A Green Bean Day

So in the midst of 99 degree days and clean up from demon winds that wiped out 10 trees in the yard, the green beans decided that was the time they were at their perfect size for picking.

So I picked green beans.

Some of the green beans.

I must say, as green beans go, these were pretty fine. They had no green bean rust and no bug holes. They were not too big or too small. They were just right.

I had to snap them (although I use a knife) and prep them for cooking and processing.

I threw some in the pot on the stove along with some fat back to cook. This is the southern way to cook green beans. They have to simmer on the stove for HOURS. My husband likes them best when they are fixed like this. We had these for dinner.

Other green beans I decided to put in the freezer. I had to blanch them (put them in hot water) for three minutes.

I forgot to take a picture of that part.

After they cooked for three minutes, I put them on ice to keep them from cooking even more.

Next I put them on a cookie sheet, and then I took a paper towel to them to rid them of excess water.

These are some of the finished beans, ready for the freezer. They will taste good this winter.

The Bird Nest

When I was picking up sticks in recent days following the demon wind storm known as a derecho, I came across a bird's nest.

I picked it up and placed it gently on my boxwood.

It fit into the palm of my hand. As you can see, it is very small.

Such a delicate creation! It is soft inside, lined with brown, black, and gray hairs.

I hope the baby birds had all grown up and flown away before the winds came.

Thursday Thirteen

*Note to Thursday Thirteen players*

Please, I'm begging you, get rid of the captcha codes. It takes me three tries to log in and I'm about ready to stop responding on any blog that uses these things. The new codes that blogger is using is just horrid and terribly hard to read.

**********************************************************************

The Library of Congress this week released a list of books that shaped the United States of America.

It is a different sort of collection of titles than one might expect.

Here are 13 of them that I have read:

1. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, by Mark Twain (1884) (Read it online for free here)

2. Beloved, by Toni Morrison (1987)

3. The Call of the Wild, by Jack London (1903)(download and read for free here)

4. The Cat in the Hat, by Dr. Suess (1957)

5. Charlotte's Webb, by E.B. White (1952)

6. Fahrenheit 451, by Ray Bradbury (1953)

7. Goodnight Moon, by Margaret Wise Brown (1947) (Hollins alumna!)

8. The Great Gatsby, by F. Scott Fitzgerald (1925)

9. Leaves of Grass, by Walt Whitman (1855) (read online for free here)

10. Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott (1868)(read it online for free here (I think))

11. To Kill a Mockingbird, by Harper Lee (1960)

12. Walden, or Life in the Woods, by Henry David Thoreau (1854)(read it online for free here)

13. The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, by L. Frank Baum (1900)(read it online for free here)


I have read a great many more on the list than what I have listed here: 32 of the 88 listed. Not quite half, but then I wasn't born in the 1800s, either. Many of the books on the list are very old.

I suspect if you want to know how a nation is what it is - how the national myths grew and twisted, how the country as a whole sees itself, how it vilifies or applies sainthood to various sections of entire people - reading the books that people read as they grow up and otherwise might be a good place to start.



Thursday Thirteen is played by lots of people; there is a list here. I've been playing for a while and this is my 249th time to do a list of 13 on a Thursday.

Unpopular Poplars

We planted a row of poplars to the side of the house in 1988. The nursery we ordered them from said they had a 20 year life span.

In 1988 that seemed like a long time.

But by 2012, the trees were dead, lifeless sentinels standing guard over the property.

My husband has, for a couple of years now, said he would cut them down.

The wind storm of June 29 took care of a lot that for him.

Let the clean up begin!

My husband, man of many talents and very busy guy,

has a business installing septic tanks as well as being

a fire chief and running the farm.

The equipment came in handy during this derecho event.

He picked up the bigger pieces with his skid steer.

He dumped them over the fence, and later he shoved

them into an existing brush pile to the right.

He cut down what was left of the poplars.

It didn't take long but it was messy.

It was hot and tiring work.

Afterward, we had to pick up all of these sticks by hand.

We finished that chore last night.

All in all, we have removed many skid steer loads, 12 garden cart loads and 2 farm trailer loads of wood and debris from the yard since Saturday morning.

In 90-100 degree heat.

