2012 Rav4

A year and a half ago, when we we still dreaming of being claims adjusters, we figured we needed a pick-up in order to be prepared to work.  So, we found a small, bottom-of-the-line model that could be towed wheels down behind an RV, even though we didn't have an RV at the time.  We ended up with a Nissan.  Larry was never really happy with it's turning radius and lack of agility in a crowded parking lot.  I was never crazy about the crank windows, lack of cruise control and other creature comforts.  Besides, we couldn't fit the grandkids in it with their carseats either.  But, we knew when we bought it we could upgrade if this claims adjusting thing actually worked out.  

Now that Larry has been driving the pick-up in Dallas for months and months he finally got fed up with it.  He did his homework and went back to Toyota for their high ratings.  He traded for a Toyota Rav 4 this week and plans to put a ladder rack on.  He choose a 2012 because that's the last year they made it with a side-swing door, which is important for not interfering with a ladder on top.  It can't be towed wheels down but it can be towed with a dolly.  He's already taken care of that so he's all set.

Now that he's all situated, it's my turn for a new car.  I've been stuck with the Corolla while Larry has had the truck... and the Corolla is, or was, Larry's car when we bought it.  He is very happy with it but I've never been crazy about.  It fits him way better than it fits me.   I can't remember the last time I got to pick out a car I want.  Now that I have the chance I can't figure out what I want.

It's a good thing I can take my time to figure this out because this is hard!  I told Larry that I need 3 cars.  First would be a sports car.  I don't care if it's powerful, as long as it is fun to drive.  Then, I need a "grandma" car that's roomy, quiet, and plush with all the tech toys like hands free talking (on the phone), a back-up camera, and other fun stuff.  You know, like the little old lady in the Cadillac type car. Finally, I need my cowgirl/gardener vehicle.., like a truck!  (Oops, we used to have one of those.)  If I could find a plush, quiet, roomy truck that hugged the road like a sports car, gets 30 mgh on the highway and comes in orange then I'd be in luck!  This may take a while.

It's a good thing he moved the rig

Here is our RV, parked in the RV park in TX that got flooded.  It's a good thing Larry moved it when he did.  He drove by the next evening to see if he could take the rig back but he couldn't even get close to the RV park.  He said the nearby "creek", which is less than a mile from his RV park, usually has barely enough water to float a canoe.  That sign you see in the photo below is about 12' high so you know that water is way over it's banks.   He said the other two major RV parks in the Dallas area flooded before his park did.  A week later, the road to his RV park is still closed. Fortunately he found another RV park with an open spot... the last one.

Texas Flooding

Larry's RV Park, where he is staying near Dallas, is in danger of flooding.  In fact, he heard that this morning some people had to be rescued due to high water on the other side of the park, and it's not that big of a park.  He got word while he was at work this morning and they let him come home long enough to secure his stuff and move the RV to higher ground. He will be roughing it in a Walmart parking lot for a day or two, until the threat is passed.  

In the meantime, I've been talking to quite a few Texans with various sorts of storm damage like blown off shingles, trees down, leaks in their homes, and flooding.  It makes me appreciate when things go well, like having some warning to move the RV before it floats down the swollen creek... And knowing Larry won't float away with it during the night.

A New Chapter

Our blog has been dormant for a long time.  This is a tell-tale sign that life had become repetitive.  There wasn't much newsworthy going on and then I got out of the habit of posting altogether.  Facebook probably had something to do with this too.  It's time to change resurrect the blog.  Why?  Because life is not repetitive anymore.

Almost two years ago, I was told my job of 4 years was being moved to Rochester, NY.  They kept me on for nearly two years when I finally said "Enough".  In the meantime, I prepared for another career along with Larry who also needed a change.  (That's another whole story.)

We are both now independent adjusters working primarily in the catastrophic claims adjusting world.
We began with getting licensed and then studying for and passing several certification courses.   Larry started in June of last year with a deployment to Minnesota for several weeks.  He came home for a couple weeks and then headed for Michigan.  After that he came home for a couple weeks and then answered a call for a deployment in Dallas.  That was in October and he's still there today.  He's technically working in a non-catastrophic environment with no known end in sight.

