Eight Things Learned in July

Most of these fall under the category of Cowboy Logic, but it is fun to learn and see them in action.

  1. When diverting flowing water from a trail, go to the highest point of trouble first; then look for the first best place to send it down to its correct channel. 
  2. When repairing a sinkhole in a road, put boulders in first and fit them together as close as possible; keep adding rocks of progressively smaller sizes, and put the dirt in last. Also, be sure to have a backhoe and an operator handy.
  3. Baby peregrine falcons could get blown out of their nests by the concussion if you explode a boulder nearby. But the real reason for not using explosives near a nest is that drilling the rock is the most upsetting sound to them.
  4. This Irish saying tickled my funnybone: “May those that love us, love us, and for those that don’t love us, may God turn their hearts, and if he can’t turn their hearts, may he turn their ankles so we know them by their limping.”
  5. Ever heard of a “tulipiere“? A friend told me about them. They are special vases, invented in Holland in the 1600s for holding tulips, which were considered expensive status symbols. (The tulips, not the vases). It is pronounced, er, never mind. Can’t write it correctly.
  6. When your radiator disintegrates, it is best to not be on a steep road on a hot day, but if the road is closed, everyone who shows up will be a friend. (No photos of Fernando disabled on the side of the road nor as he was being towed away; he is repaired now.) 
  7. Every heard of “24 7 Day”? It is July 24, which is 7/24 or flipped, 24-7. This has been turned into a day of appreciation for first responders, and many stop-and-rob stores honor people that day who have badges or are wearing uniforms of first responders. (“honor”– maybe they get free coffee)
  8. When you have a skittish cat with a booboo (nope, not showing a photo of Tucker with a fat face) who cannot be captured in a carrier or a box, it is good to find a traveling veterinarian and to have a large bank balance. (THANK YOU, DR. McCONE, 559-942-1101)

Thus we conclude a month of some difficult circumstances, new experiences, and random pieces of trivial information, (but no talk of hiking in Mineral King when it is closed to the public.)

P.S. Anyone know of a Honda or Toyota (no Civics, Elements, or Tercels) for sale with less than 100,000 miles and a manual transmission?? I am ready.

Just Thinking… and Getting a New Idea

 

 

(Not my front porch)

While at the cabin for a short week I did some thinking about the blog. After fifteen years of continual posting, it is hard to shut down the ideas. It is hard to think about just stopping. It is hard to have ideas that would be rude to share, since Mineral King isn’t open to the public this summer.

Many ideas were flying around my overactive mind: nope, not that; nope, not that one either; nope, better not write that. (“Nope” is the opposite of “yeppers” in my peculiar vernacular.)

Then it came to me that I could write a series about cabin life. I have a lot of experience and thoughts about cabin communities and living simply in a cabin in the mountains. Maybe you, O Gentle Reader (doesn’t that sound quaint?), would be interested in an inside look?

I wouldn’t be talking about the trails, the water, the flowers, the quiet, the beauty, although that would slip in simply due to the location. The goal would be to show you what in the world we do with our time “up the hill”, as almost all people in almost all mountain communities refer to their cabin places.

The posts won’t be five days a week, because there is no internet, electricity, cell service, or even a reliable landline available where I will be spending a great deal of time. If you comment, it might be a few days before I “approve” the comment so that it shows. But at least you’d know I haven’t quit blogging, and you might enjoy a new topic.

Pressing Pause

 

This photo is from May of 2022.

Mineral King is closed to the public this year. The Silver City Resort will not be accessible. Cabin folks are strongly discouraged from going up the hill.

NOTHING can stop Trail Guy and I from going up the hill to our cabin.

This poses a question: is it wrong to post photos of and chit-chat about a place that people aren’t allowed to go?

I don’t know how to handle this.

In addition, I seem to have accidentally retired. Actually, I don’t want to be retired, so let’s say I am on a sabbatical. I think this means a paid break for the purposes of learning new skills or doing research. However, I don’t earn if I am not working, and I am not researching anything, so “sabbatical” might also be the wrong description. I simply don’t have work right now, an odd situation that I have never encountered in all my years of self-employment as a Central California artist.

