Saturday, September 19, 2026

Putting up firewood

With autumn flying by, we wanted to get the firewood put up sooner rather than later. Among much else, we wanted to clear the driveway in preparation for an upcoming yard sale we plan to hold in the next couple of weeks (it's weather dependent).

We bought three cords of log rounds from a friend with a side business of selling firewood. We didn't need the wood split since we have our own log splitter. The first delivery was made in late May (so the rounds sat in the driveway all summer), and the second one in early September.

The funny thing is, we still have a fair bit of wood left over from last winter. Sometimes we forget we're living in a much smaller place than our last house, plus it's more efficiently insulated, so we don't go through nearly as much wood each winter. (And also, last winter was fairly mild.)

Still, extra firewood is no bad thing. With the full delivery now sitting in rounds in the driveway, it was time to get splitting.

After each bout of splitting, we stacked it up in the woodshed.

We spent about a week splitting and stacking, working for just a couple of hours each day.

Gradually the wood shed filled up.

We crammed as much wood in as we could, up to the very top, filling random holes with wood pieces of appropriate size to slot in.

This lady startled me. I'm not sure how she managed not to get smushed, since I found her right on a log round I was splitting.

The time came when we had the wood shed crammed full to the very brim: Top to bottom, side to side, back to front.

However we still had a lot of wood left to go. Where to put it?

After some discussion, we laid down pallets and started stacking wood on the side of the house.

And don't worry, we didn't stack it directly against the house.

This will be easy to tarp.

We also stacked some wood on the back porch to use first.


In short, we have firewood coming out our ears, possibly as much as three years' worth. A blessing indeed as we prepare for winter.

Friday, September 18, 2026

I'm back!

Phew, what a journey! For the past two weeks, this blog has been having technical difficulties and many readers couldn't get on due to a "security risk."

After much assistance from a computer expert named Gregory, at first the issue was thought to be through my hosting platform, necessitating a number of lengthy phone consultations. (Hat tip to a woman named Lindsay, who was wonderfully helpful.)

The hosting platform, as it turns out, wasn't able to assist. The matter needed to be addressed through the dreaded Goliath of Google, which of course is famously helpful and accessible (/sarc/).

The bottom line was the issue was the need for an SSL certification. Fortunately there is a convenient option in Blogger to change things from http to https. Unfortunately it didn't work.

Gregory went back and forth and back and forth and dove deeeeep down some technical rabbit holes involving encryption sites that even he admitted were not user-friendly. However, finally, he was able to pull things together and make things work.

Now the blog, once again, should be visible to everyone. Thank you to Gregory for his assistance, and to all of you for your patience!

Saturday, September 12, 2026

Weird dreams

"Do we have any other quilts besides the one on our bed?" Don asked randomly one morning.

"No," I replied. "Why?"

The quilt on our bed was a lucky thrift-store find from about 15 years ago, and it's the only one we have.

"Because I had a dream," Don explained. "We had a valuable quilt we were going to sell, and I posted it online with a giant list of technical descriptions with terms I'd never heard before, yet with logical-sounding definitions such as 'well-tipped' and 'fully pressed.'" He said in his dream, a quilting expert would know all these definitions, and the terms had to be exactly right for the quilt to be correctly valued. None of the dream terms were gobbledygook ("This quilt is blooper-rooper"), but he'd never heard of any of them.

We both had a good chuckled at such an outlandish dream.

Then a couple of days later, he had another bizarre dream. He dreamt that one of our chest freezers full of beef had malfunctioned. The meat was still soft-frozen and therefore salvageable. The problem with moving the meat to another location, however, was the freezer was surrounded by huge rattlesnakes. In his dream, he was going to try laying on some steps near the freezer and remove the meat with long grabbers ... and that's where the dream ended.

Don has no fear of snakes (though of course a healthy respect for rattlers), and the only source he could imagine for such a dream was sighting a rattlesnake on the road a few weeks ago, only the second rattler he's seen in all our years in Idaho.

Yup. Weird dreams.

Thursday, September 10, 2026

Twenty-five years ago. Never forget.

It's been 25 years since the Sept. 11, 2026 terrorist attacks. Stubbornly, I will continue to post some of the heart-wrenching photos from that horrible day because I don't want people to forget, excuse, dismiss, rewrite, or minimize what happened.


Never forget.

Tuesday, September 8, 2026

Scenic drive

This morning we went to pick up Romeo, the bull/steer we recently had butchered, at the meat-cutter's facility. Here's the meat, packed in totes and crates in the back of the car.

The butcher lives waaaaay up a hill above a river. We had never been to this particular neck of the woods before, and immediately fell in love with it. I didn't think to take photos as we drove up, but I took a few on the way down. This is some random and distant outbuilding with some hay bales in a field that made us wish we could move there.

