The bees are back. You may remember that our colony of last year suddenly swarmed up and moved on to a better neighborhood. A mystery, and their owner, Allen, doesn’t know where they went. Or why. They just did.

So he had to buy a new queen and her colony, put them in a box, bring them here, and pour them into the beautiful hand-crafted hive under the little oak cluster. This operation had to wait until the cows were moved out of this pasture, as they would otherwise surely rub against and knock over the bee’s home.

“So how do honey bees survived the winter, anyway?” you ask. “Don’t most of them simply die?” Good question. Most do, I learn, but this particular species of bee, apis mellifera, has a strategy which has them huddling together, surviving all winter on the honey they’ve stored and something called bee bread. When extra cold, they shiver as if to fly, but stay stationery and the friction of hundreds of the little creatures warms them all.

“Very cool, but what happens when we’ve stolen their honey?” Right. Apparently the colony produces two to three times the volume of honey they need in order to survive the winter. Bee keepers can thus harvest the excess without compromising the colony. Why, exactly, the bees over-produce I do not know.

Anyway, the cows have been moved away from the pasture near the house and down toward the barn. Much better. While the chickens are cute, rushing to meet me with their funny two-legged waddle, the steers, not so much. They’re not threatening, exactly, just imperious. Entitled. Give us what we want, right now, or we’ll bellow your silly little fence down. (On consideration of their future, okay, carry on?)

When a young child, I wanted to be a cowgirl. I realize now that I didn’t really want anything to do with actual cows. It was all about the horse I longed to have. Me and the purple sage. That didn’t work out, but here I am! Be careful what you wish for! (Don’t misunderstand. I love these ugly, dirty, noisy, bossy animals. At a distance.)

“You’re so lucky, living in the country, with the animals and chores you probably don’t have to go to some gym to get your exercise.” Hahahaha. Good one.

Like the rest of you, who probably had a gym somewhere and a trainer or zumba classes, or tai chi, or yoga, we also had a gym. Up until. For a while we worked out in our garage “gym” outfitted with a few accessories, like a TRX scrappy thing, a couple of benches, some weights, and a treadmill. Going out there on a cold winter’s morning, in between the cars, boots, recycling bins, spare refrigerator? I’m not complaining! Yes, we are lucky, thank you for reminding me. (Jesus.)

But we did it. Sometimes. Then our son Peter suggested that we might like to join him and Allison once a week on Zoom-like training sessions with their personal trainer, Nancy. Why not? It seemed to work, and although Nancy is very, very good, she was simultaneously managing two active Californians and two old Oregonians. Whatever that means. We’d be exhausted for the rest of the day. Then Peter had another bright idea. He works out alone with Nancy on Fridays, and we could join him then, for half-hour sessions. That worked for a time, until Peter was unable to take his Friday one day, and did we want the time, alone, with Nancy? Okay, sure.

We’ve only done it once, but we have seen the future. It is sweet to see our family, briefly, once a week, but seriously. I didn’t think I’d like working out via Zoom, but, I do. (Vik says their grand kid Jordan suggested that they should buy Zoom stock. Don’t know if they did, but, smart kid!) Now I think we’ll never go back to “our” gym, Snap Fitness, even when Covid is a distant, dim memory.

Thank you for coming to my rescue with book recommendations after my little rant last post! Here are two ideas which are exactly what I wanted: Miss Benson’s Beetle, by Rachel Joyce, which Jeanne Ederer (Jenny’s m-in-law) suggested. “Two spirited women, one journey to the edge of the world.” I haven’t read it yet, but Jeanne says she laughed out loud reading it. Perfect.

And: One Long River of Song, by David James Duncan. As he’s an Oregonian, you may have read some of his fiction. But this! OMG. Vik said she actually sobbed while trying to read a bit to Gordon. Vik? Sobbed? You have to pay attention to that. It’s because it’s so heartbreakingly beautiful and profound and and . . . it’s a collection of thought pieces, whew. Try to find both of these books.

