We said goodbye to Edward around 12:20 yesterday, a month and a few hours after saying goodbye to Luigi.  There was a cloud that was rainbow colored in the sky, a nacreous cloud (except May?! and 35° latitude?!) that greeted us as we reached the vet, that offered a bit of marvel to go with the grief.

The medication to allow Edward to breathe more easily failed and the prognosis became even more complicated. No prognosis had him leaving the cage where he was receiving supplemental oxygen, so we said good bye to him there.

We're shattered, and i have so much at work to focus on the next few days. A week and a half before i can safely see my dad.... No spots, so we're thankful for that. (I think Christine worries the stress of waking to Luigi's condition triggered the last flare of my condition.)

--== ∞ ==--

Meanwhile, B-- (Christine's sister's husband) is now using supplemental oxygen.  D-- and B-- lost their two grey cats Atty and Scout to some seizure condition in late 2024 and this spring. We know additional grief is on the horizon.

So we will go through the change in our lives because forward through time is the only way i know.

--== ∞ ==--

I'd started working in the yard just before, the vet called. And then while Christine showered before we went to the vet, i put a few plants in the ground in the yesterday:

Better boy buried deeply in the eastern side of the back of the circle garden; a bigger Early girl to the west, and between them a "Sweet banana" pepper and a sweet basil. Last year a Matt's wild cherry tomato swarmed that whole area. I would have expected seedlings but maybe the winter weeds then pinestraw mulch was too thick.

Carmen (Red Italian frying pepper) east most, and the second of the four "Sweet banana" peppers in the east middle bed; the last two  "Sweet banana" peppers in the west middle bed, and one between the two tomatoes.

The Thai basil in the east front bed  close to the peony where sage thrived before.

I also pulled some seeds out from my collection - Zinna, marigold, sunflowers. I have struggled to grow sunflowers here but will try again, i guess. I mixed a bunch of collected marigold seed heads in the soil near the tomatoes - who knows when i collected those.  I should probably soak some of the hyacinth beans and plant them so when all the poppies die back i have something to replace them.  It failed last time i tried but i will try again. If i get my seedling kit going soon, i should start some more basil.

I'm leaning towards planting the  rosemary where i had it before but i don't know why that big plant died last year. I suspect humidity from all the stilt grass and Bears foot (Smallanthus uvedalia), then drought. But i wonder if the Smallanthus uvedalia had anything to do with it beyond the shade and captured humidity.

I haven't done much more with the microscope. I flailed at Reddit trying to get references for improving technique, but finally remembered the https://www.nclive.org/ access NC libraries provide. There i found

Bain, Barbara J.. Blood Cells : A Practical Guide, John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated, 2022. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/chathamnc-ebooks/detail.action?docID=6837075.

which has instructions -- including proper use of the microscope, each step that should be taken -- plus blood smear troubleshooting images plus a list of places to see other blood smears.  I'm still fuzzy on whether the AI assertion that the scattering of purple specks beyond the edge of the smear are platelets or not is correct. The image is under the cut, and i think it's attractive in the abstract.

Also under the cut is some of my down notes. I've just (well hours ago now) had pecan praline French toast & coffee and feel more optimistic. I made an experimental loaf of banana bread using up some of my odd ingredients, almond flour and mesquite powder. I think i will get more mesquite powder as it is apparently sweeter than sugar, and functioned nicely in the bread. Because the almond flour doesn't have gluten, i added flaxseed. I should have blended the flaxseed with a little more liquid, even though i had more banana than the recipe called for. The almond flour and mesquite also absorbed liquid. The bread is a little more crumbly than i would desire.

 ( Read more... )

I'd declared email bankruptcy at the beginning of January. The past week i've started backlogging again.

This weekend i spent much time experimenting with ChatGPT, the Airtable AI, and a little bit with Gemini nee Bard because our org's Dear Leader is all in with AI and wants us to explore. Also, i think some closer management is all <3 AI. So, i should have some clue as professional defense. Anyhow, learned some useful things including that the new thinking models are better.  Spent much of my time trying to figure out how to use the models efficiently: when to do my own research, etc.

An example is Gemini asked to compare the free models of Gemini and ChatGPT. The usual model was very hedged speculation (interesting training there), the "reasoning model with apps" has access to current search and actually did searches to get current details.

I did ask ChatGPT to help me figure out how early payments on the mortgage would affect the end date. I can't tell if the counter intuitive results are because i made a mistake or if it did. I know talking to Christine about similar topics can be ... well, let me say i might not be the most clear in expressing my mental model of financial math.

