A Report in High Summer

The week began with a very pretty summer morning. It was a little on the cool side, but it warmed up as soon as the sun came over the hill. It was mowing day, but I had to wait for the dew to dry before I could begin. While I waited, I did some trimming. I was pruning one of the lilac bushes, cutting off the spent flower heads, when I was attacked by insects that stung me on the finger and wrist. I couldn't see what they were at first – I was too busy running away. I grabbed some plantain leaves and chewed them up and smeared them on the stings and then went back to investigate. I found the culprits. There was a Bald-faced Hornet nest in the lilac bush. 

The offending nest.

Bald-faced Hornets are also known as Arial Yellow-jackets, Blackjackets, and Bull Wasps. I won't tell you what I called them as I nursed two painful stings. They are not true hornets, which are in the genus Vespa, but are wasps in the genus Dolchiovespula. Their binomial nomenclature is Dolchiovespula maculata. They get their name "bald-faced" from the white markings on their faces. I can be tolerant of hornets and yellow-jackets because they prey on other insects, many of them harmful, but this nest was in the garden, too close to where people walk. And they tend to be aggressive. So the nest had to go. First I sprayed the nest with one of my organic insecticides. That seemed to kill most of them. Later in the day, I used the jet nozzle on the hose and disintegrated the nest.

Bald-faced Hornet (not my photo).

As usual, my encounter with them got me wondering about the term "bald-faced" they way we use it as in telling a bald-faced lie. It has an interesting etymology. It is an American term derived from the English "barefaced." Barefaced goes back a long time, at least to the 16th century, and might have been invented by Shakespeare because the first time it appears in print is in A Midsummer Night's Dream where in Act 1, Scene 2, Nick Bottom is trying to decided what sort of beard his character should wear in their performance of Pyramus and Thisbe and Peter Quince answers him with a pun.

Bottom:    I will discharge it in either your straw-coloured beard, your orange-tawny beard, your purple-in-grain beard, or your French-crown-colour beard, your perfect yellow.

Quince:    Some of your French crowns have no hair at all, and then you will play bare-faced.

That little diversion made me want to watch the movie again – my favorite version done in 1999. Traditionally, Midsummer Night is June 23rd, so that has passed already, but the actual midpoint of the summer season is on August 7th, which is yet to come, so we are midway between the midsummers. That seems like a perfect excuse to watch it again – as if I actually needed an excuse.

So back to the words. Originally, "barefaced" described a man without facial hair, which was considered audacious in an age when men normally wore beards. [As a longtime beard-wearer, I approve of this sentiment a little.] So barefaced, and the more American bald-faced, came to mean something brazen or impudent, most commonly paired with phrases like a barefaced or bald-faced lie. Words are wonderful.

Mowing took me most of the morning. It was a Big Mowing Day when I mow the lawn and the orchard. While I was mowing the orchard, I noticed an apple on the ground under the big Yellow Transparent tree. I didn't think that tree had any apples on it this year. I stopped mowing and investigated. There are a few apples up in the branches. Yellow Transparent is a very old variety and one of the earliest to ripen, usually at the end of July and beginning of August. As their name implies, their skin is pale yellow-green when ripe and they have soft, mealy, juicy flesh. They make the very best applesauce. I have my eye on those few apples. I don't want them to go to waste.

A few of the few Yellow Transparent apples on the tree.

I got a phone call from my doctors office that afternoon, a follow up from my appointment a week ago. The news was not very good. Not awful, but not what I wanted. He prescribed a new drug to add to my regimen. Yay, another pill. And I keep on going.

In the afternoon, I went out to the big garden, not to work, but just to see what was happening. I went by way of the front yard and then followed the meadow path that comes out at the front of the big garden where the corn, squash, and melons are growing. As I passed through the meadow, I stopped to breathe for a minute. It was warm and the sun was shining and the grasses and other meadow plants were giving off a rich aroma like resin and vanilla and something almost piney. According to AI, that scent is made of volatile oils and volatile organic compounds such as terpenes, phenolics, and aliphatic molecules. I don't know what those are, but I love the way they smell. It is pure summer.

The gardens, flower and vegetable, are looking good. We are eating fresh things now – zucchini, chard, peas, cucumbers, onions, and a few tomatoes. The pumpkins are plumping under their vines. Soon there will be green beans and new potatoes. The flower garden is bright with marigolds, zinnias, phlox, and balloon flowers. 