Hoping now for calmer weather!

Books: The Last Promise

The Last Promise
By Richard Paul Evans
Audiobook
Read by Jonathan Davis
8 hrs 55 min
Copyright 2002

Richard Paul Evans gives us yet another love story in this nice tale set in Italy.

Eliana (Ellen), an American from Utah, has married a count and now lives at his vineyard with their young son. The boy is asthmatic, and his father is seldom around. He travels a great deal and has several mistresses to keep up, to boot.

Ross Story is an American from Minnesota, a somewhat melacholy fellow who becomes a tenant at the vineyard.

As you might be able to predict, Eliana and Ross fall in love.

The story then revolves around whether or not their love will be unrequited.

This is a straight character story with a basic love affair plot, and I enjoyed listening to it. Evans' tales require very little of the reader; he has a nice style and the stories flow well. They are somewhat predicable but when I'm killing time in the car and driving, I really don't want to have to concentrate hard on what I'm listening to. So these are perfect for those half-hour trips back and forth to the city.

Aftermath: The Derecho

When I woke this morning, the clock said 6:40. I glanced out the window in time to see a red streak in the yard. I reached for my glasses and hopped up.

The fox was beautiful and majestic as it pranced through the yard. It passed through quickly, and I was unable to grab my camera.

I wiped the sleep from my eyes, drank a glass of water, and hurried into old clothes. I walked outside. To one side of me, I heard the far-off roar of a generator, while behind me I heard the distant whirr of a chainsaw.

Someone was already up and cutting down felled trees.

The siren or alarm that has been sounding for two days continued to wail, too. I haven't been able to place it, but have concluded it must be someone's house alarm. Perhaps they are out of town and the power outage set it off. Or maybe they had a tree limb go through a window. In any event, it is a strange backdrop for the surreal disaster area that the Virginia Derecho of June 29 left in its wake.

As I did yesterday, I set out early to pick up limbs and sticks. Yesterday I filled up my garden cart five times with limbs and sticks. It took me about 10 minutes to fill the cart, and an hour of this work out in the intense heat and humidity is all I can manage. Between my asthma and my high blood pressure, not to mention back problems, the work leaves me feeling weak and light-headed.

I have decided that I will do this for an hour every morning until I have done all I can. The large limbs I will have to leave for my husband, as I cannot lift them, but he has his hands full and it will be a while before he can turn his attention to our yard.

So I stoop and bend, pick up a limb, rise, toss it into the cart. Repeat. Repeat. Repeat. This morning I did this for an hour, and filled my cart five times once more.

I am glistening with sweat when my husband comes home from work.

Yesterday he was in the city. As a battalion chief with the Roanoke City Fire-EMS, he had a big job. With so many trees down, and people in need of help, the first responders had a lot going on.

On the farm, we have trees across fences, and that must be the first priority since the house is okay. Cattle will roam, and they must be fenced in. So he came home and changed from his fireman's gear to his farmer's gear, and he is off working on fence.

Fortunately, yesterday while he was at work one of his cousins came out and fixed up the worst holes so that the cattle could not get out into the road. But the fence must be in good repair at all times. It is one of the important parts of raising cattle.

We have also been fortunate to keep our electricity. The lights went out for a brief period during the height of the storm, but they have stayed on. The internet has been spotty but basically reliable, considering the state of emergency, and I have been pleased with it.

I have checked on friends and neighbors; all that I have spoken to are fine and making out. I am worried about one elderly friend but so far she is all right. Most of my friends and family have electricity and I am grateful for that.

The loss of electricity is a big deal. People are very power-dependent and this should serve as warning. I hope folks buy generators and keep gasoline on hand.

The upcoming week is looking like one that will be quite different for many people. Some folks will not be able to go to work because their offices will not have electricity. Many people are irritable because of the heat. I imagine some folks are starting to get a little stinky, too, because they cannot take a shower.

Food businesses that lost power worry me, because I fear many will not do the right thing and throw the food out but instead sell it anyway. I will not be anxious to eat out for a while, I think.

I see on Facebook that people without power are tossing their food from their refrigerators and freezers now. I imagine what was in the fridge was bad as of Saturday since most power went out around 9 p.m. Friday night; the freezers, if unopened, might last for three or four days but beyond that, certainly not.

