Winter, day 1
Last night I started up the woodstove; it got down to -5C last night and the mud was frozen this morning for early walking. My house is warm; the pain/slowdown of joints and muscles that my mind is so good at sidestepping is gone and with it a lot of tension and unrecognised cognitive load. I still need to figure out what to do with the roof, but I have a heating system at least.
I think I've also decided on a truck. More about that when it's happened though.
Mom and my youngest brother are planning to come up this Thursday. It'll be good to have them here, though the perennial problem of where to put my brother to sleep still exists. I'm thinking of buying a folding cot to put in the pantry; he often sleeps on the sofa when he comes over but the sofa is in the kitchen/livingroom/main room and his sleep cycle is different than mine and mom's, so I'd like him to have room to be undisturbed.
My mind is a little slow right now, I just woke up from a nap and I'm enjoying the surprising mental weightlessness of my body just being able to relax. It's been awhile.
I'm also already thinking of next year's tomato trial, and next year's pepper trial. I got seeds for some peppers that survive down to a range of -2C to -15C, some are perennial on the gulf islands here. They won't overwinter here but they should tolerate much cooler temps. I'm very excited about those.
And there are a ton of little indie seed places popping up on instagram that have short-season tomatoes. I suspect I will not be growing fewer tomatoes next year than I did this year. I also wonder if these indie seed folks have always been there and I have only now discovered them, or if they're a result of the pandemic. Probably a little of each, I imagine.
I did manage to score both Lucinda, which is a silvery fir tree green-when-ripe cross I've been looking for. Plus I'm looking into microdwarfs, which I should be able to grow indoors under lights. It's fun.
I did a feed run and the next town over was full of hoarfrost today: half-inch ice spikes covered everything as water sublimated out of the damp air. Winter is here. Better bring in my hoses.
I think I've also decided on a truck. More about that when it's happened though.
Mom and my youngest brother are planning to come up this Thursday. It'll be good to have them here, though the perennial problem of where to put my brother to sleep still exists. I'm thinking of buying a folding cot to put in the pantry; he often sleeps on the sofa when he comes over but the sofa is in the kitchen/livingroom/main room and his sleep cycle is different than mine and mom's, so I'd like him to have room to be undisturbed.
My mind is a little slow right now, I just woke up from a nap and I'm enjoying the surprising mental weightlessness of my body just being able to relax. It's been awhile.
I'm also already thinking of next year's tomato trial, and next year's pepper trial. I got seeds for some peppers that survive down to a range of -2C to -15C, some are perennial on the gulf islands here. They won't overwinter here but they should tolerate much cooler temps. I'm very excited about those.
And there are a ton of little indie seed places popping up on instagram that have short-season tomatoes. I suspect I will not be growing fewer tomatoes next year than I did this year. I also wonder if these indie seed folks have always been there and I have only now discovered them, or if they're a result of the pandemic. Probably a little of each, I imagine.
I did manage to score both Lucinda, which is a silvery fir tree green-when-ripe cross I've been looking for. Plus I'm looking into microdwarfs, which I should be able to grow indoors under lights. It's fun.
I did a feed run and the next town over was full of hoarfrost today: half-inch ice spikes covered everything as water sublimated out of the damp air. Winter is here. Better bring in my hoses.