A little pumpkin hiding behind a blossom.

The first of the phlox.

Balloon flowers, one of my favorite summer flowers.

A tiger swallowtail on a liatris flower.

Zinnias.

On Tuesday morning, when I checked the forecast for the day, it said we should expect thunderstorms, some of them possibly severe, during the day. The morning was still clear, so I hurried and did all I could outdoors before things changed. These days, my mornings include hunting for snails. That usually takes me about half an hour as I slowly walk through the garden with my container of salt water, plucking them up and dropping them in, not giving it much thought other than my amazement at how many there always are. However, Tuesday morning was different. I realized that, although they are destructive pests and I need to control them, I was suffering from a deplorable lack of curiosity. I should also know what kind of snails they are. So I took my phone with an identifying app with me and logged the species that I found. And then I killed them. Here's what I found.

Brown-lipped, White-lipped, and Amber snails from my garden.

I think I have three kinds of snails in my garden, at least the ones I could find – the Brown-lipped Snail (Cepaea nemoralis), the White-lipped Snail (Cepaea hortensis), and the European Amber Snail (Succinea putris). I might only have White-lipped and not Brown-lipped because White-lipped Snails sometimes have brown bands on their shells, but I couldn't tell from the sites I researched if that is the case here. The Amber Snail and White-lipped Snail are native species. The Brown-lipped were intentionally introduced to North America. No matter where they came from, they do a lot of damage in my garden and I have to be vigilant in killing them. They seem to prefer certain plants, especially tall phlox, which is just coming into flower now. I don't really take pleasure in killing them, it is just a necessary mollusc-cide, and I know it might sound cruel, but I always find myself singing the Japanese children's song about snails, Den den mushi mushi, while I'm killing them. Possibly out of a perverse attempt at irony.

When we lived in Southern California I fought a continuous garden battle with the Common Garden Snail (Cornu aspersum). There were thousands of them. I used to go out in the mornings and fill a gallon bucket with them. They are native to Europe, but were introduced into California as a food animal in the 1850s. They are eaten as escargot. I tried escargot when we were in France. I don't know if my long negative association with them (the snails, not the French) was a factor, but I didn't like it. The garlic butter they were bathed in wasn't even enough to get me to choke it down. I ate snails while I was in Japan, but they were whelk, sea snails, not land snails, and even then, I wasn't very keen on them.

The Common Garden Snail.

Escargot. No thank you.

Japanese whelk. Still, no thank you.

I worked until 11:00 at pulling weeds. That's when the first raindrops fell. It was just a light pattering, but I could tell there was something bigger coming soon. I finished and put my tools away just as the first thunder rumbled. I stood on the back porch for a few minutes to watch the storm roll in. More than watch, I wanted to smell it. If I could bottle the scent of July Thunderstorm, I'd make a fortune. The smell of the rain, the wet earth, the newly mowed grass, and that sharp whiff of ozone is the quintessence of summer. Summer Meadow and July Thunderstorm, sounds like marketable products to me. I'd buy them. I don't usually mess around with AI, but I thought it would be fun to try this:

That first wave of storm eased up after a while. The rain stopped. The air grew calm. The next wave arrived at 2:30 and it was bigger. There was no thunder or lightning this time, just wind and rain. The wind bent the trees and shook the house. It blew branches down. It knocked over all the potted plants on the back porch stairs. It was tremendous. The sound of it was awesome. I could feel the pressure of the air against the house. Down at the Rigas house where Stacey works, she reported trees snapped off. I postponed going down to the afternoon chores, hoping it would stop. Finally at 4:30 it eased up and I hurried and did the chores. When Stacey arrived home, she and I cleaned up the fallen branches in the front yard. Another lesser windstorm blew through just as it was getting dark. The weather was so unstable and turbulent.

At our house it looked like this after the wind.

At Stacey's work it looked like this.

And this.

After Tuesday's storms, on Wednesday the weather turned cool and gray. It felt a little like fall and I didn't like that. I like fall weather, but in October, not July. The garden didn't like the cool weather either, well, most of it anyway. Peas and lettuce like cool weather. Tomatoes, cucumbers, beans, and all the different squashes do not. When it cools down, they slow down. Our growing season here is short enough as it is without chilly weather in July slowing it down.

