THEY say the changing of the seasons is really something to see and I don't know who "they" are but "they" are so absolutely right. While we're not fully out of Fall yet, we do seem to be having a Fall/Winter fluctuation of temperatures. I'm certainly no expert - this is just what I've been told :)
We're in that funky stage where you have to wear long pants, long sleeved shirts, coats and gloves (I do anyway) and you hope you'll be warm enough. It's that stage where you have to let your car warm up in the morning and you drive all the way to work with the heater on. It's that stage where when you leave work for the day, you're peeling off that jacket and those gloves, you're turning off that heater and rolling down the window just a crack.
I never know what to wear... not that I'm trying to make a fashion statement (ha ha ha) but it is nice to be warm enough or cool enough either way.
So in my (almost) 8 months of being here I have witnessed partial springtime where the trees, shrubs and flowers were all in full, glorious bloom. I witnessed summertime when it was as hot as any Florida summer where the grass turned brown and was begging for water and the dusty, dirt road coated my car with a dry, tannish hue. I witnessed the on-set of Fall and the leaves of the trees changing from bright, shiny green to all the different colors of the rainbow. I witnessed that colorful display of leaves fall to the ground and cover any semblance of white or yellow lines on the roads.
November has been a mix of warm temperatures reaching as high as 80 degrees and cold temperatures dipping as low as 28 degrees. It has been a mix of glowing sunshine and of heavy, gray, rain clouds that block almost all measure of that same sun. It has changed from gentle, cooling breezes to bone chilling 25 mile per hour winds.
Driving home I now see brown grasses that used to be a luxurious green. I see tree trunks and the bare limbs that used to be filled with leaves blocking my view of the houses behind them. I see the farm houses with wrap around porches and smoke rising from fireplaces burning within. The houses and barns are all cloaked in the white mist that hangs in the air around the mountains. The horses in the pastures have capes on their backs and I can see their breath as they stand eating their hay.
As Days Go By, we'll see what the next 4 months hold for me as I round out my first year here (can you believe that?) and I'll keep writing about it on the blog so you can experience it vicariously through me. That is assuming you want to :) While I do miss everyone in FL, there's no changing the fact that I am loving living here in Tennessee and I'm looking forward to all the exciting adventures (ha ha) to come.
Although there was a 100% chance of rain yesterday, we did get a little break from it in the afternoon. To my benefit it decided to stop raining right about the time I was leaving work. Hello? That never happens. Literally, it rained all day. It was raining while we were still in bed, it was raining while I was getting ready for work and it was raining the entire ride to work. I got soaked coming into the building because, of course, who knows where my umbrella is...? Behind me are windows that span the length of the area where I sit. Looking out periodically all I could see was rain, rain clouds and trees blowing in the wind. It was supposed to be 57 degrees but I hardly think it made it that high.
The clouds took pity on me just long enough to make it to my car however, and then they let loose again. It rained all the way home and was still raining when I got out of my car to get the gate....arrrgggghhhhh
Since I was already wet, I went ahead and fed the roosters. They were making their little noises and acting like they hadn't been fed in days. Hardly - not with me around :) Since they did such a jam up job digging the dirt away for my Hosta, I decided to let them do the same over on the side of Dizzy's Apartment (the outhouse). Once they have dug sufficiently deep, I'll stick a couple tulip bulbs and a couple daffodil bulbs in the ground and we'll have red and yellow flowers come springtime. Good ole' roosters! They may not lay eggs but they sure do cut down on the digging time :)
I've been getting some sage gardening advice and tips from my new gardener friend, Arlene. Arlene is up here in TN and from what I hear she has a beautiful garden practically year round. We have only met via email so I have yet to see her place. Regardless of that her advice and tips have been so helpful that my plants are no longer in danger of, well, winter demise. Those day lilies I thought I had to separate before winter? Turns out I needn't bother with that until spring. Whew! With everything else I want to do that is a big relief.
The stinky albeit beautiful paper whites...turns out they will not over winter here in the great outdoors and will have to be brought inside the cabin. I have no idea where I'll put them when they start blooming and letting off that horrendous odor but I'll have to find somewhere suitable... lol I can't see letting them die when it's my fault they were planted to start with.
The irises that still are not in the ground? She tells me they will be fine no matter where or when I plant them. She says they are very hardy and will survive the winter without issue. I've tried to get these bulbs in the ground but we've been so busy, I just haven't had the time. Now that I know they'll survive no matter what, I can relax and maybe think about getting them planted this weekend.
