Sourdough!

As a follow up to my post earlier today, here is a photo of my first sourdough loaf. I definitely need to practice my technique and make some adjustments for altitude, but it's a very tasty first try.

Ingredients:

• Unbleached, unbromated, organic white flour grown on the Great Plains of the United States
• Water
• Sea salt
• 100% wild yeast culture
• Lots of TLC.

The Urban Homestead

The calendar may disagree, but spring has arrived in Colorado.

And so begins a new season of work for the homesteader, urban or otherwise. Gerard and I were talking this morning about cycles (not the bi- or motor- kind). Successful athletes train heavy, punctuated by periods of active rest or "back-off" sessions. Most nutritionists agree that periods of fasting or, at the very least staggering you caloric intake, can help keep you lean. Even the concept of weekends offers respite from the daily grind, a cycle of work and rest. And so too the farmer and backyard gardener must stir from winter's rest to begin the planting that will end with the harvest. Nature, indeed everything I can think of, runs in cycles of on and off periods. Maybe that's why I get so much pleasure from abandoning "fresh" tomatoes in January and savoring them only during the summer months when they can be grown in my back yard. It just feels natural.

Of course that's not the only reason, but I have to say I have a much greater appreciation for some of the things which are most mundane to the average supermarket shopper. (I know, I was one of those supermarket shoppers most of my life.) Never before was I as excited about the warm months as since I moved to a place where winters are long and intense. Never have I looked upon a ripe red tomato or dark crisp vegetables with such adoration as I have since I gave up the supermarket. Never have I savored a hot slice of bread slathered with butter as I have since I started baking my own bread and churning my own butter. Why? Because I now know how wonderful these things really are. I no longer take them for granted because they aren't granted to me anytime I want them. I know how precious they are and how much work it takes to get them. When I was a child my mom told me how, when she was a little girl growing up dirt poor, for Christmas they would sometimes get a little fruit and it was a big treat. I remember I snubbed my nose and thought what a lame Christmas that must have been! Of course I was spoiled by her childhood standards. We weren't rich, but anything I wanted to eat was in the kitchen any given day of the year. An apple or an orange meant nothing to me. I wanted armloads of plastic toys. Can I honestly say my childhood was better having had the "luxury" of caring about an abundance of plastic toys more than a few pieces of fresh fruit? Life seemed so unfair if my mom wouldn't (or couldn't) buy me a toy I demanded. I never knew what it was like to long for something that could actually impact my life, like food. How might that have affected me as an adult? How might that today influence my ability to deal with the curve balls life throws?

My quest to be self sufficient, local, healthy and as free as possible from corporate overlords has taught me a lot of exciting and difficult lessons. It has taught me a lot of skills that are lost on most Americans but that at one time were quite commonplace. It has given me an entirely new perspective on the world, a much greater appreciation for the things in my life, and a sense of wholeness and joy that no amount of material things could ever bring me. My most recent conquest: bread. I've been baking my own bread for a couple of years, but until recently I was still a slave to the little plastic packets of commercial yeast. Obviously, those are new fangled products invented by someone who wanted to make a buck. Specifically, it was a man named Charles Fleischmann who introduced pre-made yeast packets to the world in 1876. Yet people have been baking bread, even leavened (risen) bread, since the stone age. How did we manage all those millennia until yeast packets became widespread in the 20th century? One answer: sourdough. After a few failures and months of digging, I finally was able to cut through all the myths and misinformation floating around the internet to discover the delightfully simple formula for bringing this ancient culinary wonder into my home. Mix flour and water and feed it daily for two weeks. That's it. At the end of two weeks you have a jar full of strong sourdough culture that can be propagated indefinitely. How amazing is this: the very organisms you need to make a fluffy loaf of bread live in abundance in the air and on the very flour that will become your bread. All you need to do is coax them into a dense symbiotic colony of bacteria and yeast with a little bit of food and warm water. With your sourdough starter you can make all sorts of delicious, nutritious breads and pancakes, no mass produced industrial plastic packets of genetically modified superyeast is necessary. That, my friends, is an every day miracle.

