Rainsong Redux

We went back to Rainsong winery to sample wines, visit with friends, enjoy potluck, and to bottle a barrel of red, this year a generic combination of merlot, cabernet, and pinot noir.  The weather was in the last throes of summer: clear sky, warm, a lovely day, perfect for a drive and a party.  We arrived about noon.

The vintner, Mike, had already unplugged the barrel and draped a Tygon tube to the filling trough.

After most of the crew had arrived, Mike told us again about the procedure, and pointed out the pressing barrels, which have bladders in their centers that squeeze grapes against the sides for a more efficient result than bottom squeezing, as screw presses do.

So much for barefoot virgins.  In short supply anyway, here, given our ages generally.

We gathered in position, and the wine started flowing.

Filling bottles.

Corking.

Labeling.

Martha Lewis designed the labels.

Twenty-five cases later, potluck.

The wine is a little rough to start but if you let it air out, it improves greatly.  Like a lot of us.

Western Shade

In 1977, I dug a whorl of five cottonwoods from my Oak Street place and planted them at the southwest corner of the house on Park, planning on having shade in a few years.  As they grew, I got the shade I wanted.  I liked the way they reminded me of the cottonwoods in the dry washes of Western Colorado I once hiked.  I liked the shower of cotton each spring, some days as thick as a snow storm.  I liked the afternoon shade in the summer and the light through the bare branches in winter.

I wasn't too fond of the way sprouts kept shooting up all over the lawn, but I managed to keep ahead of them.  As the five original grew, I cut them too, one at a time, when they spread over the house or started leaning too far.  But the last one kind of got away from me, reaching some 60 feet tall.  As it leaned away from the house over the orchard, I wasn't too concerned.  Finally, however, I started worrying about what damage the roots might do to the house foundation if the tree fell, and as it was bigger than I thought I could safely deal with, I arranged to have it removed.

On August 7, about 8 in the morning, Tim of Tim's Tree Service called to say his crew would be there in about 15 minutes.  They were, with a rubber tracked high lift which they walked into the drive and set up.

With it, the cutter started at the bottom and worked his way up.

Two hours later, the last cottonwood was a pile of leaves and branches.

Not one branch had hit the roof.

The final step was cutting the trunk.

Then they left.  For $1,100 more, they would have chipped and cleaned and for an additional $200, grind out the stump, but for that money I figured I could move the remains to the fence along the back pasture now lined with blackberry vines.  I hooked the three-wheeler to the utility trailer and stared cutting and hauling.

I have plans for the trunk.  More later.

Spring 2014

Spring is off and on as usual, some days sunny and warm, others windy and rain but however changeable the weather, it is still fine to be out.  The apple tree over the dog run bloomed nicely,

and bees showed up despite the news about hive collapse.

Cherry blossomed. Pussy willow came and went.  Deer ate the tulips, left nothing but stems. Daffodils sprang up in the old apple orchard next to the house.

The mallard pair returned and scarfed down cob I scatter

and the geese don't seem to mind.

They spend more time fussing at me than at the ducks.

The chickens have started laying again.  A nice day's haul is five or six eggs from the eight hens.  They are getting old, three or four years, so occasionally produce a freak, extra small or large.

The Anna's Hummingbirds drain their feeder every couple of days and mostly ignore me and the camera but catching the male showing off his plumage is a tricky coup─a play of light and angle.

Usually all the camera catches is the dark side, but one day I caught him flicking his tongue, even rarer than catching color.

Not exactly part of the local scene, flowers at Pike Street Market are particularly lovely this time of year.

Locally, camas are back.

While out feeding, I discovered deer at the end of the back pasture, first one,

then another, five in all.

And then there's Bugsy the porch kitty, a year-round delight, looking for his lunch: "Feed me!  Feed me now!  Please?"