I need time to think, and I welcome your thoughts on this odd situation. Meanwhile, I will be pressing pause on my blog for an undetermined amount of time as I examine what might and might not be the appropriate method of blogging about this current phase of life as your Central California artist (and Mineral King reporter).

 

Eight New Things Learned in June

 

  1. Mulberries are SWEET. Some friends brought a bowl to church to share, and they were so sweet that my teeth almost started humming.
  2. A gabion basket is a wire mesh cube, perhaps 4x4x4 feet. It gets filled with rocks, and then it serves as a solid piece to built up a road bed or shoulder.
  3. A Foley fork, also called granny fork or a blending fork (because “Foley” is a brand name) is an old-fashioned kitchen tool that some people just cannot be without. There is interesting info about it on this website, called The Baking Wizard. (Nope, I don’t want one—simply found it interesting.)
  4. There is an entire subculture of foragers, with a website called “Falling Fruit“, which maps where there is free stuff for the picking all over the world! The Central Valley’s flyover status is confirmed in that although we feed the world, we do not appear on that map (unless it gets greatly enlarged and you locate an orange or fig tree overlapping a sidewalk in Fresno). I love to glean walnuts and citrus from friends’ groves, have occasionally picked Miner’s Lettuce to add to salads, wished to find the wild berries along the Mineral King Road (but never stopped to look), picked elderberries for jelly, and never hesitated to ask someone with a pomegranate tree if they had extra. Foraging in public spaces in a city sounds very bold.
  5. The price of flat screen televisions has dropped significantly. However, there is catch: you have to pay someone techie to hook it up and teach you how to operate it. (If it was up to me, I would not own one.) Furthermore, there is no way to get rid of “non-smart” teevees. No one wants or needs them, even if they work. (The cable company said it was the teevee, but it turned out to be their cable box that got fried in the 2 power outages and restarts.)
  6. A friend who participates in 12-step programs told me about a list of questions for consideration that she received in one of her meetings. The question that grabbed my attention is one that we all need to ask ourselves in many situations: Why am I talking? (I once heard Rush say “Before you pick up your phone and dial this show, ask yourself the question ‘Does anyone care?'”)
  7. There is a monastery in Dubuque, Iowa, where the monks make caskets. This sounds like a weird thing to learn, but the caskets are beautiful. They provide free caskets to people who have lost a child, and they do not accept orders online, only over the phone. They are called “Trappist Caskets“. I hope none of you need this information anytime soon, but it is an undeniable truth of life that none of us will leave this planet alive (unless Jesus raptures us outta here.)
  8. Have you ever heard of terramation? This is a new alternative to cremation also called “human composting, a process whereby your body is turned into compost and then spread in your garden. It is legal in five states and you can read about it here.

Well. Alrighty then. Ahem. This had a bit too much morbidity. What does it mean? 

Why am I talking?? 

Over and out.

Hume Lake Annual Reunion

My sixth annual friend reunion at Hume Lake was a week or two ago (time flies). It was a little odd to go to someone else’s  cabin before spending time at my own. It was also the first time we didn’t rent some sort of watercraft, and the first time I actually wore long pants. Summer has been slow in arriving this year in the Sierra Nevada.

The Generals Highway is closed, but I normally don’t go that way. I went my usual route of Dry Creek Road to 245 to Hogback to 245 to 180. This is one of the iconic scenes along the classic foothill road of Dry Creek.

The Park entrance station was very backed up, because going through Kings Canyon is the only route open to Sequoia.

Then I went through Grant Grove and turned toward Hume Lake at the Princess campground by the closed Cedar Grove road. Too bad, because it would be a terrific year to see the big water in the Kings River on the road to Cedar Grove.

Walking around the lake is a tradition. We have always thought it was a 3 mile walk, but the phones (so smart, eh?) tell us 2.5 miles. Ten-mile Creek was roaring as we crossed it on the footbridge. (Incidentally, the road called “Ten-mile” is only 9 miles.)

