Early Spring...A Visit From Afar

Hi World, I'm back. So what you may say. Ok, I can accept that mild report but really the last three to four days have been wonderful in many ways. The highlight, besides the amazing spring-like weather, has been the arrival, stay and departure of our eldest enfant Ashley. She is bound out for the Right Coast to live for a long while we hope. She was bubbly and happy as a butterfly on a red poppy. Her truck loaded down with her meager (in amount) household goods and enough maps and electronic aids to get her there in a most timely manner. She is a DRIVER! She likes driving and is damned good at it with a nearly perfect driving record over a 25 year timespan. He Toyota truck is long in the tooth at 12 yrs of age and 200K miles but sounds really healthy and all mechanicals were checked and new oil and filter at the same time. We had a ball this weekend, she all talkative and cheery as she could be about her new Beau and new life-to-be. Terrific, we ate Mexican and drink enough beer to fill the 50 gallon recycling container by Sunday afternoon. Mike and the kids came by Saturday evening, we fed them too and had a virtual laugh-a-thon til about 9 pm when the energy level flattened and everybody slowly drifted away and quiet fell on the house once again. It was only a prelude to Sunday morning on the warm (70 degrees f,) deck eating waffles and chortling with Mike, Jessica, Jordan, Audrey, Ashley, Kelly and I. A blast! The rest of the day was a technological exposition of Tom-toms, various smartphones, tablet discussions and musing about maps and Googling locations for hotels and eateries for Ash on her way east. More Mexican food for dinner for the four of us as Mike and the kids had to get back to Petaluma for s movie and a date for Jordan (13) and girlfriend and Jessica sitting rows and rows away 8-). So fun! We all sat around the table and talked and talked, I crept upstairs to get our of the estrogen laced atmosphere a bit and hadn't been here 5 minutes when Kelly called me down so they wouldn't miss me! Ohhhhhhh. Soon Ashley began to yawn as did I and we called it a night at about 8:30! LOL!! We all drifted off to sleep somewhere and prep for this mornings departure of Ashley. She was up and out to go next door to shower and collect her "stuff" and came in just as I woke up for the 2nd time, we had a small earthquake about 6am that woke me with a loud "BOOM!" and a little vertical shake, nothing much so I just went back to sleep...beats a tornado any day! Up coffee, cleanup last nights dishes then I was joined by Kelly and we all helped Ash get organized and packed into the trusty Toyota for takeoff. She pulled away from the curb at exactly 9am bound out towards Modesto to pick up Hwy 99 instead of freeway 5 south and then on towards the California Border about 600 miles southeast of here by tonight she thinks. Like I said she is a DRIVER! I'll report her progress as she writes or emails us through the next few days and YES her "friend" in the east is monitoring her constantly by smartphone and settling her into hotels and motels along the way. Cheers!

Summer in ...February?! and Dedicated to Liz.

Well first California tried to freeze us outa here for three weeks in December and January and now I slept on top of the bed (NOT in it!) last night. So it goes this winter, unusual weather here in CA and the rest of the country in a big deep freeze.

We drove last Sunday down south to Indian Wells, a distance of about 515 miles by Prius. Into the pouring rain (naturally)and fog. We took Highway 5, about the most boring road in the world...miles of rolling hills amidst the rain and fog and morons driving at 85 mph. We had "Bonnie" our ol' faithful Tom-Tom commanding our every move as while I PLANNED to skip "The Grapevine" climb over the Tehachapi Mountains and go southeast via Mohave (Mo-hhawv-ie)to the sunshine promised us. Bonnie decided otherwise midway through the southern part of the San Joaquin Valley and took us right on up The Grapevine towards downtown Los Angeles. Shit! Once on The Grapevine you are ON it with no chance to turn around until you reach the summit at 4400 feet or so. Once there the view above the fog and rain behind us made us rethink our possible retreat and onward we went into the LA traffic. Rain ensued, as did fog and the speeding morons. The traffic was thick, pasty actually with far too many cars in all 8 lanes of the monster Highway 10 as it passed downtown LA and wound through Pasadena. Stop and go on a rain slickened freeway is a difficult drive to say the least, many skidding BMW's and Mercedes and Lexuses and two complete write-offs, one upside down, in one mile long stretch that had standing water 6" deep to skid on at luge speeds. Fun. Once past the largess of the city, 20 miles of it at least, the traffic lightened up a bit and flowed at a rather stately 35mph.



