Multiple Killings on Halloween

...and it didn't even make the news! Nine done in by an axe-wielding man, dismembered, and frozen. What is this ridge coming to?

Well, one thing it's coming to is turkey-less. This was D-Day for the turkeys--time to put them in the freezer. We had 13 and had optimistically thought we'd get them all done today. And we would have without a few technical difficulties, like running out of LP gas for the water to heat up and having to get a wood fire going instead. But nine is good, and we plan to finish the job tomorrow night. Now we would have finished today if we had stuck with our plan to work on the turkeys yesterday, but instead we took off downstate to Hinton at the suggestion of a friend to participate in an open mic session at the Chestnut Revival Coffee and Tea House. We had a great time--music, stories, poetry, and fun people--and rolled back in here around midnight. So. Guess you could say we played turkey hooky.

Here's mid-process, after plucking and gutting which I am sure you do not want to see:

The bird on the top left is being wrapped in plastic wrap after it was all nice and clean and scrubbed. I wish I'd been around when a friendly local butcher would wrap turkeys--these things are not easy to wrap. They have wings and awkward legs and they're heavy and slippery.

The other bird just came in from outside, where Larry did the plucking honors. They look pretty rough before being cleaned up. I scrub them well before and after cleaning the insides to be sure all bits and pieces are gone. There are always feathers to finish removing, hairs, etc. I found that it was easiest to lay the plastic wrap on the table, then flip the bird over and over on it to wind the wrap around the turkey. The plastic pulls the wings and legs tighter to the turkey's body, making it more compact.

After the plastic wrap, I wrap the birds in freezer paper. They are so hard to cover neatly but I try to get the wrap as tight to the bird as I can.

Last step: put the wrapped bird in a while plastic trash bag, weigh it, mark it and get it to the freezer.

 This one weighed 20 pounds; they have ranged from 20 to 24.5 pounds. "Pretty" means this one cleaned up very well--one is marked "ugly" because the scalding water was too hot so some of the skin ripped when Larry tried to pluck it. It's still edible and without the skin you would not be able to tell one from another, but I don't want the ugly one for Thanksgiving dinner, just not as attractive as one of the "pretty" ones.

What will we do with 13 turkeys? Eat them. For us turkey isn't a special-event meal but an everyday meat, like some people might consider hamburger. We eat little beef or pork these days, opting instead for poultry and venison. This is our "stocking up" meat.

A Story and Some Winners

I taped a new ghost story for airing by WV public radio this week. They played it yesterday. If you'd like to hear the story, just click this link. It's based on a true story from Wetzel County, WV (actually, it was still part of Virginia at the time of the story, 1850) about a murdered man's return from the dead to seek justice.

Today I will be helping with the awards program for the winners of the first-ever ghost story writing contest at our local library. I am looking forward to this. Winners will read their stories, I'll tell a tale and sing a ballad or two, we'll have some refreshments...a nice time, I think.

Later in the day...it's turkey time! Time for those BIG birds to be put into the freezer. That will take up the rest of the weekend I'm sure, because there are 13 of them, and did I mention that they're BIG? I'm guessing each one weighs at least 20 pounds. 20x13=260 pounds of meat for the coming year. That will meet most of our poultry meat needs.

What's on your agenda this weekend? Oh goodness, I almost forgot, it's trick-or-treat tonight too! Well, there may be plenty of blood and guts around my place to creep 'em out. (Insert evil grin here)

Last Tomatoes

 These will probably be the last tomatoes we get from our garden this year. While all the other plants gave up in the intense heat and drought of September, the little yellow pear tomato plants continued to brave the elements and set fruit.

Larry picked these yesterday, and they are just perfect--sweet and tart, cold from the cool night temperatures and best of all--bite-sized. I want to hoard them and eat just one a day to make them last but I know they won't keep that long.

There is always next year to look forward to, I suppose. Insert big sigh here. Without a doubt, these tasty little tomatoes are one of my top five varieties-in no particular order, the others are Brandywine, Amish Paste, Hillbilly, and German Pinks. All heritage varieties, actually.

