Scattered – temporarily

January 7, 2012 11:39 am

I am back from my second early ( very early) airport in run. Today I took Peter to Dulles to fly to Atlanta and then on to Honduras where he will be part of team from Students Helping Honduras.. Yesterday it was Alex to BWI, heading for Quito, Ecuador via Miami to be part of a MedLife volunteer clinic. On the way home from Dulles I listened to the BBC World Service, “From our own correspondents” was on, with personal reports from around the world and I felt a sense that I too was stretched around the world, with emotional connections from South America, to Central America,  and of course to Scotland and Wales.

I will be very interested to see what the boys have absorbed from their short trips to new places. We were all in Costa Rica several years ago, so the general South/Central America atmosphere may not be a total surprise to them – but on the other hand they have not had much exposure to other kinds of places even here in the USA. The atmosphere, sounds, and smells of the villages they will be working in may not be very different from what you can find in a poor Appalachian or Mississippi Delta town – but they have not been exposed to either of those places here in the USA. Alex especially is not a very observant or curious person about the world – self absorbed is a good description – but I imagine that he will find it impossible not to be affected by what he will see in the volunteer clinics where he will be working.

In just over a week they will be back home, with pictures to show us, tales to tell us ( and a greater collection of stories to share with friends, stories we will only hear many years later). Until then I will wonder where they are and what they are doing and pray they are safe.

 

Posted in boys

2012 begins

January 3, 2012 6:00 pm

2012 – seems like an very futuristic year – the date you might pick if you were writing science fiction in the early (19)70s and wanted a date that was not in crazy far   future, like 4278, but far enough away that you could imagine most things. And here we are and about the only thing that I think is really where it should be is the widespread use of handheld super computers ( or “phones”). The biggest positive surprise from the 1970s  might be that we haven’t turned major sections of the planet into  barren radioactive wastelands.

I wonder what this year will bring – last year certainly had some surprises, a few sad moments, and a few pleasant events. Biggest surprise for me in 2011 was my different job, which  is generally a good situation, certainly a twist from what I had been projecting for my self – which I should know not to do. The span of my control is always much smaller than I think.

Posted in Uncategorized

Christmas Eve Cooking

December 24, 2011 2:21 pm

It’s Christmas Eve, and in roughly nine hours we will be having 30- people to sit-down dinner. And six of them – Pete, Bev and family will be staying with us for a week. Things are busy,  but under control. The food is well under way – the soup – butternut and sweet potato with corn – is made and needs to be reheated, the vegetarian lasagna is made and in the freezer ( no room in the fridge), as is the Sheppard’s Pie. The whole rib roast, which will be slow cooked on the grill is rubbed down and awaits the heat. Mince pies are made and so is the trifle. Nancy has her appetizers in process, and the table is set.

So the eating is in good shape, The house is still a mess, but we are planning on putting all three boys to serious work as soon as they awake ( or are woken ).

Posted in boys, food

Christmas holidays begin

December 23, 2011 12:11 am

Its Thursday the 22nd ( the start of Winter by astronomical standards) and we are almost all now on holiday. Only Jake has one more day of school, probably not much of a day – but he still has to wake up for the bus. I will get up with him to get a start on the cooking, final shopping and the various chores in preparation of having company, dinner for 30, and final preparations for Christmas itself.

Posted in boys, weather

Christmas Eve soup

December 17, 2011 8:53 pm

Here is a link to the soup I plan to make for Christmas Eve  - Golden Harvest Soup.

Of course I will have ?to ?cha?nge the quantities somewhat.

Posted in Uncategorized

End of the high school football season

December 3, 2011 2:05 pm

I went up to Baltimore last night to watch our neighboring high school, Quince Orchard, play in the state 4A ( there are four classes of high school, based on overall enrollment, for the sports) football final. The game was played at the Raven’s stadium. It was a great game with QO taking a lead early and going well ahead by half time. However Old Mill came back and tied the game 28-28 with seconds to go. Old Mill won in overtime with a two-point conversion.

It was a fun evening, saw a few folks I know. It would have been a tough game to lose and I was kind of happy not to be too interested!

Posted in Uncategorized

The blessings of a Thanksgiving Birthday

November 27, 2011 7:04 pm

I have had the same birthday for a long time – 51 years now. And for the past 25 years it has fallen on or around Thanksgiving. I thought that was pretty cool, since it meant that I often had my birthday off from work. But now that the boys  ( 2 out of 3 so far) are off to college, it is even more special since I can count on seeing them all together on or near to my birthday. This is likely to continue for many, many years to come.

Thank you

In other news, I planted some lettuce today in the cold frame – possibly inspired by the beautiful fall weather we are enjoying this weekend. Winter lettuce was a big success in past years, but this is as late as I have planted it. We will see if the mild weather can continue long enough for it to get a good start.

Posted in boys, garden, weather

Facebook and the blog

November 27, 2011 6:58 pm

As of last week, Facebook stopped letting anyone connect their own content ( blog, etc) directly into their Facebook page. This is an attempt by Facebook to own even more content on the web – which is fine for them. For me it actually got me thinking more about this blog – for a while I stopped writing in this blog because I had it linked directly to Facebook, and I was not sure that everyone who was connected to me wanted to see these posts. Now of course I could have unlinked the two all by myself, but that involved doing some work, etc, etc.. and so for a while it was simpler not to blog. Now the link is gone so maybe I will now go back to posting here more often.

Posted in computerTagged

Picked the wrong day to catch up in the garden

May 4, 2011 2:31 pm

I am fortunate that I can usually take off for a day or so when I want. What I can’t do is wait until the last minute to make that decision so I have to take what I get in terms of the weather. Today was not a good day for what I had planned.

Weekends and evenings have been crammed with sports, family events ( and some plain procrastination has not helped) and the vegetables grown from seed have kept getting bigger and bigger. Time to get everything planted. So I take off today – and I had checked the forecast. Showers were mentioned.

That would not be a problem – a little rain never hurt me. But these “showers” over performed as they say, leaving the veg plots filled with standing water. I went on nevertheless, hammering in the deer fence stakes, setting out the bean poles, and grasping a few  deep rooted weeds. Eventually I had to come in to make a phone call – and now I don’t want to go back out!

The radar shows the back edge of the rain is not far off, so maybe I will take care of some things inside and see if the afternoon is dryer.

Posted in garden, Uncategorized, weatherTagged , ,

Ready to plant seeds

March 3, 2011 6:41 pm

The last real frost date for my area is May 12 ( with a 10 % probability), or April 24th if  you feel like a 50-50 bet – source is this NOAA report which is probably a little conservative if you accept some sort of global warming ( or at least an suburban heat island effect).  Based on that the seed starting schedule is going to be:

March 6th – 7 weeks before last frost – peppers, a few tomatoes destined for pots on the deck, petunias

March 20th – a few more tomatoes

March 27th – 4 weeks before last frost -  remainder of the tomatoes, cucumbers

These are all going to be planted under florescent lights on a standard plastic folding table, warmed by an oil filled heater under  the table. I am going to monitor the soil temperature using my 1-wire data network ( the sensor is a DS1820) which connects to my “Misterhouse” program. I can then cycle the heater on and off to keep the temperature at the correct level.

Posted in computer, garden, weatherTagged , ,