Once through the awfulness the area near our destination provided us with huge windmills whirling in the constant wind of the storm as it blew itself towards Nevada in the distance. Hundreds of them, some in rows, some on top of mountain peaks. Quite a sight. Then through the late afternoon confusion of the Palm Springs group of "villages", Palm Springs, Indian Wells, Palm Desert, Desert Hot Springs, Cathedral City (Where's the Cathedral?...and the Bishop?), La Quinta, Indio etc. etc. All pretty "toney" these days with the exception of Indio and Palm Springs which have or have not (Indio) seen better days. Our stay (3 nights, 4 days) at the Renaissance Esmerada was hidden in the groves of palm trees along side highway 111 that scoots along the base of the local mountain chain quite dramatically (the mountains anyway). The hotel was huge and modern-ish with strange pyramidal fountains and square columns in the entry cul-de-sac. It couldn't figure out what its design was, Spanish? Mayan? Desert Southwest USA? Even a baroque table in the Elevator kiosk, huh? And our room had been furnished in campaign and mid-century modern style. All very nice but a bit confusing. The convention would begin for me Monday morning. Long winded meetings filled with men dressed in scholarly blue jeans and plaid shirts with pocket protectors. Mosquitos don't have a chance with these geeks on the job! Every day til Wednesday my days were meetings while Kelly found every possible thrift and junk shop in the "villages" and there were plenty! A few great finds from the miles of racks she perused in those three days.

We found great eats and a dud while we were there, a packed Don Diego was the worst Mexican "Cuisine" I had ever had and that included the fine Mexican mamacita on the beach in Puerto Vallarta who poisoned me with her chicken tamales some years ago. My over-breaded, over fried fish stuck into oily corn tortillas with a mushy tasteless salsa had no Mexican spirit or verve whatsoever. Kelly's Lobster Enchlladas were coated in a thick dark Mole and the "Lobster" crowed early in the morning the day it died. No meal worth eating in this lowly place but the local centenarians thought it was just dandy. Not me brother, give me the real stuff or nothing at all! Where's Rick Bayless when you NEED him?! The winner in the food department was Vicky's only a short drive from the hotel. 1/2 priced food and drink amid a people show, friendly bartenders and clean modern surroundings. The food was exquistite! Fresh fish tacos for 6 bucks, a 9.25 dollar NY steak, great crab cakes for 6 dollars as well. Fabulous food! 1/2 priced as well! Got them in the door I'll tell you...

Our return drive was uneventful though I was way too Prius-lagged to drive all the way or even 1/2 the way...so Kelly took over and soldiered her way through the desert, Boron, Mohave, Bakersfield and up the old 99 through Fresno and Stockton to
good ol' highway 12 and our little Suisun. She was a trooper! My hero!

Mike is ensconced at The Swamphouse. His arm is still a mess though he can do quite a bit with it, he's in pain.

Thanksgiving come and gone...

We travelled down the 99 Highway through the valley towns to Le Grande in about 3 hrs, then took another 35 minutes to run the rough road up into the beautiful hills of East of Merced to the ranch. Thanksgiving 2010 was held in the 150 year old stone farmhouse and headquarters of The Van Ness Ranch. I have uploaded a 3 part 36 minutes in total video of the trip up that @###@! road. It is passable, that I can say, but not without horrendous ruts and potholes big enough to swallow a car. One dodges as a matter of course so it is an exhausting exercize to say the least! Kelly's cousin actually COMMUTES to her job in Le Grand...more to come...Mike's Home! More about THAT in a while! Here's the video...

Part 1 of 3: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qsKQGbzeaf4

and another taken last night (Monday) at Chris's Club in Vallejo, CA. HOT!
More to come!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9YvLceYN3Fk

Farymann Follies - My Life As A Diesel Mechanic...NOT!

Well we got it, drove 128 miles and change to Santa Cruz By The Sea to construct the engine lift (a JOB), and haul the yellow Farymann Marine Diesel A30 to the truck bed. I eased her down, fasten her in, deconstructed the engine lift, straped it in, jump in the truck with Kelly and awaaaay we went!