And here’s a suggestion of my own: Klara and the Sun, by Kazuo Ishiguro. I’m listening to, not reading it, and my suggestion is to follow my example, as the reading is so good. I’m rationing it because I’m addicted. Great writing (duh) and a compelling, amazing story.

Now the sun is shining, I found a frozen chunk of Gumbo in the freezer, so dinner is thawing. I’ll go see if there are any eggs today, and if so, post a photo. Excuse me, be right back.

Three chickens, two eggs. Someone taking the day off, but that’s fine. Go enjoy this nice day, ’cause I’m going to! See ya.

“Cows lick each other around the head and neck to show affection and help forge strong friendships, a new study reveals.” Or so says Mr. Google. I’ve been wondering! Our boys are, as I mentioned, feisty teen-agers, here without their moms (or certainly their dads). They spend their time grazing, head-butting and shoving, mounting one another, kicking up their heels. But now and then, we’ll see one licking another, both still, mesmerized. Really?

And they talk to us. Last year, with cow/calf pairs, there was a lot of communication, and the vocabulary is surprisingly translatable. “Where are you!” “I’m hungry!” But what do our boys have to say to one another? I don’t know, but if they don’t talk among themselves, they sure do talk to us. Right now, the herd is grazing in two joined pastures , each abutting the driveway. They wander freely, not, so far as we can tell, herded up. When one or several spot us, however, they come rushing up to the fence. The others notice and soon, some 25 cows are jostling and, get this, mooing at us. Plaintively. “We want to be in that other pasture over there where it’s greener. We’re tired of this grass. We’re stuck here and it’s your job to move us!” They’ll follow along as we walk, and they’re noisy!

Here’s one, assessing me, looking picturesque behind the daffodils:

Yes, daffodils! Spring! We walked down through the copse on Wednesday, and were surprised to see all the fawn lilies in bloom under the trees:

The camas lilies are not quite out yet, but here’s an early pilgrim:

Soon the wetland will be covered with blue. Under the ash woods, the trillium are arriving:

Buttercups. And who is this? Any ideas?

You should get your shots and come visit us! But hurry, these wildflowers won’t last long.

What else? The garden, of course. Every living creature is stirring, even this cabbage half, spending the lonely winter in the veg drawer of the back refrigerator. In the dark. Still:

Don’t question my reason for having this moldy thing still in the refrigerator. I didn’t know it was there, okay?

Here’s Larry at his chores:

I’m in a race to use all last year’s squash before the new crops start arriving. I’m not complaining! Well, just a little.

And while I’m complaining: I never imagined a day would come when I would be tired of reading, but here it is. Same goes for listening. I never want to read or hear another story in which there’s a dead body. Three generations of Southern women. A sassy female lawyer, cop, teacher. Anything based in New York City because I don’t get those people. Rich people with a cottage in the Hamptons. I don’t even know exactly where “the Hamptons” are. Anything involving WWII — I mean nothing! Yeah, no, I don’t want something inspiring or intellectual or historical. I want to be entertained. To laugh. Is that so much to ask? Any good ideas?

I’ll tell you a story I just learned about an uncle I never even met: Uncle Buzz. My mom’s brother. Speaking of WWII. So in civilian life he was an elevator engineer for Otis, but some way found himself in the Navy, serving on an aircraft carrier in the Pacific. His ship was attacked by a Japanese bomber, with the result of 29 dead. The system which moved the planes from a lower to top deck for takeoff was destroyed, thus disabling the ship’s mission. It was thought that they would have to return to San Francisco, spending at least half a year out of service. But my uncle to the rescue! This is about elevators, after all. He figured out a way to replace the plane’s lift system from one area of the ship to another, and so the ship lived to fight another day. A war hero!

Why didn’t I ever meet this man? Good question. One of the ways my family has been strange and weird, and don’t we all have strange, weird families? Yes, we do.

