First Storm of the Season

When my Christmas Cactus blooms I know we can expect the beginning of the storm season.

Last night we went out to dinner on the mainland. When we came out of the restaurant it was sunny, although we could see storm clouds to the south, the direction from which most storms hit the island.

Sure enough, by the time we got home 30 minutes later we found ourselves right in the middle of a strong windstorm. There were fir needles & branches all over the road, & in one section the fire department was diverting traffic & cleaning up a tree that had gone down.

We were about a mile from our house by then, & it was getting dark when we noticed none of the houses had lights. That always means we'll be out, since our neighborhood electricity is always the first to go out as well as the last to go on.When I checked with PUD (our Public Utilities District) their phone recording said 51 people were out.

We keep a latern & oil lamps in the dining room within easy reach, so I read by oil lamp for awhile then decided to go to bed. We didn't get power until 5:30 the next morning.

When we ask PUD officials why we're always the ones to go out they never have any other explanation than "there's lots of trees". Well, there's lots of trees all over the island & when we look across the sound there's lots of trees on that island too & they rarely go out. This winter I'm keeping a close count on days we're out & then raise some stink about it.

Giving Up On Composting

Yesterday I helped load my composter into another woman's van & saw it disappear up the driveway. From now on I order commercially prepared compost--delivered.

One of the "rural" lifestyle habits I adopted when we moved here was composting. Our soil is glacial till & needs massive amounts of amendments to get anything to grow. Since I have massive amounts of spent perennials every fall their logical use is as compost. First I tried just piling it up in an unobtrusive corner of our property, but of course that didn't work since, as I subsequently learned, compost must be turned, watered & nurtured with the right mixture of ingredients. I had to have a professional type composter.

Pouring through catalogues I found a drum type that you put yard waste, etc. into & then hand cranked to turn & mix it. It came in a narrow rectangular box & I laboriously put it together all by myself. David just shook his head. We stuck it around in back of the garage in a niche that fitted it perfectly.

To make a rather long story short, I never really did get the kind of compost you're supposed to get from a composter, nor did I really have a knack for composting. I tried. I put yard waste, grass clippings, vegetable peelings, strips of torn newspaper, I watered it & even added "compost booster" in my composter, but it never worked properly & I was never able to figure out what I was doing wrong. But David never said "I told you so." Bless him. So I finally gave up composting.

We have a wonderful FreeCycle group on the island & when I listed it I received many calls from the composting crowd. The lady in the van was the first to come & I'd really like to know if she has better luck with my composter than I had.