Here's a view of the river.

Can you see the road way down there?

The road wound through rocky and very steep hills.

The hills appeared crumbly, and Don said they're probably basalt.

For this reason, it didn't altogether surprise us to see a gravel pit at the top of the hill where things flattened out.

We agreed it was an incredibly scenic excursion to pick up the meat.

Meanwhile, this is our property, photo taken from a neighbor's place. The barn is on the left (the metal roof is shining in the sun), and the house is on the right tucked behind a row of trees.

Here's a closer view of the house, what little of it is visible.

And that was our scenic drive.

Monday, September 7, 2026

Technical difficulties

Several readers have brought something to my attention, namely that this blog is giving "Secure connections failed" and error messages stating it's an issue on my end.

The trouble is, neither Don nor I can "see" what's happening. We tried implementing the HTTPS availability under "Settings" and get this screen:

In short, we have no clue what's wrong or what happened. We have not changed a single thing on our end, so we don't know what to change or fix. At this point we're about ready to contact a local computer specialist and see what he can do to restore full access to the blog.

Meanwhile, if you can see this blog post, please take a screenshot of whatever issues you're encountering at your end. Don set up a temporary email address, so please send me any technical difficulties you're experiencing. This email address is: troubleshootRR@proton.me

Thank you!

Friday, September 4, 2026

Three-day beef ambrosia

We'll be getting our bull/steer Romeo back from the butcher in a few days' time, so we've been reorganizing the freezer to make room for him. During this process, we came across several cuts of meat from a previous butchering that have just been ... sitting there. For years.

This cut is a chuck roast. I've put chuck roasts in a slow cooker in the past with excellent results, but it still remains, for whatever reason, my least-favorite part of the animal. It's generally the last thing I reach for when it comes to making something for dinner.

But this time, needing to make room, I fished out three chuck roasts as well as two packages of soup bones, another item I seldom use. My plan was to can up the meat in a bone broth.

I threw these all into a large stock pot, added powdered garlic, dried onion, pepper, and a splash of vinegar (to help draw the nutrients out of the bones), topped everything with water, and let it simmer overnight.

The next day, I scooped out all the meat and bones. I carefully went through each piece of meat and de-fatted it as best I could. I think this is one of the reasons I'm not so fond of chuck roast – it's just too fatty. (I put the fatty bits aside to feed to Mr. Darcy in small increments.)

Then I put the meat in the refrigerator overnight. More importantly, I put the pot of beef broth in the fridge too, so the fat could cool, rise to the surface, and harden.

The next day, I scooped the fat off the surface of the broth.

The bone broth is incredible – rich, meaty, full of nutrients. I filled canning jars with meat and topped them with the broth.

Then, not wanting to waste anything, I filled the rest of the jars with leftover broth.

After canning, the result is six pints of beef ambrosia – tender and delicious – and eight pints of beef bone broth for the pantry.

Not a bad haul for some cuts of meat otherwise taking up space in the freezer.

Thursday, September 3, 2026

Happy birthday, Mom!

Today is my mom's 95th birthday.

Clearly I couldn't wish her felicitations over the phone, so I called my dad to pass them on to her. My brothers and sisters-in-law (bless every one of them) are making things festive. My older brother and sister-in-law brought homemade cheesecake (which Mom loves), and my youngest brother and sister-in-law will come in over the weekend with a birthday cake.

Dad says Mom is doing quite well in the nursing home. After her rough New Year's brush with illness, it took her a long time to recuperate and now she's much improved. As Dad says, if it wasn't for the effects of the stroke, she would be exceptionally healthy.

Altogether, Dad and I agreed, we have much to be thankful for with our family. Despite the challenges, everyone is in good spirits. We're beyond grateful for that.

Happy birthday, Mom!

Wednesday, September 2, 2026

Rain relief

As I post this, it's raining. What a delightful sound to hear the raindrops on the roof and water running in the gutters.

I checked my weather diary and confirmed that, with the exception of a few light (and I mean light) showers, we haven't had any appreciable or measurable rain since June 29. This is not atypical for the west, which is why fire danger is always on our radar during the dry months. It's also why the rain is such a welcome relief.

Today's rain is coming in a single dramatic spike.

But we have the promise of more rain and unsettled weather for the foreseeable future (i.e. the 10-day forecast).

The oak leaves are dripping water.

The porch rails are wet.

Some turkeys are taking refuge under an apple tree.

The road is running with rivulets of water.

And by evening, the blackberries will plump up.

Everything is looking fresher and cleaner since all the vegetation is having a bath and the dust is washing off. Yes, this rain is a relief.