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Not far at first, to the Santa Cruz Diner as seen on Diners, Driveins and Dives. Packed with milling people, waiters and waitresses and the smells of breakfast, lunch and possibly a dinner or two wafting over the scene. We sat in a wall booth as directed by a most polite hostess, water came soon enough and we spent the next while amide the hustle and bustle trying to sort out our choices for lunch. Kelly chose the steak sandwich "as rare as you can get it" was her command and I the patty melt, next the choice of drinks, I opted for a coke and kelly had her norm...H2O. Both came with a generous portion of golden french fries and Kelly's steak was as rare as it could be without mooing. She was happier with her meal than I was with mine, mine lacked something, under seasoned perhaps (for me who has a penchant for the saline) but it seemed more even than that. What I do not know but I've had better versions of this old favorite of mine. Meal eaten 16 USD and change with a generous tip for the fine level of service we were off for Highway 1 and the Pacific Ocean views it provides as one ambles north towards San Francisco. One old beach friends of days long gone slipped into view and past though throngs of people had come to sit, walk, sunbathe and ogle on this spectacularly sunny and warm day in the month of November. We did not stop as I knew this was a longer trip than the ride down on 680 to 17 and across the mountains, probably the better part of 4 hours at the restful pace we were going loaded down with the engine and the lift. Every hill a journey. I contemplated what work was going to be needed to get the Farymann into shape for installation in Zulu. Paint certainly, some derusting of the obvious, new filters, oil and such and the ever challenging finding it a home in the meantime in the already packed garage. Oh the garage! Soon the cutover to highway 280 was upon us at Pacifica and we motored carefully into the traffic bound for the east bay across the now infamous Bay Bridge. Though we were heavy it didn't collapse as we hunkered down in mid span and drove on. Up Hwy 80 to 12 and across the marsh past Walmart and home. In for the day and night we bedded down early exhausted by all our efforts at gawking and riding. The next morning I began The Undertaking...no not a funeral...maybe it WAS of sorts but certainly not intended as one. Removed the lift from the truck, assembled it and hauled out the objects necessary to create a spot for the Farymann and related equipment, tools etc. I went next door to summon Captain Vern to give me a hand positioning the Farymann on a wheeled trolley which took us about an hour to accomplish as the lift's long legs had to be assisted to roll uphill on the driveway towards the flat floor of the garage. A chore this was but once done the Farymann was loose of the chains that bind and on the trolley and, best of all, rolled into the garage for inspection and cleaning. About that time Kelly and Audrey returned from a lunch effort. They soon swept and removed the detritus that I had swept from the garage and placed it into the various rubbish bins. More about THAT later. I thinked them for thier help and they disappeared into the house. Upon closer inspection I found extensive corrosion, rust and deterioration of the crankcase, cylinder casting etc. As I rubbed off more dirt and grime it became apparent that this corrosion had consumed much of various metal parts over not a short time. I purchased the engine from a party unmentioned on eBay. I had paid with Paypal so there was a level of protection from this sort of situation therein. I sat at my computer and went to paypal, signed in and found my 455USD transaction shortly. Then I undertook the dispute process and emailed my findings and desire to be refunded the money to the seller. That is where it stands at the moment. I returned this morning and took photos of the corroded areas and sent them along to my diesel guru in North Carolina as well as to the kindly gentleman at Farymann whome I contacted about the engine earlier today. We shall see where this all goes. At the time the engine is in the garage sitting on wood blocks on the trolley. While feeling let down I have some degree of hope, if not for the engine and a possible repair, for our bank account and the refund it may soon see.
Later!