Now it’s 11:00 a.m. and I have some weeding to do in the driveway, where grass has been determined to migrate from the lawn. Larry sprayed it, but now we just have dead yellow grass in the driveway which shows no sign of blowing away. I know. I should have been doing my job all along and we’d all be free to sit in the sunshine with a good book. A good book. Anybody?

No, we haven’t gotten our shots yet. Yes, both my sisters, plus all Allison’s California relations and friends are protected. “You have to be proactive,” they tell me, which is good advice, of course.

No, one can’t be vaccinated at the mass event in Reser Stadium without documentation of a place in the chosen hierarchy. “Just stay on the line and an informed respondent will be with you momentarily,” promised the pleasant voice on the Benton County vaccine help line. For an hour. Wait, what does “momentarily” mean?

Terwilliger Plaza, the old folks’ home with whom we’re registered for down- the-line-emergency/ just-in-case lodging when and if we ever sell our condo or one of us falls off the tractor, can’t get the vaccine. Because we’ve decided, apparently, to vaccinate teachers before old folks in this state, this county. I think this is wise, and proactivity can do nothing to alter our place in the queue.

So we wait.

In the meantime, it snowed! I still get a childish jolt of euphoria when I wake to a white wonderland. A girl of the rain-drenched Willamette Valley. Guess the same thrill doesn’t occur to the boy who grew up in Minnesota. I had to beg him to come with me for a walk. These are sheep across the road from us, and a lonely hawk:

But the snow didn’t last a day. I claim that winter isn’t over, which is true, even if winter holds no further guarantees.

The Lorax? Dr. Seuss? Okay, I didn’t quite remember exactly what Seussian figure it is, so had to check with Amazon after this cute little truck showed up at our gate Saturday.

“I speak for the trees,” the Lorax says, “because trees have no tongues and cannot speak for themselves.” A quick trip further into the literature and I learned that a town in California once banned the book in their schools because it portrayed logging adversely, unfairly. Adversely for sure, if not unfairly!

But our Lorax was here to saw up and chip the oak tree that fell by the road last month. All was going well, until. Well, it is mud season and the Lorax got very adversely and unfairly stuck.

The Little Tractor That Could to the rescue. I won’t accuse Larry of enjoying the opportunity to get out the chains, but what man doesn’t like using his toys?

And here’s the result of the job Andy and his crew completed after the equipment was safely parked on the road:

Come the spring, we’ll rent a splitter and haul it over to this sweet pile of firewood. Andrew, Charlie, Will? Come on down/up to the farm for a few days of hard labor and cousinship bonding? The pay’s good.

The drama for Larry continues with the solar panels on the barn. Seems whatever device is meant to be monitoring the power extracted and added to the grid has failed. This has to do, unfortunately, with a computer and modem specific to the job, and Larry has been unable to decipher the instructions he gets from the system’s creators somewhere in Minneapolis. So, neighbors Ted and Patrick to the rescue. These are both engineers of one sort or another, and well-certified for handling this problem. I wish I had crashed the party down at the barn to take photos of the head scratching which went on for a couple of hours before the discovery of a way forward. I’m pretty sure, given these guys, there were not a few laughs. But I waited too long, and we will all just have to use our imaginations.

Today’s challenge has been the attempt to get ourselves subscribed to the local newspaper, the Corvallis Gazette Times. The offices of which in Corvallis are closed. But it’s owned by the Albany Democrat-Herald (where do they get these names?), so we thought to take a road trip over to that city while our cleaning women did their magic here. Only to learn that these offices are also closed, in this case, by the pandemic. But a phone number on the door roused a woman inside who took our info and handed out a copy of today’s edition as well. It feels settled to have an actual newspaper in hand. And think of all we use old newspaper for! No idea if there is a political slant to the news we’ll find on board.