Some places are not expected to be reconnected to the power grid until next Saturday - a full week away.

I am so grateful that I have come through this with what seems to me to be relatively minor damage. We were lucky the house was unhurt, that only fences are down, and that the electricity has stayed on all of this time. I feel for the folks who are without power.

The county has set up a cooling center at Lord Botetourt; I assume it is in place again today but I am not certain. Also, they have asked folks who are on public water to conserve water. If their pumping stations are not functioning, they may be having trouble keeping water in the tanks.

This weather event will be one for the record books. I hope I never experience it again.

Derecho

Last night we had a weather event that this area had never experienced before. It is called a derecho, a straight-line severe windstorm. I had never heard of it.

We had no warning. We had been out to dinner, and when we returned we turned the TV to HBO. About 9 p.m., suddenly the air around us burst into a roar; it sounded like the house had suddenly imploded.

We jumped up and raced to look outside. The clouds were dark and foreboding, and the wind was fierce. The Roanoke Airport recorded 81 mph winds, which are hurricane force.

This is the damage just around the house:

Tree limbs down, my wishing well destroyed.

Tree broken off.

A redbud twisted and destroyed.

Two more trees down.

Debris and limbs in the yard.

Poplars, which had died and needed to be cut down,
are now mostly down.

Large pine tree down.

Another large pine tree down.

An ash tree with the top gone.

Debris in the yard.

What is left of my garden.

I have no idea what the rest of the farm looks like, but I am sure there are many more trees down.

Thousands are without power, and the temperatures here today are expected to reach 102. I have, somehow, been fortunate to keep my electricity, and I have already invited a few folks to come use my shower and stay out of the heat here if they have to.

Hopefully the county will open a shelter, but I have not heard if they have done this yet. UPDATE: The county has opened as a shelter at Lord Botetourt High School, and Fincastle Baptist Church is also offering its space as a shelter.

Please everyone, be safe. Stay out of the heat.

Remembering Grandma

Yesterday was the anniversary of my grandmother's death. She passed away on June 28, 2007. I can't believe she has been gone for five years.

She was my mother's mother, and she was 84 years old when she died. While my father's mother is still alive (and in her 90s!), she lives in California and I do not know her well. I love her, of course, but there is much to be said for hands-on.

My mother's mother was my full-time, hands-on grandma.

I have many stories of staying with Grandma. She kept us during the summers when school was out, and on weekends when my parents would be away (my father played in a Top 40 band). And on the many days I missed school because I was ill, I stayed with Grandma for her tender loving care.

My mother worked at a job only a block from where my grandmother lived, which was handy. When my brother or I (or both) stayed with Grandma, she could drop us off and pick us up without problem.

My grandmother cooked every day. My grandfather worked at the Kroger warehouse, where he was a foreman. He went in early and came home at 4:10 p.m. every day. And that was when he wanted to eat.

Frequently we had an early dinner at my grandmother's, then. And I still eat early to this day, preferring to have it all over and done with by 6:15 p.m. at the latest.

If Grandma had a food speciality, it was macaroni and cheese. I'm not talking about mac and cheese like you buy in the Kraft boxes. I really can't describe her mac and cheese except that she made a lot of it and we all ate it.

She also liked to fix pudding. She did not use instant mixes but made the cooked kind of Jello brand pudding. I remember one day she was out of chocolate. Of course we wanted chocolate.

She made up some chocolate milk and used vanilla pudding mix to create what we thought was the best chocolate pudding ever.

After that, we asked for her special chocolate pudding instead of the normal kind. We did not always get it, but she made it occasionally.

Grandmas are like that, you know. They offer up treats and love in all sorts of ways.

My grandmother's birthday is also in June, so I have been missing her this month. I have thought of her often and I hope she knows she remains in my heart.

Thursday Thirteen

I am happy that young people have their music - I hope they remember it as fondly as I do the music I listened to as a teenager and young adult.

Without further ado, here are some links and embeds of my favorites:

1. American Pie, by Don McLean. This is the song that will make me stop whatever I am doing, and sing along. And yes, I know all of the lyrics.