So it was on this sunny Sunday morning over my first batch of fluffy sourdough pancakes, slathered with home churned butter and preserves made from last summer's peaches, that Gerard and I discussed the cycles of our lives. Though I gave up church and organized religion many years ago, I suppose this is our way of honoring God or the Universe or the Great Spirit and all the true wonders of this world. Our church is our chemical-free home, stocked with clean foods grown by the loving toil of real people, our neighbors. Our tithe is the labor we invest in growing, preserving and preparing the nutrition given to us by the rich soils beneath our feet and the warm sunshine that shines on our faces. And our prayers are understanding the miracle of it all and never taking for granted the luxury of having so much good food to eat.

Eckhart Tolle believes that all the beauty of nature spanning the vast expanse of space and time was unknown until humans, in all our sentient complexity, came along to tell her how beautiful she is. I suppose that's another reason why I spend so much time figuring out how to churn butter and make sourdough. It's my way of honoring the beauty of nature and saying I acknowledge that I am part of her and her endless cycles.

Chasing the Antelope

If you're down and confused

And you don't remember who you're talkin' to

Concentration slips away

Because your baby is so far away.

Well there's a rose in a fisted glove

And the eagle flies with the dove

And if you can't be with the one you love

Love the one you're with.

Don't be angry, don't be sad

Don't sit cryin' over good things you've had

There's a girl right next to you

And she's just waiting for something you do

Well there's a rose in a fisted glove

And the eagle flies with the dove

And if you can't be with the one you love

Honey, love they one you're with.

I've had that song in my head all day. It was a gorgeous day and I decided not to work. I've really been in the mood to run and bike lately. It always hits me this time of year. Spring wakes me up and gives me energy. Most of the trees now have buds and the daffodils are pushing up out of the dirt and life starts anew for everyone. I spent the whole day biking around Boulder doing not-so-urgent errands just because I could. I went by the Boulder Bookstore to browse the "Popular in Boulder" section. I dropped off a small bag of clothes at a charity. I returned a book to the library. I picked up lunch from Whole Foods and delivered it to Gerard at work. I stopped into REI for a new pair of sunglasses. I also bought a new bike helmet at University Bikes (the best bike shop in the world) and scored a couple of vintage cowboy shirts at Buffalo Exchange. I biked along the creek and through several parks. There were people with their dogs, people playing frisbee, people picnicing, people fly fishing, people doing yoga, and hot shirtless guys jogging or playing flag football. And all this I did on my bike, mostly on quiet bike paths that wind throughout our fair city. I stopped off late in the afternoon at The Cup to have an iced blackberry tea at a table on the sidewalk and people watch as the sun went down. Gerard and Cris eventually joined me and we just talked and laughed for a couple of hours, then caught The Hop home. I prepared a dinner of smoked pork chops and roasted winter squash, all from local organic farms, which we enjoyed with the windows open listening to the sound of Boulder Creek. Really it was a perfect day, one of those days that reminds me that life in Boulder is extraordinary. There are no "bad" parts of town, it's beautiful, clean, quiet yet alive, and everywhere is accessible in minutes via bike. It seems absurd to wish for more.

I finally started reading a book I bought years ago called Why We Run. It's a pseudo-scientific examination of why people like to run and the biological and archaeological evidence related to running. The author is a marathon runner and professor. In the very beginning he talks about "chasing the antelope." Basically, the condition where humans find it necessary to always be chasing something that's fleeter and faster and very difficult or impossible to catch. For a stone age hunter it was, quite literally, an antelope. For a modern recreational runner it may be a 100k race. For a poor inner-city kid it may be a college education. Maybe for you it's landing that person you have a crush on, taking that long dreamed of trip to Europe, or somehow acquiring a 100 acre dream ranch in Colorado complete with farm house, a big red barn, water rights and fantastic panoramic views of snow capped mountains. I'm just sayin'. The point is the "antelope" can be anything and is certainly different things to different people. And sometimes we catch the antelope after a long chase and feel great satisfaction. If it was particularly difficult to catch, taking a tremendous amount of work and/or time, we savor it all the more. But inevitably we start looking for another antelope. It isn't because we need another antelope per se, but because we need another chase. We need to feel the fear of possible failure combined with the exhilaration of possible victory, the anticipation of the unknown and those first sweet moments when we know we've done it. It's really the chase that keeps us going in life.