On Wednesday afternoon, Miriam and I watched the movie Seventeen Miracles. Our Stake held a pioneer trek over Thursday and Friday and Sarah, Tosh, Miriam, Hazel, and Ava were part of it. In preparation for that, to get Miriam in the proper frame of mind, we watched the account of the Martin and Willie handcart companies that left Omaha in August 1856, headed to the Valley of the Great Salt Lake. The movie describes the hardships they endured – sickness, fatigue, starvation, frostbite, exposure to early winter snows, and for some of them, death. It recounts some of the sacrifices they made and the miracles they experienced during the trek, events passed down, stories told and retold and recorded in their journals and letters. The last of the two companies arrived in Salt Lake City on November 30, 1856 after 1,032 miles of grueling hardship. Of the approximately 1,000 people in those two companies, as many as 250 died along the trail. We'd seen the movie before, but I'd forgotten how powerful their experiences were. 

Between 1847 and 1868, an estimated 61,000 Latter-day Saint pioneers traveled by wagon, handcart, and on foot to the Salt Lake Valley. Almost 4% of them died along the way. I don't have any pioneer ancestors in my family history. I'm only a second generation member, my parents joined the Church in the 1950s, but I consider myself an heir of that great pioneer heritage. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, my church, would not be what it is today without them. I would not be who I am without them. I have always revered them. I remember as a child in Primary sometime in the early 60s learning the song Pioneer Children Sang as They Walked. It was a new song, not in the old green The Children Sing songbook we used. When we got home on the day we learned it, we sang it for my parents. 

Pioneer children sang as they walked and walked and walked.

Pioneer children sang as they walked and walked and walked.

They washed at streams and worked and played.

Sundays they camped and read and prayed.

Week after week they sang as they walked and walked and walked and walked.

My father thought we'd got it wrong because it had so much walking in it, but we were singing it correctly. They walked a lot – 1,300 miles from Nauvoo, Illinois to the Valley of the Great Salt Lake.

The Mormon Trail, 1,300 miles from Nauvoo to Salt Lake City.

Rachel and her children arrived at dinnertime on Wednesday. The house is full and lively again. All of the grandchildren except for Hazel will be here for the next three weeks, so the house will remain lively for the duration.

Thursday morning it was 37° when I got up. I felt cheated as I put on my heavy fleeced hoodie to go out on my morning walk. Five degrees above freezing in July is not acceptable. When I came in from my walk, I was cold. I sat at my desk and, for the first time in a long time, I turned on the electric heater to warm my hands and feet. After a few hours of sunshine, things did warm up, but only to 72°, not warm enough. I went out and worked in the garden all day. I tackled one of my bigger projects, redoing the retaining wall in the long border. It was slowly collapsing and was a haven for ants and voles. I took it apart and then reassembled it using different bigger stones. Then I dug out that part of the flower bed and removed all the grass and deep rooted weeds that had invaded it. I'm working to get parts of the long border ready for planting biennial seeds – hollyhocks, oriental poppies, and lupin – and self seeding annuals whose seeds are ripe and ready now – common poppies, nigella, cornflowers, and larkspur. The beds look bare where I'm cleaning them out, but they will fill in soon. I like to envision what they will look like next year.

Thursday's project done.

Sarah, Tosh, Miriam, Hazel, and Ava leaving for their trek on Thursday afternoon.

The trekkers.

After Hannah got home from work, the children wanted to go swimming. It wasn't very hot, and I knew the water at the pond would be very cold, but I'd been working hard all day in the garden, and I was hot and sweaty, so I decided to go along with them. When we got there everyone jumped right in, but I couldn't do it. The water was way too cold for me. Instead, I took a little nap in the sunshine. When we got back from the pond, Stacey had dinner ready – BELTs – bacon, fried egg, lettuce, and tomato sandwiches. Delicious.

Thursday afternoon at the pond.

Friday morning we were at 39° at dawn. As I took my morning walk, I could see my breath. I was starting to despair that summer might be over. When I came back in the house, I looked at the weather map and saw that parts of the Midwest were under an extreme heat warning. Lucky. The forecast said we would be warming again, but only into the 70s for the next ten days. That's better, but still not the kind of heat I want. The dew was heavy that morning. I waited for it to dry a bit and then went out to work cleaning out another section of flowerbed.

Friday was Russell's birthday. He turned four. He was a very excited four year old. He spent the day on the slip and slide over at the Shillig's. Tabor arrived in the afternoon. Later, it was warm enough that we went swimming. Russell wanted his favorite food, cheese pizza, for his birthday. The Shillig's came to dinner to celebrate with us. He loves heavy equipment, trucks, dozers, and such things and said he wanted a crane for his birthday. He got three and was a very happy four year old. After dinner we went next door for a silly string fight and sparklers.

