Pumpkin

I waited until yesterday to walk into town and get the pumpkin, mostly because I knew I'd be curious about the storm damage after the hurricane passed through. While I was out I bought a mum to go with the pumpkin. I got a red one because it caught my eye. I wonder if it wouldn't have been better to get a yellow one, though, they were kind of sickly looking. With both the caladium and the mum being red, the mum almost goes unnoticed.

I think the arrangement is a bit awkward. If I had to make my living as a landscaper, I would have starved. It's just not my talent, but my neighbor likes my attempts to dress up our shared porch. The caladium will need to come in next week as it will be too cold for it to be outdoors. I'm thinking of getting yellow and purple mums to replace it. That may even out the asymmetry and give me the look that I was hoping for.  

Most of the damage that I saw while I was out walking was just small twigs and leaves. I did see a fence that had been damaged by some kind of limb fall, but the limb had already been cleared away. 

My door is the most fall like thing around here right now. The trees have not begun to change. The birds have not even started flocking yet. Tomorrow the temperatures will go back up to the high 80's and stay that way all week. Then they are supposed to fall into the 60's and not see the 80's again for the rest of the year. 

While I was out, I bought the candy for Halloween. I have no idea if the kids who live here Trick-or-Treat or not. I assume that at least the latch key kids will. I was shocked at the price of candy these days. It has been a while since I have bought any and in the mean time, high fructose corn syrup seems to have become gold. Halloween only happens once a year, so I shouldn't mind so much, especially considering the amount of joy the day gave me when I was a kid.  

Dodged

Isaias came aground near Destin, then headed up through central Alabama. As expected, we were just to the east of the majority of the storm. We had a lot of wind, and I'm sure when the sun comes up, we will all be out looking at the damage. I would be shocked if there aren't downed trees. I will be more shocked if there is not a lot of damage to the facade to the apartments. It was already in bad shape. 

I brought the caladium inside. I had not appreciated how big it had grown over the summer. I made sure that I had flashlights, batteries, candles, cooked food that could be eaten cold and candles enough to last a few days if the storm was worse than it actually was. I am glad that I did not need the things that I prepared. 

The electricity flickered a few times, not enough to affect the internet router. And it went out for about 10 seconds. As far as I know, the water has not been affected. It is still raining. There is minor flooding, but not enough to reach the doors to the apartments. 

The storm is like so many of the hurricanes that come through here, a bad storm, but not much real damage. Still, it doesn't hurt to be prepared. 
 

Isaias

We've been hearing about it for a few days now. At first it was a minor disturbance that might become a tropical storm, but probably not. It has progressed to a category 2 or maybe 3 that is heading toward us. Yesterday the weather stations were saying not to panic. Today they are essentially telling people to panic...not in so many words of course, but be prepared, know your evacuation routes, know where your emergency shelters are. 

Actually, the town I live in is just a hair to the left of the cone, and a couple hundred miles away from the coast. Hurricanes blow through here, quite regularly. And until Helene hit Asheville, I would say that being inland protects us from the worst of it. Now I'm giving that thing the side eye. I will bake a couple of loaves of bread, boil some eggs, have the water pitchers filled, bring my plant in off the porch, If it looks like it will move to the east a bit, I might fill the bath tub with water. I will probably sleep in the back bedroom, as it is a safe spot in the apartment from tornados. My neighbors have all been hitting the grocery stores. They say that Walmart is an insane asylum. 

Today is beautiful. I got out and walked for a long time. The fall colors have not started here yet, but it won't be long. Tomorrow will be as nice as today, but the weekend will be interesting;

I have tickets to see "Imagine a Dragon" at the community theater tomorrow night. I'm looking forward to it, as I enjoyed "Spitfire Grille" done by the adult theater of the same company. I don't think I should have any worries that I will be walking in the rain to get there. Nothing is supposed to start happening until the next evening. 

The storm should herald the final change into fall. The temperatures have been much cooler, bearable, but still above average. The storm will push them down into seasonal norms. 

I might walk into town tomorrow and buy a pumpkin.

