Another Day, Another Detour

Katydid by Becky

Routing traffic away from flooded areas, un-inspected bridges, and such has snarled traffic like the wind will your hair when you ride in a convertible. It took Alan well over an hour to pick Becky up from work yesterday and she only works a mile from here. Worth every minute of it though, if keeps everyone safe from further disaster.

Folks are being so good about it too. If you need to pull onto what was once a thoroughfare, but is now a slow-moving parking lot, people let you in with a wave and wait as patiently as they can. As always there are a few bad actors and rude folks, but they are in the minority.

Most everyone from politicians to whom I never paid any attention before, news sources (can't say enough about the fantastic job media and ordinary people are doing at getting out information), volunteers and professional emergency folks, to the kids cleaning up the fair ground so the fair can go on albeit a bit late, are making me feel fortunate and proud to live here.

What a great region for neighbors and caring and community spirit!

I even talked to really, really nice people at the power company yesterday. The boss's elderly aunt is still without power and not getting her meals on wheels and such. (We packed a cooler and ran it up as soon as we knew, but she needs her fridge.) My first call about the power was routed to Boston for some reason, but the lady there was incredibly helpful and got me the numbers I needed for the local situation. The man I reached next was helpful too. Hopefully she will soon have power. Meanwhile Liz hit the grocery for imperishable edibles last night.

Anyhow, I really want to thank everyone who has worked and is working so hard to restore the upstate area. Great job! Great neighbors! Wonderful people, thank you, thank you, thank you.

***Update, amazingly 5 and the Thruway are open.

Flood Video

Here

Marooned, Incommunicado

Collage of just some of the things that were flying over the farm yesterday.

I missed the governor's helicopter, having run outdoors quickly to quiet the dogs

Collage of skies, from Saturday through yesterday

What you can see from our windows

"The wind makes me restless. I can't settle to normal Sunday pursuits. Dishes, laundry, chores galore, all done before the crew is finished in the barn. Judging by posts from my Facebook friends, it's the same all over. No one can be calm with all this going on."

That was written on Sunday before the main storm hit. at that point the storm looked unimpressive, but there was a gripping, ominous tension in the air...you just couldn't walk away from it.

Our senses were not wrong. The poor valley is devastated, the whole region damaged horribly. We were lucky, we are fine. We couldn't get out and no one could get in, but we never completely lost power, although phone, Internet and television were gone.

Entities far from this region complaining that the storm preparation was over done and over-hyped are full of it. Whole farms were swept away, whole towns inundated, people died. People are still in shelters, people still don't have power. Buildings that have stood everything that has happened since the Revolutionary War were badly damaged. Guy Park Manor

It is too soon for me to process it all, but here are some links and pictures.

Video of part of the extent of the flooding taken from the governor's helicopter, which flew very low over us several times. Drove the dogs totally crazy.

Leader Herald story

There is so much more...too much more. As I said, I can't process it yet. Prayers for people who had and have it a lot worse than we do and belated thanks to Grandpa Delbert for going against convention and buying land high on the hillsides instead of river flats. I sent him good thoughts all weekend.....

If you are on Facebook, look up WRGB, WENT, the Recorder, and Montgomery County Emergency Management, etc. There are some pictures that will chill you....

Sunday Stills....Pests

Japanese beetles

Rock Pigeons

Tommy, who tries to sneak into the milk house

where cats are banned by law and then sits on the bulk tank,

or the microwave or anywhere else that we don't want him

He's cute though

Fox tails

Lots of pests available this time of year.

For more Sunday Stills........

Preparing for Irene

Hard to know what to do. Looks as if heavy rain and potentially dangerous winds will be coming our way. The ground is already so saturated that I don't know where the water will go. Hope the folks in charge of the river dams are paying attention

This time. (Our fair starts Wednesday and some of the photos at this link are of our fairgrounds during the 2006 floods.) To the north of us Washington County Fair has already decided to close early and I can't say as I blame them.

I am planning on cooking a large meatloaf and just putting it in the fridge. Along with something baked...don't know what yet...we will have good food if the power goes. If the guys get the cows filled up we will just hunker down and hope that it stays on. If it doesn't well...you CAN hand milk cows, although its really not a lot of fun.

Maybe the darned thing will swing out to sea and leave everybody alone. We can hope anyhow.

Links

Gratuitous cute kitty....Athena

Just because:

Dairy, a dirty job nobody wants (and here we are doing it for the love of it)

It's National Dog Day. The boss thinks that PeTA and HSUS should dig into their coffers and buy every dog in the country a nice, thick steak! Nick is waiting for his right now.

The estimable Chuck Jolley on the NYT's ag "expert". (Great job, Mr. Jolley, you knocked this one out of the park!)