And in the course of the journey, we identified a coffee shop to investigate, come the day. Vik and Gordon tell us about the coffee shops they’ve discovered and patronized in various towns in the area, and this appeals to our sense of travel well executed.

Mitch and his bro-in-law Chance have arrived to have a look at the extension for the chicken run they will build for us. Going to get those birds out of the orchard proper while still allowing for hawk-protected free ranging.

And it’s raining. It’s okay. Water in the well! See you next time.

A day when everything changes!

For Andrew — here are the photos I promised of the “great-flood-so-far”:

We walked down the path to the river that morning. Luckily we didn’t do anything stupid like drop a phone in the water, or fall in, but Grandpa said his right boot had a leak and his toes were getting squishy. No help for that, so we walked along Llewellyn back to our driveway. There’s never much traffic along the road, but everyone who passes smiles and waves. This is nice. We don’t know one another, but it feels like we belong here.

We always stop to see if there are eggs, and this day the answer was yes:

Okay, buddy, your turn! The photo of the BMW was an excellent start, but if you’ll send more, I’ll post them here next time. Deal?

It’s been a busy week here at the Wood! After struggling with our hot water system, on the advice of the plumber, we decided to go ahead with a change to reverse-osmosis treatment for the household water. This involved a great new tank in the shed, causing a round of rearrangement where the patio chairs and the Traeger used to spend the winter. I cannot tell you how reverse-osmosis works, but it does allow us to dispense with the Britta filters for drinking water, get hot water to the shower without a five-minute wait, and, we hope, a return to actual white linens from the washing machine.

The next day was the beautiful Wednesday-the-20th. We celebrated with some neighbors, correctly distanced — wait! Does this now go without saying that when we meet anyone we will be correctly distanced? How long, oh Lord, but okay? Anyway, we sat out on their meadow, watched the sun set, toasted the peaceful change of power with some champagne, laughed and told stories. Practically froze, because hey, it is winter and this outdoor gathering stuff, while saving lives, friendships, and sanity all around? Sigh.

Speaking of which, we got a notice that Benton County and Samaritan Health were joining to offer mass vaccination on Reser Stadium field next Tuesday and Wednesday. Didn’t mention how they’d offer the second dose, so I’m not sure if we should jump in. We have an arrangement with Terwilliger to get the shots after they’ve completed the Assisted Living vaccinations, but have no idea when that will be. Kind-of tempting to join the crowd down at the stadium. We’ll see.

Back on the farm, our favorite crew from Peterson Landscaping showed up early Thursday morning to plant three maple trees in the north-facing yard. This is with the idea of providing shade in the hot afternoons on the porch. Side benefits will be to soften the house into the surrounding land, offer birds a stop between the oak copse and the distant standing oaks. Maybe to induce the owls who nightly serenade us to make a home nearby? Those owls sing all night long, and it’s perfect background noise for sleeping.

And on the subject of trees, we’ve been talking with Matt, the county planting contractor, about adding trees to the creekside habitat. At the moment, this habitat consists mostly of spirea, Oregon Grape, wild roses, red alder. He’s coming back next week with the trees he can find in the nurseries. Ash, alder, willow, maple. We thought maybe a couple of dozen, but he says, no, 600, depending. This is courtesy of our grant from Benton County, and wow! Gonna be fun!

Bob Altman, vesper sparrow guy, visited with Jerod Jabousek from Fish and Wildlife to consider planting shrubs in the pasture lands to encourage the nesting of vesper sparrows. These birds apparently like to live among grazing cows, but they do need intermittent bushes to house their nests. In the past, cows haven’t grazed on the F&W land, but we can work with Ryan, cow guy, to pasture them in a timely dance with the wild flowers and birds.

Now it’s Saturday morning. Blue sky, frost on the land, Larry cooking his breakfast, all’s well. See ya next time! Andrew, send those photos!

And how are we celebrating this shiny new year? First, just enjoying the sunshine. But.