Yard work happened, with massive pruning of fig tree and before/after photos that i should record where i took them from -- the nearest corner of the elderberry bed, the neared corner of the HVAC, the south end of the top step -- and then the photo from the south looking north at the tree doesn't have a good landmark.

Time blindness and infinite project optimism continues to frustrate. At least i have words for part of what is so frustrating.

A hawk cried across the sky, screamed from the western pine snag, and has moved along. The crow calls have stopped as well, so i suppose they were threatening to harass it.

It is in the mid 60s (°F) outside and the nearest dogwood is fluorescing red as the green fades. It arches over the yellow of the cutleaf coneflower. I can't smell the figs this morning, but there are so many and I am so behind. The hornets cut through some of the organza bags, so i used the bags less, a bit. I can see, though, that the bags helped with fruit flies. It's just so slow to put on the bags, and so many figs to pick.

I made and had a 5 jar out of 9 success in canning the following sauce recipe on Saturday, and have a couple more quart jars of the dried figs. (More raisin-tender than the rocks I made when i was terrified of moisture.) I fermented some puree that i used to replace water in my buckwheat bread recipe after seeing recipes for fermented fig butter. Those recipes called for adding kvass, which sounds like essentially lightly fermented fruit jusice. Since the figs are fermenting fine, i didn't bother. I wonder though what the bright ruby juice that separates from the solids tastes like. I wonder lots of things but i also wonder if i have the time to experiment.

A reliable fig apple jam recipe for canning is surprisingly hard to come by. I shall wing it this week.

I had some self critical spirals that may be entwined with worrying about how i am bruising and developing petechiae. (From falling down and scraping up my arm and legs? No bruises from that. Tapping my chin on the ladder? A big black bruise on my chin.) I'm feeling a little better We had a short notice gathering with my sister and her family last night to celebrate their eldest who moves into his dorms at NYU on Saturday. He is such a great kid, er, young man. I love listening to him and Christine talk.

I've bought some seaweed foraged in Maine: Irish Moss, "Kombu" (given as Laminaria digitata so an Atlantic species), and a Soup Mix - "Wakame" (Alaria esculenta), Sugar Kelp (Saccharina latissima), "Kombu" (Laminaria digitata). Saccharina latissima ios also known as Kombu

--== ∞ ==--

My idiosyncratic recipe development where i am trying to figure out how much of each recipe quality is needed so i can substitute and riff away, and also guestimate the quantity.

Aromatics & Spices (~ 0.5 cup)

*

1/4 cup olive oil

*

1/2 - 1/3 cup fresh alliums (onions, garlic) Using *my walking onion
tops* and bottoms

*

1 tbsp peeled and chopped ginger

*

/HEAT 7 tsp/

  o

    1 tablespoon smoked paprika

  o

    1 tbsp (1 dried pepper) ancho/poblano (/If using whole peppers,
    bloom with  onions)/

  o

    /2024-08-17: used two of my 2022 cayenne peppers during the
    onion stage. Noticeable heat!/

  o

    1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper /2024-08-17 used up the
    last of the white pepper. Meh. Had to add black pepper later./

*

Ground spices

  o

    2 teaspoons ground **my *coriander
    *

  o

    1 teaspoon ground cumin

  o

    1/2 teaspoon ground allspice /2024-08-17  used clove/

*

Umami

  o

    1 tbsp nutritional yeast

*

/2024-08-17: two eights of a preserved lime - So! Much! Salt!/

1.

Grind coriander seed.

2.

Measure spices into bowl

3.

Prep onions and ginger

4.

Heat oil in pan, add alliums, soften

5.

Bloom spices

6.

Add umami (and preserved lime)

FIGS

Two quart jars of very ripe figs ~ 3 - 4 cups as fig puree. Used 2.25 cooked ripe figs and pureed another quart jar with very ripe figs

ACID

2 3/4 cups of spiced and sweetened apple cider vinegar. /2024-08-17 left over from making spiced pickled apples. Had a 1:3 or 1:4 ratio with brown sugar. /

Mustard (or 1 cup Dijon)

*

2/3 c water in bowl

*

1/3 c yellow mustard powder

*

1/3 c distilled vinegar

1.

Assemble 15 min timer, whisk, measured water in vessel > 1 cup,
distilled vinegar, mustard powder, 1/3 c measure.

