Oh, what a beautiful morning!

(Once again this got a little long. More below the fold.)

Woke up around five, as the light was rising in a cloud-free east. The porch boards were dryish, but the crank-out bathroom window panes were dripping under the eaves: There’s so much moisture in the air that the eaves were actually dripping with dew.

Clouds in the west, of course: the weather is still unpredictable. But we were clearly up for a few sunny hours anyway, so after a remarkable breakfast I set out washing some clothes in the sink while they had some prospect of drying on the line before the next rain.

While that was going on I got a phone call from neighbor D: “Hey, we’ve been over at [J&H’s] and have some scraps for the chickens. You decent?”

Sure, why not. I wasn’t planning for guests, and had in fact been looking forward to a Perfect Day…

…But these things happen and D&L are always welcome. They not only brought scraps for the Bald Ladies but day-old donuts for me, which normally would have put a perfect icing on a near-perfect morning except for the aforementioned remarkable breakfast.

Y’see, a few months ago somebody gave me a bunch of free food including – be still my heart – MEAT. And I consumed all the meat in short order except for two great big pork chops which have been hiding in Landlady’s freezer ever since. Well, yesterday H gave me two ears of really fresh corn at shit-shoveling and I decided that since Landlady, Ian and I were apparently never going to get around to sharing the chops it was time for Uncle Joel and the boys to have a party.

And so we did. I baked potatoes, browned those chops in “butter” and roasted them with gravy made from my last can of cream’o’mushroom soup, boiled the corn, and Got Down. Then this morning I fried up the leftover pork, and there was a lot, and consumed it with potatoes and onions, fresh eggs and fresh bread. And I saw, and Look! It was very good.

We’re getting along toward my favorite part of the year, where the temperature’s pleasant, the desert is green, there are eight or ten different kinds of flower blooming everywhere, and the constant threat of incineration by fire from the sky begins to moderate somewhat. It’s followed by winter, which is my very least favorite part of the year, but you can’t have everything. This autumn, like every autumn, I have taken a solemn vow that I’ll start the winter with at least a fat cord of wood put up. That may or may not actually happen, but this time I’m getting a jump on the resolution. I knocked together a new sawbuck, and I’m already accumulating wood in August.

The saw’s in perfect repair, all my spares are sharp, and I’d basically have to work harder finding excuses not to than to just go out and cut some wood. Dealing with it during the winter hasn’t really proven any big deal since winter here tends to be kind of episodic. And I don’t actually use all that much wood: One fat cord will probably be enough. But it does seem that Uncle Murphy keeps an eye on my wood supply and only throws a blizzard or week-long cold snap at me when I’m low. So I’m going to try to fake him out this year.

Connectivity is still wonky, but not as bad as Saturday and Sunday. Today like yesterday I couldn’t connect at all until around nine in the AM. If today goes like yesterday I’ll shut the ‘pooter down and not be able to connect again until sometime tomorrow. But there’s no actual rule that says that has to happen. What will be will be, which has almost gotten to be my motto. If I started having a motto other than…