This is, I suppose the official good-bye to summer. In two months the new seed catalogs will arrive and we will plan, once again, the perfect garden in our minds, with neat rows, careful stakes, mulch, trellises, and not a weed to be seen. I have yet to actually see that garden but in my mind it is a thing of beauty and each year there is the possibility that it may become reality, this time.

Hope springs eternal in the gardener's breast, does it not?

The Value of a Name

Recently I told stories to a group at a senior citizen's home. They came with wheelchairs, walkers, hearing aids and other assistive devices. They were bent, crippled, old and many just plain tired of living. What could I possibly say to them that would be worth their attention? That was what passed through my mind as they came into the room.

I decided that I needed to get to know them, each one. I introduced myself to each person, asking their name. I met Sophia, Marie, Mary. Willadean, Dale, Bob, and many others. Each told me their name and where they were from. Most were from that very county, a few from out of state. Each told me their name carefully, and each name I recorded in my memory.

Then it was time to tell stories. They listened. I sang, they sang, I laughed and they did too. The stories flowed; sometimes they shared a memory with me.

The hour ended too soon. When it was over, I went to each to say good-bye, to give and get hugs, and look into each pair of aging eyes. As they are, so will I be one day. It is not a frightening thought; if I am like them, how blessed I will be to be able to hear a story with my friends, to laugh and sing and enjoy yet one more day in this world.

When I left I thought over the time with this group and what I could learn from it. Of all the lessons I learned, the most valuable was this: remember the names. Listen to the names, for that is most important. Remember the names and the valiant people attached to them. What other means of identifying ourselves do we have?

I am Susanna, teller of stories, mother of sons, grandmother of many. Who are you?

Wordless Wednesday: Fall in Taylor County, and that Glorious Trestle

 One-lane curve

 Overlooking Grafton

 This road takes you to...

 this!

(I can't help myself, I take photos of this trestle every time we pass by. It's just too amazing.)

Down by the Riverside

I took these photos last week and have not had a chance to post them. We were at the state capitol building for a concert at the culture center, both of which are located near the banks of the Great Kanawha River in Charleston, WV. The night was beautiful, the building glowed and there were two sternwheelers on the river.

 The West Wing entrance to the capitol. This is the entrance to the governor's offices; the wide walk leads to his mansion which was just behind me as I took this photo.

The first sternwheeler cruised into view just as the last light of the day was fading on the horizon.

See the water splashing off the paddles on back of the boat?

In a few minutes, the second sternwheeler came up but I could not get a good photo of it. When I turned around there stood Lincoln, as somber as ever: the bronze sculpture called "Lincoln Walks at Midnight" captures the essence of what it must have been like to be president in the turbulent days of the Civil War.

Some evenings stay in our memory a long time. With digital cameras, we can retrieve those times in photos to savor again and again. Even if the photos aren't perfect, they make me happy and help me relive the soft breezes, clear air and the fun of walking at dusk with a friend along a beautiful river.

Friends, Stories, Music and Apple Butter

Where to start? Maybe with Thursday night's concert?

Mick Moloney and Athena Tergis entertained Roads Scholars with songs and tunes in the Irish tradition. The concert was open to the public so we were able to have a listen to these fine performers. We left with our friend from Toronto, Catherine Crowe, for a late dinner at a Mexican restaurant and some good conversation.

Friday found us heading to Tygart Lake State Park to tell ghost stories for the haunted trail. The moon was full, the air was crisp, the audience delightful and the tales, I hope, sufficiently spooky. I debuted several new stories including the Holland Handkerchief as both story and ballad, the Cale Betts Ghost, Coffin Hollow and a couple others along with some of my most requested ghost stories. Writing friend Diane Tarantini came with her children for the storytelling and we went out with her later to the Grafton 1-2-3 for another late dinner and also got to chat with the owner of this quality little coffee shop, our friend MK Stover.

