Just talked to Berck on day one of his trip from Seattle back home
Berck was about to pass someone on US 12 when a little tornado crossed the road in front of them, became a water spout as it hit the river on the other side, and then petered out. “I don’t know if it was just a little tornado or an over-sized dust devil, but it threw a bunch of trees onto the road.” He parked the car and got out to help clear the pavement. “It being Idaho, there were plenty of people with pickup trucks and chains, so we got it cleared in about 15 minutes.”
The Asparagus Hunt
Yesterday, my friend Nikki and her three little girls and I went asparagus hunting. We went to a local park, which used to be a homestead that supplied a lot of produce for the little town of Colorado Springs and once even had six acres of asparagus. Nikki had seen the mature asparagus plants in the wilderness areas of the park each summer but hadn’t been able to catch them in the act of sprouting in the spring.
The night before, I did a little research on the web to see what I could find out about hunting asparagus. The best information I could find was to find the dead stalks still standing from the year before and look at their bases for the new sprouts. The dead stalks would look like miniature, bare Christmas trees. Don’t bother looking for the sprouts without finding the dead stalks, the information I found said; you won’t be able to find anything that way. I also found an article about how June was the best month to find asparagus in this area.
We went through the back entrance of the park so we didn’t have to go through the front gate to pay to go in where they give you stickers to put on your shirt so you can enter the museum buildings. We passed by the big tilled field in front of the farmhouse and saw where the rows of asparagus had sprouted and were about six inches high. Those weren’t the ones we were after. We continued along the path to the area where the park has a tipi set up in the summer complete with Indian docents. “Right here,” said Nikki. “Right here at this bend in the path is where I saw the adult plants.” I looked around at the various dead weeds still sticking up and started wading through them.
“I think this might be it,” I said, finding a stalk that looked like…well, Christmas tree-shaped. I rooted around in the brush at its base but didn’t see anything that looked like asparagus poking out of the dirt. Maybe it wasn’t time yet.
“I think you may be right,” said Nikki. “Here’s another one.” At the base was a skinny sprout of asparagus sticking out of the ground. She snapped it off and held it up triumphantly.
Suddenly, the hunt was easy. We knew exactly what kind of piece of dead brush to look for. X marked the spot. Only about half of the stalks we found had anything sprouting out. Mostly, they were just starting to poke out of the ground.
We ate some raw. I’ve never had asparagus that tasted so good, bursting with juice and unbelievably sweet. The rest of what we found was enough for one small serving.
I can’t wait until more of it is ready, though I we’ll have to find a larger source.
British Racing Green!
She’s all ours!
I’m in Florida.
I’m teaching my Uncle how to fly. He’s always wanted to learn to fly, and now turns out to be a good time for a lot of reasons. The best part is that he’s got an experienced flight instructor he can trust that’s otherwise unemployed.
The big downside for me is being away from Jonah. Additionally, I don’t much like Florida, but it’s nice to be able to visit my Mom as well. I flew down here on March 24, the day after Jonah’s birthday. It snowed about a foot that night, and the roads were pretty well snowed-over, with packed snow turning to pretty deep slush further north. Jonah dropped me off at DEN, and I played my role in the Transportation Security Theater, the first time I’ve done so without a crew badge in years.
How do you people tolerate it? I really could have driven down to Florida, and I was seriously regretting my decision to fly instead. The plane ticket was slightly cheaper than the gasoline, but flying is just awful.
As I got through security, I had a voicemail from Jonah:
You’ve got to love the vaguely up-beat, matter-of-fact tone voice as she relates the demise of the car my Dad bought new in 1991. This turned out to be a case of Google Voice’s transcription being totally worthless, though perhaps vaguely amusing:
Both and I’m okay, but the price not ready re bad rap. Yes I when you have a party there. But give me a call. Thanks.
It’s probably repairable, but from what Jonah said, one of the front wheels is badly bent, and the front subframe is probably bent as well. Additionally, “The engine makes bad noises.” Before the wreck, the car wasn’t worth a whole lot, now, I’m not sure. Fortunately, the Bremers are being kind enough to let the car live in their yard until I can get back and figure out what to do with it.
The flight was delayed about 45 minutes, which gave the obnoxious brats a few seats behind me enough time to practice screaming. I can understand that you can’t do a lot about infants crying, but they never do that long. Once your kid is old enough to talk, it’s also old enough to understand commands such as, “Shut the hell up!” If you can’t teach your kid not to scream for the entire 4 hour flight, then don’t put it on a flight. I wish that airlines would put the parents of screaming kids on a no-fly list for the benefit of the rest of us. These are the same people who only fly when they find a $79.99 round trip special anyway, and some customers are worth alienating.
So now I’m in Florida. The weather is surprisingly nice. It’s currently 71°F, and I’m sitting out by the pool. I can deal with this. If it gets much hotter (high of 82ish for the rest of the week), I’m not going to be as content.
I’m teaching in an old (1968) Cessna 182. It’s been a long time since I’ve flown a single engine plane at all, and even longer since I’ve flown a Cessna. Instructing in this thing makes me miss the Diamond with it’s modern airplane manners. That said, the 182 is well-behaved beast and I haven’t seen anything that makes me question it. We started pounding it into the runway with practice landings for the first time today, and it seems solid.
I’ve forgotten how much work and and mental exhaustion results from flight instruction. After 1.5 hours at 8am this morning, I was ready to take a nap. All in all, though, it’s been good and I’m thrilled for the opportunity to work a little bit.