Sunny, Sunny Sunday in Napa County

Well with a week and one day to go before we fly to good ol' CDG in Paris we decided to take in the sights and flavors of Napa Valley. The drive thru Jamison Canyon, Highway 12 was easy and the intense green of a wet spring has colored every hill and dale with an emerald sheen. The yellow of mustard flowers blended with purple wildflowers by the acre. Amazing scene, a sight in California that is repeated over and over mile after mile everywhere you go this time of year. Makes me glad to have a home here and know how very fortunate we are t live here even if it is part time. In a blind-minded moment I forgot my little camera but with three of us it would have been an intrusion to stop the car for me to grab, yet again another shot of this tranquil and spectacular countryside. We stopped at the new Oxbow Market built near the river amidst Francis Ford Copola's buildings of COPIA, The American Center for Wine, Food, and the Arts that recently suspended operations. Too bad, a great idea and with, I thought, a monied backer who would support COPIA for a long time to come. I apparently was wrong. Anyway the market is running, if not full speed ahead at least nearly fully rented and well attended. Prices were, as expected and as we've seen before, NOT competitive with any other market anywhere,
high and higher. People stood with their hands in their pockets but little money or goods were exchanging. We ate at the wonderful Argentinian dining spot named Pica Pica Maize Kitchen, just superb! The Cachapas, a 100% sweet corn pancake, folded and filled with pulled pork was truely fabulous! We divided one by three to maintain a low financial profile which is the way of life in the US of A these dark days. A small salad with Papaya vinegarette was crunchy, sweet and lovely. Three smallish corn flour papusas each filled with either black beans, cheese or chicken, they were each delicious with a crusty exterior and a soft, flavorful interior. Amazing!
What a find!
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Then off to St. Helena further up the highway amid the acres upon acres of grape vines grown so carefully and tended beyond the possible under my care (that's for sure!). Money, money, money surrounds this entire region, huge wine cooperatives, French corporations, E & J Gallo, so many wineries belong to one or the other of these, all sold out for hard cash when the game was rich. Now...the wine glut is well known but the prices are still high, what are they thinking? On the way into The Valley (as it is known) there are HUGE, Refinery sized storage tanks on the hill above the highway...thousands upon thousands of Napa's finest lies therein...aging in-bulk as the glut continues. With the world financial situation the way it is it might be time to drain the swamp and start over. Sure.
St. Helena itself was good fun, the downtown area is all small shops, antiques, homewares, women's clothing stores, hardware and cooking supplies. An interesting walk, I did buy ONE thing, a fish spatula, very flexible under Mario Batalli's label...for pulling resistant bread for my cast iron dutch oven. I needed it Saturday night! The bread was stuck like I'd glued it and I had a terrible time getting it loose...and yes, I had buttered the pot and sprinkled corn meal on the bottom as well, still I had problems.
We returned to the car largely empty handed except for my spatula and Audrey's kitchen towels and wanderred off to a snack at a nearby drive-in "Taylor's" where the line to the window was 30 customers deep! Just good ol' American snack food, french fries, hamburgers, hot dogs, corn dogs, rootbeer floats and malts and shakes. The place is popular among locals and visitors alike.
We ordered mini-corn dogs with fries, a vanilla coke (fountain made) for Kelly, a rootbeer float for Aud and I had a Coke float. Terrific way to end the day! We drove back along the highway and turned left to cross the valley a short ways to the road known as Silverado Trail. We drove it along to the signs to Lake Berryessa and our home port of Fairfield/Suisun about a 1/2 hour away along the winding, forested road.

Pineapple Storms and New Tax

Yes the Rains in Spain are definitely raining on our plain! Days of the blanket has lent a decidedly wet aspect to our rather dry rainy season. Not a warm rain like many that come up from the tropics are (Pineapple Storms I call them). This one seems to extend way out into the Pacific and is a slow mover so it lasts and lasts though not in large amounts. It has managed to screw up my porch painting at the little house and wash my truck of the bird shit from the fine Red Tailed Hawk that has taken to nightly roosting in our Weeping Eucalyptus growing over the driveway.
He had done his/her own "painting" of my Ford pickup in the last two weeks. I can't wait for him/her to move on outa here so I can wash it off and it'll stay off.
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New Tax, I was just laying here thinking of the stupid government giving away all those TRILLIONS of dollars to the Wall Street minions and the banking ripoff industry here in these United States and thought...we need it to be personal, so you and I can get a few bucks to buy stuff and get this damned economy running again like it should, after all this is/was a CAPITALIST system and we simply must participate to make it work. We just need money, that's all...like the trillions of the publics money that the government is giving away to those worthless bastards.
So...no tax CUT will do what we want, never big enough, no rebate either...a thousand bucks is a drop in our need bucket...we need a constant source for all the little necessities of life, like gas, food, electricity, scotch, beer...those things that bring us old farts pleasure. So we don't get it from the government as they're too busy giving it away to CORPORATIONS (Worthless congress and that bastard 0ush started the flow), who is going to supply us then? Our KIDS!!! What a great way to pay us back for every breath they take...afterall...we BORE them or at least the female mother types did...we males were the sperm donors. I think there's a viable basis for a Kid Tax. Yes, they make it to 21 or some other age and from that month on for the rest of OUR lives they pay us some decent percentage of their net income which because it is after taxes (theirs) it will be tax free to us most deserving adult persons that bore them. Comments please...

Pea Soup! And Cinnamon Buns!

