Life on Snow Hill

Hello again, loyal readers.  I’m sorry I haven’t posted anything in so long – the last date I put anything up was the 4th of August.  I don’t have much excuse for the rest of that week, but all of last week I’ve been gone on vacation.  This will be a long post, so hang on!

Becky and I went up to Ohio to see my sister and her husband, and then on to Michigan to see her grandparents.  On our way back south, we stopped back in Ohio to visit some more and then went to a Reds game.

When we first got to Ohio, it had already been a hard day at work.  I had to work on Saturday the 9th for maintenance – that’s a time when we can do work on servers that can’t be done during regular hours.  My job was simple that day – cable up the new storage to the SAN, and update the patches on our VMware hosts.  We ran into a small issue with the SAN, but it took us a while to fix it.  The VMware stuff went just fine.  But I didn’t get out of the office until about 2:00 in the afternoon, and it was too late to make it to Ohio for the main purpose of our trip in the first place.  My sister’s husband was being ordained as the assistant pastor at First Baptist Church in West Union, Ohio.  We made it to their house around 8:30 that evening I believe.  We went to church with them and several other family members on Sunday.  My sister’s father-in-law preached both services.  We all stayed with them again on Monday night, and went to the Creation Museum near Cincinnati the next morning.  I’ll blog about that trip in a different post since there is so much to tell.  After that, Becky and I headed straight up to Michigan.

Becky’s grandparents live in Lexington, MI.  It’s a small town right on Lake Huron.  This photo to the left is from the ‘Rock Wall’ that extends out into the lake in this small harbor.

We stayed with them for three nights and had a great time overall.  We were also able to visit with some of Becky’s other family members – cousins, aunts and uncles.

While we were there we also drove down to Port Huron to see the sights there.  Becky’s grandma (Oma) wanted so bad to take us ‘across the bridge’ into Canada.  I honestly hadn’t been crazy about the idea at all from the start, and then one of Becky’s aunts told us about how she was detained one day when her name/age/description was flagged as someone they were looking for.  That was enough for me – I didn’t want to spend any extra time with the authorities than I had to.  Going through customs was going to be bad enough for me – I hate subjecting myself to searches, etc.  Not that I have anything to hide, just that it violates my sense of privacy.  Anyway, we did go to the river and look across at Canada.  In the photo here, you can see two land masses – the one of the left is Canada, and the right is the good ole’ USA.

Lastly, on our way back home on Thursday, we stopped back by my sister’s house.  We got there around 8:30 again I believe.  They made home made chocolate ice cream for my birthday and we watched a movie.  Well, we tried anyway – we were all really tired.  We got up the next morning and headed to the Cincinnati area.  Our main intent was to go see the Reds play, but we did a little bit of shopping before game time.  At the game, we started out in the very top of the nosebleed section behind home plate.  I’m serious – when we looked behind us, we were looking at the outside of the stadium.  After a few innings, we headed down to the right field corner where they had a mostly empty ‘family’ section where alcohol wasn’t allowed.

The entire trip was a lot of fun, but there was a lot of driving involved so that was a bit tiresome.  We really enjoyed getting away, but we were glad to get back home at the same time.  Now it’s back to the daily grind of the job, and taking care of things around the house.

Lately there are things that keep happening that are inspiring me to try to get back into music a little bit.  For instance, a good while back Becky and I decided we wanted to try to learn a song or two to be able to sing in church.  Mostly if not completely my fault, we haven’t learned anything yet.  One of the new churches we’re visiting has asked us if we sing, so there’s one thing.

I went to my cousin’s house one day to pick up some eggs (of all things, I know).  Her daughter was in her room practicing the piano, and when I came in she asked me to play a certain southern style of “I’ll Fly Away” for her so she could hear it and try to learn that style.  It’s been forever since I played that song, much less that style, so I wasn’t able to do it.

It’s just little things like that.  I’m thinking more and more of needing to get back on the piano, or my guitars.  I also have a mandoline, fiddle and banjo that I can’t play.  I need to learn how to play those.  I love the way they all sound – I just haven’t taken the time to learn to make that sound myself.

So I’m trying to inspire myself even more with this photo I took of the fretboard on my bass guitar.  I’ve also got a music theme background on my computer, so that every time I sit down to use it, I see it.  I’ll get there one day.

Tags: guitar, Music, piano

Today on my lunch break Becky and I went out to the garden.  There were several things that needed to be picked or dug, so we set to work.  We had it all done in about half an hour.

In this photo (You can click it to make it bigger) you can see carrots, squash, zucchini, potatoes and cucumbers.

There were a ton of carrots – all of them that were planted in fact.  We probably dug out about 5 earlier in the year, but we decided these were all big enough.  So we have a pretty big pile of them.  We just need to cut the tops off and clean them up so that we can get ‘em in the fridge.