Barriers: Poking the Bear

I made a pound cake last night. It was a feat for me because in my mind pound cakes were expensive, complicated and infinitely touchy. I think the perception comes from the fact that I had grown up hearing my grandmother say things like "I spent the whole afternoon baking a pound cake for the church supper tomorrow." or "Don't y'all run through the kitchen. You'll make my pound cake fall." Or my favorite, "Don't you be opening my oven door. You'll make my pound cake fall." even though the possibility that someone would open the oven door didn't really exist until she suggested that it might happen. My mother's special Christmas Eve cake was a seven flavor pound cake. She divided the batter, flavored each of them with a different flavor from a bottle and then put the batter section by section into a tube pan. The problem was that there was no way of knowing until you bit into the cake which flavor you got. You could be hoping for lemon and end up with butter rum. It all seemed so complicated. So for me there has always been a mental barrier to baking one. 

It turns out that a pound cake might just possibly be the simplest cake to bake. Just cream the butter, egss, sugar, flavor and cream together, then slowly add the flour. Put it in the oven to bake and take it out when it is finished baking. 

I think my cake turned out kind of pretty. I had a piece of it last night while it was still warm and thought that I really need to do some work on the recipe. It just didn't seem quite right to me. But today when I ate a piece of it cold, it was more like I remember my grandmother and mother baking. Mine wasn't quite as good as theirs, but definitely worth doing again, somewhat regularly. It was good enough that I had a second piece with some ice cream.  I enjoyed it immensely. 

It's funny how things throw up mental barriers isn't it? Like if you live with someone and they always leave their clothes in the washer and dryer, it puts a mental barrier to you being able to get your clothes washed. Or if you have to clean up their coffee mess and fight their cats off to enjoy a fried egg for breakfast, you might just give up and eat peanut butter toast all the time,  And if you have to transverse through someone's bedroom to get to he vacuum cleaner, it is a discouragement to using it. All of those things are just minor things to overcome. But they do throw up motivational barriers that become a drag on effort. 

My son gave me a nice board that is meant to sit over the top of the stove. It's been in a few of my posts like the one about baking bread. The intention is that it will be added counter space in a small kitchen. It can be placed across the sink when the stove is being used. But when I'm cooking I use both the stove and the sinks. The board was just in the way. It was becoming a barrier to me using the stove. I was opting for the peanut butter toast again. 

My oven is a Hot Point; the back right hand burner has an opening that lets heat from the oven warm a pan that is set on top of the burner without turning it on. If you are roasting a chicken in the oven, you can set your pan of potatoes on the burner and the heat from the oven will cook the potatoes, or green beans or whatever side you have. It's a nice feature if you cook that way, but I don't. So I didn't think about it when I was drying the salt dough beads I made the other day. I left the board covering the stove, and the heat dried the board out and it started to crack. I noticed it when I picked it up to heat something. I was able to apply some wax and restore the board, but it gave me the reason I need to expel the board from the kitchen. It is now making a nice tray on my couch. I am enjoying it so much more there than I ever did while it was in the kitchen. Of course when guests come over, it will be in the way again. But for now, the barrier is removed.

Just What I Need, A New Hobby

Have you ever worked with salt dough? It was a thing back in the 80's and I really wanted to try it. But my ex was always dismissive of my crafting ways. Every new project was met with a miser's grudge. So I just didn't try it. 

But now I don't have anyone to pout and sneer about what I do. What I do have is a Christmas tree that my son gave me and very little in the way of ornaments to hang on it. Two cross country moves has me pretty much a minimalist in that category. And Christmas is coming all year long.

Some of you will remember seeing this picture from last Christmas. I had just moved into my apartment and put up the Charlie Brown tree to give myself a bit of cheer. It had a few strings of lights, some jingle bells and a fake popcorn and cranberry garland on it. It was simple, but it did the job. The tree my son gave me is a five foot tree, not overly large, but I won't be able to match the garland. I've priced it and no, I'm not going to spend that. So I've been thinking that it will be a good time to try my hand at that old hobby that I never got a chance to pick up. 

I think I will keep it simple. I want to do a garland making beads and stars out of the salt dough using cookie cutter stars, snake rolled and cut beads and twine. Only, I don't have any cookie cutters, so I had to buy a set. They are kind of cheap. And the Mod Podge sealer is dirt cheap now. When I was in high school, you would have thought the stuff was gold. But now it's $5 for a whole big jar of it. 