Yesterday we spent a day in Portland clearing out the condo in the hoped-for event that the sale goes through. This is tricky. We need to get the personal stuff out of there, yet leave enough “staging” in place, should this sale fall through and we need to start showing it again.

So Larry started in his office. This is a man who keeps the most complete records of every transaction ever effected, and keeps it on hard copy, because who trusts computers? Btw, he is right to suspect computers of evil-doing as experience has demonstrated. Still, that’s a lot of paper. Neatly filed. But where is it going to live in our little farmhouse?

Me? I started with the kitchen. Specifically, the spice drawer. Dear God, what have I been thinking? Never mind, the past is history. We are advised to dispose of our herbs and spices every 12-18 months, or so, but who does that? I piled the lot in boxes and hauled it home to the farm, where all those sister and brother herbs and spices are already — alphabetized, incidentally, and yes, I hear you, Vik — filed in drawers. See, I’m no different from my husband in this respect.

Can you relate? Hey! I already dumped 21 redundant bottles. I just counted.

Exciting bird news in the ‘hood. Remember that photo of the colorful bird from last entry? Seems an expert from OSU came to see it and noted that this is the first painted bunting ever sighted in Benton County. Only 10 reported in Oregon since 1963. But he won’t, he says, reveal the location or hundreds of eager birders would descend with binocs and spotting scopes. I’m feeling grateful that this little pioneer didn’t arrive at our bird feeders. Would we have known what we’d seen? Yeah, probably not.

Okay, that was fun. Now, back to work. While Larry’s office is a continent unto itself, the kitchen is a cluster of archipelagos, some of them even French-speaking. Take the pull-out pantry shelves. Half-full packages of pasta in various shapes. Cans of Campbells soups. (Why? Did I bring them to Oregon from Minnesota where they make “hot dish” using Cream of Mushroom or etc.?) Plastic baggies of hull-less barley. Oh! That nearly empty container of wild rice that Gloria gave me once. Damn. I’ve been missing that.

Hey. I just noticed that in that paragraph I managed to use three hyphenated words containing a rhyme. Find them? I’m a regular genius.

But you can’t throw food away. Let’s move on. Allison has offered to help with this project, and I’d be three times a fool if I didn’t accept. But I think I offended her by the suggestion that she identify some items she might want. Paintings? Grandmother Eagleson’s Seth Thomas clock with the wooden gears? The cut-glass pitcher that came over on the Mayflower? (just kidding) But honestly, who wants to pick over her mother-in-law’s dusty artifacts? Not me. I totally get that. However, she can’t be here in any case — Covid, of course.

Meanwhile, Larry and I have been trying to sort out exactly where we will stay in Portland while waiting the three years for our apartment in Terwilliger’s Park View addition to be built.

The present option under consideration is a little re-finished detached garage, fitted out as a tiny apartment. It’s like 284 square feet, but it has a super kitchen tucked in complete with stove-top, oven, microwave, refrig. Tiled bath with walk-in shower. Queen-size bed in, unbelievably, a separate room. After seeing it, we decided maybe not — Larry didn’t think he’d be comfortable there. No cozy chair for reading or putting on your socks. But we’re rethinking it. We’ll have to put a few things in storage while we wait for the Terwilliger apartment, but that’s okay. It’s not like we’re going to spend too much time in Portland. Just need somewhere to sleep and brush our teeth. Why not just stay in a hotel, you ask? That’s the other option. For three years it feels kind-of nice to think we’d have our own space. Where we wouldn’t have to pack every time we came to town.

We’re going to have another look this Sunday, and maybe will make a decision then.

People keep asking if I’ll miss our condo. The answer is yes. Emphatically. But I won’t miss the building, and of late, won’t miss Portland. I’ve lived in or around Portland most of my long life, but something happened, and it got broken. It will recover, but right now, it breaks my heart. And I simply love our “farm.” So thank you for asking!