We’ve been getting squash and zucchini for a while now, so those aren’t as big a deal – they just add to the grand total.

The potatoes are the first that we dug up this year.  They look to be in good shape, but we need to cut into them to see if there are any of those tiny little black worms.  My dad hasn’t been able to grow potatoes because of those stupid worms.  Maybe they’ll be okay in the ground I have.

And last but not least, we have another big mess of cucumbers.  There are probably enough (15 lbs) to do another batch of pickles.  We’ll see though.

We had to use the wheelbarrow to get all of these veggies out of the garden.  Now we just need to get to work on getting them cleaned up and in the refrigerator so they won’t go bad!

Let me back up a bit and start with Thursday.  I mowed the yard for the first time in what seemed like forever.  Some of my grass was at least 6 inches high if not more.  Needless to say, when I mowed that area, I had huge clumps of cut grass all over the place.  Not a pretty site.

Fast forward to Saturday.  I mowed the yard again after giving the cut grass a chance to die, and the rest of the grass a bit of a chance to grow a little more.  It was a little more enjoyable this time (I normally love mowing the yard, but not last Thursday!) because I didn’t have to poke along in the thick areas.  I did, however, have to go over those areas twice so that the clumps of grass would spread out a little more and make the yard look more presentable.  That was what I spent most of my time doing.

The first thing I did, however, was to go out and run the weed-eater.  I really hate that part of yard work, and I conveniently skipped it the last 2 or 3 times I mowed.  Things were starting to look really bad, though, and I knew it really had to be done.  So I got out of bed and started it first thing so that it wouldn’t be too hot, and I’d still be willing to mow later on in the day.  There were 4 flower beds and a strawberry patch that was way overgrown.  Normally I’d blame Becky (:)) but she’s been hurt, and I honestly haven’t been able to keep up with everything outside.  So the weed-eater took care of all of those, and they look at least manageable again.

A lot of the rest of the day I helped Becky out with a few things here and there.  I got some time in on the PS3 as well, but with my help, Becky got some bread & butter pickles done (15+ pounds of cucumbers worth!), got the smaller fish tank cleaned up and a few other smaller things throughout the house.

At the end of the day, we were both worn out, but were happy with the things we’d accomplished.

I went out today and shot some more photos of the garden. There are two or three plants out there that we’re starting to see some food on!

Becky and I have worked pretty hard on our garden this year.  We want to be sure we get lots of food out of it, because we plan to can a lot of it and try to make it last as long as we can through the Winter.  Everything seems to be doing really well, except maybe the watermelon and peppers.  The watermelon is just having a hard time coming in, but there are a few coming up.  It should be enough, anyway.  For the peppers, the bugs are liking them a lot this year, so I’m having to try to keep bug spray on them.  Maybe they’ll make it.

I can’t remember if I said this in a previous post or not, but we’re going to be overrun by tomatoes.  We have 20 plants!  Last year we only had 4, and we had plenty.  But Becky canned some of the tomato juice (about 12 jars) and made tomato soup from it.  She wants that to last longer, so we did a lot more.  I just hope we’re able to keep up with it all!

We also will have a LOT of cucumbers.  She wanted to try making pickles out of them, and they’ll last forever, so we decided to do quite a few of those as well.

We didn’t do any corn, and this year is the first that we’ve done beans, broccoli and carrots.  We’ll see how that all turns out.

We’re really excited about the garden this year.  One concern, though, is thieves in the area.  I just hope they keep their sorry backsides out of my garden.  Otherwise it might get a little nasty for everybody involved.

It was a good weekend.  I’m worn out from it, but it was fun.  On Friday, when I got off work I got some new tires put on the truck.  They were needed badly.  I was going to have them do an alignment on it as well, but they told me the lower ball joint on the passenger side was worn and the wheel had some play in it, so it couldn’t be aligned.  Hopefully tomorrow I’m going to be replacing that with Becky’s dad’s help.  The good news about that is that it is a part that is less than $50.

On Saturday, I left about 8:30 in the morning to put some gas in the gas cans so I could mow the yard and work the tiller through the garden.  From then on, I stayed outside until 3 in the afternoon.  I had to replant some watermelon (If it all comes in, I’m going to have a ton – want some?), squash and zucchini.  Hopefully it will all come in strong this time and I’ll have plenty.  I need to fertilize the garden soon – maybe if I can get that done everything will do well.  I’m more excited this year about our garden than I was last year, or even the year before.  In all, we’ll have:

• Watermelon (up to 25 pound melons)
• Yellow crookneck squash
• Zucchini
• Potatoes
• Okra
• Green beans (tendergreen improved – stringless)
• Carrots
• Peppers (Several kinds of bell peppers)
• Broccoli
• Cucumbers (We should have lots and lots of these too – Becky is going to try pickling them)
• Onions (Yellow and white)
• Tons of tomatoes – 20 plants in all.  Becky will can tomato juice this year.

