Landed in Oregon XXV

Good Morning -

December 17 & 18. Training in Ashland. Across the valley 50 miles. This morning the egrets were clustered. Sometimes they spread, tiny, single white dots.

Mornings in the low 40’s. Rain. The creek is starting to rise. With Pass Creek it has to do with saturation of the ground. At the beginning of winter we can have a lot of rain. The creek will barely change. Once the creek starts rising then it also will be very responsive to the rain. It rains: the creek rises. The rain stops: the creek falls.

Lunch at the Dragon Fly in Ashland. A “fusion” of Mexican and eastern foods. Quite good.

While we were away, the boys, either in play or in freaking out, tore the house up a bit. Stuff off shelves. On floor. Some broken.

No evidence yet of house construction stuff to the north.

December 19, 2007

Stocking are all hung on the mantle. Tree has been up since last weekend. Christmas cards are all mailed. Sharon has been a ball of fire.

December 27, 2007

Shazam! Time flew. A.J. and Jennifer and Heather for Christmas. Mike for a second Christmas. Presents galore. A dusting of snow. Three days and a roast, a turkey and a ham. Don’t know what we will eat for New Years. (Leftovers, maybe.)

Received Buddy, a black Lab, from the Eagle Point Raders. Little A.J. leading big Buddy around.

A forked horn went by the day before Christmas.

Slept in this morning. Starting last night, the snow is accumulating. This afternoon the snow level is forecast to rise.

A present from Jennifer is Blake or Bailey or who knows, a year and a half old black lab mix with some other dog. From the pound. He has the big bones of a lab. Presently he is about half the size of a full grown male lab. We gave him several names. Currently we are calling him Buddy. Although he has shown no interest in felines, the cats are not happy. He knows several commands and some we do not know.

January 2, 2008

Cappy and Mr. Manners will come into the house when Buddy is there. They ignore him and he “does not see them.” Buddy had kennel cough when we got him. Much better now. Pleasure to watch him run. The cats now look at Buddy like he is really, really ugly.

Buddy is a pack rat. When inside during the night, he collects stuff and carries it to his bed. He doesn’t chew on it. We thought of calling him Thumper because of his Lab tail. Maybe we need to call him The Collector. A retriever.

Buddy heels very, very well. We are thinking of calling him Shadow.

His coloring is that of the original Labradors. Fishermen would use them to pull their nets in. Actually he has the weight of a mature Lab, but their weight can go well above 100 pounds.

Mrs. A. started the new year by cleaning the bathroom. What does this signify for the new year? It was a quiet day. We put away Christmas stuff.

This was the year U. of O. won the Sun Bowl. Michigan also won their bowl. As did U.S.C. win the Rose Bowl. It was the year, earlier in the season, that U.O. beat both U.S.C. and Michigan. Therein lies a tale.

Mornings have been running at 25. Annie is doing fine. She enjoys her slice of whole wheat bread like I do my morning coffee.

January 6 or so. Snow. Five inches.

January 7, 2008. Rain, but cold enough it did not melt much of the snow.

January 8, 2008

Heard Buddy’s first growl. He was having a nightmare.

You know, sometimes I have nothing to say because there is nothing to say. Then there are times when things to say are there, but I am not. And then there are times when there is too much to say. I am in one of the above times.

January 25, 2008

Brat has gone on to a greener pasture. Nearly exactly a year ago his brother Dini (as in Houdini) died. It was a rainy, snowy day. I buried him in the lower pasture. Although the weather was miserable I had heard that the surviving goat would not do well, and so I dug another hole for Brat. I marked it with a white stake. Today I filled the hole in. John the contractor knew we wanted to keep Brat or find a home for him. He talked with his crew. His carpenter had a grandfather who had 80 acres, fruit trees and blackberry vines, and other goats. The carpenter’s name was Chris. He came today and picked up Brat. In the pickup, with a bucket of grain to eat from, Brat put up no fight at all. Sharon sent a letter to the grandfather, requesting visitation rights. Chris assured Sharon there would be no problem at all.

January 26, 2008

Tree cutting started in earnest this morning.
Jennifer and America visited this afternoon. The roads were clear from the highway to the house. Amelia, touring the lower pasture with Grammy, looked at the stumps and downed trees and said, “The trees are sad.”

January 31, 2008 -- Shazam! The last day of January. Time fleets. Shazam!

The upper pasture was filled with all kinds of markers, little red flags. Next slide. They drilled a well. One day. Fifty gallons a minute. Next slide. We boxed Brat into a smaller pasture. I salvaged metal gates. Cut off the electric feed to the barn. They took out the barn. But the shed was attached. It came out too. Time for Brat to go. He retired to 60 acres of apple trees and black berry bushes. I filled in Brat’s pre-dug burial hole. Next slide. We have a couple of piles of debris and a couple of deep holes for drain field purposes. Next slide. We mark trees. The cutter comes. A logging show. Next slide. A stack of logs. Next slides. Loading dump trucks to haul away piles of debris.

It rained and filled the wheel barrow. Then it froze. Then I needed to use the barrow to haul hay from the barn that was going to be demolished. I dumped the ice on the ground. That was two or so weeks ago. The ice is still there. All kinds of weather. This week we are receiving a new storm each day.

For weather change fans, in January California, Oregon and Washington each received gusts of wind above 100 miles per hour. In northern California, one gust reached 167 miles per hour.

Buddy does not know how to retrieve.

I have never thought about it before, but for Buddy I learned it was a good thing that that family took him to the Pound. Some persons should not have pets.

We are going to have Neighbors to the North. They will own the family sequoias. Should I plant two more, a Gay Sequoia and a Howard Sequoia?

January 12, 2008

A colonoscopy yesterday. They just knock you out and wake you up and send you home. Awaiting testing on polyps. Get a call in a couple of weeks.

While purging, learned again of my addiction to coffee. While signing in at the hospital found myself entranced by the clerk’s coffee cup. Newly learned that I have picked up habit of (more) snacking. While purging found myself initiating thoughts and behaviors directed getting this snack or that snack.

Ham and eggs tonight! Life doesn’t get much better.

Have a good week!

Marc