It's Baaaaack! The Fog. Thick, swirling viscous fog of the marsh and California Valley. The fog that kills. Boats collide, cars and trucks mix up metals and paint.
Terrible stuff this because here...life goes on with or without it. One must drive in California, it's a rule. Everything you want, job, careers, training, food, fast food (not real FOOD but simulated...quite popular) and that commodity that makes it all run...gasoline! Yes We Drive For Gas! So in fog as thick as this the traffic barely slows down except to glare at some other poor soul who has given up and is parked in the high speed lane eyes wide open (or shut!) in fear for his/her life! Then they get hit! So went the commute to wherever. Fog so bad that hundreds of cars enter the fray when some woe-be-gone changes lanes into the side of a passing big rig. Others, the other way is to take only 2 lane roads and avoid the high speed travails of the Interstate grid lock death race. That's even more hazardous!
Uncontrolled entrances from side streets, mom and pop stores, mini-malls, strip malls, malls! Deadly game this Fog Driving business. Avoid the driving and you sit home watching reruns of "Dr. Phil's House" where couples take IT out on their spouses and Others trapped by the good Doctor in this HOUSE somewhere in Hollywood (I expect). Or watch your cats sleep. Life is OVER in California without your ever so reliable car. It's the way-it-is.
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Then there's Cinnamon Buns To Die For:

These are for breakfast in Heaven...
Now...think of that regular ol' Lute whole Wheat Nut Loaf from a few blogs back...make it but w/o the oats in the beginning and hold the nuts for after the 1st rise. Use dough cycle of your machine, or do it by hand, I don't care.

Same recipe except:
ADD 1 Teaspoon Ground Cinnamon to the dough right in the beginning.
Now:
Mix thoroughly
1 Cup Brown Sugar
1 teaspoon Ground Cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon Nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon Cloves
2 TBSP (the big one) Butter or Margarine
1/2 cup chopped Pecans, chopped Walnuts (expensive these days), Pine Nuts,
Spanish Peanuts.
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The Glaze:
1 Cup Powdered Sugar
1/2 cup Whole Milk
2 Tablespoons Butter
1 Tablespoon Shortening or Margarine.
Heat this slowly in a small skillet til it just begins to boil, turn off.

At the end of the 1st full rise while the bread is still in the risen state,
poke a finger in it and knock it down...this is normally done by one of the
baker-helper angels but here on earth it's up to you. Don't punch it!
Never. never, never! Others are watching!
Now...after that rant...
Take your dough and place on a well floured surface. If God wanders by at
this moment because of the luscious smells...tell him it'll be a while,
he'll understand...maybe.
Roll and shape with a rolling pin to a large rectangle.
Sprinle the brown sugar mix over the entire surface.
Roll tightly into a long round loaf.
Cut 1" slices across the beauty and place in a well greased pan, skillet or
baking sheet.
Allow to rise til it doubles...45 min to an hour.
Bake at 350 for 40 minutes. Remove and brush on the glaze as you like it,
thick or thin.
Allow to cool...HA!
Tell the angels to "beat it"! This disaster is yours and you'll make more
for them later...share one with God. Or two if you're friendly.

The Quiet Before 2009

After Christmas...what? Currently the scene in the US is everyone has quit buying anything but food and gas to get to work. Christmas sales were a bust according to the newspapers and CNN and the Black Friday of two days ago came and went similarly.
The average American has no where to go but up now, as we live in DOWN. Kelly and I are working on the little house, putting it back to a decent condition in order to rent it again. We were going to move in it but that was nixed by our ever thoughful Audrey who said to us "How will you fit?" She was right of course, it has about 1000 sq, ft maximum and we live almost within the confines here in The Swamphouse of 2500 sq. ft. with furniture to match. What with storage fees for the excess and stuff we won't/can't/shouldn't sell there's no payoff that's positive that she could see and she's right. Thus we are hard at work scraping off layers of paint, patching nail holes and caulking tub and showers and sinks. Next comes painting of the woodwork and the walls to suit her...yes...Audrey wants to live in it! How the heck did this come about?! I dunno but that's the way it looks today. I think she'd really like it too, she'd be surrounded by our friends Jane and Wayne, Bob and Marsha and the denizen's of the Olde Town area such as they are. The date? 1 February, a bit over a month off. Meanwhile...work goes on.
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My bread was a hit wherever it found itself, people really liked the nuttiness and crunch of Lute's Nut and Whole Wheat Bread. I delivered 5 loaves on Christmas Eve and heard nothing but praise afterwards. Amazingly simple this bread for something that tastes so complex. Today I made an Oat Bread for our neighbors across the street and for Jane. The second one is in the bread machine now on dough cycle. It takes a couple of hours to go thruogh 2 rises and the kneading it requires before I can turn it out, shape it and pop it lovingly in a 5X9 tin for baking. It is good bread. I've ordered some high gluten bread flour online and will have that to experiment with someday real-soon-now.