As Francis told me earlier in the year, as long as they have "flags" on them, they will bloom the first spring. When I described them to Arlene, she said they will stay green like that throughout the winter and blooming in the springtime shouldn't be a problem. Claudia probably knew that when she separated them to share with me. How sweet!
Darcy, Darcy (instead of Mary, Mary) quite contrary, how does your garden grow???
I have yellow, red and white mums and a variety of colors of pansies all at the cabin and all in bloom as I write. Hopefully by Christmastime I'll have blooms of paper whites and red amaryllis. For spring so far I have purple irises, red tulips and yellow daffodils and a bright, green Hosta - all up at the cabin. I have hollyhocks of varying colors, mystery plants (Allium) and delphinium down by the flag pole (where my decorations used to be...) all waiting for summer. I have a "Lily of the Nile" lily that I brought from Florida (thank you my friend Kathy) and which decided not to bloom this year. I have hope that once it goes through its first TN winter, it will put on a most delightful show for all to see. Don't forget the wild roses, wild daisies and those huge spreads of day lilies (that Arlene said I didn't have to separate until later...). Not bad for my first year here... I'm no where near through :)
I haven't completely finished the cookbook from Connie's mom but the completion is probably only a week or so away. In the meantime I found another old cookbook stored upstairs in the cabin. This one dates back only to 1985 but it is a collection called "Kentucky Kitchens" and at the bottom it says "Favorite Recipes of Telephone Pioneers." What are the chances of that? I work for a phone company and this book has recipes from folks who worked at various phone companies back in the 80s. Yes, AT&T is one of the employers represented in the book. Pretty cool, huh? Remember, if you have old cookbooks that you don't want or no longer care to cook with, I'll take them off your hands :)
The first recipe in it goes like this...
"No Los Baloney"
"Slice baloney to desired thickness. In skillet, saute onions in bacon grease. Throw in baloney. When baloney is half done, cover with slice of American cheese. Cook until cheese melts. Scoop works on toasted bun; add lettuce and tomato; salt and pepper to taste. It's great!" Chef Keno
Isn't that funny??? Now I don't know about y'all but this sounds like a cholesterol bomb to me... lol I mean, it sounds good and I would certainly eat it but my gosh, it couldn't be more bad for you unless it was deep fried. lol!!! So you see how this cookbook begins with a slightly different twist than the one from Connie. It should be interesting and amusing to compare the two as I read through the Kentucky Kitchens book.
You can still buy slab baloney here. I imagine you can in FL too but I don't remember seeing it. Maybe at Winn Dixie? To put it in bacon grease and then cover it with cheese... then keep it together with a bun... it's a heart attack waiting to happen. Ernie - whatever you do, don't feed this to William. If, one day, we find him with a half eaten one dangling from his stiffened fingers... we'll know what you were up to!!
As I said earlier, it was cold and rainy when I got home yesterday. After I fed the roosters I went to check on the dogs. The light wasn't on in the doghouse and only Wesson had come out from under the porch. About that same time Wally pulled up so he fixed the warming light for them and while he was in there, he filled their feeders. For a doghouse, it looks pretty cozy LOL The floor is covered with straw, the straw is covered with two old blankets and then they have the warming light and feeders full of dog food. Well, it didn't take them long to pile up in there and get warm. It's so cute to see them like that. I know, I know, show you the pictures! I will - soon as I can. Promise :)
By now the cabin was looking warm and inviting so we headed inside and I started heating up some chili that we had frozen a month or so ago. It didn't take long before the whole place smelled like chili powder, onions, tomatoes and beef....mmm mmm good! As I stood there stirring the chili, I watched through the kitchen window as two small deer came walking out of the woods behind Dizzy's Apartment. They were too small to shoot so we just stood there watching them as they calmly grazed in the yard and along the driveway. Every now and then they would raise their heads and their ears would go up as they listened to the sounds of the evening closing in. Before long, it was too dark for me to see them even as close as they were.
I served up those steaming hot bowls of chili with some cheese sprinkled on top and we filled our bellies until we could fill them no more :) The time change still has us messed up. I think we were ready to go to bed around 6:00 - which is insane - but it had already been dark for 2 hours. I cleaned up the kitchen and made my lunch for today and off to bed we went. We watched Two and a Half Men and How I Met Your Mother and by then we were sacked out... lol! Three am comes pretty darn early in the morning and that's what time we woke up.
Since I got to work early today, you know what that means... woo hoo!!!! I get to leave early :) :) :) That being said, I need to finish up before I go :)
"Weather forecast for tonight: dark. Continued dark overnight, with widely scattered light by morning."
George Carlin
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