It’s getting dark. Larry has been outside all afternoon working on the fallen oak tree. Just picking up the pieces, hauling firewood down to the barn, tossing the small branches onto a burn pile. I think he prefers this to filing paperwork!

I’ve been trying to find words to express the sight of an oak tree crashing to the ground as we drive by. Just across the fence from us, in real time. And the discovery later, of an even larger giant lying on the ground, torn, mute.

So I’ll begin instead with some human news. Seems, out of nowhere, a couple from San Francisco would like to buy our Portland condo. If I were talking to you, at this point you would say, “well, not ‘out of nowhere.’ Apparently they’re ‘out of San Francisco.’ ” Hahaha, you’re funny.

Anyway, they made an offer, we countered, they accepted, and the earnest money is in the bank. The inspectors have come, haven’t discovered any deal breakers, so the clock is ticking toward Feb. 10, the closing date.

And the fun begins: We knew that one day we would have to sort out the closets, drawers, shelves. Keep all the hundred CDs which no-one ever plays these days? The books? Powells is not buying back books in this time-of-Covid, so it’s off to Good Will or the libraries. I’m surprised at what trails behind me as I move through life. Time to let go. Easily said.

But about the trees. Maybe these photos can express something which I’m struggling to say:

Oregon White Oak in the south pasture. White Oaks can live 500 years. Do trees have souls?

After it fell.

To answer my question, read The Hidden Life of Trees, by Peter Wohlleben. “A paradigm-smashing chronicle of joyous entanglement that will make you acknowledge your own entanglement in the ancient and ever-new web of being.”

See, I love this! Beautiful writing about the first great mystery.

When our neighbor, Ted, saw this ancient giant on the ground, his engineer brain took over. “How much to you suppose this thing weighs?” (I had given its weight no thought at all.) “You could take one of those wedges of firewood,” he earnestly began, “and they’re really heavy, right? So you could measure . . .”

Not going to happen. Marjorie, his wife, suggested that the tree looked like a semi lying on its side. Hmm. True, but. At that point, Terri, another neighbor showed up, walking her dogs and the conversation veered to a painted bunting seen at the the Barnes-Stuart bird feeder.

Gorgeous! (Don’t worry about this neighborhood gathering — we were outside, maintaining our 6-foot distances). But the question of the tree and its soul, the ancient web of being, had wandered too far to be reclaimed, and we all found our way home.

And it’s now Christmas Eve. We had tried and failed to see the “Christmas star” last night in a clear and cloudless sky. We’ll try again, but this evening we’ll be listening at 5 0’clock, our time, to the broadcast of Loyola Highschool’s Christmas Eve service. I hope this is filled with music, not so much preaching . . .

Larry has been out attacking the everlasting blackberry brambles along the first creek, running with water now after the dry summer. All the Christmas Eve music in California can’t exceed the lovely sound of running water in a creek. I think.

And if you’re interested, our Christmas day feast will feature Larry’s smoked ribs and a new loaf of his amazing sourdough bread. Not traditional, but we do have those cookies and my fruitcake to bring our meal to its proper conclusion.

Happy holidays one and all, we’ll meet again in 2021!

The first sign must have been when Larry came back from FedEx-ing Peter’s birthday present. “Didn’t get your book,” he told me.

“How come? Didn’t they have it?”

“No, when I left FedEx I noticed I was wearing my bedroom slippers. Not going to the book store in my bedroom slippers.” Of course I laughed. You know how fastidious Larry is. He would NEVER. “Don’t tell anyone,” he said.

But I’m not telling anyone. I’m just telling you. And I got what was coming to me. See, we were going to have a nice Sunday dinner, this rainy Wednesday, with roast chicken and et cetera at 1:00-ish. So I was mashing the potatoes and leaned the little hand mixer on the potato pot, reaching for more milk. The mixer leaped off the pot, struck the counter on its way to the floor, thereby turning itself on, and landed with the beaters happily flinging mashed potatoes across the floor, the cabinets, under the island.

