Goodbye to the Summer

I'm having to face an unpleasant fact.

I saw this sunflower skeleton outside my window this morning, "Summer's coming to an end," I sighed.

John corrected: "FALL's coming to an end."

Remember these sunflowers from July?

Remember our early morning garden times, and the glory and color that splashed into my world from every corner?

Now the landscape is drying up; colors are fading. Beauty, so saucy and unabashed for months, is donning her cloak, becoming delicate, shy, reclusive.

Fall is coming to an end.

Say it ain't so.

Harvest, Part 3

Driving the grain truck home at dusk.

Sometimes we harvest at night.

There's something cozy about our little lights shining in a dark sea of corn stalks -- like faces in candlelight when the power is out, or playing hide and seek outdoors at night.

An tiny hub of illuminated activity in a big, dark, quiet world.

Watching the corn drain into the auger hopper, John prepares to shut the grain
door for the last time of the day. Now go home and rest your weary bones.

Harvest, Part 2

John's job at harvest is to drive the combine through the corn.

It's called a combine because it combines the tasks of picking the corn and threshing it, separating the kernels from the cob, husk, and chaff. Golden corn piles up in the combine bin, while the refuse blows out the back.

Even after Americans knew how to build atomic bombs that could obliterate an entire city, it took a while to make a machine that could pick corn and shell it in one pass. Until 1954, corn was picked in the ear, hauled into the yard and then removed from the cob in a separate operation.

Step 1: The old fashioned corn picker harvested whole ears.

Step 2: The sheller separated grain from stalk and husk.

Picking and shelling photos courtesy of the Internet.

The invention of combines, which could both pick and shell grain in the field, resulted in a remarkable increase in productivity - corn that took an entire day to shuck and shell in 1900 could, by the end of the century, be picked, shucked, and shelled with a combine in five minutes.


My job is to drive the grain cart alongside the combine. When John's combine bin gets full, he dumps his corn into the grain cart.


My dad took this photo last year, of the combine unloading into the grain cart. Having a grain cart saves John lots of time - instead of driving to the field edge to empty the combine every time it's full, he keeps picking while I drive alongside, receiving the corn.


A lot can go wrong when you're driving the grain cart. To avoid dumping corn either on the ground or the cab of the tractor, you have to be the right distance away from the combine, and you have to go the same speed as your combine driver. If he slows, you slow. If he speeds up, you'd better not be thinking about what's for supper.

When the combine is through dumping, it's time for the grain cart driver to haul the load to the edge of the field. Filling the trucks without spilling corn on the ground can be challenging......

....that corn comes out FAST!

Sometimes I mess up.
Then I get a little aerobic exercise with a shovel in my hand, out in the gorgeous fall sunshine.

Harvest

Twenty minutes after curling out of the minivan, freshly home from our whirlwind Colorado trip, I was back in the saddle. Not the horse saddle, but the grain cart saddle, working with my dear hubby to get this corn (and all the other corn) into this grain bin (and all the other grain bins).

This corn is not like the sweet roasted ears you chomp through at an August cookout. This is "field corn". It stays in the husk and on the stalk just where it was planted, until the kernels are dried and hard. Then it fills up grain bins and elevators across the Midwest until someone needs it to make ethanol or corn syrup or cattle feed or Fritos.

I would write more, but I hear the combine starting. Duty calls.

Colorful Colorado

The Bad News: After much travail to get tickets to the World Series Game Five, after driving to Denver to see the game, after picking up my Texan dad at Denver International for the same reason...



there was no Game Five.

Baseball fans hiking the hill behind Aunt Suzanne's house for a nice panorama of Denver.

My dad enjoying the view from Aunt Suzanne's driveway.

The Good News: Colorado is beautiful and time with family is a blessing, even when your best-laid plans go foul.


The best laid plans of mice and men often go awry. (Robert Burns).

(If Robert Burns had been a baseball fan, I'm sure that he would have written "go foul.")

Chocolate Mint Dreams

These cookies are so light, dreamy, and soft, they nearly float.

