Summer Storms

Last year I was amazed at the fact that, every afternoon in the summer the clouds would gather and the rain would come.  Every afternoon we had some sort of rain storm.

This year we are thankful and relieved that the summer storms have returned.  It has been so hot and so dry.  Our friend, Carlos, who has 10,000 acres of land east of town, has sold most of his herd of cattle.  He raises his own feed for the cattle, but this year the answer was -- no rain -- no grass.  As a sad result, most of his herd have been sold so that the remaining cattle can survive on what little grass there is.

I suppose that the cattle will rebuild their extended family themselves over the future years.  Now that it's raining, the herds are happy.  And that's the antelope, the deer, the elk -- and the domestic stock.  The range is turning green.  Rejoice.

But with the rain and the storms comes the thunder and lightning.  Those who know me know that I love the thunder and lightning.  I can sit on the porch and watch for hours when there's lightning going on.  Schultz hated the thunder... I loved it.

Up on the property, the storms seem more intense.  That 3 miles of distance and 1,000 feet in elevation seems to make a real difference.  Lightning and thunder roars up there.  The lightning and the thunder seem almost simultaneous.  The rain so much more intense.  Lightning strikes happen.

That being said and in hind-sight, we should have put in a "whole house surge protector" on the "shed."  That was a given on the house, but for some reason it never occurred to me to put one on the garage.

Yesterday Les and I visited the property.  I haven't been up there all week as I've been chained to my desk with quarter end stuff for my clients.  I put the last envelope in the mail yesterday and we celebrated by going up to Raton to buy a new chain for Les's chainsaw.  Whoo-Hoo!

After coming back from our southern neighbor we went up to the property just to sit and think for awhile.  I went to the freezer to get some chops out for dinner and found that most of the contents of the freezer was thawed out.  It was still cold, so I grabbed what was completely thawed to bring it home.  The freezer was purchased no more than 3-4 years ago and it's a Fridgedaire so I thought we'd have a few more years of use out of it.  But after talking to my friend Angela today we figured out that a power surge must have caused the motor to go out.  The light goes on... but no one is home.

Damn... another $400 out the door!

Today Andy and I went up to the property to see if the remaining items froze up again.  Sigh -- no dice.

Today we had chicken piccata, tomorrow I will be roasting a turkey.  I put 3 pork roasts into the crock pot today.  I'll throw a little BBQ sauce in that later this week.  I cooked up 4-1/2 pounds of ground turkey.  Put in salt and pepper and re-froze it when it was cooked.  I'll probably make some chili or some Sloppy Joe's with that.

I visited Angela and gave her 6 chicken breasts.  I visited Jim & Joelle and gave them a roast beef and tamales.  Jim and Joelle will be sharing our turkey dinner tomorrow with the fresh corn I bought at the Farmer's Market.

Summer and storms.  The year is passing so quickly.

I love it here!

Bears

There have been many, many bear sightings in and around Trinidad lately.  Just last night Les and I were laying in bed watching TV and a very pungent scent hit my nose.  Kind of skunk-like, kind of musty.  I figured it was a bear.  (Of course we keep all of our windows wide open to enjoy the night air.)

Sure enough, our neighbor told us that his dog was going crazy at the bear last night.  So that's confirmation that odor is coming from pure American Black Bear.  We've smelled it a few times during the past month or so.  For the longest time it was so hot and so dry.  The bears were wandering into town looking for food.  Now, even though it's cooled some and we've had some rain, they've found that picking through dumpsters is an easy meal.

One bear was chased away from the dumpsters behind Taco Bell.  Another -- and in broad daylight -- strolled up Main Street last Thursday afternoon.  He peeked into a few of the stores and then walked right into Haddad's Furniture Store right next to my friend's Art Gallery.  He sauntered right through the store and then out the back door.  No harm -- no foul.  He made his way back to the river and was out of sight again.

We've only had our trash knocked over once, thank Heavens.  I guess our trash is too stinky for the discriminating bear.  Our neighbor has had his gone through a few times.  A client I saw on Friday showed me where a bear made his way through her garden in her back yard.

I was just thinking today how glad I am that I didn't have to take Schultz out to pee at night.  He didn't like going out by himself at night time.  And that was fine with me.  It gave me a chance to gaze at the stars.  But I just thought about how I'd feel if I ran into a bear munching in my back yard.

Then I thought again about that.  If I had to go out with Schultz every night for the rest of my life I wouldn't mind...as long as I could have him back again.  Bear or no bear.

Goodbye Jeep

When we bought our 2008 Grand Cherokee it was with the idea that we would keep it forever.  Now Les and I have a little reputation for buying and selling cars... an expensive activity.  Remember the 2004 Cadillac CTS?  A beautiful car!  We paid an extra $1000 for a diamond white color... kind of a pearly-sparkly-creamy white.  Beautiful!

As soon as we brought that car home I noticed that every other CTS out there was white.  Boy did that burst my bubble.