2.

Add powder, set timer for 5 - 15 min, measure vinegar /2024-08-17 10
minutes was not too much of a kick/

3.

At timer, add vinegar to stop heat development

1. Add fig puree and vinegar

Final adjustments //

/Added black pepper , 2024-08-18/

*

1 tablespoon kosher salt

*

additional vinegar

• Processing *

Simmer until thick enough, well over 30 min, dropping a noticeable amount in the pot.

15 min water/steam processing of 8 4 oz jars and one pint, plus about 8 oz un-canned.  (~56 fluid oz)

I got too spooked to finish harvesting by a bug that looked very crab and spider-like in the mulberry tree. I think it was this guy https://content.ces.ncsu.edu/eastern-leaf-footed-bug -- although mulberries aren't mentioned, everything else is.  Anyhow, i think realizing it's NOT a spider and is a pest will make me a little more ... courageous... tomorrow.

Plenty of mulberries picked, as it was, plus a handful of strawberries, a fig and plenty of blueberries.

Several Aunt Rachel apples are turning red.

All the plants are a riot of growth with over 4 inches of rain since Sunday June 30. My sister, less than four miles away as the crow flies, has had perhaps just over an inch. It is remarkable how localized thunderstorms can be. (And this is why i got the rain gauge: I'd read the accumulation from the weather sites and be perplexed because it was very different from my experience. https://maps.cocorahs.org/ provides an excellent view into rainfall in the US: i am NC-CH-41: Pittsboro 3.3 NNW)

No fireflies in my brief survey tonight at 9:30 pm. Not dark yet, so maybe in an hour. It's not hot but the humidity is just oppressive.

Several mornings last week i've sat on the deck after letting the fe-lions loose. Squirrels make an incredible ruckus jumping branch to branch and descending into the mulberry tree. I harrumph, figure they are shaking all the ripe berries on to the ground. (Next year, a fruit capture net will be installed). But today, despite the squirrels descending quite low in the tree, i was back to a decent harvest of mulberries. (A "decent harvest" is, i dunno over half a cup. I'm not getting out the ladder.)

Friday I circled to the blackberries, which are about done, and noticed the ground cover of strawberries still blooming. I haven't checked the ones in the garden for a while but i quickly found three strawberries and figured i could given them a really good wash and add them to some berry thing. The blue berries are beginning to come in heavily, and there were lots of mulberries! A sudden wave of ripening? A bird didn't beat me to them?

Weekend was hot and i spent the time learning how to write better python as i began processing my weather sensor data. I moved slowly, but with ChatGPT acting as an opinionated and sometimes wrong tutor, i moved faster. It offered significant help in answering questions when i knew what i should do but couldn't quite remember how to express it, and it helped me through setting up functions i can use across Jupyter notebooks, a big step for me. When i could i read the docs instead of chatting, but i know my code is better for its tutoring.   All of this is fairly junior skills, but i hope it can advance other skills.

I am impressed how data analysis has become more accessible. I remember struggling to deal with time series data some years ago. Now the tools and the information about using them is so much more available.

Had third harvest of strawberries yesterday. The walking track around the community colleges has a tree with ripe mulberries and (once i started looking up) many trees with ripening berries. Mine are still small pale things.

Found a practice for stopping coughing (https://www.wsh.nhs.uk/CMS-Documents/Patient-leaflets/Physiotherapy/6386-1-Stop-Cough-Technique.pdf) that i will try today. Tired at the end of Monday and Tuesday.

--== ∞ ==-- ( Issues in Christine's family )

I have fought to keep from coughing all weekend. Going to see someone's gardens in the country -- how troublesome can that be? Pretty bad when smoke from a fire drifted through. As i looked at the hostas, my brow furrowed. On inquiry, it's their two free ranging Great Danes that protect their hostas (and two shaggy donkeys). So, if i was willing to really ward off deer AND have lots of nonnatives, including invasives  -- hostas! helebores galore traveling off down the slope! A pond filled with yellow flag! Italian arum! -- yes, i too could have a lush shade planting pretty quickly.

I did find out about https://plants.ces.ncsu.edu/plants/phacelia-bipinnatifida/ and wonder how well it would fight stilt grass. It's lovely even if it doesn't....

The NY Times alerted me to the hard rocking trio of Muslim women VOB https://www.voiceofbaceprot.com/ which reminded me to go check the hard rocking trio of Mexican sisters, The Warning, and find i've missed one album and a new one is on it's way.

