The Not Normal Now
My particular California county is purple. For whatever weird reason, the state of California has opted to color code counties, with purple being the worst for Covid. Yeah, that's simplifying it. The whole thing is based on cases/population, and my county is sparsely populated. We have Covid cases. We're purple.
Now, you would think that a county with an infection rate of PURPLE would have hardly any tourists, right? If you were foolish enough to say yes, you would be very wrong. We're stuffed with tourists, much to the locals' dismay. Tourists who don't want to wear masks, tourists who get uppity with businesses, tourists whose license plates are from Tennessee, Washington, Arizona, and many parts of Canada. FWIW, our SIP orders say we're not supposed to travel more than fifty miles. Yes, you may join me in a sneer.
My reality is mostly focused on very home-centered projects. This being autumn, it's time to turn to the apple-related projects, like picking and pressing cider. However, we have a lot of cider from last year, being as there have been no events to donate said cider. The decision, such as it is, is to pick only the best cider apples (in our opinions) and leave the rest. That's not going to save us any work. Fallen apples are homes for pests, so they have to be picked up and carted off. My back is not amused.
There is also one last major canning episode that probably should start around now: pears. Pears ripen off the tree. I've been avoiding going into the orchard to check the pears, because I know once I pick the pears, all my other projects are going to be on hold, which means they ain't gonna happen.
In no particular order, I need to get at least one, if not two, truckloads of compost and apply that as a thick layer on many planting beds and also to fill up a bed that I've finally declared dug enough for now. Removing all the alstromeria tubers and redwood roots has lowered that bed by about six inches. Of course, after I raked the remaining dirt out today, two new alstromeria shoots thumbed their leaves at me. Those are under three nice, healthy flowers. I think those are annuals. I'll go back to digging the damned things out after the annuals die.
There is also another project that is, if you ask me, not going to be that bad, but if you ask the WBH, is going to be horrible. We've been thinning out some of the massive hedges around the house, including removing some big shrubs. Looking at the infrastructure around these things was a flashback to when we were poor and lazy. We're still some of both of those adjectives, but we also agree that, if it's worth doing, it's worth doing (mostly) right. Thus, it's time to shovel gravel from the old pathways, set down new textile and hammer it into place with a helluva lot of staples, replace the gravel and add a lot of wood chips. The real work is digging out all the blackberry and pruning back the existing hedges. It's always something, isn't it?
I did finally read a whole book! I'm too scattered to do much fiction reading these days. Instead, I doomscroll the news and spend a lot of time fretting over that. It took weeks, but I can check off "Unhallowed Ground," the fourth Hugh de Singleton mystery by Mel Starr. It took four books, but I've finally figured out what's odd about this series. There is no urgency. Someone gets killed, that person is clearly murdered, Hugh starts the case, and he slowly plods from here to there, talks to people, goes home and eats, maybe bathes, probably gets beaten up at least once, and very slowly yet steadily comes to a conclusion. Really, this is perfect for right here and now. Likable protagonist, simple plot, nice backdrop.
Recs! If you have Amazon Prime, check out "Utopia." I gather it's a remake of a UK show, but I really liked it. Very dark, kinda violent, and very intriguing. "The Boys" just released the final episode for S2. This AU where superheroes turn out be the sort of jerks you knew they would have to be is very watchable. A slight disappointment but still worth watching is "Into the Whirlwind." I'd read this Gulag memoir many years ago, so I expected this to be a Russian movie. It isn't. A movie can't have the depth of the memoir, and this was glacially slow, but the camp scenes were excellent. Cross-posted from dreamwidth.org
Now, you would think that a county with an infection rate of PURPLE would have hardly any tourists, right? If you were foolish enough to say yes, you would be very wrong. We're stuffed with tourists, much to the locals' dismay. Tourists who don't want to wear masks, tourists who get uppity with businesses, tourists whose license plates are from Tennessee, Washington, Arizona, and many parts of Canada. FWIW, our SIP orders say we're not supposed to travel more than fifty miles. Yes, you may join me in a sneer.
My reality is mostly focused on very home-centered projects. This being autumn, it's time to turn to the apple-related projects, like picking and pressing cider. However, we have a lot of cider from last year, being as there have been no events to donate said cider. The decision, such as it is, is to pick only the best cider apples (in our opinions) and leave the rest. That's not going to save us any work. Fallen apples are homes for pests, so they have to be picked up and carted off. My back is not amused.
There is also one last major canning episode that probably should start around now: pears. Pears ripen off the tree. I've been avoiding going into the orchard to check the pears, because I know once I pick the pears, all my other projects are going to be on hold, which means they ain't gonna happen.
In no particular order, I need to get at least one, if not two, truckloads of compost and apply that as a thick layer on many planting beds and also to fill up a bed that I've finally declared dug enough for now. Removing all the alstromeria tubers and redwood roots has lowered that bed by about six inches. Of course, after I raked the remaining dirt out today, two new alstromeria shoots thumbed their leaves at me. Those are under three nice, healthy flowers. I think those are annuals. I'll go back to digging the damned things out after the annuals die.
There is also another project that is, if you ask me, not going to be that bad, but if you ask the WBH, is going to be horrible. We've been thinning out some of the massive hedges around the house, including removing some big shrubs. Looking at the infrastructure around these things was a flashback to when we were poor and lazy. We're still some of both of those adjectives, but we also agree that, if it's worth doing, it's worth doing (mostly) right. Thus, it's time to shovel gravel from the old pathways, set down new textile and hammer it into place with a helluva lot of staples, replace the gravel and add a lot of wood chips. The real work is digging out all the blackberry and pruning back the existing hedges. It's always something, isn't it?
I did finally read a whole book! I'm too scattered to do much fiction reading these days. Instead, I doomscroll the news and spend a lot of time fretting over that. It took weeks, but I can check off "Unhallowed Ground," the fourth Hugh de Singleton mystery by Mel Starr. It took four books, but I've finally figured out what's odd about this series. There is no urgency. Someone gets killed, that person is clearly murdered, Hugh starts the case, and he slowly plods from here to there, talks to people, goes home and eats, maybe bathes, probably gets beaten up at least once, and very slowly yet steadily comes to a conclusion. Really, this is perfect for right here and now. Likable protagonist, simple plot, nice backdrop.
Recs! If you have Amazon Prime, check out "Utopia." I gather it's a remake of a UK show, but I really liked it. Very dark, kinda violent, and very intriguing. "The Boys" just released the final episode for S2. This AU where superheroes turn out be the sort of jerks you knew they would have to be is very watchable. A slight disappointment but still worth watching is "Into the Whirlwind." I'd read this Gulag memoir many years ago, so I expected this to be a Russian movie. It isn't. A movie can't have the depth of the memoir, and this was glacially slow, but the camp scenes were excellent. Cross-posted from dreamwidth.org