A musical education

Everybody has a favorite genre of music. Mine happens to be classical.

While there are many different genres of music I enjoy -- folk, bluegrass, Irish/Celtic, John Denver, once in awhile 60s or 70s rock -- my heart belongs to classical music. There's just something about it that sends my soul soaring.

For years I listened to the only local classical station I could get on the radio, KAGU 88.7 out of Gonzaga University in Spokane. First thing in the morning, I would turn on the radio to a low volume and allow the music to softly play all day long, until I turned the radio off just before bed. The family learned to tolerate this peculiarity.

But the station isn't very powerful and way out here in the boondocks it's often hard to get. Unless the radio dial was precisely at 88.7, I would get bleed-through with another, much stronger station (at 88.5 on the dial) that would completely eradicate Mozart or Beethoven with some truly awful stuff. A few months ago it got so bad that I ceased listening to the radio altogether because I couldn't get the station at all. For that period of time the house was eerily quiet.

Then my girls introduced me to Pandora.com and I was hooked. (For those unfamiliar with the website, it allows you to listen to free music of whatever genre you choose.) I (cough) "borrowed" Older Daughter's computer speakers (and -- cough -- haven't returned them yet) and am now happily listening to my beloved composers once again. Because I hated the strident and abrupt interruptions when Pandora played advertisements, I paid a yearly fee (I think it was $36) for ad-free service.

Recently as a family we've been watching the superb BBC production "The Story of Music" by Howard Goodall, available on YouTube. (Mr. Goodall's intro remarks conclude with, "There are a million ways to tell the story of music. This is mine.") While we've only watched four of the episodes so far, I am finding them fascinating.

After forty years of being a classical music buff, I'm suddenly receiving a more advanced musical education. With a radio, I'm subject to the whims of either pre-taped music or a deejay's preferences. If I'm lucky, a piece is announced at the beginning and the end, and often I couldn't catch who wrote what. But on Pandora, I can see who the composer is, learn when he (or she) wrote the music, and begin to pinpoint the styles and periods I prefer.

And thanks to the BBC "Story of Music" series, I'm learning what made each musical period distinctive. I never realized, for example, how much I specifically enjoy the Baroque composers. I've always loved Bach, Handel, Mozart, and Beethoven, of course, but now I'm discovering the beautiful precision sounds of Albinoni, Corelli, Telemann, Scarlatti, Vivaldi, and the like.

Mr. Goodall tells how the people during this Age of Invention (Baroque) were obsessed with cogs and wheels and laws of gravity and other scientific marvels. Music was not immune from this widespread discovery of order and motion, hence the precise, chord-rich works of the Baroque composers. The enormous advances of clockmaking -- with the need for intensely precise gears, cogs, wheels, and timing -- is no accident, and neither is the precise and beautiful works of music that came out of this era.

The Baroque period was also the beginning of the full, lush orchestral sounds that characterized Mozart, Beethoven, and Handel's greatest and most familiar works. In short, this Age of Invention was a major stepping stone in classical music as we understand it today.

So my musical education happily continues as I wade my way through the beautiful Baroque composers to my heart's content.

Ahhhh.

Tightening up the chicken coop

We have some cold weather moving in.

We haven't had a cold snap in a couple of years, so in anticipation of this, Don did something he's been meaning to do for quite awhile: finish insulating the chicken coop.

Two walls of the coop are insulated, but two are not.

Neither is the door.

We have a bale of insulation that's been sitting in the shop, so Don decided to use some to finish insulating the coop. First he cut pieces of OSB left over from building the barn awning, to fit over the insulation (otherwise the chickens will peck at it).

Usually we just leave the big coop door open, but earlier this fall Don built a hatch door where the birdies can have access directly into the barn. (They've learned to go OUT this hatch but not to come IN. Chickens aren't big on brains.) But it will help keep heat in to only have the hatch door open.

Don unrolled and cut the insulation to size...

...and started fitting it into the framing.

He originally built the door so insulation could be fitted in. Now he worked to complete that task.

He buttoned up all the insulation with custom-cut OSB and now the coop is much cozier. I added a fresh layer of bedding and an additional heat lamp, so our ladies will be a lot happier through this cold snap.

Ambulatory appliances

It totally slipped my mind to post this weekend's WND column called Incivility at Trader Joe's.

This was actually a rewrite of an older blog post called The Human Touch. I seldom recycle material for a WND column, but what can I say, it was a busy week.

Canning turkey stock

The morning after Thanksgiving was foggy and full of hoarfrost.

I saw a solitary male quail acting as sentinel over his flock.

It was a good day to do some canning. On Thanksgiving night, Don deboned the turkey carcass and put it in our largest stock pot, then filled it about 3/4 full of water. I added a splash of vinegar (which was an excellent reader suggestion -- it draws nutrients out of the bones) and let it simmer all night and most of the next day.

I rough-strained the stock through a colander and started filling jars. My canner holds 18 pint jars at a time, and I knew I had at least two batches' worth.

Scalding and draining the Tattler lids.

Lids on.

First batch in the canner.

Because my stock has meat scraps in it, I pressure-can it for 75 minutes (for pints) at 13 lbs, which is the correct pressure for our elevation (not quite up the pressure in this photo).

First batch out of the canner. It was too late in the evening to start a second batch, so I added some more water to the pot with the carcass and let it simmer all night again.

The next day I canned up another batch.

Altogether I ended up with 29 pints of hearty turkey stock for future recipes. Not bad for something that might otherwise be called garbage.

I hope everyone did something similarly useful with their turkey carcass?

Finished!

At last, NaNoWriMo is over!

For some reason getting my daily word count in was like pulling teeth this year.

But I managed to slog through (actually I polished off a very long novel I started in 2011) and managed to acquire a winner's badge. Younger Daughter, on the other hand, passed her 50,000 work mark seven or eight days ago. (Prolific!)

Now comes the long editing process of this 120,000+ word novel to (hopefully) get it into marketable form.

So, who else won NaNoWriMo?

Cheeky chickaree

I took an early-winter walk this week.

There wasn't much to see except this cheeky chickaree who fussed at me from some branches a short distance away.

I couldn't resist taking loads of photos. He just stood there chattering at me, posing beautifully.

Although when he did move, he was nothing more than a blur.

Mighty cute, though.

Wikipedia refers to chickarees as "enchanting to watch." They're quite right.

Thanksgiving Day

This year for the first time in a long time, we didn't hold Thanksgiving dinner at our house. Instead we joined my parents, who are staying in Coeur d'Alene.

My folks come up twice a year (spring and fall) and stay in Cd'A. (Sadly, my mother's very bad asthma precludes her from vising our farm any more.) They come mostly to see the girls, and without their brave trekking between states we would hardly see my parents at all since they live so far away. They're not usually here this late in the year, so it's a rare treat to have Thanksgiving dinner with them.

My mother and I split the cooking. She made the turkey, gravy, and veggies; I made the stuffing, dinner rolls, and dessert.

I did all my cooking yesterday. I started with bread stuffing.

Two pans, ready to cook.

Making a blueberry pie.

Dinner rolls, second rising.

The day's tally: a basket of rolls, wild rice stuffing, bread stuffing, two cheesecakes, and a blueberry pie.

Cleaning up the mess...

...then indulging in a much-needed glass of wine after nine hours of cooking.

This morning after church, we joined my folks. All the bounty was on the table.

My dad carved.

We had a lovely but quiet -- and very blessed -- Thanksgiving Day. How was yours?