I own a Fusion Powered Clothes Dryer and it is a wondrous thing. It is extremely cost efficient, is low maintenance, and lasts for many, many years. It is the kind of appliance that draws families together and creates a healthful, green environment for a community.
The dryer model that I have installed is probably the largest model.
Drag'n Rock Farm, Tuesday, July 13, 2010
Image via WikipediaUp at 4:30 am to get Tim off to work, have my coffee and greet the day, find my notebook, empty pages and begin to list. Today is list day. Not just my daily list, but the day when I make multitudes of lists. The first list is...
- What I should accomplish today.
This list entails all those things that are time sensitive; phone calls, vegies that need harvesting and what needs to be done to finish my website (if you can ever truly finish it). I star those items that have the highest priority. This list then goes on the kitchen table where I can see it ALL THE TIME. It doesn't get covered or moved, or I'd forget about the things on the list. I'm truly not forgetful, well to some degree maybe, but mostly when there's a lot of lists and a lot to do, it's easy to procrastinate or get side-tracked. In grade school they would have issued me drugs but they hadn't invented the term attention deficit yet, so I developed the habit of listing to keep me on track. An example of this is the beautiful crochet lace buffet runner that I have halfway completed. I set it down once and haven't been back to it. That was 11 or 12 years ago. Sheesh. And here I am going off on a tangent again. See how easy it is?
Drag'n Rock Farm, Monday, July 12, 2010
Image via WikipediaThis year, the weather has generally, been kind to us. Not a lot of high temp days and lots of rain to keep the temp down. Humidity, that is a first cousin to the rain however, is the beast and no amount of air conditioning will relieve us of that. The weatherman says two to three days of pleasantly warm, dry, sunny weather ahead. Great, but he claimed that for Saturday also, and we had storms and hail. You don't gamble on the weatherman and you don't out guess Mother, as she revels in unpredictability.
It's early, 5:30 am. I sit at the kitchen table, going over my list for the week...what to take out for supper, what to do with the apples from the storm damage, where to move the roses and what needs to be painted, washed and weeded. One of the birdfeeders is just outside the kitchen door. We generally stop feeding the birds in the summer but just on a whim, I bought some suet cakes and thistle seed bags and hung them up on the feeder. Now I'm watching yellow and purple finches, woodpeckers and a beautiful young cardinal. But isn't that the reason we feed them? To watch them, check out their beautiful plumage and to draw many different birds all to one area. We feel like we're helping out a small defenseless creature. In truth though, they'd survive as a species longer than us. In fact they already have. New studies have shown that birds are true dinosaurs, genetically changed to new habitat, but still dinosaurs. When they are x-rayed when young, the x-rays show a tail. The tail is eventually absorbed into the tail feather section by a gene that stops it's growth. Birds have also been born with teeth. Ewwww! Birds survived the catclysm that killed most of their brethren and went on to populate the new world. Somehow, even without our help, they'll survive just fine and will continue to outlast other species. Check out the video link below...
60 Minutes: Into the Wild, Part 3 Video
The bird feeder is great though but keeping it in use for birds in the summer comes with different problems, It could become a feline feeding station or could host a breakfast or late night snack for possum, skunks, rabbits and bear, none of which I want to see in my yard. They don't usually play by the rules and generally have a bad attitude to being told otherwise. I love my cats but they can take a toll on the bird population. This morning I had to save a young robin from our calico. The bird is now in a box that may allow him to de-stress enough to get his act back together and fly away. I hear him complaining and that's a very good sign. When the kids were young, they and their friends would bring hurt birds for me to 'fix'. Some made it and some did not. I tried to help with each one.
Next to the house is a tall arbor vitae. Birds love these trees and bushes in the summer and in the winter. It's important to have protection for them near the feeder, a 'safe haven' for them to fly to when a predator is near. The arbor vitaes are perfect for this. They give cool shade in the summer and dense coverage in the winter. They are periodically covered with seeds/fruit and aren't easy for cats to climb. To us, they look nice, make great living walls, dampen sound and nosy neighbors, and the boughs or clippings make great wreath and table trimmings for the holidays. Some are trees and some are bushes. They grow in shade or in sun. Last year we put in a long hedge of arbor vitae that will eventually reach 30 feet, along the east side of the property as a privacy and sound screen. Though it will take some time, this planting will reward us for years and years and will be home to many. I plan and plant with our animal guests in mind. Food, shelter and safety. They all have their place here, from the lowly snake to the lofty red tailed hawks, or the night cruising owls. A small sampling of each makes for a healthy balance.
I quit my reverie and added more to my list:
- Finish mowing the lawn,
- Run to the local grocery store,
- Call the DOT about the blasting just north of us.....
At that I quit and head to the phone. Construction on the new highway just north of us has encountered a bit of a problem....lots of rock....big ones, so a blasting company has been hired to come in to break it up. The blaster's rep showed up two weeks ago to inform us of the blasting and that they were going to set up a seismometer in our yard for monitoring. Great. The blasting is due to happen later today and they still haven't shown up so that is what my call will be about. In the interim, I was busy. I took pictures of everything where a stress crack could develop or where there was already a crack, in the hopes that those cracks would not get any larger. This morning I pulled a water sample from our well. I'll take another in a few days and more as the blasting continues. These will be dated and sent in to the local lab for analysis and then compared to see if there was an impact on our water quality. Under all this clay is bedrock. It is granite, but fractured granite. Water gets to the aquifers through the various cracks in the rock, filtered by the clay. Several things could occur with the blasting that would destroy our well or pollute beyond use, the water in the aquifer that we have tapped into:
- Pesticides from the edges of the railroad, lodged in the clay could be disturbed, allowing groundwater to carry it to the aquifer. Some of these pesticides may be from many many years ago. For example DDT,
- Pesticides and herbicides residing in the farm fields could be disturbed also and be allowed to filter down into the aquifer. That could include roundup and atrazine. Scarry.
