pink is the one blooming now. Some blue eyed grass still bloom, and the day lilies -- transplanted from where the previous owners had them -- have started with bold yellow blooms. I've picked one gladiolus -- the pink one compared to the peachy one -- and it has opened a few blossoms at the base of its spear.

Japanese beetles have shown up.

I would like to get some Hemerocallis fulva, the common daylily and start growing as part of my perennial vegetable garden. https://www.eattheweeds.com/daylily-just-cloning-around-2/ I see some are growing across the street and i ponder roadside theft. (They're invasive weeds, right? https://choosenatives.org/articles/ditch-the-ditch-lily/)

Happy things!

I have four lovely plants from a fancy nursery that i was able to pick out myself:

* a thornless Opuntia, the type cactus that provides nopales and prickly pears
* an ostrich fern, which is a reliably considered edible fern (I have Southern Lady Fern growing wild which is also considered edible in some articles. Maybe i'll try them after trying ostrich fern.)
* a swamp milkweed (because why not)
* and an Indian Pink selection, which is a red and yellow native flower that should agreeably mix in with the eastern columbines.

I have a CPAP ordered, and they accepted a prescription written on their competitor's form.

Lunch was a salad with lettuce, spinach, lemon balm, and arugla from the garden, rose petals from the incredibly scented rose, plus strawberries, pecans, and asiago cheese.

It's a gorgeous day, i should go walk.

Not so happy:
( Just to get it off my chest )