64°f this morning, about 17°C. Pleasant but humid. Cloudy all day.
Absolutely the wrong time of year for it, I suppose, but with so much mincemeat in the cellar I decided to make a pie. I learned that mincemeat is apparently good any time of year! This was a nice treat.
Rain is predicted almost every day the rest of this week, and for the past several days too. For all of that, all we have had is a tiny drizzle for 10 minutes yesterday morning. The frustration is wearing. Everyone we see talks about rain, how little we've had, how much we need it, who is getting it, how dry the fields are, how desperate the gardens are. The truck accessory of choice these days is a large plastic water tank as wells go dry, cisterns are drained, creekbeds are stony, and springs quit running.
Some farmers are selling off some of their cattle because they have no way to get enough water to them. Some people are giving up on their gardens because they can't afford to keep watering. There will be no second or third cutting of hay, and field corn may not be worth harvesting. It's bad around here, folks.
But the county fair is happening this week. Normally during fair week we can expect it to be stormy, turning the fairgrounds into a muddy mess. Our friend Don is here from Arizona, and usually whenever he comes we get lots of rain, making the trail--can't really call it a road-- to his cabin inaccessible except by tractor or ATV. This time, neither Don or the county fair has been able to attract the rain. Maybe what we need is for granddaughter Sarah to come for a visit, because inevitably it will pour for days when she is here!
We are fortunate to have a very deep well (723 feet, to be exact) that the well driller said could easily supply 5 houses without any trouble. I say fortunate, but that well was pretty costly at the time we had it drilled in 1990. It cost over $10,000 then. We sold some acreage to drill it, because the old spring we had relied on for 16 years kept shifting and drying up, and the 1/3 mile of pipe and the pump-and-gravity feed system we used to get the water to the house had constant problems.
So we are watering daily, shifting hoses from garden to garden, trying to keep as much alive as we can. It is wearing, as any of you going through this know. But I know it could be worse, and my heart really goes out to those who can't do what we're doing.
After yesterday's hard work, we had a little break today, going into town to pay our annual taxes (ouch), visit our friend Rachel, stop at the thrift store to browse the used books, pick up a few things at the store, and have a late lunch at one of the two Mexican restaurants.
Then it was home to, you guessed it, water once again. July has always been my least favorite month, and this one sure sealed that!
Copyright Susanna Holstein. All rights reserved. No Republication or Redistribution Allowed without attribution to Susanna Holstein.
We need rain and are watering everyday but our problem is nothing compared to that of farmers and others that depend on water for their livelihoods. Hearing of farmers having to sell some of their animals because of the lack of water makes me so sad.
ReplyDeleteYou are really going through it. TG for that deep well. Our 24-day-forecast has most days going into the 80s and some close to the 90s. Wife does not do well in the heat.
ReplyDelete...I've never had mincemeat, am I missing something?
ReplyDeleteLots of work if you have a huge garden during hot summer months..the pie looks great, Sue.
ReplyDeleteThat is the second mincemeat pie I have read about this week! The midwest is in a drought right now too. Plenty of rain early in the Dakota's but the last few have been dry. Could use a nice shower to finish off the crops, but there is nothing in the forecast.
ReplyDelete17C, brrr, that is no summer!
ReplyDeleteWhen in Perth in summer we always eat (meat)-pies.
We have too much rain, I would enjoy, if it was warmer... Wish I could send some rain over to you. This sounds really bad.
Glad to hear you have a deep well, but so sorry to hear farmers are suffering so from the drought. We're stuck in some kind of cycle where it's cloudy and rain almost every afternoon with daytime temps in 80s. Of course that's a usual summer forecast, but we're missing the sunny days sometimes. However, last month our region was also in drought. Glad you posted a photo of your pretty pie.
ReplyDeleteMy grandmother used to make a mean mincemeat pie around the holidays.
ReplyDeleteI'm deep-watering our remaining tree out front for 2 or 3 hours every other day or so. We had a good rain a day or two ago but now it's missing us again. Phoenix is due for a thunderstorm later this afternoon. And mincemeat: is there any meat in your mixture or is it the way I'd prefer it, all fruit, nuts and booze(!)?
ReplyDeleteI hope for rain for everyone. We have finally had some rain. Not enough, but certainly better than nothing. How very smart of you to drill a deep well!
ReplyDeleteWe had a very deep well at our old house. The jury is still out on whether or not the existing well at the new house will be enough. Tim is pretty sure that it will be, but we do not know until we get there. It seems to recover quickly, though.
ReplyDeleteOh this sounds like how it was in Arkansas in the 1990' through to around 2010. Every summer the rain stopped mid June, the temps rose to over 100' for days on end & everything died. It was miserable & it's why I hate summer so very much. But for some reason, 5 to 7 yrs ago we started getting regular rains in the summer. We had to mow every week to keep up! Now, my husband hates it because of all the mowing.
ReplyDeleteBut for sure, going without rain in the summer heat is such a hard thing to endure. I hope you get some soon.
Water is essential to all life and it’s great that you had the foresight to drill the well so deep. Burgeoning human populations will ensure that sooner rather than later more people will be without it.
ReplyDelete