Saturday morning we were up and out, heading home to prepare for an evening ghost stories concert at the Alpine theatre in Ripley,

with Keith Maynard and Suzi Whaples,

 to be followed with a very late night get-together around the firepit at our house with Catherine, Derek and his family, and friends. We sang, talked and laughed until 3:00am (how did it get so late so fast?). Jeff sang a song called Canned Goods by Greg Brown that was a perfect description of our way of life. This morning we were up by 10 so we could get started on making apple butter.

It was a good day for this project--warm, no threat of rain like in 2008 and no snow like in 2007, and lots of help from Derek and Amy. Some friends met here on this blog stopped by to look at the land we have for sale and we had a good visit with them while we filled the copper kettle with apple sauce I'd cooked and canned in September, got the wood fire lit under the kettle and got cooking. I sometimes can the sauce in advance because I don't have a clear weekend to make the sauce and immediately cook it down when the apples need to be picked and worked up. So rather than lose the apples I can the sauce and save the apple butter making for a good day. This year I also froze some of the applesauce which saved jar lids and a lot of time, but we ran out of room in the freezer so I had to can most of it. They stayed long enough to help start the stirring, and left just as Derek and Amy arrived.

I was worried about this year's apple butter because I had no access to red apples this year, and I had always been told that you need red apples to get the rich brown color in the apple butter. I had only my yellow apples this year; would they make good apple butter? Well, as you can see in the photo (which doesn't show the entire yield) the color is lovely; the taste? it's fine. Whew.

It takes about 60 quarts of applesauce to fill my kettle, and it cooks down to about 30 quarts of apple butter. We ended up with 31 quarts this year. When it was in the jars Derek made his BIG biscuits and we got to taste the fresh, spicy apple butter at the time when I think it's best--right off the fire.

That was the weekend, in a nutshell. Much driving, much storytelling, many friends, good work, and very, very, very tired tonight. But a good tired, and ready to sleep like a baby and be ready for tomorrow's back-to-work morning.

On the Road Again...

This time we're headedacross Rte 33, north on 119 and into Grafton to tell ghost stories at Tygart Lake State Park's Haunted Hayride fundraiser. If you're in the area, please come and say hello! I'm bringing CDs and books to sell.

I did a quick look through my collection of West Virginia books and found duplicates of a couple county histories, Jack Tales, Grandfather Tales, Coffin Hollow and other books. I actually have FOUR copies of Coffin Hollow! Two of them are my working copies and are falling apart. But four is a bit much. I'll be bringing these used books with me too and they will be for sale along with my CDs and other items.

What stories to tell? That's always the question, isn't it? I've got some new ones for tonight--since I told here last year I want to be sure the audience doesn't hear all of the same stories again. And there are plenty to choose from. I am thinking about Ikie's Tomb, The Cale Betts Ghost, Big John, The Braxton County Monster...and a few others. Two new ballads (The Cruel Ship's Carpenter and The Holland Handkerchief) are also on my list of possible things to do tonight. I think it will be a good program and if last year was any indication we will have a great crowd too.

Hope to see you there!

Her Bright Smile Haunts Me Still

She was one of hundreds in the room, a tiny girl with wispy blond hair and blue eyes that seemed enormous in her little face. She was bone-thin, and her delicate skull structure was visible under her pale skin. She was in a wheelchair, her body twisted in a way that made it clear the chair was her only means of mobility.

I watched her as she watched the storyteller on stage. I wondered, does she understand what he's saying? The storyteller sat down and began a story that required audience participation. He put his hands on his knees and I watched the little girl's hands move. Was she trying to imitate him? It was hard to tell. He raised his hands in the air, and her hands moved upwards too. He clapped; her hands came together and a small smile played around her mouth. She never took her eyes off the storyteller. She was listening; she was in the story with him just like all the other noisy, wiggling kids in the room.

The little girl reminded me again of something I have seen over and over as a storyteller: children who might not seem to be listening...are listening. Children who do not seem capable of understanding a story...understand. Their bodies might not be perfect; their minds might not have developed along with their age; their eyes might not be looking; their behavior might not be the same as other children. But they can join with all listeners in the story journey, and no handicap can stop them.