It's probably going to be a lot of work, but if I start now maybe I can have something presentable by the end of November. If all else fails I can buy a bunch of cheap plastic ornaments to go on the tree, but I'd rather give making something better, or at least more meaningful a try. Oh well, I'll have fun with it and see what happens. 

But maybe I should make something like this first...

Happy October. 

Eating Good in the Hood

A week ago I made a quiche. It was really good. I made it with breakfast sausage, cheddar and parmesan cheese and fresh basil. I wish I could say that I made the crust from scratch, but I find that to be pointless. Pillsbury makes perfectly fine pie dough and I can save myself the hassle of cutting in the lard and rolling the thing thin. I ate one piece the night I made it, and another for lunch the next day. It was better the second time around. But two meals is enough, so I cut the rest into slices and vacuum sealed them to be stored in my freezer for another day. 

Later that week I made an Italian sausage and vegetable, pasta dish using more of the basil. It was awesome the first night and again, better the next day. But it made a lot, so I froze three meals of it.

Saturday was game-day, so all the pizza companies were hitting the airwaves hard with advertising. I haven't had pizza in a while and really wanted one. I went online and ordered from Little Caesar's because I like their pizza. They had a pretty good deal on it, but after all the fees to have it Door Dashed and the tip, etc. it ended up costing $25. I was kind of scolding myself for the expense. I have to pay for a move. I can't afford to go throwing my money around. But when it arrive, I realized that it was game-day in a college town. Pizza, Pizza! I got two pizzas for the price of one.  Twenty-five dollars isn't bad per meal when I'm getting 8 meals from it. I won't have to order pizza for a while. I love my vacuum sealer.

While I was feeding my sourdough starter this evening I was thinking about what I could do with the loaf of store bought bread I have before it goes bad. I decided to make it into French toast. 

I should fill my freezer and refrigerator with meals like these. They are easy to reheat with a minimum of pans and utensils, and can be eaten from paper plates while I am packing up to move. It will make packing the kitchen so much easier. 

Then I got a text message on my phone. It was from "Mr. Cary" the property owner. He sent it to all the residents of the apartments. He wanted to remind us that we are under lease agreements to maintain the appearance of the property by not disposing of trash or storing personal items on the porches or in the breeze ways, and that we needed to pick up our litter. That hit the wrong nerve with me. I responded to all, probably rashly, that he needed to consider the tone deafness of his text. That in my opinion he had admitted on public record before the planning committee that he had broken the lease agreements by failing to maintain the upkeep of the apartments. And that he need not lecture the tenants on keeping a lease agreement that he himself had violated. So far there have been 72 thumbs up on my response. Mr. Cary was not one of them, but he has a way of ruining a good meal.

My outburst has me thinking. He really has publicly admitted on record that he broke the covenant. I wonder if we as a tenant group could use that as leverage to get him to release us without penalty from the leases if we find other lodging while our agreements are still current. I wonder if their is a lawyer in town that would answer that question for me pro-bono. 

I cleaned up the kitchen and took the trash out to the bins, then went to the mailboxes to get my mail. The landscapers had been out all day trimming the bushes and picking up the trash. The waste management company had made a non-scheduled pickup of the the trash in the bins. I will bet that Mr. Cary's concern arose either from having a developer coming to inspect the property before purchase, or from a neighborhood complaint to the public safety commission. I think it was the latter as I saw one of their inspection vehicles circling the parking lot. What I received in the mail upset me further. We have all been getting these since the news that we will be forced to move. They are offers for loans, checks that are really loans and pre-approved credit card offers with high limits and very high, predatory interest rates. This one is actually pretty mild compared to most of the ones that come. I have seen as rates high as 55% and I have a decent credit score. The vultures are circling. 

Some humans ain't human... 

Transitions

The story that I am going to tell you is true. All of the facts have been greatly altered as a protective measure. 

I met my friend Linda when she was an account manager at a market research company that I worked at. She was the life of the party, even at work. She was the person who brought everyone together. I was married at the time, my daughter was a toddler, my boys pre-teens. She was Auntie Lin to them. 

