Catching Snowflakes on the Tongue

It's snowing. Del is out in the snow trying to catch snowflakes in his mouth.

(Sorry, no video available.)

This is probably one of those cases where a picture is worth a thousand words and a video is worth a thousand pictures. There is no way I can get video or pictures at the moment and I could type my million words and still not create an accurate picture of what Del is doing.

We're getting a heavy, wet snow backing off the Cascades. Some of the snowflakes are almost two inches across – fluffy snowballs really – and Del is out in the pasture trying to catch them in his mouth.

You've seen people catch snowflakes on their tongue. Some of you have probably seen dogs snap snowflakes from the air. Dell's process is something between the two, and nothing I can really describe. I'll save the rest of my million words and simply say one of my alpacas is exhibiting another fun and cute behavior.

Erudite? Not today!

I am supposed to write erudite, cheery, blogs of how much spinning and knitting I'm getting done. Now that the girls are off the farm, I'm supposed to have so much more time to do all this, but it's not getting done. I'm supposed to have so much less stress, but it doesn't seem that much changed.

(We got more pictures of the girls last week. They're doing very well in Tennessee. The babies are growing so fast.)

There is still this overwhelming mound of fleece in the middle of the living room – a mound I'm supposed to be sorting to figure out what to handspin and what to have millspun. Unfortunately, I still learning about millspinning and I'm not being very decisive and what little decisiveness I have has needed to be undone. Mostly, what I do, is move my bags of fiber from one stack to another in the way in the middle of the living room and complain about how I really need to re-organize myself and start all over again.

We need to sell the boys – sooner rather than later. As much as I love them, I'm getting to the point I'd love to have them off the property. The problem is, finding them a good home. They're my babies and they must go to a good home. I've had a couple inquiries lately about eating alpaca and llama. I've told people that alpacas are too expensive to eat – which is the truth. However, fiber quality alpacas priced at a discount so they sell in a hurry are probably affordable for eating. Percy and sweet, gentle, Donovan will sell as fiber-quality animals. Sindre and Del won't sell for that much more. I'm really worried about my boys. We can't keep them, but I need to find them a home with a handspinner where they (and their fiber) will be loved.

Sooner rather than later.

Then there is the book reduction project. Before we met, Pam and I both established large collections of books. In addition, I was responsible for dividing the book portion of my grandfather's estate, and I inherited a large portion of his hoard. We have something like 15,000 books and we're attempting to reduce to 500 or so. Letting go of books is hard – even books I've never read and I know I'll probably never read. I find the ones from my grandfather's collection hardest to turn loose. He was a grand old man and he read everything.

There has been a little spinning and knitting progress.

Most of the spinning I have been doing is spinning my wheels and spinning in circles re-arranging the piles of fiber in the living room. There is, however, another skein of that black suri I first blogged about on November 22, 2005. The yarn I skeined yesterday has actually been sitting on the bobbin for a couple months. However, the bobbins of singles are getting close to full again, so one day soon, I need that bobbin to ply again.

The need to finish that fleece soon is just another weight on my shoulders as is the knowledge I can't really start any other fiber projects until it's completed ...

I have about two inches of ribbing on my first sock – the ribbing is long enough it's actually starting to behave like ribbing. I measure my progress in needles and I think I'm managing three to five rows per week. My sock is forty-eight stitches around, or twelve stitches per needle. There were evenings last week, when I managed half a needle.

Erudite. Not this week. Bubbly happy about alpacas and fiber? Not this week. I'm feeling just a little overwhelmed.

Pileated Woodpecker !

I wouldn't consider myself a bird freak, but I do enjoy birds, I observe birds, and I keep a (haphazard) list.

One bird that has always been special to me is the Pileated Woodpecker. In some parts of the country, the bird is almost common, but it's always been a special sight for me. When I was a kid on the the farm in Wisconsin, there were only a few Pieated Woodpeckers in the state, but we had a breeding pair on our farm. I was disappointed when a tornado tore down the tree containing their nest -- although the same tornado demolished our house, so at the time, the nest was just one more nice thing ruined by the storm.

Today, when I went out to clean up some fencing, I saw a Pileated Woodpecker on one of our oak trees. For the past week or so, I've been wondering if I've been hearing a Pileated, but the Northern Flicker makes a similar call and the Acorn Woodpecker sometimes sounds similar enough to confuse me. Since we have plenty of the latter species around, I wondered if it was a Pileated, but I basically assumed it was a Flicker.

Today, when I heard the call, I thought Flicker. Then I decided to look anyhow. I saw a flash of red, then a flash of white which flickers don't have, then a huge black body which isn't a flicker.

I watched the bird for several minutes.

It's always nice to see a Pileated Woodpecker.

Attention All Politicians!

(We interrupt sock knitting and fiber sorting progress to bring you this open letter to all politicians currently campaigning in Douglas County, Oregon.)

Attention all politicians. There are two voters in this house. Both of us are on the national telemarketing do not call list. We are on that list for a reason. We don't mind if you call us personally to talk about your positions and your records, but we don't really care to listen to your recordings.

Both of us can read and use the internet. We research our votes carefully. We research your records in places you probably do and don't want us looking.

I work retail and I have this really funky schedule. You see, when I have to be to work at 5:00 AM, I'm up at 3:30 AM which means I'm usually in bed and frequently asleep by 8:00 PM. On those days, your political calls at 8:30 PM are extremely unwelcome.

Other days, I am scheduled to work until 10:00 PM. By the time I get home, take the dog out, and program the coffee maker, it is approaching midnight. Early calls the following morning are once again, extremely unwelcome.

Due to the obscene volume of political calls and the interruptions they cause, we are instituting some new criteria for placing our votes.

We will be keeping score of how many calls are placed to our home during election season and how many recordings are played to us. Each pre-recorded call counts against a candidate. Calls to endorse a candidate or initiative count against both the endorser and the endorsee. Recording calls placed by third parties count against all candidates and initiatives endorsed by that third party. Calls while we are in bed count double. At the end of the campaign, we will total up pre-recorded phone calls and vote for those candidates and initiative campaigns who have called us least.

Our house! Our phone! Our rules! You don't like it? TUFF! Call us live and in person next time.