And the best ever of those little copy and paste jobbies from Facebook:

A dying granny tells her granddaughter, "I want to leave you my farm. That includes the villa, the tractor and other equipment, the farmhouse and $22,398,750.78 in cash." The granddaughter, about to be rich, says, "Oh my Granny, you are so generous. I didn't even know you had a farm. Where is it?" With her last breath, her grandmother whispered, "Facebook".

Thanks to Isla Gringo

Irene

Peacock Cumulonimbus

Seems the Hurricane from Hell is on its way. Prayers for everyone and everything in its projected path...Upstate NY is expected to only get lots of rain...so far they are saying six inches.

That would be about par for the course this summer. I have dumped that much and more out of the wheelbarrow several times. It is still wet enough here...and has been almost all summer...that the tractor tires push water in front of them in the hay fields. Heck it rained its little heart out yesterday, so much so that the hummingbirds came and sat on the porch and shivered. A song sparrow found the little box of sunflower seeds I keep under the shelf and came in off and on all day, so bedraggled you barely tell what it was. I'm afraid the cardinals are going to damp off like tomato seedlings, they are so wet when they visit.

A good day for nagging I guess. Hopefully maybe convincing the guys to fill the wagons with extra feed for the cows, stock up on a few every day essentials (like dog and cat food!) Batten down the hatches and the horses and all.

And of course the fair starts Wednesday...our own fair, right across the river in Fonda...Frankly I am dreading it. Traffic has been hellacious all summer due to the construction. It plumb boggles the mind to add in the fair. Liz is taking Bling and hopefully it will actually be possible to get over there to take care of her. Incidentally some folks who saw Rosie at the other fair showed some interest in buying her, but not for what I want to get. I am not that interested in selling her anyhow, but we always get offers on her after a show for some reason.

Hang in there all!

OMG

Liz had no more than left for work when she called to tell the boss that they would have to take Becky to work by a different route. This terrible accident happened just seconds before she crossed the intersection.

I hate this intersection! So many close calls and horrific accidents. Traffic moves too fast on the main road and the sight line is terrible for cars coming off the side road. Scares the heck out of me.

Wet and Dark

The Fruit Salad Tree is Filling Up

On mornings like this the entire valley moans and grumbles, clasped damply against the soggy breast of a bad-tempered, slow-moving thunderstorm.

Pitch dark at six AM. We'll be milking wet cows this morning....when they deign to come down off the hill that is.

Sorry I missed you yesterday. Deadline was nigh, tomatoes were ripe, and the men could finally chop feed again, after a series of disasters so bizarre and unlikely that you probably wouldn't believe me if I told you about them. (Suffice to say a truckload of ticked off skunks would have been more welcome...what is it this year anyhow?)

The season of ripening maters has lead to BLTs bulging with bacon, slippery with tomato succulance, and so tasty they should be illegal, taco bowls (take everything that makes up your favorite taco and layer it into a bowl, replacing the taco shell with taco chips, with which to dip) fresh, homemade, vegetable-beef soup, afloat with rings of shimmering yellow summer squash, and pungent with fresh-dug garlic, and even plain old tomato sandwiches for breakfast. I suppose if we had fresh tomatoes from the garden year round they would be ho hum, but here in the Great Northeast, tomato time is something to write home about.

Sorry about going on and on about groceries like this, but when I was working on the Farm Side yesterday we got to talking about how the boss's mother used to feed us. She was an old-fashioned farm wife, who felt that staggering meals were an important component of the wage of her worker bees. Since she spent her formative years working in a well-known Boonville restaurant, she was more than qualified to provide the same. She used to even serve the author of Drums Along the Mohawk, Walter D. Edmonds ( a fan of strawberry shortcake in season.)

Not much to say about the earthquakes...none of us noticed any of them. Before we lived here the tiniest one centered in Blue Mountain lake, where ours usually begin, would wake me right up. Now, living so close to the constant stream of heavy freight trains, shaking the earth day and night...well, not so much.

Have a good one...I've got to go get wet.

Going, Going, Yeah, it is Gone

The elderberry crisp.....of course there are a lot more elderberries in the freezer in the cellar...don't tell....

Not a Cloudy Day

Morning

Evening

But a day of clouds

Contentment

Teeny Leetle Spider Guy

It makes me happy to learn new things. These things do not need to be useful in any way...my brain is a old granny's attic crammed with pointless clutter. However, interesting, odd, cool, unique, yeah, even totally meaningless in the grand scheme of things trivia, that is treasure to me.

Some of the stuff that has come my way this summer:

Female cardinals sing too. Thanks to the Cornell Lab of Ornithology for this little tidbit. No wonder it seems as if we have so many of them each winter.

Leave the landscape alone if you visit Hawaii. Pele prefers it apparently. There are places where you can return anything you inadvertently remove....especially lava rock.