Once I finished in the garden, I mowed the yard.  Although that wasn’t particularly hard work, it still wore me out.  It wasn’t even that hot, but the sun beat down on me the whole time I was out there – I still have the sunburn to prove it.  But it was still relaxing in a way – I mow between 2 to 2.5 acres, and it takes me probably 2 or 3 hours to do it.  So I ride the mower around just thinking about anything and everything under the sun.

Once all the hard work was done, I came back inside and relaxed for a little while.  We bought some spareribs and got them going in the oven for a couple of hours, then I threw them on the grill for a few minutes to sear the outside of them.  Once it was all said and done, they were falling off the bone and were some of the best ribs I’ve ever had.

All in all it was a good weekend, even with the little bit of bad news about the truck.  Hopefully that will all be taken care of this week and all will be peaches & cream, or a bed of roses, or whatever else you want to compare it to.  I know, I’m probably dreaming, but things have to get better at some point.

3 years ago today, April 16, 2008, is when Becky and I were married.

It was a good, but sort of a hectic day.  Well, it was for Becky anyway.  She got up early and was off doing all the things a woman does to make herself pretty.  (I’m so glad I’m not a woman)  She did a really good job, too, by the way.

I honestly don’t remember what I did when I first woke up.  I do, however, remember that when I got myself ready to go, I had plenty of time to spare before I needed to be at the church, so I dozed on the couch for a few minutes to relax and calm my nerves.

Once everybody was at the church, things started getting a little more hectic for me.  Everybody was running around doing last minute arrangements, getting pictures done and getting things ready for the reception.  I personally tried to hide as much as I could.

There weren’t really any big mishaps for the day.  Well, Becky’s mom forgot to bring her wedding dress.  But no big deal.  It wasn’t really that important.  Of course, I’m being completely sarcastic.  Her mom was freaking out and thought she’d ruined the whole day – but there was plenty of time for her to go back and get it, so it really was no big deal.  That was about the time that I realized that I forgot to bring the tux for one of my groomsmen.  Becky’s mom picked that up while she was out as well.  Other than that, and something about somebody not being able to find some flowers, things went smoothly.  It was a great day.

So now for 3 years, Becky and I have been growing closer to each other.  We’re still learning about all the little quirks that the other has (does that ever end?) and figuring out how to deal with them.  But that’s ok – she wanted a Wii for our anniversary this year so she could kick my tail in that boxing game.  She got me a very nice watch, which has been much needed for a few months now.

All joking aside, I couldn’t have picked a better lady to spend the rest of my life with.

As most of you know by now, I’ve been really excited about the arrival of Spring.  This week in particular has been really warm, with highs in the mid-70′s most of the time, and lows only as low as the 50′s.  I was even able to ride the motorcycle all week long to save a ton on gas.

Becky and I have been watching the tulips grow in our front yard.  We bought some bulbs last fall and planted them, not expecting any blooms for the first year.  But we noticed one red tulip getting ready to open up.  We were both surprised, and decided that would probably be the only one.  But after a couple of days, we noticed most of the others doing the same.  Needless to say, this area of our front yard is now a bright red and yellow reaffirmation that Spring is here to stay.

This weekend we’re coming into the ‘Dogwood Winter’.  It’s one of two cold snaps we get here in East Tennessee after Spring has arrived.  There will be another one in a week or two that we like to call ‘Blackberry Winter’.

For those of you not from the Tennessee area, I can hear you asking, “Why is it all about Dogwoods and Blackberries?”  You see, Dogwood Winter is right about the time Dogwood trees bloom, and the same goes for Blackberries.  So while things will get cool again a couple more times, Becky and I have been enjoying ourselves in this warm weather and getting lots of work done outside.  I love Spring.

Dad got his tractor out last Thursday evening and ran the bush hog through all the local gardens – his own, mine, Granny’s, Fred’s, and Jeff’s.  Then he plowed mine up.  The tractor struggled a bit, but we’ve since concluded that it is because there wasn’t enough fluid added to the tires to put that extra weight on the back on the tractor for extra traction.  I wish it hadn’t rained the next day, or we would have been able to run the tiller through it as well so that it would be ready for planting.  I’m probably jumping the gun a little bit – with my luck, it will freeze again before Spring/Summer is here to stay.  That’s what happened last year, and I had to replant just about everything in the garden.

Becky and I have done yard work over the past couple of weekends.  Mowing the yard, cleaning out flower beds and all that fun Spring stuff.  It’s been hard work, and I’ve found that I’m not used to it in the least.  But it is still satisfying.