Birthday pizza.

Blowing out the candles.

One of the birthday cranes.

June and Mabel after the silly string fight.

The sunset on Friday night was beautiful.

Sunset on Friday.

Because some of the family was gone on the trek and didn't get back until late Friday night, we split the birthday celebration between Friday night and Saturday morning. We had pizza, cake, and some of his presents on Friday after dinner. Saturday morning we had Russell's other favorite food, pancakes. We had a brunch at 10:30. The Shilligs came over. We sang happy birthday again and there were more presents. Two days of celebration. But you only turn four once.

Birthday pancake breakfast.

More cranes.

Rachel, Tabor, and Hazel left after brunch. Rachel and Hazel are going to girls camp this week and Tabor is working. So we have June, Mabel, Florence, and Russell here. Next week, after they back from girls camp, Rachel and Hazel will come back up and stay a week. So we have grandchildren here for the next fifteen days. 

The day warmed nicely and I spent the morning and early afternoon weeding the asparagus bed. I do that every two weeks and you'd think there would be very few weeds, but there are always plenty of them. It looked nice and tidy when I was done.

The tidy asparagus bed.

In the afternoon Stacey, Tosh, and I took some of the children to the matinee to see the new Moana movie. The children liked it. I thought it was okay, but I like the original animated movie a lot more.

After dinner, I was finishing up some last tasks in the garden. Hannah came out and helped me do an evening snail hunt. We found at least a hundred of them. We finished and I decided to do one more job. It was going toward twilight. The children were in the house. They'd just finished taking their baths and were getting their clothes ready for Sunday. I was deadheading lilies in the raised bed garden. Suddenly a rabbit bolted out of the lily bed. I've seen a rabbit hanging around in that garden for weeks. I've found evidence of it feeding on lettuce and beet greens. I've been tempted to shoot it, but never had a good opportunity. So the rabbit ran and I continued deadheading the lilies. Then I saw it. Where the rabbit had jumped from was a nest with baby bunnies in it. There were about five of them. I ran to the house and had everyone come out to have a look. The practical gardener in me said I should get rid of them. I don't want more rabbits in my garden. But the tenderhearted lover of life prevailed. I couldn't do anything. Those lucky bunnies. Now, later in the year when they are grown, if they presume to think they are welcome in my garden they will encounter the practical gardener.

The bunny nest.

This Sabbath started out cool and gray, but after the sun was up, it turned into a very pretty morning. There was a higher energy level than normal with getting the grandchildren up and fed and dressed for church, but we did pretty good. No missing shoes. Only a bit of whimpering over brushing hair.

In honor of Pioneer Day, which was on Friday, we sang pioneer hymns in church today. We sang Come, Come, Ye Saints and They, the Builders of the Nation and Pioneer Children Sang as They Walked. Our meetings were very good – great talks, great lessons. Now we're home. Lunch prep is underway. It's a fine day. Maybe we'll take a walk this afternoon.

This week we have a big and exciting event taking place here. Our Amish tree cutter, Enos Keim, called and said he and his crew will be here on Tuesday and Wednesday to finally take down the two huge maple trees at the front of the house. We were lucky that the wind we had during last week's storms dropped branches away from the house, not on it. Unfortunately, the forecast says there is a 100% chance for rain on Tuesday and a 70% chance on Wednesday, so I don't know if it will actually  happen. I don't think they can cut down trees in the rain. I hope the forecast is wrong, but it's usually right when I don't want it to be.

Those rainy days will also put a damper on keeping the grandchildren entertained. If they can't go swimming or ride bikes or play outdoors, what will we do? Since Stacey and Hannah will be at work during the day, I'm relying on Miriam to undertake the task. The other question is, on those rainy days, what will I do? I have plans to work on a big project of my own. I'll be ripping out the front flowerbed, completely gutting it. I've had it covered since March to kill off the plants. It's been a weedy mess for a long time. I can hardly wait to redo it. The tiller is already there, waiting. Now if the weather will just give me a break.

Smoke Gets In Your Eyes

Sun shining through smoky sky.