Audrey made some to take to the field where John was harvesting. I wonder how many farmers get to munch on gourmet cookies amidst the roar of bin fans and the swirl of corn dust in the air. It may not be quite as relaxing as taking high tea at the Brown Palace, but I'm sure the treats here are every bit as good.

Be careful how many you eat, lest you become as pillowy as they are.

Chocolate Mint Dreams makes approximately 30 dreamy cookies

3/4 c. butter, softened

1/2 cup powdered sugar

2 squares unsweetened chocolate, melted and cooled (can substitute 6 T. cocoa mixed with 2 T. oil)

1/4 tsp. peppermint extract

1 1/2 cups flour

1 cup chocolate chips or mini chocolate chips

Icing

2 T. butter, softened

1 cup powdered sugar

1 T. milk

1/4 tsp. peppermint extract

1 to 2 drops green food coloring

Drizzle

scant 1/2 cup chocolate chips

1/2 tsp. shortening

In a large bowl, cream butter and powdered sugar. Beat in chocolate and mint extract. Gradually add flour. Stir in chocolate chips. (Dough will be soft.) Drop by tablespoonfuls onto ungreased cookie sheets. Flatten with spoon. Bake at 375 for 8-10 minutes, or until firm. Cool for 4 minutes before transferring to wire rack to cool completely. Meanwhile, mix together icing ingredients. Spread over cooled cookies. Let set. In microwave, melt chocolate and shortening; stir until smooth. Drizzle over cookies.

Thursday Afternoon

The hens are still laying.

The geraniums are still blooming.

Summer's not dead yet!

Seriously, About those World Series Tickets.......

Gas to Denver: $148
Ticket to see the Red Sox vs.the Rockies: $110
Parking Pass: $20.25
Cotton Candy: probably another twenty bucks

Making a dream come true for the man who taught you the game, bought your first ball glove, and to whom you send a sympathy card every year after the last out in October:

PRICELESS

Weapons

At New York's Kennedy airport today, an individual later discovered to be a public school teacher was arrested trying to board a flight while in possession of a protractor, a T-square, a slide rule, and a calculator.

At a morning press conference, Acting Attorney General Peter Keisler said he believes the man is a member of the notorious Al-gebra movement. The man is being charged by the FBI with carrying weapons of math instruction.

"Al-gebra is a fearsome cult," Ashcroft said. "They desire average solutions by means and extremes, and sometimes go off on tangents in a search for absolute value. They use secret code names like x and y and refer to themselves as unknowns, but we have determined they belong to a common denominator of the axis of medieval with coordinates in every country. As the Greek philanderer Isosceles used to say, there are 3 sides to every triangle," Keisler declared.
When asked to comment on the arrest, President Bush said, "I am gratified that our government has given us a sine that it is intent on protracting us from these math-dogs who are willing to dis-integrate us with calculus disregard. Murky statisticians love to inflict plane on every sphere of influence," the President said, adding: "Under the circumferences, we must differentiate their root, make our point, and draw the line."

President Bush warned, "These weapons of math instruction have the potential to decimal everything in their math on a scalene never before seen unless we become exponents of a Higher Power and begin to factor-in random facts of vertex." Keisler said, "As our Great Leader would say, read my ellipse. Though they continue to multiply, their days are numbered as the hypotenuse tightens around their necks."

Author unknown

The Day the "Music" Died

Somebody gave us this old organ, amidst our protests that we really didn't want it. The girls had played on it at their great-grandma's house when we went to visit, a gaggle of toddlers entertaining themselves as best they could in an old woman's home. Adults visited around the kitchen table while three- and five-year-olds amused themselves with Grandma's treadmill and the electric rhythm---cha-cha-CHA, cha-cha-CHA---of this plastic organ.

When grandma moved on to assisted living, the organ came to live with us. Mostly it gathered dust---the girls had moved on as well---but occasionally, we'd hear a round of Happy Birthday or How Great is Our God, overlaid with a snappy electronic samba beat.