Her smile lingers in my mind, a ghost of a smile on a beautiful young face that has probably seen more pain than its share. She will haunt me when I am on stage, a little one whose hands came together in delight as she listened to a story.

She reminded me of this old song:

Her Bright Smile Haunts Me Still
(W.T. Wrighton, J.E. Carpenter)

It's been a year since last we met
We may never meet again
I have struggled to forget
But the struggle was in vain.
For her voice lives on the breeze
Her spirit comes at will,
In the midnight on the seas
Her bright smile haunts me still.
     In the midnight on the seas
     Her bright smile haunts me still.

I have sailed a falling sky
And I've charted hazard's path
I have seen the storm arise
Like a giant in his wrath
Every danger I have known
That a reckless life can fill
Though her presence is now flown
Her bright smile haunts me still
     Though her presence is now flown
     Her bright smile haunts me still

At the first sweet dawn of light
When I gaze upon the deep,
Her form still greets my sight
While the stars their vils keep.
When I close my aching eyes

Sweet dreams my memory fill
And from sleep when I arise
Her bright smile haunts me still.
     And from sleep when I arise
     Her bright smile haunts me still.

From Traditional American Folksongs, Warner and Warner
apr97; from the Traditional Music Library website. 

Autumn Haiku

Leaves drenched in fall shades,

Turkeys fattened for fall feasts,



Frost expected soon.

Friends and Potato Soup

I am so excited! Catherine Crowe is coming to visit! Catherine is an amazing Celtic enameling artist and a beautiful ballad singer. I met her this summer at Augusta Heritage Irish Week, and we stayed in touch on Facebook. That's how I learned that she was coming to Cedar Lakes to teach a Road Scholar class on enameling. We've been emailing back and forth trying to find a time to get together.

What does this have to do with potato soup? I invited Catherine for dinner and since I work all day I thought I'd make something in advance that was simple and would be easy to heat up. With this cool fall weather, soup seemed like a good choice--soup, with cornbread made from the stone-ground meal I bought at Jackson's Mill , a salad, and poached pears with vanilla gelatto and drizzled with our honey for dessert. Add wine, good coffee and conversation. Stir well. Should serve three comfortably.

Here's the soup recipe. Talk about easy!

Peel and cut up about 4 cups of potatoes. You don't have to peel, of course, but I did.

Dice 3 stalks of celery and one or two onions. I'm not sure how much I used because I used my frozen onions--I put in a little less than half of a quart bag.

Chop up one large clove of garlic, about a teaspoonful.

Melt 1/4 cup of butter in a dutch oven--about a 4-6 quart pan. Add the chopped veggies and saute until the onions are clear.

Cover the sauteed vegetables with boiling water, add about 1/2 teaspoon of salt (optional) and 3 bay leaves (also optional, but I like them). and cook until the potatoes are soft.

At this point you can put the pan in the fridge and finish making the soup the next day, or continue to the next steps.

Here's where you can make some choices. You can put the soup through the blender for smooth soup, mash it with a potato masher for a chunky soup (my preference) or not mash the veggies at all. You can also add some milk to the blended soup and cook to a boil, adding a little more butter and some paprika. Or you can mash with a masher, add the paprika and maybe a little ground black pepper and no milk at all. I chose this last option. In the photo above, I had not yet mashed the soup so the vegetables were still pretty chunky.

Actually, I've made this soup twice in the past day. I made it Sunday night because I thought Catherine was coming tonight perhaps---we had not got it all figured out. I thought I was good to go for tomorrow but when I got home, I found that Larry had eaten a goodly portion of it for lunch! So I made it again. It's so simple it only takes about 10 minutes to chop the vegetables and another 15 or so to cook the soup.

Two other favorite potato soup recipes are potato-dill soup and potato-corn chowder (that is luscious!). I haven't posted the potato-dill soup recipe yet, but you can find the chowder recipe by clicking here. All are perfect for fall and winter meals. Comfort food at its best.

