Doug, Stacey, & Kellen

Happy Halloween

Lehman Caves, Great Basin National Park:

Thank you to 2121 Watts Ave, Justin's neighbor, for providing me with this year's card:

Alma, one week later

Happy Halloween!

Hard to believe that she had surgery a week ago today.

The staff at El Camino Garderns: L-$ Albertha, Mina, Kristen, Thomas

L-R: Albertha, Mina, Kristen, Mina, Thelma. Thomas gives Mom a kiss.

Sophia and Thais

Today I watched Sophia for a few hours while Thais worked from home.
Sophia is 6 months, 23 days old

First fire

Finally. It's cold enough and Justin builds the first fire of the season.
He builds a great fire.
Game 1 of the World Series, a perfect evening.

Alma's surgery

Today, Mom was discharged and moving around quite well. By 5 pm, she was back at El Camino Gardens. I just love the way the staff greeted her: clapping, cheering, welcoming. It put a smile on her face.

Dear Dick,

I took the rigging to Jack Scullion in Alameda this morning.
He's located sort-of behind Nelson's Marine.
On the hard nearby was this monstrosity:

Steve Fosset's 32 meter (105') Catamaran

LOA 105'; LWL 97'6"; Beam 60'; Draft 14'8" (daggerboards down); Estimated Displacement 38,460 lbs.; Sail Area 7,274 sq. ft. (upwind), 11,631 sq. ft. (with masthead reacher); SA/D 102 (upwind), 163 (with masthead reacher); D/L 15.71; L/B 18.39 (for single hull); Auxiliary twin 100-hp Yanmar diesels; Fuel 150 gals.; Water 30 gals.
Source: http://www.wingo.com/sailing/fossett/index.html


Jack said it showed up about a week before Fossett disappeared
and little has happened to the boat since.
Jack needed about an hour to inspect the rigging so I went and had breakfast here:

Weekly Farmer's Market: I found a really good artichoke focaccia,

and Needle in a Haystack, an excellent needlework store.
Another attraction near Nelson' Marine:

Alma's surgery

Everything went well. As Mom has said before, "She's a tough old bird."

However, her Alzheimer's is complicating her hospital stay. A family member needs to be with her to remind her where she is, why, and what to do or not do. I spent Friday night at the hospital, Justin will stay tonight.

Another friendly face

This person wasn't so easy for me to recognize. I pointed at her, she pointed at me, and we knew we recognized each other. Like me, Eileen Orman worked for Rio Linda Union School District. Retired for about 10 years, she now volunteers at Mercy San Juan Hospital.

Who's this handsome guy?

Justin and I went to lunch at La Favorita while my mom was in recovery and before she was assigned to a room. And there was Hal Higgins, my first principal at Frontier School in 1971 and a few years later, also at Rio Linda Elementary School.

Alma has surgery

It's 3:30 in the morning. I'm about to leave Justin's, to pick up my mom, and take her for colon cancer surgery.

Thanks to all of you who keep her in your prayers.

Calvary Lutheran Church Gospel Choir

Thank you, Leone Thorne, for organizing this performance for my mom and the rest of the residents at El Camino Gardens.

Back Row: Marvin Fox, Don Strauch, Don Thorne, Ron Smith with arm around Jan Smith.
Middle Row: Marlene Fox, Lois Penman, Betty Lagge.
Front Row: Joan Weber, Mom, Evelyn Brown and Leone Thorne.
~Thank you, Leone for helping me with everyone's name~

Thais and Sophia were there also.

Field Trip with Justin

Stop #1: Justin's favorite coffee place in Marysville.

We arrived a bit early and discovered a cow being butchered in the back.

The hide is almost off. The slice mark in the side of the carcass splits one half into quarters.

The saw goes down the center of the backbone.

One more to be butchered.

George and Polly Harriger.

Beef age for 14-21 days before being cut according to the customers instructions.

Justin picked up 1 1/2 (of 3) pigs,

and left instructions for how to cut one beef.

A tour of Yuba City's old downtown and where the new shopping areas are, then on to a

tour of local cropland, with a focus on orchards and this nursery:

Top quality fruit and nut trees, 55 years in business, Certified Nursery Stock,
and say their trees are "handmade in Sutter County."

http://www.sierragoldtrees.com/home.html

Almond budwood: These saplings are planted inches apart.
They'll be pulled from the ground and bundled into groups of 10,


laid horizontally onto racks like this,

and put into cold-storage warehouses to be picked up by customers in the spring for planting.

All walnut varieties are grafted onto Black Walnut rootstock.

The almonds have been shaken from these trees and swept into rows.

Many of the nursery properties are lined with fruitless plum trees.

Crop rotation: after a crop of trees has been harvested,
the field is fallowed for two years by growing grains.

The bulge is where the graft is located.

These short squat trees can produce 300 branches which are harvested for propagation.

Olive trees are grown in hedgerows and are harvested by a machine
that travels down the rows and over the tops of the plants.

Loaded with olives!

Sierra Gold is located on the Garden Highway next to a memorial to Sutter's Hock Farm, established in 1841, and constructed with iron from the original building.

Feather River: we're up on a levee at Boyd's Pump Boat Ramp.

Looking the other direction.

Sacramento Ave off Hwy 99 will take you the shortest path to Woodland, but not in winter.

It crosses the Sutter Bypass and floods.

Gravel part of the way, it becomes Kirkville Rd and runs into Road 113.

There was a heavy early winter storm a week or so ago.

This rice wasn't harvested in time and has "lodged."
20-30% of the crop can be lost when this happens.

The End:
the teacher and her tour guide are leaving the building.