Fact Fiction

Got up in the dark, as I've been doing of late, to finish reading a fiction, so I could return it to the library when I took B to town. He called, as planned, and I finally got dressed and brushed out my matted hair. B and his dog (a very handsome hound with a nice voice) seem comfortable with each other. A nice chat on the way in. Because of the detour, B gets mileage now (over 20 miles) days he teaches, and he's as busy as I am, getting ready for winter. His truck had a short somewhere and the battery drained, also a fluid leak; I need to get my oil changed, and check the strength of the radiator liquid. But the next thing on my list is the refrigerator. Now that B has his truck back we should be able to get the new-used smaller fridge up here in the next couple of weeks. The trip to town was interesting. Cory had a new beer on tap he wanted me to try, and they had a new dish planned for the menu, a squash ravioli, and he wanted my opinion on a sauce. It's pretty good, and I told him I'd just use an herbed butter/olive oil drizzled on top, with a salad side and bread. I immediately came home and made a creamed Butter-Nut squash soup, minced onion, chicken broth and put it to chill. I'll eat it cold, with roasted oysters. The new batch of oysters are from New England, they're sweet and tangy and I love them with just a squeeze of citrus, and they had beautiful mussels, from Prince Edward Island. I should have ended up on the shore somewhere, I love shellfish so much, but I take what I can get on a ridge in southern Ohio. I'll just steam the mussels in white wine and minced onion and eat until I fall over. The library was holding a book for me, on early English cutlery, and I do enjoy looking at pictures after a day of questioning commas. B had loaned (lent) me a book of Chuck Close photographs. I like these, but I'm not crazy about them, I just wanted visual stimulation. When I look at pictures my brain works differently. I was thinking about this recently, the difference between hearing books and reading them. Then thinking about visualizing the main beam in the clear-span room Bear was building for Jenny. He called again, thanking me for my advice. I had told him up front, because he's a large strong guy with a temper, that I did not want to be held accountable, I'm just reading some tables here, looking at weight-stress analysis, and I'm only assuming that sassafras is as strong as white pine. Dried peat, did I mention this? is about the density of white pine. Burns hot but quick. I'm currently working on an algorithm that translates turves to cords Compressed horse-shit might be a good way to store energy. Some work to do in the woodshed, last year's collection of pieces that are just too long for the stove and I need to cut them in half, burn a fire of chunks. If you're hanging around the house, drinking hot-toddies, reading Swedish mysteries, in a rocking chair near the stove, burning small burls is a perfectly acceptable course of action. Knocks for knock. Late at night, quiet as a tomb.