The Dogs are Barkin'

And I'm not talkin' about my hounds, I am talkin' about my FEET! What a weekend! I bet we sold over $40,000 of used books yesterday and today. It was wild, exciting, exhilarating, and totally tiring. The library will benefit from our efforts and that's all that counts, right?


About $350 of that total was my contribution. I found some great bargains, some just curious and interesting books and some that are vital to my storytelling and writing research. My best, and most expensive, find was the complete West Virginia Encyclopedia by Jim Comstock, published about 1976. I needed it. I had most of it already, but was missing several volumes, and that is frustrating. Now I have all of it, and I can sell my first incomplete set on eBay and probably get back what I paid for the new set.

Second best buy, at least that I have researched so far, is a history of Ohio, bought for $2 and worth $100 or so. Not as good as last year's $3 buy that ended up being valued at $470, but good enough. I have many more to look up so I may yet find a hidden treasure.

We worked hard. Can  you imagine setting up about 35,000 items for sale in 5 hours? Then organizing the selling of those items? That's what we did. Tomorrow we'll know the final sales total, put away all the signs and supplies and pretty much just bask in the memory. Larry was our hidden hero because he worked many unscheduled hours, just helping out.

Tonight we're vegging out. Too tired to do much but read emails and Facebook, was a few dishes and a load of laundry. Tomorrow, it's back to business as usual. But for now, I just want to remember the many friends I saw, the books. the laughter, and the fun of this weekend.

Beautiful Jackson's Mill

Sharing some of the beauty of Jackson's Mill with you:

 The graveyard just across from our lodge hold graves of some of Stonewall Jackson's relatives, incuding his grandfather.

 Stone, iron, and earth create a landscape of angles and softness.

Maples glowed in the woods behind the cemetery. 

The flag is on the grave of Jackson's grandfather. 

 Adam explored the herb garden beside the McWhorter cabin, and brought bits of leaves for us to smell and identify.

 The McWhorter cabin basks in the October sun,

and a Koi glides beneath reflected green in the mill pond.

Blaker's Mill is still operational and I brought home a five-pound bag of corn meal stone-ground at this mill. It makes the best cornbread.

 The Director's house is a testament to his wife's gardening abilities.

Stately, restful oaks line a path on the grounds.

Storytelling at Jackson's Mill

I thought I'd share a few photos from this week's storytelling. The weather stayed beautiful for the most part and the leaves were just at their peak of reds and yellows. With the rustic surroundings of the Mill, it was the perfect atmosphere for storytelling.

The kids arrived by busloads early in the morning and filed into one of two buildings, the barn or the West Virginia Building.

Here you can see how many children were packed into the West Virginia Building. And you can also see how beautiful this old building is with its woodwork and murals. This was taken before I got on stage and the kids were still getting settled in.

Here I am holding a Nehi bottle as part of my story about how I spent one whole summer searching for pop bottles so I could order a pair of coveted shoes from the Sears Roebuck catalog. The kids liked this story, and got appropriately grossed out when I told them about how I fell in love in 4th grade! So funny to hear them saying, "Eeew. Yuck!" And encouraging too. Kids haven't changed much, have they?

 The second day in the barn. It was cold in there, but we warmed up once the kids got there and we started telling. My partner this year was children's author and poet Marc Harshman. I took the stage first and he followed me. I started us off with the song Old Dan Tucker--it has a chorus for the kids to sing and is just silly enough and imaginative enough to get everyone in a good place for story listening.

As you can see, the barn was pretty full too. Lots of warm little bodies--just what we needed on a cold wet morning. The sun came out later and warmed us up a bit, thank goodness.



The tellers four!

So. Much. Fun.

Ah! I needed that--two whole days of storytelling with kids at a beautiful place, and good people to work with. What could be better?

 In the barn--that's a lot of kids! About 700-800 in this group, I think.

