On a rocky ledge

Above the Winter snow -

Winnemucca Lake in July

Fresh Garden Spinach
Garlic sauteing in oil
Red wine on my lips

Last night I dreamt of the forest gypsy again. But as always, she slips into the copse beyond the brook before I can talk to her or even see her face.

Last days of school
One thousand voices speaking at once
Sand in my sandwich

I was up at my dad’s house the other day, and just before the sun was going down we were presented with some pretty Autumn lighting. I had the family get into some poses to capture it on camera:

“Lomo” Effect

“Holga” Effect finished with Sepia

Horse and Buggy

One of my goals going down the road of simplification and self reliance has been to use as little fossil fuel as possible, and this includes natural gas. Most of us have gotten away from the fireplaces or wood stoves we had as kids, and have become reliant on central air, natural gas heating. And this was fine for many years, but now it seems to be following the same depletion problems as oil. I finally took the plunge and got back to basics. Firewood, and a simple cast iron stove.

A good helping of Pinion and Almond

We got two cords of wood, a cord of pinion pine, and a cord of almond. The pinion was cut locally, is cheaper, and starts easily. The almond was harvested from the almond orchards near Chico, CA. It’s a little harder to start, so I throw it in with the pinion. The almond is a much denser wood, and burns long and hot. Both sources of wood have greatly shortened the supply chain, assuming my natural gas probably came from Canada. There are also reports of natural gas being 17% higher in price this winter. It makes me feel good knowing that I can keep the family warm throughout the winter using fuel I can collect myself if need be!

Toasty Warm

The stove we got is rated for an 1,800 sq foot house. Ours is only 1,400 sq feet, and I close off doors to rooms that we aren’t using at night. In conjunction with the stove, we run a ceiling fan blowing in the “up” direction to push hot air to the back of the house. Throwing a log in the fireplace before bed keeps the house warm most of the night, the gas furnace kicking on around the time I get up for work with the thermostat set on 60. It’d probably be no trouble to get up at some point in the night, like I usually do anyhow, and throw another log on. This may keep the heater from coming on at all.

It’s also been fun relearning how to use the maul and wedges to split wood! I haven’t done that since I was a kid. The pine is fairly easy to split, and I only have to split a few of the logs, as most of them are pretty small. It’s highly recommended that you get the almond split before delivery though! It’s super hard, and would wear you out or hurt you trying to split it.

Next year I may get a chainsaw and go cut some of my own wood…

I had a few thoughts after I left my new friends and their magical bus…

I began to wonder if the walrus dreams in corduroy as it slides through the lush slippery meadows of Aunt Jean’s back 40. It got me to thinking that I carry around way too much dog hair in my wallet, as this tends to offend our friends in the southern regions of Scandinavia; hard workers though they are, they just will never master the precise art of hot, liquidy, and ubiquitous midwifery. I was thinking very clearly now, and goosestepped at a feverish pace all the way to city hall. I felt that I must speak on behalf of mollusks everywhere, “Don’t step on my gastropod dude!”