We got caught in rain walking around the lake the first day.

The dam release was roaring.

The grounds at Hume’s conference center are beautifully landscaped. I flipped over these columbine. We saw a few deer but only away from the main activity areas. People the area get all excited about seeing deer; I try to keep my disgust for the flower-consumers to myself. (Jumped up to respray some geraniums while typing this at home.)

There was a ton of snow on the distant peaks. Hume Lake gets me geographically confused, because it drains to the east.

Here is Ten-mile Creek in sunshine, still rip-roaring along.

Someone got creative with a downed tree below the dam. This walk was after it rained hard so the water is coming over the spillway in addition to the normal release pipes (channels? culverts? tubes?).

Every year I count on seeing wild iris around the lake. There were zillions in the meadow by the Princess campground, but no place to pull over and be a looky-loo.

We took a “back-stage” tour at Hume, where we got an in depth look at the inner workings. The place is self-contained like a city, with its own charter school (under Fresno Unified School District), auto shop, metal fabrication shop, sewage treatment, and fire department. They didn’t disclose the source of their water or discuss garbage, and I was a little short on time because I had to hustle down the hill to teach drawing lessons.

They showed us the ropes course, where apparently there are quite a few come-to-Jesus moments. (I already came to Jesus, so won’t be testing my faith on any of this stuff).

I learned that they bought their own coffee roasting equipment and in 9 months it paid for itself in savings. (I didn’t try any of their coffee because we were self-contained in my friend’s cabin). This is a photo of one of the dining halls. I was gobsmacked, since I served in the former building as the hostess of the dining room in 1978. That building burned down, and this huge elegant multipurpose structure has replaced the one I knew.

Besides walking the lake, there was a craft project. I observed and appreciated the results, but the method doesn’t work on Crocs, so I knitted instead.

The morning I left, it was brilliant, just fabulously brilliant.

This is Ten-mile Creek from the bridge. The Google told me that Ten-mile road was the quickest way to Exeter, along with the same roads I used to get to Hume, but coming down 245 into Woodlake rather than Dry Creek. Such a beautiful drive, if one has air conditioning. Fernando’s A/C still works—thanks for your concern.

If you came here for Mineral King news and are disappointed, you can check the Mineral King website to see if anything new has been posted.

 

More thinking

There isn’t much to report on the Mineral King Road. Work is in progress, but there are People in Charge Who Make Important Decisions, and we are the little people not in charge, awaiting those decisions.

Meanwhile, I am in a holding pattern. Do I continue to draw and paint, without places to sell, building up a large body of work? Or do I just go pull more weeds? 

There is a show coming, but it is a Long Way Off (that’s how I am thinking of the show, capitalized, titled “Long Way Off”). I have been thinking, planning, digging through photos, wondering if there is a way to rework unsold pieces, or if I should just paint over the top, wondering if there are too many repetitious subjects, wondering if I am clever and creative enough to paint new subjects that people might want, or if I am clever and creative enough to jazz up the unsold pieces for Long Way Off.

In order to decide what to paint, I chose the subjects, then looked through my existing paintings to see what sizes were already done. I went through my numerous files of photos, and chose ones that stood out. I don’t know why they stood out, but I just went with my gut instinct. 

The categories are ag, the lake, the river, hills, Mineral King, Sequoia, trees, Hume Lake, Balch Park, Yokohl, and of course, citrus with foothills and mountains. In other words, everything I love about Tulare County (plus Hume Lake in Fresno County). In more other words, places I frequent, not too far away, close and close-ish to home, places I know.

There is plenty of time to figure this out. For all I know, the Long Way Off show might decide that I am passé, a has-been, and cancel the show.

I am not worried, simply curious about what might be next for my ever-changing art business.

Now I think I’ll go pull some more weeds.

Drawing and Thinking

The business of art is fickle, always changing. An artist can just make whatever she feels like making and hope it sells. However, if an artist wants to earn a living, she needs to pay attention to the ever-changing world of what people want, what they can afford. She also needs to pay attention to selling opportunities, another ever-changing set of circumstances.