After I left my job at the end of January, I waited only 3 weeks before getting a call to work the winter storms as an in-office adjuster in Atlanta.  I'm still here.

Right now, Larry and I both work 60 hours a week.  Being only two hours from home allows me to run home on Sundays.  Larry made a quick visit home a few weeks ago but that was his first visit since October.

More posts to come!

According to the weather channel, Rochester, NY is the 3rd snowiest city in the US with an average of 100.5" of snow a year.   Erie, PA #2 and Syracuse, NY #1.  Who wants to live here?
Rochester #3 Snowiest City

Wabbits and Wigglers

So call us crazy.  Sometimes I think we are.  We're busy people with enough interests to keep us going for quite some time.  We don't really need another hobby.  But, here we are with 8 Silver Fox rabbits.

This one is Creme (short for Ice Cream Bunny).  She's a mature doe who has already had a litter or two and was named before we got her.  She looks a little bit brown in this photo but she's really gray or "Blue" as they're called in the world of rabbits.  She should be having a litter in about a week.

Silver Fox Rabbits are domestic rabbits, bred right here in the USA around the time of World War II.  They were bred for both meat and fur and they have wonderful dispositions.  They nearly went extinct since both meat and fur went out of fashion.  They're making a comeback now as people take an interest in being more self-sufficient and more in control of what they're eating.  Rabbits produce a lot of meat very efficiently.  These "large" rabbits command a pretty good price too so we hope to sell some of them to other people who want to also raise rabbits.  Thus, we feed ourselves and help save a wonderful breed at the same time.

This little girl is almost 4 months old and is developing good "Silvering" on her Black coat.  She'll be a breeder (as will all 8 of our herd), at least until we determine which ones are good mothers and carry traits we want to continue.  Seven of the 8 rabbits I got are unrelated so we have a lot of genetic diversity.

Right now, Black is the only color recognized by the American Rabbit Breeders Association (ARBA).  Blue used to be a recognized color but they became so rare the ARBA dropped them.  The Blues are now 2/3 of the way to being recognized again.  Even though 7 out of my 8 rabbits are Black, several of them carry the genes for Blue as well as for Chocolate which (I believe) is a color that has never been recognized.  The brown ones are sure pretty though.

Larry built (in his not-so-spare time) a very nice cage set-up.  We have 12 cages (4 for overflow when we have lots of babies growing up) in all.  There are two racks with 6 cages each, two across and three high. Under each cage is a slanted "floor" that moves waste into a rain gutter and into buckets.  It's fairly easy to maintain.  Each cage is large for their needs but we don't mind.  We originally planned on getting a different larger breed (Giant Chinchilla) but then I found the Silver Fox and was sold.  By then, we already had the cages on order.  Adult weight is about 10 to 12 pounds.  My 3 month old bunnies weigh 5.5 to 6 pounds and are still growing quickly.

Here, Cora is brushing Alexis (her ID tattoo is L6 and Alexis is the closest name I could think of that sort of resembled that).  While most of my herd is not yet totally tame they can all be caught, carried and petted.  Cora is gentle, as are the bunnies.  I won't say that Silver Fox rabbits don't bite but they are not prone to biting and I've not been bitten yet.  The adult pregnant doe is the most likely one to do so and she hasn't tried yet.  The worst she has done is kick with her front feet and then only occasionally.  She can be petted if approached from the side.  I think she's probably extra grumpy right now so I'm giving her some grace.

When I got my 8 bunnies, Laura got 3 of her own.  She is trying extra hard to raise hers a little more naturally.  Ben made a bunny "tractor" - a home that sits on the ground where then bunny can eat grass and weeds and dig a little too (much to Laura's concern).  They've had a wild bunny come visit quite often and has gotten to the point where he hangs around while they're feeding or working on the yard.  This morning he actually jumped into an empty hutch that had a door hanging open.  Silly bunny.

I LUV TN

You already know we love TN.  But now we all know that Georgians too love TN!  Isn't this great!

Larry saw this plate on a car while driving around town. 