An avid crafter, there wasn't much in the home-made category that she couldn't do. I was into counted cross-stitch and she greatly encouraged me. Under her tutelage, I got pretty good at it. She had graduated from an Appalachian college that her mother was an alumni of that was founded to continue the arts and crafts native to the area. But she said that she didn't fit in with the crowd there. So after graduation she made her living in corporate America instead. 

I lost touch with her after I stopped working for the company, and I missed her for many years. Then in 2014 I re-taught myself to knit and became enthusiastic about it. Another friend, ardent crafter, from a different job invited me to attend the Southeastern Area Fiber Festival with her. I jumped on the chance to visit. But my friend had other friends there and I was pretty much on my own. While visiting the vendors I was shocked to find Linda in one of the booths. She had moved on from the company we had both worked at. She was living in a small town in middle Tennessee where she and her partner had a craft store. I was so happy to have found her, I shamelessly abandoned the friend that I went to the festival with and spent my time with Linda. 

After that, we didn't lose each other again. She would get in touch with me anytime she was in Atlanta, which was often. And I was involved in a clinical trial that had me at Vanderbilt in Nashville every six months. By 2016, there was Skype and Facetime, long distance friendships weren't pen pals anymore. 

In 2018 I was talking with her a few times a week. Her relationship with her partner had soured, and she confided in me that she had never felt comfortable in the crafting community. She wasn't a girly-girl. She, in her late 50's was covered in tattoos and had purple dreads. She said that she always felt like she was on the outside, even at her own events, even in her own store. By that time, they were doing a bi-monthly pod-cast that had gotten a lot of notoriety. Her partner was pressuring her to do a lot of symposiums aat some of the larger festivals. And while it wasn't outside of her element, it came with a lot of criticism about her lifestyle and the way she looked and behaved. It was tearing away at her.  

At the end of the year Linda got some really bad news. Her father had a heart attack that left him an invalid. A few weeks later her mother was diagnosed with metastatic breast cancer, stage 4, it was already in her lungs and liver when they caught it. Linda was their only child, and they had no other family. So she sold her share of the craft shop to her partner and moved to Nova Scotia to care for them. While she was there she was tested and found to have the BRCA1 gene, and stage one cancer in her right breast. She was recovering from her surgeries and treatment when both of her parents died within a week of each other. By that time it was the end of 2019 and in a few short weeks the world, with the Canadian border shut down for Covid. 

We hadn't talked so much while she was taking care of her parents. There were Facetimes a couple of times over those months, but she was busy. And I was all up in my problems having retired and moved to Seattle. Then on July 24, 2021 I go a call from Linda. Jason was on the screen and he had shaved his head. He told me that from now on, Linda was gone and that he was Jason now. 

I can't say that I was shocked. I was surprised, but I could see how it could happen. I tried to be positive and reassuring. I told him that in my opinion that it wasn't up to me to tell him who he was. I was his prerogative to tell the world that. But still, I kept asking him if he was sure. 

When we hung up, I was sure that he'd never call me again. I was very wrong. If anything, even considering the fact that we live in different countries, our friendship has grown. I grieved for Linda, as if she had died, and I have told Jason that. He is a very different person than she was. He doesn't sew anymore. He doesn't go to fiber festivals. The last quilt that he made was for his mother right before she died. 

He is living in a different part of Canada now. He has a new partner who is somewhat younger than him. The partner teaches mathematics and coaches soccer. I don't think that he has come out to his community yet. They have a large house in a different town that Jason is renovating. Instead of sewing, he's hanging drywall and painting. When we talk he takes me on tours of the rooms he has finished. They also have two bungalows on the property. He says that he's going to open a commune for Gilead (U.S,) refugees. He's joking of course, but they do plan on a posh long term AirB&B type rental situation. I told him that what he was describing was a boarding house. 