 

I was at Jackson's Mill-WVU Conference Center near Weston, West Virginia, for the WV Storytelling Festival. This isn't a typical storytelling festival--this one is restricted to schools only. The children arrive by busloads and we tell stories to them in the lovely surroundings of Jackson's Mill.

 Ilene Evans, Marc Harshman, me and Adam Booth--storytellers all.

Some of the schools that came are ones I have visited in the past to tell stories, so they are like old friends. Sutton Elementary, for example--I performed for them for several years in a row until they couldn't get funding any more for their event. The principal is one of those rarities, a leader who understands the value of the arts in education. A musician himself, he works hard to make sure his students get to experience all kinds of art during the school year. He's one of my heroes. He gets it, when so many do not. Life is informed and enriched by art.

I had an adventure on the way to the festival. I stopped at an ATM to get some cash and my brake pedal went POP and suddenly went to the floor under my foot. I was pretty sure this wasn't a good thing. I eased out carefully, testing the brakes and waiting to see if any warning light came on. None did, and while the pedal went to the floor each time I pressed it, I was able to stop.

I decided that I better test it a little more before getting back on the interstate. I was about 100 miles from home and 40 from the festival at this point and I did not want any nasty surprises. So I drove to a drive-through restaurant, got dinner and as I pulled out, the warning light, bells, and all came on. LOW BRAKE FLUID the light said. I pulled into a gas station and looked under my car. A telltale trail of fluid leaked from the back passenger side wheel. Uh-oh. This wasn't good.

By now it was getting dark. I tried to call Larry but he wasn't home. Tried my son Aaron, no answer--Aaron was closest to me, about an hour away. Finally I tried Derek and just as I was explaining the problem to him, Aaron called me back. He said he would come right away. What a son. This was the evening before his birthday, and he had to be at work at 6 am.

While I waited for Aaron, I decided to make use of the time and walked over to a bulk food stores to get some things for my two days at the festival. I found a bottle of Lambert Winery's Blackberry Merlot, which I know Aaron and his wife like, so I bought it as a thank you gift. Then I walked to a produce stand to get a few apples. I had a nice talk with the lady who was working there. She is a cook at the high school, she said, and works part-time at the produce stand. She was canning tomatoes as she worked! She said she figured she might as well make use of her time when there were no customers and can the tomatoes that were beginning to go bad. What a woman. I do believe she was a little older than me, but she was full of energy.

Aaron arrived and figured out the problem quickly--somehow my emergency brake cable had got pushed over and rubbed a hole in the rubber brake line that ran to the wheel. I'd tried calling a few garages before Aaron arrived but of course no one was open that time of night. I asked Aaron, "Can't we just tape it up with duct tape and put more fluid in it?"

"No," he said, "first time you put your foot on the brake it would start leaking again." He thought a minute. Then he said, "But ya know, if I crimp off the line with a pair of vice grips, then tape it good with duct tape and tape the vice grip to the frame of the car...that would work!"

And that's what he did. 45 minutes later I was on the road with Aaron following me to be sure I didn't have any problems. The brakes worked perfectly.

I got to the festival, Aaron was home by 10pm and all was well. Today I drove v-e-r-y slowly home, using the brakes gently, no small feat when traveling halfway across the Mountain State. But here I am home, the brakes are fine and Larry will repair them in the morning.

This story was the perfect lead-in to my set with the kids because I planned to tell a Jack tale (along with a few songs, of course). Jack is a mountain trickster (remember Jack and the Beanstalk? Same Jack, many stories) who gets into trouble but always finds a way out by using his brains and coming up with novel solutions.

I am pretty sure my son Aaron is a modern-day Jack. What a guy.

And by the way, Happy Birthday, Aaron!

More from the 1942 newspaper, and this week: a busy time coming up

 

Here are a few more photos from that 1942 Jackson county newspaper we found in the floor of the old cabin. This ad is for the Smoot Theatre in Parkersburg. I thought this was interesting because of the different way a "superhero" is portrayed. They seem to be a lot more muscled up in the chest these days!