I've been trying to find a new home for the organ for years. No one seems to want it, and they charge you fifteen bucks to take it at the dump. Plus, to haul it to the dump, you actually have to GO to the dump, which I try to avoid.

They say that time changes things, but sometimes you have to change them yourself. That's what we did today.

See that dumpster in the background? If we can get this organ to fit in that dumpster, we won't have to pay the fifteen bucks........

we won't have to go to the dump......

and we might have some jolly good fun in the meantime!

For the Living.........

I went to a funeral Thursday, the second one in as many weeks.

I've never been to a funeral where the preacher wept and wailed because the departed soul had missed out on a relationship with his Savior, and would, as a result, be spending a sorrowful eternity in a horrible place. We just don't do that at funerals. Funerals are for the living, we say, and no one living wants to think about a loved one in hell.

Funerals focus on finding a silver lining to accompany the starkness of loss and death. "He's in a better place now. He was a good man."

The man who died last week was indeed a good man. He tried to do what is right. He cared for others, loved his family, worked hard. And yet, at his funeral, the preacher dealt with the reality that the Bible says that is not enough. Because, even though Mark was what we call a good man, Mark broke the commandments. At some point in his life, he lied. He stole. Perhaps he looked lustfully upon a woman, which God reckons the same as adultery.

As humans, we say, "Well, we've all done that. He was sorry for it. He knew it was wrong and he did his best to change." All true. But God says the penalty for sin is death. Just that bluntly. He says there is no one, not even one single person, good enough to earn heaven. We may not like that, but we didn't make the rules - God did.

Then, because He loves us, He stepped up and made a way for someone else to take death and hell, the penalty for sin, that we deserve. All He asks is that we accept the gift -- a gift, not something we can earn -- of eternal life, purchased for us by the blood of Jesus.

If you don't believe me, look it up. If you think that your own good nature, or all your good deeds, or the fact that you're in church every Sunday, will save you from paying for your sins, read through the Scriptures below to see what God says about that. But don't ignore it, thinking you'll ride to heaven on your good works, your intellect, or your church contributions.

You can't afford to be wrong.

Romans 3:12 They are all gone out of the way, they are together become unprofitable; there is none that doeth good, no, not one.
Romans 3:23 For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God.
Romans 6:23 For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Matthew 13:41 The Son of man shall send forth his angels, and they shall gather out of his kingdom all things that offend, and them which do iniquity; and shall cast them into a furnace of fire: there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth.
1 Peter 3:18 For Christ also hath once suffered for sins, the just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God.
John 17:3 And this is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent.
Ephesians 2:8 For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: not of works, lest any man should boast.

Four Friends

It's terrific to have the GeorgiaGirl back in Nebraska, even if it is only for a long weekend.

Audrey at Work

Audrey is making friends with this kitten.

A poor grandma with a walker found this orphan baby, hand-raising it and bottle feeding until it was old enough for solid foods. Only trouble is, orphan kittens don't have mama around to show them who's boss, so they tend to get mean.

Grandma brought this kitty to the vet, asking for help. So it's Audrey's job to help socialize the kitten. I'd say it's not going too well.

Audrey disagrees. "You should have seen it when it first came," she said. All you had to do was walk into the cat room, and this little kitty started hissing and dive-bombing the cage door, trying to take you out.

No wonder grandma needed a hand, with Kittykins flinging himself at her walker and shredding her nylons!

The remedy: hold it by the scruff of its neck while it squirms and hisses. Try not to get your arm ripped off. Then, when it calms down a bit, tell it what a good kitty it is.

Combine Surgery

More signs of fall: the combine is undergoing surgery.

These are not vital organs strewn across the driveway, as this operation is more akin to fixing carpal tunnel syndrome than to open heart.

Combine surgery requires precision, just like medical surgery.

Combine surgery requires lots of money, just like medical surgery.

But at least you get to do combine surgery out in the sunshine, with a little breeze flipping through your hair. And if you mess it up, the combine doesn't sue you.