He called me last night. We talked about the move I will be making soon. And the wall in me broke. I try to be upbeat and positive about the situation with everyone. But it is hard. I feel like since I retired in 2018 I have been pushed out of every place, like I don't belong there.  It's hard to be hopeful. It's awful to contemplate starting over, and building a community one more time. It's hard to be hopeful that it won't be taken away from me too. I told him how the situation here is deteriorating. My neighbors are angry and depressed. I told them that they have given up any pretense of caring for this place. They drop their trash on the ground and leave it where it lands. They are no longer trying to be considerate of each other. They bass blast from their cars at three in the morning. Why be clean and quiet and considerate when you are going to be forced to leave anyway? 

I told him about the back to back illnesses that I have had recently, the pinched nerve followed by the phlebitis and now the gastro issues with allergies and arthritis kicking in too. He understands. He says that when your mind and spirit are not well, then your body follows suit. That is why I have been so sick lately. It was where he was at back in 2018. I think he's right. 

So, and he was not joking, he has invited me to Canada. He says that I can stay in one of the bung-a-lows and help him fix it up. He says that Canada is accepting expatriates from the US to piss of the orange one. But I doubt that I fit the demographic that Canada is looking for. I am sure they are looking for doctors and lawyers and such. It just seems another place to be pushed out of when my Visa is up. And it is so far away from my children, and across a boarder. I just can't. Still, it's enticing. 

Bread - I Want To Bake It With You

I walked into the kitchen to grab a cup of tea,,,it is that time of year again. I am so very happy, practically giddy after the summer we've had. There on the counter, where I left it, sat my sourdough starter. It was filled to the top and screaming that it was up for it's assignment. That did not take nearly as long as I thought it would. I was expecting at least a week for it to wake up and be ready for service. So after putting the kettle on, I gathered everything I need to mix the first batch of dough. Bread is basically just flour, water, yeast and salt. But I add sugar and oil as emulsifiers. I like a crusty loaf, but the crust on a loaf of sourdough can be hard enough to make you bleed. I prefer to eat my bread without oral injury.

I measured a cup of starter and poured it into the bread bowl, I was impressed with the bubbliness it had obtained in such a short amount of time. I've named the starter Charles this year, and it is as randy as a king for sure. I then added a cup and a half of water, a tablespoon of salt, two tablespoons each of oil and sugar and a little more than four cups of flour. I used white sugar and canola oil, but any sugar and oil will do. While I was kneading the flour in I thought about using bacon grease and maple syrup for my next batch. It might make an interesting loaf of bread. I kneaded the dough until enough flour was mixed in to make a soft dough that could be lifted from the sides of the bowl. 

I covered the dough with some cling wrap and put it aside for a series of stretch and pulls. I haven't used the stretch and pull method of kneading before. I learned about it watching Lisa from Farmhouse on Boone on YouTube. She has one of the homesteader vlogs that I watch. Her videos are beautiful and her voice-overs calming. It's kind of like watching a modern version of Ma from Little House on the Prairie.

Following her instructions I did three sets of stretches, thirty minutes apart. She advises three to four sets, until the dough forms a window-pane thinness when stretched. I hadn't expected it to work. Those kinds of things so rarely do for me. But to my surprise I achieved the window-pane on the third set of stretches. Surprise doesn't fully express it, more like shocked, oh my! That worked.

After achieving the window-pane effect I gently shaped the dough into a loaf and placed it into my pan. I covered it and left it to rise. Lisa says to allow the loaf to rise for two to four hours. It has been my experience with the recipe that I use that the dough needs six to eight hours. So I kept checking the progress. At four hours since the dough was created and two and a half hours after the end of the pull and stretches, the dough was rising nicely, but I could tell that I was right. It would require at least another two hours to rise completely. Sourdough baking is a game of patience. You can't hurry it. The starter tells you when it's ready, the dough does the same.

While I waited, I made myself a meal of a baked potato, bacon, cheese, chives and four fried eggs. My grandson calls it Hobbit Breakfast, but as far as I can tell there is no actual Tolkienesk reference to the meal at all. I imagine that a parent named it that in an attempt to get my grandson to eat it. I read through several blogs. I poked around the social decline network that anything Meta has devolved into and I attempted to pick up my sticks and begin knitting again. I should have been washing clothes. but yeah, washing clothes isn't my favorite activity.