I'll start this week's Journal with a mental ramble that actually came about later in the week, but explains how most of the week went for me. There are over 800 fires burning in Canada that have filled our sky with smoke. The smoke arrived here midweek and changed everything. Because of the smoke, my brain latched onto the song Smoke Gets In Your Eyes and began playing it in a continuous loop starting on Wednesday. It's still there. I'm just ignoring it. I first heard the song in 1973 when I went to see American Graffiti and it was on the soundtrack, which I then bought and played over and over again through the remainder of my high school years. That version was performed by The Platters, who recorded it in 1958, the year I was born.

The song was written in 1933 by Jerome Kern and Otto Harbach as part of a stage musical, Roberta. It has been performed and recorded many times by some very famous singers like Helen Forrest, Nat King Cole, Jo Stafford, Eartha Kitt, and Sarah Vaughan. My favorite version, besides the one by The Platters, is by Kiri Te Kanawa on her album Kiri Sings Kern (1993) which is full of beautiful renditions of Jerome Kern's songs.

So it's been a smoky week, but more about that later.

Monday started off with a doctors appointment. Not the best way to start the week, but it was a routine visit, nothing notable. When I got back, I spent the day in the garden. It was time to start pulling up spent flowers that have gone to seed, dropped their seed, and turned brown. It was mostly lupins and common poppies. As I pulled them up, I shook out any remaining seeds into the flowerbeds so they will grow and delight us next year. The flower beds are on the edge of a lull right now. There are a few bright flowers scattered about, mostly marigolds, but the big high summer show is about to begin as the tall phlox, zinnias, cosmos, and dahlias start to bloom. It's hard to believe we're already at this point in the season. We're past the middle of July already.

Tuesday was mowing day. I started early before the day got hot. I began with an hour of weed whacking. That was pretty strenuous. After that, riding the mower for an hour and a half was almost relaxing. By the time I finished, it was 89°. Miriam was going to the gym and I went along. I made no attempt to exercise, but went straight to the steam room. Even though I was hot from working in the heat, the steam room, along with alternating cold showers, was very refreshing.

I'm trying a new strategy with pest control in the vegetable garden. I got some sticky traps for Squash Vine Borers and Striped Cucumber Beetles. They are bated with pheromone plugs. They arrived that afternoon and I hung them, one each in my raised bed garden and out in the big garden. I also read that Cabbage Moths are territorial and one way to dissuade them is to make fake moths and place them near the brassicas. So I cut out little paper moths, drew on the appropriately positioned spots and dangled them near the rows of cabbages, broccoli, and cauliflower. The Cucumber Beetle traps were effective right away. So far I haven't caught any Squash Vine Borers. I know they're out there. Maybe their breeding season is done and they've already laid their eggs. And I still see plenty of Cabbage Moths, so maybe they don't care about my paper decoys.

Cucumber beetles caught in my trap.

One of my Cabbage Moth decoys.

In other garden news, Sarah bought a new drip irrigation system for the big garden and we spent several days in the evenings setting it up. It's nice. It runs on a timer. Now we don't have to water everything by hand.

Wednesday morning I was working in the garden pinching tomatoes when a neighbor up the road stopped to say our peacock was walking along the side of the road down on highway 49 almost to Burrell's. I grabbed a stick and headed down the road. The peacock was not very cooperative. After some violent coaxing, I got him back on our property. I don't know where he thought he was going. He has become a nuisance, eating the strawberries before they are ripe, nibbling on my lettuces. We had to cover the brassicas and celery with netting to keep him from devouring them. And now wandering. He could have caused a traffic accident.

Later in the morning on Wednesday, the sky began to grow dark. We weren't expecting rain and the darkness didn't look like rain clouds. It was that smoke from Canada blowing in a plume that stretched from Ontario to the Atlantic Ocean and we were right in the middle of it. Because of the smoke, the hot temperatures we were expecting for the second half of the week never arrived. The sun was veiled. At first the smoke cast a yellow haze over everything, then it rolled in like fog.

The sun veiled by smoke on Wednesday afternoon.

On Thursday the smoke was worse. When I woke up at my usual rising time, 5:30, it looked like a winter morning. The sky was dark, the air was gray. When I went out on my morning rounds, it was like walking in a dim and foggy twilight. The air smelled bad. Down at the barn, the automatic coop door, which is  programed to open when the morning light reaches a certain intensity, was still closed. I had to open it manually. Then, as I was coming into the house, I heard the peacock. 

Smoky Thursday morning.

When the sun came up on Thursday.

