Severe Clear

After hours writing I settled in to read the newest John Sandford novel and read through most of the night. Microwaved the last of the Mac and Cheese in a heavy glass bowl to warm my lap while I read. Supposed to be quite warm for the next few days, unnaturally so for the middle of February, and the frost is out of the ground. Still several freeze-thaw cycles coming, but it's so beautiful outside I sit on the back porch and stretch like an old dog. This weather bodes terrible for orchards. On my walk today I noticed the first stages of budding on young poplars and sassafras. Weeks too soon. Nothing for it. A great piece about batteries on Science Friday got me thinking about immediate needs. My electric lap blanket, the computer, and a seven-an-a-half watt LED light. A couple of marine 12 volt batteries could handle that for 24 hours, and I'm rarely without power for more than 24 hours; if I am I sleep on a down pallet over near the stove and break out the candles. It's not a big deal. I have a special pile of noir fiction I go to then, and I mostly sleep when it's dark. If I've banked a good fire, it's easy to cook breakfast and make coffee. You stoke the fire, chip and melt some ice for coffee water, take a trip to the outhouse, maybe read a travel brochure (outhouse literature is an interesting subject), fry some potatoes and get back in your sleeping bag. Wait until the sun wakes you. Roll up your pallet and stow it away; left-over potatoes, hash and eggs, more boiled coffee (settled with eggshells), my agenda, such as it is, is to split some kindling, and bring in two armloads of wood. I made the meatballs, simmered them in the tomato sauce, and had a serving on toasted cornbread. My first thought is that I should open a restaurant that serves these. "Bridwell's Meatball Shoppe". A small restaurant, off the beaten track, that only served a very expensive tasting menu. Meatballs in various guises. The waitress would speak a heavily Swedish accented English, I only say that because my Mom never made meatballs, and my introduction to them was a cheap TV dinner of Swedish meatballs on egg noodles, a side of green beans, that cost less than a dollar. The secret to a great meatball is rosemary and a little nutmeg.