I was right about the time it takes for the dough to rise. At eight hours the dough had risen, but not impressively. I wouldn't have called it doubled in size. But I decided that it was time to bake it anyway. I am unaware of what the magic spell is that Lisa incants to make her bread rise in two hours. Does she add some secret ingredient into her dough? Mine just doesn't rise that fast. 

I heated my Dutch oven in the oven and made a slice across the top of the dough, sprinkled it with water and put it in the ovens to bake. 

The morning has been cool, with temperatures rising from the high 50's to the mid 60's. But the heat from the oven had my air conditioner working. It heated the apartment into the 70's reaching back into the hall where the thermostat resides. This apartment is nothing if it isn't efficient with heat.

After an hour in the ovens, I have a wonderful fresh loaf of bread. It rose very well. I might have scored it a little deeper to prevent that cracking of the crust, but I'm please with it.  Here is where sourdough is the real test of patience. I have to wait another twenty to thirty minutes for it to rest before cutting into it. Otherwise the middle may not be fully cooked and be gummy. But it smells amazing and I really want to break out the butter and jam right now.

This fall and winter I think I would like to expand my experience with sourdough. I have baked loaves of bread, made waffles and pancakes, but I think that I'd like to try a few more things. I am thinking about trying things like bagels and cinnamon rolls and a few different types of bread. Any suggestions? Know of any good cookbooks?

I really want to go cut into that bread!
 

Cool Down

The heat dome is gone. Temperatures remain on the warm side, but the mornings are crisp; afternoon temperatures don't hit the 90-degree mark that had me reeling; and the evenings cool down after the sun starts to set. It is so much more pleasant

I have begun walking again in the mornings. It is so much easier when the humidity level is not oppressive. I am finding that I actually can make it home without being drenched in dew. And with the cooler mornings, I can walk later, when the coffee shops are open. That makes a big difference in my motivation. I haven't actually stopped in yet, but just knowing I can if I chose spurns me on. I simply love autumn and I am happy to see it again. 

I was typing here about opening the blackout curtains, and why I wasn't putting the eucalyptus curtains back up when I had a change of heart. I put the blackout curtains up for the summer because the afternoon sun blasts heat through the living room. But the eucalyptus curtains are my favorite. I wasn't going to put them up because of the move and having to take them down again in a few months. It really doesn't take all that much effort to change the curtains and the eucalyptus ones make me happy, so why not? I can be happy, even if it is only for a few months. The eucalyptus curtains are hanging and the blackout curtains are packed away.

Since the weather is cooler, I can start using the oven again without fear of going bankrupt. So I got the sourdough starter out of the refrigerator and have it waking up on the counter. It will take it a few days of feeding and acclimation to stabilize before I can start using it. I am looking forward to baking bread again. It will be nice to have a fresh loaf.

My son is trying to get his starter going too. He bought a starter on Etsy that is supposed to be from a 900 year old strain of yeast. So far, he has made two attempts but has had to trash both due to pink mold. I'm not an expert on how it works, but I have my doubts about the strain of yeast being 900 years old. Even if there is a bowl of starter that has been growing continuously for that long, the yeast changes and takes on the characteristics of the environment that it is in. Or at least that is my theory. Like I said, I am no expert on the behavior of yeast. I'm not telling him that. Why burst his bubble? But sometimes he gets caught up on things like that. 

In general, things seem much better now that the heat is gone. I am still getting over a few health issues, some that have been severe. The phlebitis has all but resolved. I will still be required to move in the new year, but that is seeming doable, not desirable, but doable.

I 💖fall...

Finally Broken

The morning started hot and muggy, just like most mornings for the past 2 months. It stayed that way through noon, but then the rain started. The thunderstorm was impressive. 

The rain sent the tail-gaiters hanging around downtown rushing into local businesses, any shelter they could find. The Blackhawk flyover for the game was on stand-by to be cancelled. They've been practicing for days. But the skies cleared before the game. The flyover took place. The raptors were released and did their traditional swoop of the stadium. The rain cooled the air by 10 degrees. The game was more comfortable than the game-day morning.  

It will get warm again tomorrow morning, but not as warm as it has been. By Thursday the temperature will be down to the seasonal norm. I don't know if it's because it's game day or because it finally isn't so hot. But even here  the sense of doom has lightened just a bit. It is finally cooling off.