Smokin'

Oh boy-oh-boy! Our new smoker is the bomb. Heat it up, add the wood chips, some apple juice, let it go... Like a dream.

And the barbeque... best we've had since leaving Texas.

The King, checking on the meat. We cooked baby back ribs, beef ribs and a small brisket. Go big or go home!

Look at how beautiful it is.

Sometimes we play a game with the royal hounds... 'which one do you want?' and we put a different treat in each hand. I know they most likely aren't choosing, they just want a damn treat... 

Give me a damn treat!

Yummmm... was hard to wait, but we let it sit for an hour to reabsorb some of the juices, and since it was late we only had one beef rib each because we wanted to taste the fruits... or meats of our labors.

 So today I made the rest of the meal. The King read that if the yolks have a grey outer lining, they were cooked too long. Luckily mine were juuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuust right.

In they go with the mustard, mayo, salt, pepper, pickled jalapenos and bacon. I would almost say yum but I hate eggs.

Empty vessels waiting to be filled.

I do this solely for the King's benefit. I must be pretty good at it because he snarfs them down like there's no tomorrow... but there is a tomorrow and he did leave some eggs for later.

This is how I fill the eggs. I put the yolk mixture into a plastic baggie, snip off a corner and use it like a piping bag. One that I can throw away and not have to clean. Works pretty well if I do say so m'self.

Sprinkle with paprika and some freshly cracked pepper and voila. Deviled eggs fit for my King.

And I made barbecue sauce to go with the meat, not that it needed it, but we'll have bbq baked potatoes later and it will come in handy for that.

Speaking of potatoes... tater salad with pickled jalapenos and bacon.

And baked beans. Mine never turn out as good as my mom's. Gonna have to work on that.

Feast your eyes on our feast...

That's a whole plate of deliciousness right there!

Mr. Bo-Bo would like some of that deliciousness.

Pretty please?

With a Daisy Bear on top?

Sorry kids... there's nothing left but this here bone.

Daisy Bear looks more like Crazy Bear... gimme dat bone!

And within moments... it was gone.

Time to make some brown sugar-cinnamon-rum ice cream while the King continues to work on the tree.

Woohoo! Future humus. Not to be confused with hummus, which tastes good... while humus does not. Unless you're a termite or a carpenter ant.

A hunk of quartz we found in the yard. It's bigger than a softball and hurts a lot more if it's lobbed at your head.

Mayor Tom paid us a visit. He is modeling the latest in tendon technology. This superhero looking contraption helps the lymph drain so that his wrist doesn't swell.

The King stole the jester's hat.

This is my grandmother's soap box. Yes! Soap boxes do exist!

When I was a kid I was endlessly fascinated by it.

And inside were bits and bobs, earrings that were broken... nothing much but I loved to go through the soap box and examine it all.

Tonight instead of working on the tree, we started organizing the basement. A lot got tossed, a lot is going to be donated, and the rest is much, much easier to find. And we found some treasures like the soap box, Paddywax candles (my favorite!) and books. Plus, it the Queen loses weight there is an endless supply of spiffy clothing... the Queen misses her colorful frocks.

We still have 2/3 of the basement left to do, but at least part of it looks nice.

And now I am going to kick my feet up, relax and watch a little tv. I've earned it!

Something's Bugging Me

The King found this praying mantis as he was trimming the weeds. They're regal and do good things for the ecosystem, but I have to say... they creep me out.

Is it 'praying' or 'preying'? I can see why both would be true. 'Preying' would seem to be more appropriate. But Google says 'praying', so I acquiesce to the search results.

Then I ran across one of these as I was raking up the yard debris. I couldn't determine if it was a spider, an ant or a wasp. Turns out it is a Red Velvet Ant. Talking about it makes me hungry for red velvet cupcakes.

She was gorgeous but uncooperative. By the time I ran inside to grab my camera she was making a concerted effort to burrow into the grass to get away from me. So I used a photograph from this blog post.

She really isn't an ant at all, but a wingless wasp that eats ground wasps and bees. And she's clearly not aggressive, which I appreciate. Apparently the males get the wings, and they don't sting but the females will if you provoke them (maybe they're mad because they don't have wings... wonder if they've heard of Red Bull? *snort*).

You can't see them, but they're there... dozens of wasps flying just above the grass, circling around...

... looking for... what?

I don't know.

But they are definitely focused on finding it.

Luckily they aren't red wasps, they are black wasps that don't seem to care that I want to get to the front door and the only way is through their choreography. If you know me, you know it took courage to wade through a cluster of wasps.

I'll wait while you praise my courage.

To build the hugelkultur mounds you need tree stumps, branches big and small, dirt and yard debris.

As you can see, we are accumulating quite a pile of limbs, and we still have most of the tree to cut up and drag to the front. But I was worried that we wouldn't have enough yard debris.

I was worried for nothing...

We are building up a nice pile.

The yard debris pile is almost as big as the limb pile. And there is more to be raked!