2. Vincent (Starry, Starry Night), by Don McLean. This song used to leave me sobbing when I heard it in the car.

3. Seasons in the Sun, by Terry Jacks. I remember when this song came out in 1974 (I was 11 years old). I have a vivid memory of my friend Ann and I singing this song together out in the playground at Breckinridge Elementary School and drawing a crowd as we did. In high school, Ann and I ended up in a Top 40 band together. We did not play this song at that time, though.


4. Wildfire, by Michael Martin Murphy. My mother liked this song, too.

5. Time in a Bottle, by Jim Croce. Such a lovely love song.

6. You've Got a Friend, by James Taylor. This song used to make me cry everytime I heard it.


7. Make It With You, by Bread. Another lovely love song.

8. You needed Me, by Anne Murray. This one still makes me cry.

9. You Light Up My Life, by Debbie Gibson. This song was a #1 hit, but it received a lot of bad press at the time, I recall, or maybe just a lot of ribbing from people my age. However, this is the very first song I ever sang in public. My father had a band and they played a dance at Breckinridge Elementary School. I had learned this song on the guitar and was singing it at home, and my father invited me onto the stage to sing it. I nearly passed out from fright but did get through the song.

10. Sugar, Sugar, by the Archies. A fun song, and a great reminder of Saturday mornings and my childhood.


11. You're So Vain, by Carly Simon. One of the first "adult" songs that I understood and related to.

12. We've Only Just Begun, by the Carpenters. I love anything by The Carpenters, but this song is especially lovely.

13. Mandy, by Barry Manilow. This is another song I learned on the guitar and played in public. And I thought Manilow was cute.

To be sure, I know all of these songs to sing and play on the guitar. The Carpenters song and the James Taylor song are the hardest; lots of chords.

Feeling a little nostaligic this morning!



Thursday Thirteen is played by lots of people; there is a list here. I've been playing for a while and this is my 248th time to do a list of 13 on a Thursday.

Wordless Wednesday

Linking up with Wordless Wednesday for the second time ever.

A Very Very Very Fine House

My house is a small ranch, built in 1987 with our own two hands. It is not a big house by any stretch of the imagination, but it serves us well.

I was playing with some photo software this morning:




The House in Pencil
(this looked better in the photo editor than it does here)

The House in Black & White

Original Photo w/ drop shadow.

In Search of Quality

Remember when they made stuff that lasts?

When books did not have typographical errors?

When TV shows were produced with quality in mind?

When movies were made with actors who had that star quality, not just visual appeal?

When vehicles lasted for 150,000 and that wasn't abnormal?

Yeah, it was a long time ago, and I am showing my age. There is an entire generation of people alive now who have no idea what I'm talking about.

They live in mediocre-land, and always have. They don't know that there used to be a drive toward perfection, a push toward excellence. They don't remember when the word "merit" actually meant something.

Things used to have merit.

I am not a fan of mediocre-land. I liked it when I read a book without being interrupted by a typographical error. I am currently reading a compilation of a series of teen novels, and it is riddled with errors, typographical and otherwise. Simon and Schuster should be ashamed of themselves.

My refrigerator is about seven years old. It replaced one that was 21 years old; guess what needs to be replaced now? Yes. The seven-year old Frigidare. The seals around the door have cracked and split, and this morning I noticed the compressor on it was chugging away like a boat on a river. It won't be long, I fear.

TV is full of reality shows, with people who are not actors acting like children. The movies are created by hacks who wouldn't know a decent story line if it rose up and bit them on the ankle.

When I first went to work for a lawyer, way back in 1983, we were told we could not submit a document to the court with a typographical error in it. And we were using IBM Selectric typewriters, not word processors or computers. I remember sitting with my coworker, reading deed descriptions aloud to ensure that we did not make a mistake. We proofed each other's work.

I am not sure when quality became a bad word, and it became okay to simply put stuff out there. When did copy editing become something that could be dismissed by newspapers and publishers? I don't know when it became acceptable to build an appliance that lasts three years, not 30.

Sometime in the late 1980s, it seems.

I think this represents a change in mores, a decline in responsibility, and a loss of education and distinction. It mirrors the rise of capitalism and consumerism, as quality is not preferable to riches; when only riches matter, quality must suffer.