A Site For Sore Eyes

Try this site for a bit of non-family style entertainment, a Real Time Side Show!
http://www.adamsblock.com/

What is THIS? Well friends it is LIVE video with sound from a certain neighborhood in SF. To say "seedy side of town" is not to cover how actually terrible a location it is. Avoid at all costs...even in your car! Carjackings, robberies and mayhem of all sorts emanate from this place. It has been this way as long as I have had an affiliation with the wonderful city of San Francisco, California and I don't see any change these days worthy of mention. The denizens of this section of the SF forest are in dire straits and thier various needs can cause great personal calamity to the general public. BEWARE! And be wary at the same time. To view this from afar is a GOOD thing. Up close it is tragic, frightening and otherworldly all at once. I used to venture into this "hood" now and again because of my line of work at the time, it is very near City Hall and there was a large computer center therein. Parking was always a hasstle, especially at night and it forced people off onto certain streets in that all so familiar hunt. I've had bottles, 1/2 filled, empty and full thrown at me, my truck and can hear the echos of the tinkling glass shards as it bounces off the sidewalk. A hell of a place. Whores of all sorts, some with fancy business cards with rates on the other side of the card frequent the stop lights and corners. Pimps ride around with the ever loud Thumpa, thumpa, thump from their over speakered back seats. Bums ly idle on the sidewalks day and night, some with tins out to collect thier hard won alms, others just sleep it off. Broken glass, old newspapers, 1/2 drank beer bottles...a real San Francisco Post Card that you will never see in the shops in Union Square or Pier 39. This is The Underbelly.
See any police cars? Wait...and watch.

The Dredges Are Coming! The Dredges Are Coming!

Yes they...rather IT is. Soon to a cul-de-sac near you...really near us, our cul-de-sac of water and mud and birds and docks is to be dredged sometime between now and the weekend. The dredge and a mile of pipe behind it is roaring away a watery cul-de-sac away from ours back towards Pierce Island where the dredge tailings are being pumped onto. What a project this is, this time is our third since first being dredged some 12 years ago, seems like yesterday. You see whomever dreamed up these 43 homes on this island-become-peninsula had no plan to keep the water feature created by their fine earthworks from becoming clogged with the inevitable silt from a creek that flows into the bay nearby. That was in 1978 or so, the same year most of these houses were built in the Marina district of Suisun City. Of course, the silt came and by the time we bought this place in 1988, some 20 years ago, the water that makes up it's backyard was ever so much shallower (is that a word? Well you know what I mean) than it started out to be some 10 years before. We enjoyed it then too as the herons, egrets, ducks, geese, sandpipers all came at low tide to fish and gambol at the tide line twice a day. It was quite a sight. High water then was a barely adequate for boats of 3 feet (1 meter) or so. At this same time (1988 fall) our fair city began to contemplate a huge renewal project that would encompass not only many features of the buildings of our little gem of a city but also its watery front step in Suisun Slough.

Because our subdivision (The Marina District) was on private property (the 43 home owners) we had to convince the City of Suisun of the necessity of dredging our backyards when they dredged their waters. Kelly and a neighbor, Jim took on the many interested agencies, the EPA, The Army Corps of Engineers, The State Lands Commission, The Bay Conservation and Development Commission et al. It took them literally YEARS to obtain all the necessary permissions and then there was the ongoing difficulty of keeping Suisun's own government interested in our plight as well. Needless to say Kelly and Jim were a force to reckon with, the timing was set and the first dredging took place in the fall of 1996. There was a second dredging 6 years ago that further cleaned out the cul-de-sacs of the accumulations and now, once agian it is underway and about to do ours. Here's Suisun's Home Page:
http://www.ci.suisun-city.ca.us/About/Profile/CommunityProfile.html