Wildflower Walk

Jack in the Pulpit

What a wonderful Spring day for a walk in the woods.  I went with other gardeners, who are fans of native plants, to the Hiwassee River Gorge.  One of our members leads the group and fills our brains with more information than you can imagine.  I won't try to explain the day.  Instead, I'm going to let the photos tell the story.  (Maybe, just maybe, you can double click on the photos to make them bigger.)  Enjoy.

 

Yellow Trillium

MayApple

White Trillium

Sensitive Ferm

Fire Pink

Yellow Trillium with Woodland Phlox

Wild Geramium

Zebra Swallowtail
PawPaw is their only host plant

Trillium catesbaei

Crested Iris

Dog Hobble

Bellwort
(see the little yellow flowers?)

Okay - this one is weird.
These are galls, caused by insects.

Abi & Cora - it's been a while

As you would expect, Abi and Cora are growing and growing.  It's been a while since I've posted some photos so today is the day; not because of any special event but only because it's fun.

Abi is a great big sister, meaning... she's really good at being a big sister.  Cora is getting big enough that the two girls occasionally play together which pleases their Mom very much.

In the next photo, Abi and visit Rock City once again.  Abi is on the steps of "Fat Man Squeeze" but she has no trouble getting through this small gap in the rocks (unlike her Grandparents who have to walk sideways through part of it (we're not to the skinny part yet in the photo).

Finally, here's a nice fun shot of Grandpa (or Crappa as Abi learned to say and Laura loves to perpetuate).   I made the photo larger so you can see the mischievous look on Abi's face.

We sure have a lot of fun with them.  Abi, like me, loves to be outside and I'm getting her started on some gardening.  Last fall we planted some Crocus and Tulips in a Little Tykes toddler bed that I put in the garden.  Someday I need to post some before and after photos of our yard(s).  I hate to when they're still a work in progress but I guess I might as well admit that they'll never really be done.

Short Vacation - Helen, GA

While foliage at home is still mostly green, the colors in the mountains of North-East Georgia are at their peak.   I never get tired of Autumn colors.

Helen, GA is about 3 hours from home, with most of the driving on two-lane state highways.  

The cute building on the left is a Huddle House.  Usually, they look like the photo below.   We actually gave it a chance because it looked so cute, and also because it was the only restaurant open for breakfast.

The rest of town (all 3 blocks of it) looked equally cute.  For those of you who know Solvang, the Danish town in CA, this looked the same, only a half to a third the size.

We happened to book this visit during Oktoberfest (yes, I spelled that correctly) which means we went to the community hall to listen to oompah music and eat our choice of 5 different wursts.  I can say this... Oompah music is happy music.  We lasted about an hour; that was all the happiness we could handle.

Window shopping took all of half a day.  We were nearly through when I said something like, "I haven't seen a single Cuckoo Clock".    

Moments later, we walked into a store full of them. 

As long as I can remember I have loved clocks and especially clock shops.    This time I learned something about Black Forest Cuckoo Clocks.  Two pine cones operate a clock and a Cuckcoo bird.  Three pine cones means it also has other movements - like dancers or something.  Small cones must be "wound" daily and larger cones can go a week between.  

I remember my Grandpa Wells having a Cuckoo Clock in his house.  To my knowledge we only visited once but we spent the night and I remember the Cuckoo bird announcing the time during the night.  That should have been a negative but, instead, I have fond memories of it.

Before we left the shop, Larry convinced me to buy a small one.  They were on sale and probably the most reasonable we've ever seen.  So, now I have a Cuckoo Clock announcing the time in my house.  The good part is though that I can turn off the Cuckoo bird when we're ready for him to be quiet.

The rest of our short vacation was spent driving to nearby places and seeing great scenery along the way.  The Chattahoochee River runs through Helen.  I suspect this is the same river.

A trip to Ketner's Mill Country Arts Fair

Ketner's Mill is near a little town called Whitwell (pronounced something like "whut wool") in the Sequatchie Valley.  The valley itself is a beautiful place; only 3 to 5 miles wide but 150 miles long.  We visited Ketner's Mill Country Arts Fair with our friends Gary & Debbie.  What a beautiful day for it.  