His call seemed to come from far away. After his wandering the day before, I thought I'd better see where he was. I walked in the direction that I thought his call came from, but saw no sign of him. I walked across the property and up the road toward Burrell's. I heard him call distantly again from the other direction. I came back to the house and got Stacey. We got in the car and drove up and down the roads, up highway 49, up the 449, up the Rapley Road, with the car windows open, calling to him, hoping he would call back. By calling, I mean we were making his loud "peeyaw" cry. And it was just 7:15 in the morning. The neighbors probably thought the smoke had gone to our heads. We didn't hear any response and drove back to the house. As we got out of the car, we heard him call again from somewhere closer. I headed out to the big garden and Stacey went toward the Shillig's house. There he was, on the far side of their house by their air conditioning unit. I don't know if he'd been there the whole time or not. His calls didn't seem to come from there before. I chased him back home through the orchard. Two peacock adventures in two days. Crazy bird.

After that, I decided it was best not to do any outdoor work that day. It's not good to exert yourself when you can see, smell, and taste the air you're breathing. But what to do indoors on a summer day in the middle of July? Reading was, of course, my first choice. I'd just finished the book I was reading, Terry Pratchett's Discworld book sixteen, Men At Arms, and was ready to go on to the next one in the series, but thought maybe I'd take a little pause from them. I went to my shelves to look for some inspiration. As I was glancing over the spines, two authors caught my attention and sent me on a mental journey. They have the same last name. They both used their initials. Other than that, they had little in common except that I loved their books. They are T. H. White – Terrence Hanbury White, who went by the nickname "Tim" – and E. B. White – Elwyn Brooks White, who went by the nickname "Andy".

I first encountered E. B. White (1899-1985) when I read Charlotte's Web in third grade. I loved that book. I claim it as the first book that made me cry (there have been many since then). Sometime after that, I also read Stuart Little and Trumpet of the Swan, but I was done reading E. B. White by the end of elementary school. I didn't look at him again until the 80s when I was in college. I was in a writing class at Cal State, Northridge, and the professor recommended I read E. B. White as an exemplar of excellent writing style. I was surprised and said, "You mean the guy who wrote the children's books?" She was shocked at the limit of my exposure. She loaned me her personal copy of Essays of E. B. White. I read it through twice, and my love and admiration for White was deepened. After I returned that borrowed copy to her, I spent months visiting used book stores looking for a copy to add to my library. It was out of print then and that was in the days before the internet and Ebay and Alibris and all those other online booksellers. I finally found it in a bookstore in Burbank. Every few years I reread it, but it's been a while now. Because of E. B. White, I tolerate spiders in the barn, we once had a dog named Fred, and I once had a flock of geese.

E. B., his three children's books, and his essays.

My first encounter with T. H. White (1906-1964) happened when I was in seventh grade at Tallmadge Central Junior High School in Tallmadge, Ohio. I had study hall in the library. My assigned seat was at a table at the back where the shelves – fiction, alphabetical by author – stood right in front of me. One of the books on those shelves caught my eye – The Once and Future King by T. H. White. I don't really know why it called to me. It didn't have a flashy cover. It was thick to the point of intimidation. I took it from the shelf and started to read it at my table and was immediately captivated by it. I took it to the desk and asked the librarian to check it out for me. She told me that she thought it was above my reading level, but reluctantly let me have it. I devoured that book, and the rest, literally, is history. Since that first reading, I have read it over and over again – at least a dozen times. Through my teenage years, I wore out a paperback copy. I replaced it with another paperback copy and then, over the years, acquired a nice hardback copy, and then a set of the books in their original separate volumes. Because of T. H. White, I fell in love with all things medieval, read countless history books, and got a B.A. degree in Medieval European History.

T. H., the edition I first read, the first paperback, the second paperback, the fancy hardback.

So after a morning of browsing my shelves and pondering on my relationship with the Whites, who did I finally choose? Neither of them. I do want to read them again, but slowly, enjoying once again my long love for them, savoring the experience. During garden season, I don't read like that. And I knew the smoke would not last long and the garden would draw me away again. So I added them to my Winter Reading List (shudder). Yes, I've started a Winter Reading List already, and the two Whites are now at the top of it. They may be the only reason I have to make me look forward to winter. No, not even that. So I continued on with Discworld book number seventeen, Soul Music.

I did go outdoors to do the chores and I took a late afternoon walk around the garden. I was sorry for all the things I should have done, but didn't do. It felt like a mostly wasted day, at least in the garden.