- The blasting could alter how the water reaches the aquifer or damage our well. Our well is deep, but it just takes one crushing move to block or destroy its functionality.
I'm concerned and armed with knowledge of what could happen. So I pull the DOT engineers' names from off the front of the fridge and start to dial.
So ends my morning post for Monday, July 12, 2010
Parly sunny, dry, 68 degrees at 7am
Drag'n Rock Farm - Sunday July 11, 2010
Image via WikipediaSunday. I woke to a cool, damp breeze coming through the windows. The birds were gracious and sang softly, almost keeping time with the small, delicate wind chime hanging in the patio alcove. It was a pleasure to relax and enjoy all this, but was short-lived because one-by-one, three cats made their wishes known to be let outside. I got up, made coffee, watered the house plants and started up the computer. I took a cup of the java, a good book and my pen, and went out on the south deck to enjoy the peace of the morning.
I like to say peace of the morning, but in reality the world outside my door is quite loud. As I walked out onto the deck a car drove past, tires and engine whistling down the road. I looked out over the railing of the deck and heard (then saw) the clip clop clip of the Amish horses, their shiny coats glistening in the morning sun, heading to Sunday meeting. Both instruments of percussion in a disproportionately large orchestra.
My Xmas Wish List
Mid-July. Sweltering weather. Sunny and hot, 84 degrees, with a short break on the humidity. Just a short break though, as rain is expected within the next two days. I should be outside putzing in my gardens or mowing the lawn, but a headache has kept me inside. Today even the bird song is an unwelcome noise. So my thoughts turn to plans; plans for my gardens, my solar fountain, plans for the months ahead. Summer passes quickly into fall and then of course, we have the Marathon of Holidays
Looking for the Perfect Raindrop
Image by cosmonautirussi via FlickrStanding at the window, coffee in hand, looking dismally at the approaching rain. There won't be much for outdoor activity today, holiday or not. It's a day for reading, computer, and writing or if your motivation has slumped, a day in front of the telly.
The kittens want out. They slept in all day yesterday because of the rain and are restless. Since the rain hasn't yet started, I open the door to let them out, watching them climb over each other to be the first out the door, only to be trampled by the big dog cause he has other, more pressing business outside. The old cat just wants to come in. He knows what's coming. He's been out on the covered porch but the mosquitos know the porch and they like to dine on any blood bearing thing that happens to take shelter there. I contemplate bug spray and then close the screen door. I'll let the sound and the smells in but I won't be a party to sacrifice - especially my own. Not yet.
The sprinkling begins. It's hard to see, looking through a screen door but if you screw up your eyes enough to make the screen go away and slow down your thinking, you can see the rain in the air. Very light at first, no wind, just a gentle light mist. I am instantly reminded of a week at camp where the only choices of activity were games, crafts, or simply staring out the windows wishing you were home staring out the window. Any place but camp in the rain. It all makes me a bit melancholy.
As I watch out the screen a curiousity develops. Robins begin to populate the driveway and the edges of the lawn. I've always thought Robins were a bit on the eccentric side but this is sheer stupidity. The rain is bigger than they are. However, after watching them strut and run and pick, I understand. The bugs and the worms have all come out. It's a renaissance feast. Lots of meat and the rain covered pebbles are easier to slide down. Would that be grits and sausage for breakfast? Plus, after your meal you can wash the mites out of your feathers without having to take a bath in a less than clean mud puddle. Not so stupid. On a queue, they take flight, heading for the trees and I know with certainty that the big rain will follow soon.
The big rain begins, coming down hard on the driveway, sending up dirt and mud and weighting down the branches of the bushes next to the house. I press my nose to the screen, smelling the freshness, hearing the musical notes of each drop hitting each different surface, sliding along like a bow on the strings of a viola. Now I want to stand out in the rain. Now I want to putz in the puddles. Now I want to make dams and rivulets and track the sedimentation plumes and swirls. Now I want to look into the rain and see the perfect raindrop.
The urge overcomes my better senses. I put on an old pair of tenners, grab my umbrella and step out the door. I adjust my umbrella, bringing it closer to the top of my head, moving it so the rain does not run off the top of the umbrella down the inside of my shirt. My shoes have already begun to soak up a large amount of water. That can't be helped. The umbrella only protects so much and no more. The water has made it all the way inside of my shoes. They squish and they squeak but my feet are still warm. They're doing their job and on any quest you have to do some downs in order to have some ups.
I peak out of my dry protective cone at the rain hitting the leaves of the nearby trees. Has one of them already found my perfect raindrop? Have they swallowed a part of it to feed on it's fruit? I look at the concentric waves as each drop hits the surface of a puddle. Has my perfect raindrop ended it's life with hundreds of others at my feet and I failed to notice? Did it hit the rooftop, exploding into smaller droplets, loosing it's perfect identity? I see raindrops everywhere, held in suspension - on the soft white petal of a daisy, clinging to the gossamer strand of a spider's web. But nowhere can I find my raindrop. That perfect glowing bit of life, that wonder of the ages. But as if in answer to my questions, a low rumble of thunder rolls across the sky. Distant, like the sound of an approaching train, still far far off. The sky begins to lighten, the rain is nearly done. I fear I am too late.
In desperation I throw down the umbrella, water and mud coating my pants. I run out from under the canopy of trees into the hardest of the rain, raising my arms to embrace it. I tilt back my head and ever so slowly stick out my tongue. One and only one drop lands there, sweet and pure and bursting in my mind with all the colors of the rainbow. It's then that I know, I have found the perfect raindrop.
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