While traveling along the backroads we interrupted a small pig and a kitten playing.  We stopped to watch and the pig came to our car with the kitten right behind.   Cute.  I wanted to open the car door to take a better photo but I suspect the pig would have jumped right in, he was that friendly. 

  As you might guess, it's history is that of a mill, sitting on the banks of the Sequatchie River.  It's only active now-a-days during the fair but the mill was busy grinding corn.  Debbie purchased several bags of ground corn meal.

There were lots of artisan there, some quite unique.  A working blacksmith, a soap maker with a large batch of soap cooking in the booth, a broom maker who used interesting broom handles including a tennis racket, a shotgun, the neck of a guitar and many different kinds of sticks collected in the woods.   

There was a man tatting who was quite entertaining to listen to and watch.   He explained each knot as he used the small shuttles in his hands with the strings wrapped around his fingers.  He made it look easy and difficult at the same time.  

We saw sugar cane being crushed and squeezed in an all-in-one gear & press device powered by a horse walking  in circles.  (I should have taken a picture.)  The extracted juice poured into a bucket which was then transferred to a cooker.  Then, much like making Maple Syrup, they cooked it down to Sorghum Molasses which they sold at the fair.  I bought some of that and some Sourwood Honey from another vendor.

We saw art of all kinds: stained glass, ornaments, candles, paintings, photographs, soap, rod iron, wood-working, and more.  My fun purchase for the day was some whimsical yard art: a giant worm for my garden!  He may move around when you're not looking so keep your eyes out for him.  :-)

Chattanooga Zoo

Wow, did we ever have fun today!  I discovered, first thing this morning, that today was free admission to the Chattanooga Zoo.  I told Laura and she said Abi would love go.  I volunteered to take Cora too and off we went.   Cora slept the whole time but I liked having her with us anyway.  At least it gave Laura a nice break.   Her Grandpa joined us after Abi and I had been there for over an hour so he got to be in on some of the fun too.

Abi wasn't so sure about seeing some of the scarier animals.  She was especially concerned about seeing, or rather, not seeing a Tiger.  But we did manage to see a Snow Leopard along with various monkeys, birds - exotic and not so exotic, a Bobcat, a Coyote, Red Pandas (she said, "those aren't Pandas"), a camel, goats, and other animals who's names I can't even remember.

All that was fun, but the real fun began with the jump house!  Oh my, how she loved the jump house.   The lines were short most of the time we so she managed to jump 4 different times.  She would laugh and jump and laugh some more.  She held her own with the big kids just fine.  A couple times she got bumped off her feet when a big kid bumped into her and she would just laugh some more.  What fun! 

The bounce house isn't always at the Zoo.  Today was a special event for the community, including a chili cook-off, lots of booths, displays for the firemen, an emergency helicopter, and other things like that.  

What is always at the zoo is a Merry-Go-Round.  This one is special.   A local artisan is responsible for it's existence.  I don't know the whole story but it's my understanding that he either personally made or was involved in the making of all the animals on the carousel.  He has a school not far away where he teaches people to carve these wonderful creations.

Odd enough, there were no seat belts.  I was quietly amazed.  We're not in California anymore.  

Childs - Irving Power Plants in AZ

In the Girdner Reunion post this summer I showed a couple photos of a power plant where my Grandpa worked and that my Dad remembers vividly. 

Dad wrote a long comment on the blog but it was too lengthy to post.  I asked him to send his comments to me so I could share.  He also sent me a link with some interesting history.  Since I work for a company that makes turbines this is especially interesting to me.  http://www.pinestrawhs.org/childsirving.htm

I want to thank you for posting the pictures of the generator and turbine from the Irving hydro electric plant. I have many memories of that very unit humming away night and day adding it's electrical power to the grid. I remember the warmth, smells and sounds. I spent time there with my dad while he was on duty. It was a little noisier then to be able to talk without shouting but not enough to damage your ears. There was a small sound proofed room off to the side for the telephone. I used to go there and dad would help me with my homework.