The King solved the mystery of what happened to the tree... not a lightning strike as I'd assumed, but little miniature loggers eating away at the insides of the tree. Nasty little things. I assume they serve their purpose in the ecosystem, but I wish they'd stick to trees that were already down... and not ones that are still standing in the woods.

This would make a nice rustic side table with a place to put pistachio nut shells.

Why pistachio shells? Because I said so, and the Queen is almost always right.

The Day of Fun

The King and I have been working hard lately and it was time to take a day off to enjoy ourselves. So we hopped in the royal carriage and took the scenic route.

Around here every route seems scenic.

This is the big green barn. I have now seen red, black, green and today we even saw a white barn.

By the way, the hawk was perched on the electrical wire again today. First time in over a year... and guess what? It was then that I realized I'd forgotten my camera.

He flew off anyway. Just to spite me. Like, "I know you're wondering if I'll still be here when you return with your camera... buh-bye." 

This is the so-called "backwater" route.

I would like to be on a boat. Out there. In that backwater.

I was looking forward to getting a gorgeous photo as we crossed a bridge near the Gore's property... yes those Gore's... but they rerouted the road and are in the process of taking down the bridge... what? I blame the Gore's... but the view is still gorgeous. 

Imagine how much more picturesque it would have been from up there...

Speaking of picturesque.

I would trade the castle for this house.

It's amazing how much things have changed in the last year or two. Hairburger is completely closed (we call it that because it's burger joint in front, barber shop in back... like the business version of a mullet). Too bad, they actually had good burgers.

So we had lunch at the local gas station/convenience store/restaurant. It's changed ownership since we were there last. And we stopped by to see a friend.

Then it was time to hit the road - no rest for the wicked!

Yes, you've seen this dam before. Do we have a dam problem?

I didn't think so. :) 

It's like deja vu... or deja view

But guess what? Just down the road is the most amazing scenic overlook of all... we have decided to move our things there and see if we can just take it over without anyone noticing. 

Can you imagine looking at this every day?

And then you turn your head a little to the right and see this?

Dam, what a view.

Of course, we'd have to evict this guy... he's a little creepy with the big fly eyes, cockroach legs and grasshopper body. But also kinda cute like a cabbage patch kid.

What the hell is he???

Enough about him. I'm obsessed with the view.

It's a really nice view.

It's a view that rocks.

  
This is a hill of beans. Some of you will get it, some won't. But it doesn't matter.

(see what I did there?)

The royal chainsaw has been working very hard lately and needed to be sharpened. Who better to do that than Mayor Tom?

Sparks flew...

Meet Ludwig. After we met him we decided we wanted a great dane because he is such a cool dog, and that's how we ended up with Daisy Bear, who is also a cool dog.

And perhaps the best part of all - the King found my favorite ring today! I found this moonstone ring at one of the apartments I lived in long ago. I knocked on a couple of doors but no one claimed it, so it's mine, mine, mine.

(and it's my lucky ring)

And that was our day.

Tomorrow we will smoke some brisket and ribs in our new electric smoker while we work on the tree. It's exhausting, but oddly satisfying, and for the first time since we moved in, it is starting to feel like a castle.

...And the Tree Came Down

More work for the royal couple today as we continue to chop up and break down the tree. The discouraging part of the whole thing is that once we finish this, the rest of the tree has to come down and that means we have to do it all over again.

This is fascinating to me since I was just learning about how to prune a tree from The Smiling Gardener's online course.

Trees have a way of shedding branches while causing minimal damage to the rest of their structure, and that is a system of branch collars. A branch collar is something like our shoulder or hip socket where the limb joins into the tree. When you prune, you're supposed to leave the branch collar in place so the tree can heal around the wound without causing disease and rot, and I have seen the collars from the outside of the tree, but never how the branch fits into the collar on the inside.

As I was breaking the branches apart, this one didn't snap like the others, it was more like it popped out or slid out. And it was really cool, because there it was, the part of the branch that goes into the root collar!

This is a good angle to see the root collar, how it bulges out a little around the branch.

It's strange to look out the window and no longer see the other half of the tree hanging off. But you can see how damaged the rest of the tree is... there's unfortunately no way to save it, it's going to rot and eventually it will fall where it pleases... which most likely won't be pleasing to us. So once we chop up the downed half we will drop this tree as well.

Lots of wood for the mounds!

More butterflies

The tree on the ground... it's probably a good 40 feet, and some of it was already chopped up so that we could get to the fence to have it repaired.

Another root collar where a branch was shed.

We have elderberries growing in the back. I want to gather them up but we have to move some weeds out of the way first.

And the weeds are abuzz with honeybees and bumblebees and butterflies. So I want to clear out as little as possible because we like honeybees and butterflies. I'm dubious about the bumblebees... people say they aren't aggressive but the first thing that ever stung me was a bumblebee.

This is one of our red-tailed hawks. He is uncooperative when it comes to being photographed. I rue the one time I saw him perched on a power line and I didn't have my camera...

Someday I will get his picture close up. But for now this will have to do.

And now, back to the grind...