Coffee ⁽²⁹⁾

Brian Bilbrey August 19, 2019

19 August, 2019

So, mid-August, and we're in the "dog days of summer". It's been humid, hot, and unstable. How unstable? A storm that blew through last night racked up over 70K electrical discharges over a single hour. Most of those were elsewhere, but enough were nearby to freak out the little disturbed dog. Also with the heat, and fitting in with the origins of the phrase, I spent much of the weekend entrapped by lethargy. Yes, yes, I was up early doing patching work for production systems on Sunday. But outdoor chores? Not this last weekend. It was just ... miserable. Theoretically,…

Brian Bilbrey August 11, 2019

11 August 2019

Still busy, that is, and that's better than the alternative. Yesterday was given over mostly to food work - a new big batch of salsa, with only tomatoes out of the garden. Everything else came from the store, sadly. I roasted a pountd of coffee. I also made a batch of my potato/spicy sausage concoction, 10 meals worth. That'll see me through the week. Today: shopping, clean the shower, patching day for some systems at work, lunch, and lawn. And I'm a bit whacked. Time to get back to the office tomorrow, and spend the week recharging for the next…

Brian Bilbrey August 7, 2019

7 August 2019

I'm feeling a bit broken, with the shootings of recent days, and the inflammatory rhetoric of the GOP and their Beloved Leader. Sorry. The garden is two thirds dead. No peppers. No zucchini. But the tomatoes, they are in full production. We had salsa this weekend, and I'm going to make more tomorrow night, since Marcia pulled out a bushel of red fruit today. I did manage to find time to roast some coffee the other night. Here I'm pre-heating the roaster before doing the actual deed... We're drinking that coffee, and it is super tasty. I've got a new…

Brian Bilbrey July 28, 2019

28 July 2019

As far as I can tell, June and July weren't as wet as last year, but we've had at least a bit of rain each week. Additionally, for most of the last week, we had mornings that were a lot more like mid-September than late July - temps in the morning in the low 60's instead of the mid 70's, and highs in the 80's instead of high 90's. I will note that, botanically, we got nearly four weeks out of our tiger lily bloom this year, instead of the usual two-ish weeks. The picture below is from about the…

Brian Bilbrey February 3, 2019

3 February 2019

It's been an interesting week, weather-wise. For instance, it was properly cold for a couple of days, with lows in the single digits and highs in the mid-teens (ºF). And on Friday, when we were due an hour or two of snow flurries midday, Ullr sent us snow starting at 8 AM and lasting all day. It was light snow, but it all stuck, since everything was pre-frozen. I shoveled off the 2.5" when I got home late afternoon: On the entertainment front, we enjoyed a superb opening night production of Tom Stoppard's Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead at the…