There is in fact a cloud appreciation society (and so there should be). Thanks to Cathy, I now know that you can go to their website to view staggeringly lovely photos of all sorts of clouds. Do not miss the opportunity to sooth your soul with their sweet and sensuous photos. Here is one of Cathy's.

I have also learned a few creepy crawly buggy things and a couple of new butterflies, and maybe a bird call or two, bad things that can go wrong with tractor engines and transmissions (there are a lot and they are all expensive and nasty) and a couple of new recipes, but the above three are my favorites so far this summer.

Sunday Stills...the Letter B

Bur cucumber the kudzu of the north

Bedewed

Bovine

Butt

Buck

Becky with Bunny Ears

For more Sunday Stills....

Living with Ruby

Throated hummingbirds that is. Our pair had a pair I think, of playful youngsters that tumble through the air like pups. They are as tame as pups too, as long as I don't touch the camera. They like me just fine, but that big black eye is way too scary.

They come to sit on the hooks at the top of the hanging flower baskets when I am on the porch. (there is not room to hang them all, so they provide perfect little perches for perfect little birds.)

They are so very curious. I was awaiting a storm yesterday while shooting unusual clouds and succulent flowers. They came, buzzing like bombers, flipping like a deck of cards. Around and around my head, close, only inches away. Then one sat down in the variegated pink geranium, right next to me. She looked me up and down, tipping her pointy chin, then tucking it into her feathers, then whirring purposefully away, only to return for just one more peek.

I think maybe we bird watchers are a bit arrogant in thinking we are the only ones. I think she goes back to the Mountain Ash tree where she keeps her tiny field guide and turns the little pages, trying to learn more about the creature she has found...hmmmm....what is it...what is it?.

I think yesterday she put me on her life list..... ticking off the field marks....slightly bent steel rimmed glasses (don't drop them and step on them while taking pictures of bugs) Check...

Soft, blue chambray shirt...check....bare feet check.

Yep, sure enough, it is one of those fat old farmer ladies var. bluejeaniensis. Wow, never thought I would see one of those....Check.

This and That

Our "feral" visitor kitty

The cows did reasonably well at the fair, not too surprising since there were very few animals this year. Bling won junior heifer calf, which delighted all. She is such a sweet little girl. Rosie won grand champion milking shorthorn, but she doesn't get any kudos because she is the only shorty at the fair. She is being a very bad girl and dragging everybody all over the place, so she may not get to go to Fonda. She even took Alan for a run around the ring and the show barn and he is a pretty rugged guy.

Chrome came in second in her class. Moments was grand champion Jersey. Wish Liz had entered her at Fonda. She is out of the lesser of her two lines of Jerseys...her mama had some serious flaws, but I always liked her because she was such a powerful, big-framed cow. Moments has enough of that to be strong and correct and she is not wing shouldered and her udder is high and tight instead of almost hitting the floor. Monday did okay too and was reserve senior Holstein....although the boss just got up and told me that she stomped Alan pretty good last night too. They are big animals and there is so much commotion and noise at the show. She has never been shown before...and someone was shooting off explosives while the show was on...lots of fun.

All and all not bad. Now I can't wait until they are all home.......

Rural Grove State Forest

Alan and I made a speedy trip to our veterinarian's office yesterday for some medicine for Rosie



On the way home he took me on a half-hour detour through the Rural Grove State Forest where we stopped at a spot where beavers had dammed the road, rendering it impassable. It was a marvelous place. Dragon flies of half a dozen sorts zig-zagged around us, red ones that darted like flaming arrows, huge olive-green and light blue ones that flew in perfectly straight lines like the Black Hawks that fly up the valley....Black and white ones....dozens of fragile damsel flies mating like crazy.

***Alan had to take this dragonfly photo as he had boots and I didn't. The rest are mine.

There were frogs galore, the shoreline sounded like a shooting gallery as bull frogs plummeted into the water ahead of us. A great blue heron lumbered away in slowly pulsating flight. Cedar waxwings, some kind of fly catcher...probably an Eastern Kingbird, whirling in circles high in the sky..the whistling wings of some rapidly departing mallards. Lots of tadpoles and something big that was swimming just under the water, shaking the heck out of the bushes and plants. Could have been a beaver, maybe a muskrat, or just possibly a really large fish. It was too far out to be sure.

The road, after the beavers worked their construction miracles upon it

So peaceful.....

***Click for collage detail

There were interesting plants and herbs. See the boneset and the swamp milk weed? Rushes are round and sedges have edges, or so Alan's college teacher used to tell him. We saw lots!

It was an interlude of wonder and delight that I won't soon forget....just a few miles from home, yet I didn't even know it was there. It would be fun someday to put the canoe in from the road and cruise out to see what we could see.