This loss of quality comes at the cost of the rise of mediocrity.

And mediocrity does not last.

People will look back on the last 30 years and dismiss it completely, if the future ever rises to humanity's full potential. If it doesn't, no one will care anyway. It will be too mediocre to care.

Lost generation. Lost in mediocrity. Somehow today I feel that describes the world.

Happy Monday.

Chris Graduates From High School

Earlier in June, my nephew, Chris, graduated from Lord Botetourt High School. I posted photos on Facebook and just realized I never put anything on my blog!

He is a fine young man, interested in farming, carpentry, machinery,and other hands-on activities.

These three fine fellows are my nephew Emory, my hubby, and Chris. Emory is Chris's brother; he will be a senior at University of South Carolina this fall. He is studying to be a doctor.

Chris has a girlfriend!

Our seats for the graduation ceremony were not the best; this is a shot at the end, when the students toss their mortar boards into the air.

I am very proud of Chris. He has never liked school, but he still kept his grades up. He plans to attend Virginia Western Community College this fall, and I think it is terrific that he intends to further his education. He is interested in things like welding and installing air conditioners - and I think that is wonderful, too. Those are good, solid jobs.

Bravo to the nephew! Huzzah!

The Yellow Rose

This rose is from a bush that we rescued from Grandma's rose garden just before the old homeplace was sold after her death in 2002.

We stole down on a damp Sunday evening, my husband and I, with shovel in hand. We dug up four rose bushes and smuggled them home.

This is the only one that survived; it was the wrong time of year to be making such a transplant. I knew that but we were stung by the sudden sale of the property and had to make a move.

I have a few other roses that grew from cuttings Grandma grew for me, but this rose stands out for me because it was originally hers, and because we "rescued" it.

Her flower garden is no more; it did not take long for it to become a plot of grass.

Stuff changes. But I am glad I have this rose to remind me of Grandma, and the roses she loved.

Thursday Thirteen

Some links and thoughts about writing, books, libraries, etc.

1. Some of the publishing websites are making a big to-do over a fellow who used his own material a couple of times in separate articles. You can read about it here and here, plus many other places if you want to search it. The author is being criticized for "self-plagiarism," which I didn't even know you could do. How do you steal from yourself? I have read many books on freelancing and writing nonfiction articles that encourage you to rework your material for different articles, and here this writer is being railroaded out of town for doing just that. Does this mean that every time you want to do a new article out of an interview, you're supposed to do the interview again? Maybe the brouhaha is because he sold the same material to different sites, which violates some sort of copyright, but I am not clear on this.

2. Barnes and Noble has a big loss. I am really sorry to see that Amazon is creaming all book sellers and causing so much angst in the book and publishing industry. It's a good example of monopoly. If B&N has lost $57.7 million in the last quarter, one has to wonder how much longer the company will be able to hang on. Since we have few other options for book browsing in my area, I will be very sad to see the brick and mortar buildings close up shop.

4. Oprah's online book club is, at the very least, a good resource for those involved in book clubs. It also gives one a good reading list.

5. NPR has a page devoted to books, too. It's another resource for finding good reads.

6. You can find an interesting Character Building Workshop at this link. It offers some tests for creating characters, character archetypes, personality types, and personality disorders that are often associated with various jobs or other life roles.

7. This blog entry/article talks about self-publishing and selling through Amazon and using social media.

8. You can also learn about self-publishing at this website.

9. I recently discovered The Great Courses, which offers lecture series on various topics, including writing. They're rather expensive but the friend who suggested I check out the site says they are all worth the money.

10. Here's a website about blogging, how to do it better and smarter, and all of that stuff.

11. This article says that a library science degree is the worst degree to obtain. Of course, I've read other articles that say any M.A. in the humanities is a bad deal, but that is only true if you're interest is only in money and not expanding your mind.

12.  This video available at the Oxford American, shows a tiny little town. It doesn't really have anything to do with books, but the Oxford American website is a good one to bookmark.

13. And lastly, this video is a story about how a library system fought back against those who would see the place close before they paid one little cent more in taxes. Watch it to the end. I consider it must-see.



Thursday Thirteen is played by lots of people; there is a list here. I've been playing for a while and this is my 247th time to do a list of 13 on a Thursday.