Thursday, late afternoon.

Because the smoke blocked the sun, the earth didn't warm up much on Thursday and Friday morning it was a chilly 45°. I didn't like that. I want heat in July. When I stepped out that morning, it seemed like the smoke was worse. I didn't take a morning walk, I just did the morning chores and came back in the house. I checked the smoke map. This was what it looked like:

Miriam and Hannah left at 8:30, along with Chase's crew next door, to spend the weekend at the Thayn's house. They had plans to visit some antique shops and to go to the Highland Festival on Saturday. So I was alone all day. At first I began to despair of yet another day of limited work outdoors and having to find something to keep me distracted. But then things began to change. Around 9:00 the breeze shifted, the sky cleared, the haze diminished a bit, and the sun began to warm the earth again. I checked the particle pollution map and it said we were still in the "Unhealthy" zone, but I went out anyway to do a little, not very strenuous, work. I began with a snail and Japanese beetle patrol – not strenuous at all. I found lots of snails, but very few beetles. Next on the list was to harvest the garlic. I knew rain was coming on Saturday and I needed to get the garlic out of the ground before things got wet. It wasn't hard work. I pulled them up and set them to dry in the sun for half an hour, then I trimmed them and tied them in bundles, and hung them in the woodshed to cure. I didn't plant as much this year as I have in the past and that was probably a mistake. We use a lot of garlic. I'm hoping we can freeze-dry most of it and turn it into garlic powder.

The garlic patch before harvesting it.

Garlic drying in the sun.

Trimmed and hanging in the woodshed to cure.

While trimming the garlic, I encountered a pest I'd never seen before, the Allium Leaf Miner (Phytomyza gymnostoma). I didn't see the actual fly, just the small brown pupae in some of the leaves. The adult just looks like one of the many sorts of flies I see in the garden. I don't see that they did any damage to the garlic bulbs. I only found them in the stems. They looked like tiny brown grains of rice. I crushed them whenever I found them. I'm always learning about new things in the garden.

This is what the pupae looked like (not my photo).

This is the adult. It just looks like a fly.

By the afternoon it had warmed up nicely to 82°. The air was still a bit hazy. I came in for lunch and a little siesta and didn't go out again until chore time.

Sarah came over after dinner and said that Runnings was having a bucket sale. Everything you could fit in a five gallon bucket, 15% off. She, Stacey, and I went up to Wellsville to shop. This weekend is Wellsville's annual Balloon Rally and as we came into town, there were hot air balloons every where. We stopped in a parking lot at the edge of town to take photos. Then we drove on to Runnings and filled three buckets with garden supplies, hardware items, and toilet paper, and checked out just as they were closing.

On our way into Wellsville during the balloon rally.

Rain came yesterday morning and began to wash the air clean. I appreciated that. It's still smoky, but better than it was. Plus the garden needed a good soaking. It did put a damper on our plans to go to the big Amish auction out in North Bingham. It rained off and on all day and I did a lot of nothing all day. During a break in the weather, we did do some harvesting out in the garden. Sarah was here for some chard. The chard is in my raised bed garden and it did really good this year. We picked a big batch and then went out to the big garden and picked some basil, cauliflower, zucchini, and peas. I love this time of year when we have things to eat right from the garden and also plenty to freeze and freeze-dry for storage.

Pickings from the garden.

Towards evening we had a thunderstorm. It wasn't much, just some distant rumbling. I never saw any lightning. It rained hard for ten minutes. The rest of the evening was very quiet. With just Stacey and me here, we keep things pretty calm. Later this week we will have a houseful again, so things will get more lively.

There was a touch of low fog this morning, but it wasn't smoke. I was glad for that. The fires in Canada are still burning, but the smoke seems to be blowing some other direction and I hope it stays that way. There are things happening this week and I don't want smoke to interfere. Miriam and Hannah will be home later today. Rachel and her children arrive on Tuesday. There is a trek midweek involving Sarah and Tosh, Hazel, Ava, and possibly Miriam. With the grandchildren here, we need to be able to do things like go swimming and play outdoors and I have plenty of things to do in the garden without worrying about breathing.

We're home from church. The drive to and from was beautiful, picture perfect summer scenery. Lunch will be ready soon. Then a nap, the chores, the usual summer Sabbath afternoon, restful and reinvigorating. And then onward into a new week.