For a handful of years, there have been three places that sell steadily for me. One was next to a popular restaurant, which has now closed, diminishing foot traffic by the gallery. Another is a seasonal store in the mountains, and it most likely will be unable to open this year due to a ruined road. The third is in a building which recently changed hands, the lease will expire so things will go month-to-month, and with Sequoia National Park being closed so long, the traffic in town has diminished tremendously.

This may or may not be connected, but I have no commissions.

The murals which I thought were in the bag have fallen into indecision on the part of the customers.

So, I am drawing simply because I want to.

I will continue to think, and continue to share my thoughts.

Dangerous and Expensive Gardening

This is a bit incomprehensible to me, but I paid for dirt. PAID. MONEY.

After spending some time with my amazing gardener friend, I learned so much. I have dirt; she has SOIL. We live a mile apart, but our gardening quality is about 1000 miles apart. So, I learned about her SOIL: it is called “nitro mulch” and it costs $50/cubic yard. The nursery delivers for a fee, so I bought some.

She also taught me about something called Milorganite. It is a slow release fertilizer. I bought some of it too.

Finally, she taught me about something called Deer Out, a concentrate that you mix with water and spray on everything that deer might eat. It isn’t poisonous, it is water repellent, and the deer hate it.

I spend a morning pruning, weeding, transplanting, fertilizing, and spreading mulch, because THIS WILL FINALLY BE THE YEAR AT LEAST PART OF MY YARD LOOKS GOOD FOR LONGER THAN THE 15 MINUTES OF SPRINGTIME!

Excuse me for shouting. I am pretty excited about the possibility of keeping flowers blooming.

When I was finished and gathering my tools, I heard a sprinkler. We don’t have sprinklers that sound like that. I followed my ears and found Pippin far too interested in a shrub that sounded as if there was a sprinkler inside of it. 

Trail Guy was off being Road Guy (working on the Mineral King road, more to follow in another blog post when I actually have something to report). I called my neighbor, who has killed many rattlesnakes for me.

This rattlesnake was far far under a compact shrub THAT WAS IN FULL BLOOM. Neighbor had to do a fair amount of hacking to even be able to see the buzzworm. I kept the cats away, and hung around in case my help was needed. At one point I used a pitchfork to pry the shrub up so that Neighbor could reach in with a shovel and drag the beast out where he could finish the job.

A friend texted me a photo of a rattler he encountered on a recent hike. I texted him back that Neighbor had just sent one from my yard to hell. The friend replied that snakes don’t go to hell because they lack souls; instead, they are from hell. 

I’d rather have a hacked up shrub than a living snake. 

Gives me the shivers thinking about it. Let’s just calm our nerves with some photos of the better parts of that dangerous and expensive hobby of gardening, shall we?

Tucker wasn’t around for the snake action. Jackson was, and I had to shout him away from it. The cats are excellent about letting us know when there are snakes, but then we have to be excellent at keeping them away. 

Some day I may have to do my own dispatching of snakes. This one took extraordinary skill, strength and determination, and if it wasn’t for Neighbor, I just don’t know what I would have done.

 

Six Garden Meanderings

 

Apparently I haven’t gone back to work yet. But I am throughly enjoying late springtime in Three Rivers.

  1. I looked up online why garlic bulbs grow too small and the reasons are legion. Planting too close together, too early, too late, too shallow, too deep, beginning with small cloves, not weeding enough, and the most likely: poor soil.
  2. The roses are getting tired.
  3. The bugs are eating the basil in some places and not in others. Good thing someone taught me about rooting cuttings in water so I haven’t completely wasted my money buying these plants.
  4. I am determined to get these cuttings of myoporum rooted so I can plant this hardy groundcover in a rough area of our church grounds.
  5. You are curious about the porch plants that showed up with the cats last week? They are called “Queen’s Tears”.
  6. This is the pile of rocks that I helped move the other day. Maybe I’ll go back to work soon.