The past few mornings have been clear when i went out with starry, starry skies. And it's quiet: the temperatures have changed. I think this was the first morning when even waiting and focusing imy listening, i didn't hear frogs or insects, even from over the crest of the hill and the creek behind our house. It may be that i just know from the map that it's there, but i feel i can hear the sounds from that direction in the spring and fall when the sounds directly around the house have quieted.

It dropped to the freezing point at 6:42 AM, per the new sensor sitting in the front yard. It's clear there, and should get the coldest and hottest temps. It's also in a sleeve of plastic louvers, so that it can be in a sunny area and still report air temperature. I think i need to replace the sensor at the back fence: it reported temperatures in the 50s (F) for too long. And even though the woods makes its own climate, the trees are not that insulating. First, i thought it was that the battery was dying (and eventually the sensor stopped transmitting), but i replaced it yesterday. I don't know how far back in time i am going to have to distrust its readings.

I've been cranky about the autumn, a sign of the mild depression. I think i'm beginning to appreciate the color in the trees, even though there isn't bright shouts of clear color. The dogwood i can see from my office window and the front porch is such a dull garnet that i have muttered to myself about its mournful aspect. But walking up the drive this weekend, the sun through the leaves was resplendent. And while most of the trees around our home -- other than the persistent pines -- sort of drain the lushness from the green, leaving a dull yellowing green, this weekend the light in the woods (again, backlit leaves!) was a golden color. Maybe color change is on its way.

I still have three persimmons on the persimmon tree: i did not loose them to critters or humidity despite the stilt grass encircling the tree. I think one chestnut cluster is gone (squirrels?) but one is still high in the tree.

I keep trying to catch my negative thoughts and turn them. Particularly my frustration at not getting as much stilt grass out before it's gone to seed. I am making progress on ecosystem restoration here though: it's going to be OK.

So, now i can just focus on getting the sweet gums that shade the solar panels removed. (Oh, the species tree is not so colorful as the brilliant liquidambar street trees in Mountain View, CA) The black cherries have already lost their leaves, so they can stay. And i can look forward to picking out and planting some colorful shorter shade trees, like sourwood. Maybe some fringe trees (which have drupes that can be cured like olives).

From Wednesday morning:

I think this is the first day at my desk this week that i wasn't in urgent mode. Can i work on the important-with-looming-urgency? Ugh.

--== ∞ ==--

Figs are doing well, although i've resigned myself to leaving some on the tree for wasps and spiders. I will need to ponder my pruning strategy this winter. I'm dehydrating at a lower temperature and the color is much nicer. I'm also not going to rock hard. Raisins aren't rocks and last "forever" at shelf temperatures, so why make the figs completely desiccated. The fruit jerky/leather is also working nicely. The ability to cook the fruit and then keep it in the fridge a while before dehydrating allows "stalling" dealing with very ripe figs.

Meanwhile, i've given away fresh ripe figs and eat them every day, myself.

--== ∞ ==--

Replacement dehumidifier didn't drain into its bucket but leaked on the floor. Now on yet another replacement cycle.

Left string trimmer and other tools in the rain. Battery definitely dead. Trimmer seems OK. Getting new battery AND a pole saw. Very very excited about the pole saw. I had a manual pole saw and lopper and need to figure out how to restring the cord that pulled the lopper bit. It wasn't satisfactory. Maybe someday.

In balance, i have done things with things i have ordered: pink shoes are polished, boots are dyed navy blue (LOVE!), and i have properly installed the curtain pull back hooks. Now i want to fix the curtain rod the previous owners left. (Metal fixtures are completely inconsistent in the house. The curtain rod is shiny brass, but i'm trying to move to oiled bronze in that room. I can't count the different door handle finishes.)

--== ∞ ==--

I managed to get outside and fight stilt grass yesterday. Will also skip the usual grocery run and do the same tonight. I'm frustrated about going to a conference just as the weather finally begins to moderate. Will cope with humidity. At least it's not hot. [And i *did* get outside and make more progress. Hoping i can get into a habit that i can keep and make good progress.]

--== ∞ ==--

I've just made some notes about things to do near and nearish to the Hilton Minneapolis. I'm pondering the Swedish Museum on Friday, between conference ending at noon and flight leaving at 5 pm. The Foshay building observation deck seems like it might be nice, too.

I want to panic about clothes but i am trying to tell myself it is going to be OK.