Looking at the generator in the picture you'll notice a smaller generator on the right hand side, that is the exciter which generated DC current to excite the field coils of the big one. Also some of the governor is seen but not really pronounced. and of course the turbine in the left hand picture. It had movable veins that directed the water flow into the turbine buckets to very the power output to match the load. The governor controlled the position of the veins to keep the speed constant and output exactly on 60 cycles per second.

An exciting time was when the plant got bumped off the line. It took two men to put it back on. One man on the hand wheel on the governor and the other holding the big switch handle. There was a meter on the wall with one needle that went around and around and a series of light bulbs that came on in a certain sequence. You  had to control the governor by hand until the meter on the wall finally settled down and certain lights were lit, The meter needle had be slowed and stopped straight up. At that instant the big switch handle had to be slammed in hard and held there. If the cycles were synchronized exactly the switch would hold, if not then it would kick  out and they would have to start over. My dad usually got in on the fun of putting it back on line as our house was closest to the plant. You would always hear it when there was a bump. The sudden loss of load would over speed the turbine and generator and had to manually be brought down to a safe rpm.

The Irving school house was downstream a bit from the plant and the pathway went right along side the flume on discharge from the plant. On a cold morning the water in the flume felt warm compared to the air temperature. The school was one room with eight grades. I was a third grader. There was another power plant farther down about nine or ten miles that reused the same water. That was called the Childs plant. The kids from Childs were hauled to Irving for school. There were a couple family's who lived in the area but didn't work for the AZ power. One was an Indian family. Those kids attended Irving school also.

It's so sad to see what has happened to the wonderful clean power available and to waste it for nothing. The environmentalists would rather use nuclear, coal or oil and pollute the air, isn't that dumb.

Squirrel Damage?

You may have seen the news last week about all the rain the Southeast was getting.  Here, in our neck of the woods we got nearly 10" in about 24 hours.  According to the news there was flooding but I never saw any.  The ground was so thirsty from what seems like months of no rain that it soaked up a whole lot of the water.

After all the rain, the wind began to blow and apparently it blew rather severely, because, just about midnight our power went out. The next morning we found out why.  This downed tree is a half a block from us.  I also lost one of my apple trees.  It was only 4 years old and still rather small so it didn't do any damage.

The power company arrived about 5:30 pm to clear this tree and restring the wires.  When they finished, after dark, they turned the power back on and Larry and I heard popping all over the house.  We found smoke coming out of our dishwasher and smelled fried electrical wires in the office.  I ran outside and stopped the work truck just as they were leaving and told him what happened.  He stayed and found the problem a few hundred feet from the tree on the same wire.  He told us it was squirrel damage!  Really?

When we accessed the damage we found that our dishwasher, oven and garage door opener were fried.  Several light bulbs were also fried.  Fortunately, our fridge and freeze were plugged into the generator at the time so they're okay.  Every surge protector in the house was fried but they did their job and protected the TV, computers, printer, etc.  The one in the office actually left black soot on the file cabinet where it was sitting.  Good thing it wasn't sitting on the carpet!

Girdner Family Reunion

In June (yes, I am really late posting this) I went to Cottonwood, AZ for a Girdner family reunion.  This reunion occurs every 3 years and is for family of James Pleasant Girdner (called JP) and his wife Nola (Lockhart).  They had 4 kids: Glen, Dale, Stanley, & Eva.  Stanley is my Grandfather. 

I flew into Phoenix on a Thursday, visited with some friends at the airport (who used to live in Santa Rosa) and then met Dad and Millie's when they arrived about an hour later.  We rented a car and then met Willis, Susan and Jimmy for dinner and then off to Cottonwood we went.  It was dark when we arrived and we were tired.  

Friday, we went to the high school gym which would be the home base for our reunion for the next 3 days.  The family is from Cornville really but a lot of family history is in Cottonwood too.  Dad went to school at this high school, but now it's a museum.  

Somebody went to the trouble of building our family tree and posting, by family, on the walls of the gym.  Each person had their own sheet of paper, often with their photo on it and it was placed in birth order in org chart fashion.  It was very visual and I appreciated it.