Bling and Chrome

Bling, almost all clipped

Monday in the Parlor

Chrome, lunching

In the Good Old

Summertime peaks about now, with warm, humid days and sultry, torpid nights. The hay in the horse barn fills the air with the faint scent of cinnamon and tiny, new toads dot dot dot through wet morning grass on their way to bugs unlimited.

Here in the Northeast, hints of autumn abound. Robins are getting pretty scarce, although you hear one every now and then. Ours raised three broods on the porch and in the nearby cedars this year, but they are waning now, like the strawberries of June.

Just the other day a scattering of killdeers formed up into a fresh flock and vanished to the south, screaming all the way.

Geese will soon straggle down to the river and cruise the corn fields for spilled kernels. The days grow shorter at an appalling pace, with each morning darker than the one before. The sun, which has been rising well to the north of the big spruce in the neighbors’ yard, is inching its way back south again. By the time it reaches the winter nadir it will rise, already tangled in the branches of the hillside trees, cold, and grim and plumb unwelcoming.

And so we cling to what is left of the season and hope for more of the good days. I will have a few more updates from the fair a little later today. Take care.

More Cows at the Fair

Rose Magnolia, milking shorthorn

Moments and Rosie, taking a nap

Photos from 2011 Altamont Fair

Moments, the Jersey cow

Bling, Holstein junior heifer calf, with Chrome

Taken by Liz's cell phone and texted home to mom.

Fair Update

Liz milking her now retired show cow, Mandy, in the Altamont milking parlor in 2007

The cows and calves are all moved and vet checked in (including Monday...the state veterinarian agreed that it was just a scrape) and settled into the fair. Alas, a lot of Lizzie's feed and bedding got rained on. It rained and rained and rained. I need to get a rain gauge so I can tell how much.

This much I can tell you; it was a lot. So much that the left-at-home-cow's switches, which are normally kind of greyish and dingy unless you wash them with laundry detergent, which we do at the fair, were all white and fluffy. Also all stringy and wet, the better to slap you across the face, whap, whap, whack!

Rosie settled right in. She went to the show last year and knows the routine...lots of soft, fluffy rye straw (which she proceeded to eat instead of her hay), all the other good stuff she can eat, lots of brushing and scrubbing and clipping etc. Most cows love the show.

Liz had the challenge of taking Moments and Monday through the milking parlor. We have an old fashioned stanchion and tie stall barn and neither of them was ever shown before. As far as that goes they had only been led a few times. They had to be coaxed to enter the railings and bars of the place and then let themselves be milked. Moments didn't let her milk down, so I'll bet she will be glad to be milked this morning. They get used to it quickly and the fair has a very nice parlor so all will be fine I'm sure.

Sadly, it is pouring again, but hopefully there will be a bit better weather tomorrow. Thursday is show day...wish us luck....with the weather if nothing else.

Truck in Day

Rose, last year

At Altamont Fair. Of course, yesterday, Monday, Liz's three-year-old Silky Cousteau daughter, came down with one tiny, little spot of ringworm....size of a quarter...or maybe it is not ringworm...looks like a scrape today. So she can't go...or maybe she can go. She has had ringworm before and they are generally immune after one go round, but not Monday, no sirree....unless it is just a scrape, which is what it looks like today.

And naturally it is raining and soggy and ugly. Of course. And Jade's truck coughed up a caliper yesterday and he is the hauler of choice. Of course, of course.

It wouldn't be the fair if fifteen different things didn't go wrong at once. I am so glad that I stay home now. When the kids were small and needed a chaperon and crew chief all this fell on my shoulders. Now Liz will sort it all out...or not... as the case may be. I would hate to be in her shoes, managing all these disasters. She works here with us and has a challenging full-time job as a milk inspector and worked right up until Friday, so getting ready is a B*&^%......yeah....one of those

Of course Blitz is lame again so she can't go either. She has missed the last three years because of lameness or sickness. Such a weak cow.....Looks like the string is down to Bling, Chrome, Rose Magnolia and Moments, the Jersey cow. The fair raised entry fees so much this year that word is there are only two milk cows in the whole show. Yowsa! Used to be, just a few short years ago, they crammed 150 head into the tiny old barn. Now they have the big, new barn and it sounds as if it will be half empty.

None of this matters of course, the fair is the fair and will always end up being fun. It just is. Fair food, wonderful friends you only see once a year, but count among your favorite people in the world, time to pamper and play with cows all day....it is almost always worth all that it takes. By Thursday night, show night, the cows will be clean, clipped and polished, the display will be set up and looking fine and all these travails will be forgotten, other than as fodder for comparing notes with everyone else about truck in....maybe we will see you there.....

Sunday Stills...Macro Shots

The peacocks are molting

Bee

Rain

Shroom

Collage of what's in bloom

Tiger lily

The macro challenge is always my favorite.

For more Sunday Stills....