Yeah, it was kind of funny, and I should have been more cafeful. But then juices of the nicely-done chicken quietly overflowed the cutting board and trailed onto the counter, onto the floor. Great. We could practically eat our dinner right off the floor, omit the middle man.

The gravy. The whole point. Okay, the roasting pan is stainless steel and therefore functional on our conduction stove-top. I added flour to the glorious brown fond and began to stir. But the stove wouldn’t stay “on.” Kept turning itself “off.” What the heck? Seems the pan is convex on the bottom, its surface thereby not even touching the burner. So we have to transfer the hot mess onto a skillet in order to proceed. No big deal, but still. Sigh.

The chicken was delicious, by the way. Brining. Magic.

Time to do the dishes? Okay, we knew the disposal was broken, plumber scheduled for tomorrow, but we didn’t know that the sink wouldn’t drain. Until we saw the sink swimming with yuck. Really? Is this a joke?

Nope. Have to do the dishes in the laundry room. Which is not so awful, right? And while Larry got to work, I got the bottle of Bono and the floor mop to attack the kitchen floor. I’m walking down the hall when the bottle breaks loose from the spray nozzle by which I’m holding it, crashes to the floor, spraying Bono product across the walls, the front door. By the time I set it upright and find a mop, the damage has been done.

I don’t know. It’s 2020. We should have known.

“So what do you do all day?” someone asked me. “I mean, what IS there to do down there by yourselves?”

Yeah. Good question. After some thought I realized that what I do all day happens mostly in the kitchen. For example, here’s one of last week’s chores:

Poblanos, from Larry’s garden. It is Larry’s garden, his domain, his man-cave. He plants, tends, harvests and then? Right. So I was about to roast these lovelies, then freeze them for future — well — whatever. They’re the last of the produce for the year, but from the garden and orchard this year, I’ve fermented sauerkraut, canned pears, made pickles, both dill and bread and butter (this with help from buddy Vik), made blackberry jelly, dried prunes, frozen tomato sauce, frozen apple slices and mock-mincemeat, pickled hot peppers. I thought to line up the jars for a photo shoot, but that was too much work.

When you add cooking the daily bread, it adds up to a lot of hours beside the kitchen sink. No — Larry bakes the bread chez Viehl, that comment was meant metaphorically.

But sometimes we do get away. We recently toured the Nature Conservancy preserve surrounding the confluence of the Middle and Coast forks of the Willamette. We’d been there 10 years ago when the property had been acquired, and it was pretty wonderful to see how the former gravel mining site has been transformed:

Sometimes the get-aways are not all that much fun:

The realization that IF we ever manage to sell or lease our condo, we have to remove all personal belongings has struck. Until now, as we use the condo for our Portland base, we have left supplies appropriate to that activity in place. Okay, let’s be honest. We bought new toothbrushes, etc. for farm use, but over the years, acres of stupid debris have accreted in the condo. Is that the correct word? Like shampoo samples from hotels around the world. Extra toothbrushes from dentist visits. Multiple bottles, bits and pieces — well, you know. I bet you do this, too.

Anyway, the photo above is from just one day’s hard work. This is the stuff we didn’t throw away, and about which hard calls will have to be made on its arrival in Corvallis. One of us is a pack rat, the other a practitioner of the Throw-it-away school. Maybe not obvious who’s who, but one of us wonders why a man needs 17 golf shirts. Yes, all of them in perfect condition. She has to bite her tongue.

While all around us the election vibrated, a moment of transcendence:

It’s here! Already the catalogs are arriving. Ah, winter.

Been below freezing, the chickens are molting and NOT laying eggs. Can I correctly say “not laying eggs?” As in perform a negative? Hmm. Their water freezes, so we stretch an electric cord across the driveway to heat their dispenser. Larry does not like this practice, but needs must.

And it’s time to bake the fruit cake. Back to the kitchen!