Four self-guided tours were prepared and everyone choose where they wanted to go.  I was torn between Grandpa Stanley's Hydroelectric sites, the Cottonwood Cemetery and Jerome.  Dad wanted to take Millie to a museum in Jerome so I decided to go with them.  Uncle Marvin, Sharon and Aaron came too - all 6 of us in the rental car.   It was a squeeze but it was fun to be together.  We were able to visit the Cottonwood Cemetery on the way. Once we got to the museum site in Jerome I was surprised to find a power plant there that my Grandpa worked with so I got to see some Grandpa Stanley Hydroelectric history after all.  

The photo on the right is the turbine; which means even more to me now that I'm  working for a company that makes turbines for power generation. The photo on the left is the generator.  This power plant was taken off-line in 2004.  Amazing, isn't it; that it was in operation that long?  Even though this is cool, the highlight of the whole 3 day week-end was listening to my Dad answer the questions of the Ranger behind the counter at the museum.  Dad mentioned to him that he lived in Jerome as a boy and that started the questions.  I learned things about my grandfather's work (I never knew that Grandpa worked in the mines (as an electrician), about Dad's childhood, about mining in Jerome and more).  It was a fascinating conversation to listen to; I was finally that proverbial fly on a wall.

There was something special about this reunion, at least for me.  Maybe it's just that I'm finally old enough to appreciate it or maybe it's because of the trivia game we played (as shown to the left here), but I gained a profound understanding about what a special upbringing the grandkids of JP and Nola had.  Yes, there were hard times.  Yes, the cousins moved around, sometimes they moved a lot.   But, the 1st cousins (my Dad and his cousins) were a close bunch.  They played together and worked together and built a lot of memories together.  They played in the creek and swam in the swimming hole in the summer they rode on cattle drives and put up hay and so much more.   I'm a little bit envious because I had some great memories with my 1st cousins but we were as close as Dad and his cousins.  I also became aware, for the first time, that the siblings (JP & Nola's kids) had cousins in Cornville that they were raised with.  2nd cousins came to this reunion too.

Finally,  I would like you all to know that I come by my love of horses and cowboys naturally.  Here is my Dad's Cowboy 1st Cousins - Bob and George.  They were raised on a ranch with horses- I think their Dad was the first horse-whisperer.  :-)    

On the last day of the reunion, actually the last hour, some 2nd cousins (Ron, Sharon and I) got to talking about the history in our family and how little we (I especially) know and how quickly it will be lost.  We also  talked about how to preserve it.  We finally came up with the idea of sending an email once a month with a question for each of the 1st cousins.  They "reply-all" when they answer so they can see each other's answers.  We'll do this for 30 months.  Sharon volunteered to compile the stories and will bring the results to the next reunion in 2014.  With each round of questions I learn a whole lot and gain a whole lot of pleasure reading their stories.  

Picking berries

In April it was Strawberry pickin' time. Then the Raspberries started ripening; they come bits at a time over a long season. Now, it's Blackberry pickin' time. They too ripen over time. So far we've picked a whole lot and there's more than that still ripening on the vines.

Yesterday, after work, I was pickin' Blackberries so I could take some to Laura and my next door neighbor came out and helped me pick while we chatted. Then, her friend arrived and she helped pick too. Remember, we have no fences around our yard. It stuck me how uniquely Southern this little experience was (is). Rachel, my neighbor, knows that she can pick all the berries on her side of the bushes (I planted them on the property line) but she wasn't picking for herself. She said she had all we wanted and she was filling up my bowls (4 large ones all together). It's just another thing I love about living here. (There are so many that I'm going to start sharing and labeling them.)

So far we've had Blackberry cobbler and I've made Blackberry jam. Someone at work told me what he likes to so with them and we're going to try it. He washes and dries the berries and then promptly freezes them. Then, he'll put a portion of frozen berries in a whole and pour sweetened condensed milk (or evaporated milk mixed with sugar) over them and stir quickly. The milk freezes onto the berries and it makes a creamy frozen treat. Now doesn't that sound wonderful? We'll see if it's as good as it sounds. There are berries in the freezer now.