Thanksgiving 2008 In The Hills

Thanksgiving was a wonderful experience all around. We got up (thanks to Audrey for the multiple wake up calls) at 6am Thursday morning and showered and dressed for our trip south to the ranch. Audrey showed up about 7:00am and we packed the car, drank a copious quantity of coffee and headed for the hills. The fog was rather thick between Suisun and the 5 freeway some 30 miles east of here which slowed our progress a bit. Once on I5 We headed south in rather light traffic at a quite decent clip and l'viola the fog cleared by 8:30 and we jetted along towards the turnoff to Merced to visit hospital bound Uncle Jack. We arrived exactly at the right hour, 10 am, and spent about an hour chatting among the gathered relatives (Kelly's cousins) and Uncle Jack, now 94, presided over the event. He was charming and friendly as ever and always had a twinkle and a jokester's mood in his speech. He's Kelly's uncle on the Lixwiler side of the family. Afterwards we fell in line driving eastward out of Merced towards the Sierra foothills to J&A's stone house in the hills. The road going up was the MOST potholed, damaged, flooded out disaster of a road I've ever driven on for so long a time. 10 mph was a good rate but I sped to 25 occasionally to test both the shock absorbers and my tooth fillings. The countryside was gorgeous. the grasses green and the cattle shiny black, and the dark green almost black live oak trees dotted the landscape high and low.
It took about an hour to make the 18 mile drive to the entrance to the ranch. The gate was open and we drove through onto a smooth dirt road with about 2 miles to go to get to the house itself. The lake was very low with a huge blue heron fishing from the shallows. The usual gathering at the cars commenced, happy chatter and questions ensued and I realized we hadn't been there in 10 years. We all gathered inside the house and had a substantial lunch of clam chowder in rustic french bread bowls, delicious and very, very filling! Burp! After lunch, not to rest and prepare for the dinner to come some 6 hours later we "took a little walk".
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Out of the ranch house into the meandering cattle trails and access roads of the 6000 acre property we went like a herd of turtles. Up and down the hilly and sometimes muddy track we went ogling at the trees, rocks and magnificent scenery of the ranch. Down the hill to the tuolumne river. Audrey and I broke off from the rest and spent time together photographing the environs, finding much to see and she laughed out loud at my throwing of large rocks down the gully into the water below. Overland to see some miner's stone cabins built in the 1840's when there was gold in these hills to be had for lots of back breaking and sometimes thankless as well as worthless work. We climbed up the hill to the dense oak forest and the grinding rocks used by the Indians, long since gone, for grinding acorns for food.




We crossed another creek and climbed yet another hill to spy a distant lake and watch the hawks circling overhead. We came upon a carcass of a recently dead cow, maybe killed by a broken leg or some other misstep of fortune, now a meal for a family of large buzzards it's bloody rib cage splayed out before us. Back along the fence line of which there are many to divide the property so cattle cannot wander everywhere unchecked, we came finally to the house about 2 hours after we left having walked a distance that felt like 10 miles but was actually about 3. A good hike, my hips complained but we sat in the living room of the stone mansion and drank beers and whiskey and filled the rest of the afternoon with happy family chatter. About 6 we all sat down to a wonderful meal of Turkey, mashed potatoes, Waldorf salad, peas and onions in a mini-pumpkin, a swell white wine, rolls and butter, a lovely green salad. We ate like kings! What a feast! We all spoke of dinners past, other family gatherings and the future of our dear beloved United States amidst this financial disaster.
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7 trillion dollars now in bailout monies...what? 7,000,000,000,000 is the number but what does it mean? That is a subject for another time I'm sure but not now. If I've forgotten some zeros, I apologize, it's easy to do with numbers like these!
10 to the 12th Power
(1 000 000 000 000; 10004; short scale: one trillion; long scale: one billion)
ISO: tera- (T)
BioMed — Bacteria on the human body: the surface of the human body houses roughly 1012 bacteria.[1]
Mathematics: 1.1×1012 - The approximate number of known non-trivial zeros of Riemann zeta function as of August 2005[update].[4]
Mathematics — Known digits of pi: As of 2002, the number of known digits of pi was 1 241 100 000 000.
Marine biology: 3,500,000,000,000 - estimated population of fish in the ocean.
BioMed — Cells in the human body: the human body consists of roughly 1014 cells, of which only 1013 are human.[2][3] The remainder of the cells are bacteria, which mostly reside in the gastrointestinal tract, although the skin is also covered in bacteria.
Computing - MAC-48: 281,474,976,710,656 (248) possible unique physical addresses.
Mathematics: 953,467,954,114,363 is the largest known Motzkin prime.
Computing — magnetic storage: 1TB largest 3.5inch hard disk as of 2007.

Life in The Center of France...NOT!