We learned last week that cows play an important role here at the Wood. Guess all the attention paid Suzannah — not her real name, of course — for her stunt in the mud, inspired the rest of them to see what mischief they could engineer.

So, a quick photo essay:

Yeah, no, they’re not supposed to march up from the pasture, across the patio, stopping to drink from the bird bath, and into the back yard.

Larry was taking a shower, glanced out the bathroom window, and yelled JANE! Kind-of funny, and I ran for my phone to record this historic event, (not Larry’s shower — the cows, of course) but the correct response would have been to call Ryan. Immediately.

Fortunately, Ryan was working nearby, but Larry, after pulling on his cowboy clothes, boots and spurs, couldn’t wait. (Just kidding about the spurs) This is Larry’s grass they’re pulling up, trampling, and he wasn’t having it. The cows are actually accustomed to following an ATV, so it wasn’t too hard to get them moving back over to the gate through which they’d come.

Except one little heifer got stuck on the wrong side of the fence. I’m going to stop here for some fun facts about cows:

Heifers are little girl cows, calves are little boy cows. Ryan told later told us that young heifers can come into heat as early as 4 months of age. Ours are at least 6 months old. Luckily, bull calves can’t produce sperm until year, roughly, so no worries on that score in our herd. The big bull, with us earlier in the summer, has done his job and is now spending the rest of the year sequestered with the other bulls. Should these bulls try to mate with a heifer, they would kill her. Ryan did not answer the question that raised, so no, I can’t tell you how or why.

Our calves are still, um, intact? The castration will take place this weekend, as will vaccination. After that, all the animals will be moved to a “green” pasture (been irrigated) until the winter weather forces a move into barns. Our animals are raised for the grass-fed market, so will be eating hay only until spring arrives and the fescue has again grown in the pastures.

Okay, back to the little heifer left behind. She was agitated, and it was a comedy worthy of Youtube to watch Larry try to herd her around the house and finally through the gate. Sorry I didn’t get it recorded.

But how had they gotten into that pasture, the Fish and Wildlife site? Ryan has a handy little tool that tests whether the hot wire is, in fact, hot. No one wants to learn the old fashioned way. Turns out, no, the wire was dead. The cows, then, had been able to just push a lower gate open and parade through.

Furthermore, with the fence dead, what about the pump from the well? Yep. Also dead. Gasp. The poor cows had no water, apparently justified in busting out to find something to drink.

Larry and Ryan consulted down by the barn where the circuits governing electricity are mounted. They flipped the circuit a few times, no result. Ryan checked some junction and found a crispy fried lizard, whose curiosity had been the root cause of the whole, cascading drama.

Otherwise, what’s going on? We’ve been trying to manage the flow of fruits and vegetables flowing in from the orchard and garden. This means, so far, blackberry-plum jelly, canned pears, endless pints of frozen tomato sauce, and last weekend, mincemeat and applesauce from the tree I think I showed you earlier that had broken off entirely in service of our kitchen.

The plums and prunes are ripe, and while the prunes are modest in number and normal sized, the plums are insane. And about the size of a shooter in the game of marbles. Of which, at least half is stone, so they’re kind-of annoying to work with. But we soldier on, grateful that we don’t have to feed a family over the winter on them. Interestingly, for those of you who like to can your fruits, it’s become impossible to find lids for the job. Like the toilet paper shortage which initiated this whole back-to-basics post-virus movement. I’ve had just enough to get us through, using second-hand lids and hoping they seal.

I think I mentioned earlier that Larry was considering the acquisition of a greenhouse in his determination to outwit the ground squirrels. Raise your hand if you think he went ahead with the idea.

Of course he did. Mitch and Allen are out in the garden right now (5:30 p.m. after their day jobs ended) pouring cement for the base. Here’s what the space looks like so far:

They’ve laid cable for electricity from the shed, and the actual structure is supposed to arrive in a couple of weeks.

But for now, I’m out of photos and out of stories. Back soon!