Blood Moon

April 14, an eclipse of the moon would be visible on the West Coast if clouds stayed out to sea.  In 2013, Texas televangelist John Hagee published a book that called this eclipse the "Blood Moon."  Hagee stated that it was prophesied in Acts 2:19-20 "...the sun shall be turned into darkness and the moon into blood," a sign, Hagee felt, of "End Times."  (Earlier he claimed Katrina was God's punishment for America's sinful ways.)  Before his book, the term "Blood Moon" was an alternate name for October's "Hunter's Moon."  However, television commentators picked up Hagee's name and the hype was on.

I went into the backyard about 10 and set the big Leica on a tripod and snapped the first photo.  Clouds surrounded the moon but for the moment it was clear with no sign of penumbra or blood.

At 11, I went out again.  The show was beginning.  At about 11:30, light from the moon was cut enough that the star Spica was visible.

So began the first of a tetrad─four consecutive lunar eclipses at approximately six-month intervals with no partial eclipses in between.  In the years 2001-2100, there will be eight tetrads.  From the first century CE through the 21st, there have been only 62.  The last one occurred in 2003-2004, and the next will be in 2032-2033.  In the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries, there were none at all.

At about midnight, the moon started turning reddish, but hardly blood red.  At about 12:05, the hype seemed inadequate.

The next show will be in October.

Seattle Redux

Hard to imagine it's been a year since we attended the last Pac-12 Women's Basketball Tournament, but here we were again, on the train to Seattle, 6 a.m., arrived King Street station about 12:15, walked to F.X.McRory's for their oyster sample platter in the bar, a whiskey lover's dream,

then a taxi ride to the Mediterranean Inn in the Lower Queen Anne neighborhood to meet with other Beavers.

Breakfast next morning was at Lowell's in Pike Place Market, always a joy, corn beef hash, eggs, and coffee with a fine view of Elliot Bay.

The most interesting sight was a lone monk fish; flowers, food, antiques, crafts, tourists, smells and sounds could keep one there all day.

Instead, we walked to the Seattle Art Museum where we found the same introductory installation as last year--not sure what to think of a series of hanging cars pierced with flashing Christmas lights.

We went, however, to see the featured exhibit of Joan Miró from the Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofia, Madrid: 50 paintings, drawings, and sculptures created between 1963 and 1981.

Miró takes a little getting used to, but I believe I would be less likely to grow bored with his work than with much representational material, especially his women.

We also revisited the extensive ethnographic collection: African, Pacific lands, and Northwest Native material.

The first evening, we ate at Elliot Bay Oyster house, starting, of course, with a dozen Olympias, then moving to other scrumptious sea food.

Yum.

We attended Key Arena,

where OSU women dominated--until the championship game.

Sadness.

We saw on the news that a construction crew had dug a mastodon tusk which was displayed at the Burke but when we got there it had already been removed for conservation.  The Burke claims to have the fifth largest collection in the U.S. of Northwest Native art but you couldn't prove it by us.  Striking, however, was a roof decoration from the turn of the 19th century--gathered along with other artifacts by a group of Seattle businessmen when the village men were gone on a summer hunt: a century later it is "on loan" with permission of the village, to be returned some time soon.

Most surprising  was the Chihuly Garden and Glass exhibit in Seattle Center, practically under the Space Needle.  Dale Chihuly (born 1941, Tacoma, Washington) has glass sculpture in more than 200 museums and has been awarded eleven honorary doctorates and two fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts.

We walked through the entire display, then walked through it a second time.  Each installation invited viewing from all around.  I think my favorite was the Northwest room with Edward S. Curtis photogravures, Northwest Coast Indian baskets, and American Indian trade blankets as counterpoint to his glass creations.  The explanatory text stated that Chihuly's discovery of the natural slumping over time of old baskets freed him from symmetrical dictates.

Another favorite was the Macchia Forest exhibit, a collection of multi-colored bowls up to four feet in diameter.

The exhibit continued through several rooms, all filled with fascinating multi-colored collections,

and then extended into a green house filled with giant glass flowers and thence outdoors where glass constructs vied with real flowers and the winter rain.

Then Monday to the King Street Station, the Amtrak Cascade, and a pleasant ride home.

A memorable visit.