I'm missing my friends in France, the comaraderie, laughs, concerns and, of course the random gossip. We said "two weeks" when we left, smiling and waving at A&R at the train station as we pulled out like a scene from an old movie. Then once back in warm, golden California (it's the weeds that are baked golden folks!) France faded into a lovely memory of warm afternoons with friends over a local wine, our ex-pat studded dinner parties and drives to the weekend brocantes (junk sales). Even now though if I open my Picassa application and see the France label my tale wags. Open an image and stare at it like a kid at a candy store window. Oh the flowers, the green hills, the forests, the old men and their loaves of warm bread, the old women brooming off their front steps. I'm here but part of me is there. I now spend some minutes every day looking up fares from San Francisco to good ol' CDG hoping for the oh-so-rare bargain fare. No luck yet. A return date is hard to pin down now too as we have decided that we will move into the Little House at 907 Suisun Street when the current tenant vacates which will be who-knows-when-though-we-are-trying. That last mouthful is because the lovely tenant failed to pay any rent this month (was due on the 1st and now it's the 20th) and we gave her a 3 day notice last week to pay rent or quit...that's what it's called here to no particular avail.
Actually we enlisted the services of a lawyer to do the job for us at a cost of about 1 months rent, so now we are poorer by 2 months rent. They presented her with a Unlawful Detainer summons tocourt on Tuesday which gives her 5 days to answer to the court in person before they hail the Sherrif (not of Nottingham but of Solano)
to evict her and her wares from our new living place. Complicated isn't it? It's really terrible, I don't know what has gone wrong with her life but something obviously but she never answerred our phone calls or pleaded anything to us in mercy of her situation so we did what we have done. I don't like it, she's been in the place and taken good care of it inside with new paint and repairs as she went along these last six years. I balked at first at the action but now...it's done and I'm getting excited to move in and fix up the ancient old place! We LOVE projects! It will be one that's for sure. Unlawful Detainer...hmmmmmm.
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Oh...cool new site feature: http://kukuklok.com/ an online alarm clock for all you that keep your machine on 24/7. Simple to use, set the wake up time, choose which alarm you want...cock, clock, electronic or metal guitar and as long as the bloody machine doesn't belly up or the electricity fails you will have an ontime alarming experience. Lute says 4 Stars for this simple but very cool and useful net app!

The Stoveman Commeth...

Ding-Dong! Off she goes! I jolt out of a deep sleep coverred by No-Lean as a blanket. Cat scratches, a complaining Maaa! she screams and I'm jogging to the front door. Who the hell is here at 8 am sharp?! It's barely light...it's the A&G mechanic to fix my ailing Whirlpool oven...great! I show him to her and tell him of my own troubleshooting, "an ignitor, I think", he nods and gets to work and I slunk back to the office/bedroom where I live my lonely nighttime life these days...snoring you know...disturbs the sleep of my ever faithful but easily disturbed mate Kelly. Sometime later he calls for me..."It's the ignitor alright, parts and installation will be 422 dollars", I nod and agree, it's high but what are you going to do? Can't replace it for 422 dollars and go thru all that work besides, I need it now I have 4 guests for Mexican dinner tomorrow night that Audrey and I are cooking up, I need my stove! Besides the US Govt has seen fit to send me 1200 USD in a tax rebate scheme that I'm supposed to spend to buy 42 inch HDTV's and such, looks like it'l pay for this stove repair instead and buy a smaller screen, good for the repair business, bad for Best Buy. He calls, finds the part, now can't get the dead ignitor to give up it's place in the back of the oven because it's retaining screws are stuck. Damn. I skulk back to my computer and keep writing.
The weather today you are thinmking? Oh it's Sunny California, windy, cold and raining, what else? I look at the forecast, samo-samo thru the weekend. Brrrrrrr.
Dead oven, bah humbug!

Winter in Sunny California...HA!

Sunny where? All it does is rain and blow and cloud over and it feels like my Brit friends say THIER winter is like. Brrrrrrrr is the word most often heard around here. Of course we could have it warmer IF we turned the bloody thermostat up to some reasonable warm temperature like 20C, but nooooo it's expensive so we suffer along shivering at 16! Brrrrrrr. The cats are handy tho, they lie about warming this place and that to a nice temp, they lay with us when we sleep like furry, purring blankets. They along with thermal underwear are the answer at bedtime when the maiden of the house drops the temp to the nightime temp of 10C! Brrrrrrr and Brrrrrrr. Even the cats are rebelling. The forecast this week is for drizzle, rain and highs of 5C! Brrrrrr! THAT for the next while...over the weekend for sure. California sun...not here! We DID venture south to attend a mosquito abatement conference in Palm Springs! Warm at last, warm at last, thank god almighty we're warm at last! 4 days in the sunny blue skies of that other place...Southern California. Nice. Then we drove to Hollywood and attended a Dr. Phil show, very much fun and with my loud clapping and yelling attracted a FREE Dr. Phil book! We had a wonderful weeklong trip then returned last Friday to our little cloudy cold world. Alas.