Look at these prices! I remember once in the early 1970's we bought pullet eggs for 20 cents a dozen, but they were really small. And pork for a quarter a pound? Not in my lifetime.

Now ladies, here is the latest thing. Just go in and let Miss Mary measure you up!

These ads are so striking to me because it's apparent that even during a war, women and men wanted to look their best. Life went on, even if there was a terrible world war raging a continent away--and even submarines closing in on our coastline. It has seemed odd to me that we don't feel the current war more than we do, but it seems that even in the early 40's people were still going on with their everyday interests.

Larry found another newspaper or two yesterday, and I'll be posting photos of it later on. This recent find is even earlier, from 1917 and 1918, I believe he said. The newspaper is called The Mountaineer and it was another Jackson county paper, although I have never heard of it before. It is in better condition than the 1942 paper, surprisingly--and full of all sorts of interesting news.

I'll be on the road again tomorrow night, so my posting will be light this week. I'll be telling stories at the WV Storytelling Festival on Wednesday and Thursday, then back to work Friday, and working at the WV Book Festival on Saturday and Sunday. It will be a busy, busy week for me but I am so looking forward to telling stories again. Tonight I've been working on my story list, going over the details and packing my clothes since I won't be coming home tomorrow after work.

This Weekend--Wedding, Work, and Play

This weekend started early--with my son Derek's marriage to lovely Amy yesterday.

What fun we had! It was a simple, relaxed ceremony followed by dinner at one of the most fun places I've ever dined. From the back it looked like it was a biker bar--

But the flower gardens in front gave a hint that it might be better inside.

And it was.

Good food and drink, a comfortable atmosphere for the kids, plenty to look at, and lots of laughter added up to a memorable meal.

Now back to the real world and the rest of the weekend to-do list:

• Larry will be working on finishing clean-up at the old cabin site, and then if he has time, pulling in firewood. 

• I am cleaning up the Tappan (lots of Brillo and elbow grease required), canning pears and putting up peppers. I found a recipe for jalapenos I want to try, the cayenne peppers need to be strung and there is a bushel basket of banana and bell peppers to be reckoned with. The pears are a simple peel-and-can affair, but time consuming and there's a bushel of those too.

• Laundry, housework, and some time to enjoy this beautiful fall day out on the porch are on the schedule too.

• Tonight we have concert tickets for Tim O'Brien. That will be a treat! 

Looks like I'd better get back to scrubbing that stove if I'm going to get all this stuff done.

The Book Festival is Coming!

The West Virginia Book Festival is coming soon! If  you're a bookophile like I am (the real world is bibliophile, but I like bookophile better) then you need to be in Charleston, WV on October 16 and 17 for the tenth annual Book Festival.

What's at the festival? Nicholas Sparks. Carmen Deedy. Diane Gabaldon. And lots of other great authors. Storytelling. Writing workshops. Author sessions. Book signing. Booths of all kinds with books and other stuff for sale. A kid's play area. Fun. Lots of fun. And the biggest used book sale in West Virginia.

That's where I'll be--at the book sale, working in the Collector's Corner among all the rare, out-of-print books. I will have to bring some $$$ with me I know, because I'll be shopping as well as working. I've come away with some great bargains in past years and I expect to do the same this year. I'm still feeling good about the book I bought for $3 last year that turns out to be worth about $470. That doesn't always happen but every once in a while a person can get lucky.

You can find out all about the Book Festival events on the website, West Virginia Book Festival.

Almost Wordless Wednesday: Flowers, Fishing, Family and Fire--and a Fable

Late summer flowers

There was one great egret at the lake for weeks. One day two others appeared, stayed with the lone one for a day or two, and then they all flew off south together. Never have we had these birds here before. Did the two come to get the lost one? How would they know where he was? When I took this photo, I didn't know I had three birds in the lens. The one on the lower right was a surprise.

Fall fisherman on the Kanawha River

Hannah by the fire

Hannah by the fire 2

The end of a beautiful day