So the next year we traded it in on a leased 2005 CTS - silver-green.  That was a beautiful car, too.  And I only saw one other of that color in the entire valley.  Mary's happy.

It was a 3 year lease so in 2008 with the mountain top almost in sight, we did lots and lots of homework to figure out our next car.  We needed a 4x4 or an All Wheel Drive.  We investigated Nissan, Toyota and Subaru.  Nissan and Toyota had nothing we wanted.  We had heard wonderful things about Subaru, but felt we needed something tougher. 

We investigated Chevy, GMC, Chrysler... even Ford.  We looked at cross-overs galore.  It finally came down to one vehicle -- Jeep.  It had a truck chassis, high ground clearance, skid plates all along the underside, enough power to pull a trailer, and it was American.  Yeah!  The advertised gas mileage didn't seem too out of line -- 16 city 18 highway.

We started our quest for a new Jeep.  We found a black 2008 at a Ventura dealer that was absolutely loaded.  The salesman told us that this Jeep was $10,000 off the sticker because it was the last year's model and they were clearing out room for the 2009's.  Not only that, but we got 0% financing and they threw in a life-time bumper-to-bumper warranty.  How could we go wrong? 

Well, first of all, they lied about that gas mileage.  We are conservative drivers and only averaged 11.5 miles per gallon.  We tried everything to get that mileage up... a Predator Tuner, using high grade gas, additives... nothing worked.  11.5 average... that was it.

Also was the fact that it was black.  We knew this going in to this that a black car would be hard to keep clean.  Heck, Les had a detail shop years ago... he knows.  But we also figured that since we'd be out in the country, we'd soon get over our fixation about having a clean car.  NOT!

As much as I didn't want to go out and buy another car, Les convinced me.  We did the math.  Basically, fuel costs for the Jeep would be roughly 2.5 times than for a Subaru Outback.  Insurance is cheaper.  Tags are probably cheaper. 

Long story short... check out our new car.

The Outhouse

So what does one do when nature calls on a mountain top with no water?  Well, duck behind a tree, of course!

Then what does one do when they want to entertain on a mountain top with no water?   Mmmmm -- not so easy is it?  But the simple answer is -- build an outhouse.

Our friends Ken and Angela have an outhouse behind their home.  It was used while they were building their home and before they had their cisterns and plumbing.  Since our gorgeous strawbale home won't be built for another couple of years the outhouse seems like a perfect solution.

Les took some pictures of Ken and Angela's throne and copied the design.  A trip to Lowe's and couple of weeks later -- voila!  Our very own outhouse!

Of course, we will have some modern conveniences like TP in a bin along with handy wipes.  We don't want to go too far overboard with this natural thing, you know!

 The point of having a 3-sided outhouse is so that it won't stink.  The open side has a marvelous view of the mountains to our west.  With no neighbors in sight we can sit and ponder and gaze upon God's creations.  Truly, answering a call-of-nature while in the open air of nature is -- well -- natural.  And it's something I don't mind a bit.

Les is just so marvelous about working on whatever projects need to be worked on.  Now that he's finished the outhouse, he's been cleaning up some of the trees that were knocked over when the bulldozers came through to build our road and building sites.  What a great guy!

July 1, 2011



Brush Fire Sun -- but isn't it beautiful anyway?  Just like a picture of heaven.





 

I am so excited!  I have 7 followers of this blog!  WooHoo!  And I'm really not being sarcastic, either.  I'm happy that my old friend, Diane, decided to join us.  Hi Diane.

It has been hot, hot, hot here.  Hot and DRY!



Nearly every day it rains about 12 rain drops.  Just enough to tease... never enough to quench.  Just enough to get your car dirty... never enough to make it worth it.

Tonight, though, at 10:00 Les and I sat out on the porch as we often do.  We had a martini and discussed events.  And the cool evening breeze in my face was more intoxicating than my beverage.  There is a storm right at this moment just south of town in the Raton Pass.  It's been storming for the last 3 hours.  I've been watching the radar on Weather Underground and it's showing lots of reds and yellows -- but it is literally just out of reach.  We had our typical 12 rain drops.  We see the lightning, but we're like the dog on a chain in the yard.  It's always just out of reach.

The farmers and ranchers in the eastern part of the state have been approved to receive disaster funding due to the drought.  There was decent snow pack, but on the plains the ranchers rely on rain to grow the grass to feed their herds.  And there has been no measurable rain in a few months.

 And then there are the fires.  I thought I was getting away from wild fires, but I've come to learn that the fire danger in this drought is just as bad -- if not worse -- than Southern California.  Here, sometimes the fires jump from tree-top to tree-top.  That's a tough one for the fire fighters.  And they just don't have the resources that California has.  A brush fire in California would prompt C-130's and helicopters.  Here they're lucky to get a bulldozer and a shovel.  (A slight exaggeration... maybe.)



The clouds tonight at the edge of the storm.



Anyway... there has been much I've wanted to blog about.  Les has a new project, but that blog will have to wait for another day.  (Until I have more pictures!) 



More clouds at the north edge of the storm.