Up on the Roof

It was not my idea to have a picnic lunch up on the roof. I don't think of these sorts of things.

Kids see things through fresh eyes.

I like it that they help me to do the same.

Fall Classics, part 2

Opa came toting buckets of apples from his tree in Colorado.

"It's fall," they whisper, through all their shades of gold and green, and hints of red.

I love the sound of my knife schlip, schlip, schlipping through the crisp flesh, apple slices piling up thickly in my pan.

Hot apple crisp seems to soften everything, even the threat of approaching winter.

Fall Classics, part 1

When I was a kid, I cheered for the Texas Rangers and the Houston Astros, two perennial also-rans. The Rangers are still cellar dwellers; the Astro-star has risen and fallen a few times in recent memory. But since I adopted the Red Sox in order to be in synch with John, October baseball is a little more rewarding.

My best baseball memories link generations---learning the nuances of the game as I watched the Rangers with my dad; teaching those same symbols and substance to my daughters. How to score a strikeout. Why the pitcher might walk a guy on purpose. When to bunt and what's a balk. Now they girls are all great fans, and we're having fun gliding through the postseason together.

Baseball fans: Girls and Grandfather

Go Red Sox! (see below)

October baseball

Splurge

A little thing can sometimes feel like a big splurge. Merrill and I had lunch in the Barnes & Noble Starbucks on Friday. Light streamed in through the huge windows, brightening the world. Merrill smiled and savored her Limes with Orange Jones Juice while we chatted and breathed in the smell of new books and the stronger smell of good coffee. My daily battles with manure, weeds, dishes and dust bunnies seem a peaceful, distant memory.

Picking up Pipe

Some of our fields are "dryland". That means, whatever water the crop gets is because God shed it in the form of rain.

Of our irrigated fields, some are irrigated by center pivot - those giant walking sprinklers that make the huge circles you see when flying over the Midwest in an airplane. I love center pivots.

John loves center pivots, too. You press a button, which starts an electric motor to pumping the water and walking the wheels around their circle. It's so easy you can hardly call it work, except when something breaks down.

We are not so fortunate as to have center pivots on all of our irrigated fields. Some of them still get water the old-fashioned way: gravity irrigation. This means that the water is transported from the well to the rows through eight-inch round, thirty-foot long pipes. Each pipe has a series of holes along its length, which can be opened to let gravity pull the water slowly down long rows of corn or soybeans.

Each spring, the girls work with John for several days to lay the pipe out along the rows. All in all, we lay 12,720 feet of pipe on the ground - about two and half miles of pipe, laid down thirty feet at a time.

That means two and a half miles to pick up in the fall, when irrigation is over for the year. The pipe will soon be in the way of the combine, and of the planter and cultivators next year, so it has to go.

First we load it onto a pipe trailer; then haul it off to stack it on the ground. Before we're through, all 424 pipes have been stacked and restacked, one pipe at a time.

Last week, Erica, Merrill and I went out to finish the job. Four hundred twenty-four pipes sounds like a huge mountain, but, like most jobs, it's not so bad if you break it down into smaller bites. We only picked up two loads - maybe 80 pipes.

I think it boils down to attitude again. A little sunshine, a couple of girls, a little song in your heart, and it's all joy. We have much to be thankful for.

Music for the Eyes

I've known for a long time that the swelling and dancing of stringed instruments can be a blessing to the ears.

Yesterday, when Merrill's violin went in for repair, I got a chance to appreciate what the colors and curves can do for eyes as well.

I never noticed that violins came in so many shades of red, amber, brown, wheat.

Some even look like tigers. A Holstein cow. A giraffe or a dalmation dog.

I took pictures until the banjo said it was time for lunch.

Anna Naomi

Some of us got to visit our friend Anna in the hospital in Illinois last weekend. Look at that smile! Her joy spread to our hearts.

Anna means "gracious". Naomi means "pleasant" and "beautiful." This child is indeed Anna Naomi.

We're praying for you, Anna! God is way bigger than leukemia!