16 March …

 

The plan had been for son John to be here this week.  Didn’t happen.

Original thought was to get a start on the garden.  Wrong.  Weather has been saying, forcefully, not yet!

We’ll give it a couple of weeks and reschedule.

Oh well …

In addition, mornings are dark again.  And it was still light enough last night to be outdoors without a flashlight at 1945.

~~~

George and I made a run to Yreka last week between snow and rain episodes. Instead we had some really strong winds.  Coming home while bucking the head wind was almost as if George had taken his foot off the gas we would have started moving backward.

Earlier, as we left home, something went wrong in the windshield wiper mechanism.  It was not raining at the time.  But on the way home, the rain started just as we crossed the Shasta River about seven miles from home.  That meant at least four miles on paved county road before we got onto private gravel road.  Fortunately the rain was light and we made it home with no problem. 

We have the darndest adventures.

Last time wipers failed was over 50 years ago on our way back to Milwaukee from St Sault Marie.  We were driving south through Michigan and planned to go around the lower tip of Lake Michigan and north through Chicago.  Instead we wound up taking a ferry across the lake and dining on candy bars for supper.

~~~

I had a genealogical adventure last week.  I was looking for information about an ancestor used by a relative as entree to a society (to which she left me a membership).  I did an Ancestry search and lo and behold … jackpot.  It was not the first time I’d done this search, but so much new information has been digitized in the last few years I wound up with 20 pages of information from old parish records and little known histories, and that was not all but I needed to go to bed. 

There is enough there to keep me busy for several evenings.

Tomorrow is my next day at the Family History Center.

Another chance for adventure …

~~~

As I’ve told you, George and I have been watching reruns of the old “Adam12” television shows.  They are fun, partly because I recognize so many of the locations.  One show started with the unit crossing the high bridge in Pasadena and then on to the beach front in Venice and back to ubiquitous bungalows which could have been one of a great many parts of the area including El Segundo where I used to vacation with my Nana or Long Beach where George’s sister and her family lived.

Interestingly, I doubt there are too many folks now who would recognize those sites.  A great many of them no longer exist.

And another event related to watching …  a week or so ago one of the story lines was about a recently widowed older man who opened his house to “hippies” who took advantage of him requiring police involvement (Jack Webb didn’t approve of hippies).

Then monday night, on the local news, there was a report of a house in south Medford found by Sheriffs to be full of drugs, drug paraphernalia, more than twenty young people, and one older man who had been widowed a year ago.

The more things change, the more they stay the same.

~~~

Rain and snow continued for several days.9 March …

10 March …

12 March …

This morning …

Total precipitation for the week was more than 6.5″.  It will take a bit of drying out before we can even consider prepping the garden area.  In the meantime, I need to get an area ready to start seeds. Today and tomorrow are days to start seeds for above ground plants (according to the Old Farmers Almanac).  I may do some peas and have them ready to set out asap.  Maybe some salad greens as well.

Also … the first of the Spring visitors is here …

~~~

“If you don’t produce garbage, you don’t exist to historians to a large extent.”

Just read this on an archaeological site.  It means George and I will probably disappear from history.  We have very little garbage.  There are few kitchen scraps due to leftover use and soup makin’s and some compost.  What remains goes out to the chickens to make eggs.  Egg shells are crushed and returned to the chickens as their calcium source or used in garden paths.  Cans, glass, and plastic bottles and bags are recycled through collection bins at the grocery stores or the recycling center.  Paper is recycled as scratch paper, weed mulch, packing material, or fire starter.

In spite of these efforts, maybe we will be noted.  The “collections” around here seem to grow in spite of efforts. 

Depression era youth vs. environmental concern.

Oh well …

~~~

Politics is getting more and more annoying … as well as scary.  We are reaping the dumbing down of the country … starting with the change in education so that no one is allowed to be left behind, i.e. move them through the grades even if they can’t read past second grade level and gawdforbid they be taught to write or do basic math or study history.

Then came the move from shows like “Omnibus” on television to shows like “The Name Game” which is also a dumbing down.  Now less than a twelfth grade education, part-time or unemployment, trailer park residence, segregation  advocacy (probably out of fear), limited vocabulary, profanity acceptance, etc. has become normal.  And if you read something other than Avenger style comics, know who Shakespeare was (and possibly even quote him), know where cities are on a map, understand the War of the Roses was not a farm disagreement, recognize the Bill of Rights, etc. you are noted as a snob or a nerd or both.

SCARY !!!

~~~

Now … after that … I need a positive thought, so …

 

“I think that no matter how old or infirm I may become, I will always plant a garden in the spring. Who can resist the feelings of hope and joy that one gets from participating in nature’s rebirth?”    ~ Edward Giobbi

 

 

’til next week …