Happy Birthday, Mom

Today my mother would have been 68 years old, had pancreatic cancer not taken her away in 2000. She was only 56 when she died - an age that, from where I sit now, is not so very old.

Birthdays were not something my mother cared to celebrate. I do not recall her greeting any birthday with open arms. Old age was something to fight and deny. She did not want to have gray hair, wrinkles, or sags.

My mother was a beautiful woman in her youth. My paternal grandfather used to say she reminded him of Elizabeth Taylor. I think it was the dark hair.

She wanted to stay beautiful, I think.

The picture above was taken in the early 1990s, when she was about 44 or so. I have that same graying around the edge on the same side of my hair. I do not color my hair, and I wear the gray proudly.

I don't mind growing old. I can't stop it from happening, anyway.

My mother had a storied life. She was only 18 years old when I was born, and that is too young to be a mom, I think. She took a job when she was 16 and stayed at the same desk from that time until she was 48 or so, when she retired. Over 30 years. Her job was in Salem, where she grew up, and so she drove back and forth, a 40-minute drive, every weekday.

She worked on the farm with my father, gathering hay, tending cattle, canning vegetables. She was a town girl but took to this new life, or tried to, anyway. I never knew if she was happy at it.

Her creativity was boundless; she sewed, made crafts, painted Christmas decorations. I have some of her needlework; it hung on my walls for a long time, until I feared it was fading from sunlight and I put it away to preserve for my niece.

She liked the beach better than the mountains, at least in her latter years. She said she felt better at sea level and had less aches and pains.

Cooking was also something she enjoyed, and she made lots of different foods of many varieties.

I did not inherit her talents, I'm afraid.

The cancer that took her was an unwelcome beast, and she fought it to her last breath. Her fight was strong but she could not best it.

Life is funny. You never know how long you have, you can only do the best with what you do have, and in the end you have no idea if you made a passing grade. I doubt anybody gives out "As" at the end anyway.

Mom, I don't know what the last decade would have been like had you still been around. I don't know if it would have been better or worse.

I do know for sure it would have been different.

Happy Birthday.

Deer

Sisterhood - A Poem

Sisterhood
By A. Firebaugh


"Missing me one place search another
I stop somewhere waiting for you."
─ Walt Whitman

I.

I am the child
who has buried a playmate.
I mourn without knowing
what I have misplaced
or not found. A funeral
for myself; I do not attend.
I send lilies and roses
for others.

I die alone.

II.

In December winds
I stand naked, barren before you.
My chest heaves with the cold.
I want the warmth of company,
another close in my heart.

I probe the earth for understanding.
I search for conversation
by an open fireplace, walks
in the forest, the tangy sweet
taste of persimmons in fall.

I search for fables, but this I
dare not believe. I am
the survivor,
I intend to live.

My quest is for sisterhood.
I seek only a friend.

Summer Concert

Botetourt County has three wineries, and they have joined together with WSLS and Lewis Gale Regional Health System and a number of other businesses (including The Fincastle Herald) to sponsor a series of summer concerts. The concerts have been going on for several years. You can see a list of the businesses that sponsor the event at the link.

Last night my other half and I decided to check out the concert at Virginia Mountain Vineyards. It is located about 10 miles away, outside of Fincastle, on Old Fincastle Road.

The place was rocking when we arrived. Note the grape

vines in the background.

Another shot of the grapevines in the distance.

The line to pay to get in was long. We went in as

non-drinkers, which only cost $5 each. It was $10

each if you wanted to sample the wine offerings.

The vineyard offers some spectacular views of the

Blue Ridge Mountains.

The band, SolRevolt, played under a tent. The offered

up a mix of 1970s rock and blues.

We sat under the tent for a while, but the band

was louder under there. After the inconsiderate

man next to us lit up a cigar, we picked up our

chairs and moved to the rear of the event.

My husband greets his cousins, who joined

 us for the evening.

The vineyard had a nice gazebo. It would be a good spot

for a wedding.

We sat and chatted and listened to music for several

hours.

Final shot as the sun went to sleep.

Nice event. The next one is August 11 at Blue Ridge Vineyards in Eagle Rock.