I'll be honest. I obsessed for years over moving to Colorado, specifically Boulder. Also factored in there was finding the "perfect" job, making a certain amount of money, and living my own idea of the "perfect" life. Years I obsessed over this with little progress that I could see at the time, though unknowingly I was closing in on my target. I stalked that antelope relentlessly, but never could get within throwing distance. Then, out of the blue, I found myself standing downwind with the antelope just yards away, completely unaware of my presence and perfectly aligned for the money shot. I took it, and at one fell swoop I found that dream job, got the big salary, and was whisked away to Boulder all expenses paid. It happened almost overnight. Of course I was ecstatic. I had just brought down a trophy I had stalked for the better part of my adult life. I was stunned. I couldn't have been happier. And then a most peculiar thing happened when the glow of victory began to fade. I asked myself one day, "Can I now die happy?" It's a stupid question anyway, but at that moment I realized that now that I had my long awaited trophy I didn't know what to do. Was this it? Was my life over? Was it time to sit back and enjoy the spoils for the rest of my life? Was there nothing more to look forward to but being a successful socialite (or a mountain man as I was pushing more for at the time)? All my life I had so looked forward to something big, and that something's head was now mounted on my wall. And strangely that made me sad. Sad because I imagined myself with no more purpose, nothing else to really strive for or look forward to or work toward. Was I to now spend the rest of my days pining for the feelings I had BEFORE I got my prize antelope? I was an extremely social person in Austin until the end when things started moving toward the transition. At that time I became extraordinarily focused on the kill and fell out of touch with most of my friends. I remained mostly asocial in Boulder, especially in the beginning, as I tried to make sense of it all and settle into this new reality. It was all so weird to me. Wonderful, but weird. Now it's beginning to make sense.

I'm happy to say I have since found (or remembered) several new and forgotten antelope and, sure enough, they have begun to restore me. Continuing my education and, most obviously to anyone who knows me or reads this blog, a ranch are two particularly fleet footed bucks I now have my sights on. Understand it isn't that I don't actually want these things and just made them up for something to do. I do very much want these things. But I now realize the importance and the role of the actual wanting. The pursuit that results is what actually makes me feel alive. Similarly, I also now have a better understanding of both the benefits and the pitfalls of extraordinarily single-minded pursuits. Laser focus can help you get the things you want, but it can also make you forget what you've already got. I wanted Boulder so bad I forgot my friends. I want a ranch so bad I've forgotten Boulder. It's kinda like the song says, if you can't be with the one you love, you can at least love the one you're with. But that doesn't mean you have to give up the chase. If I get my dream ranch, that'll be a wonderful thing. But if I don't, the years spent living in the heart of Boulder while trying on some level to get it will also have been wonderful, just in different ways.

Today was a good day. I always learn something when I take time out to step back and let the Universe teach me.

GREENS!

And reds and yellows and oranges too! We got our first greens of the season! One of our farmers has a greenhouse. Combined with the extra warm weather this year she now has an early crop of fresh greens, and the farmer's market is still 4 weeks away. Spinach and rainbow chard were among the items in our pick up this week and they were the prettiest things to my winter weary eyes. I sauteed the chard in butter and olive oil with onions and a little salt and served it up with leftover bison pot roast. I had all but forgotten how creamy and flavorful fresh chard is. Wow! A taste of the market, a taste of things to come.

The weather service is predicting possible record breaking heat this week. We could see 75 degrees in the next day or two, which hasn't happened this time of year since 1902. It's perfect spring weather (if a bit early) and many of the trees already have buds. The crocus are in bloom and I'm expecting to see tulips any day now. Spring fever is setting in and the world is waking up.

So I now have five places to garden this year. Two community garden plots, plots on two different ranches, and a home-owning friend a few blocks away who I convinced to turn her entire back lawn into a garden. Plus I've secured a volunteer spot on one of my favorite local organic farms which I regularly patronize at the market. I guess technically that makes six gardens. I hope to learn a lot.

Tonight I'm going to sit down with some homemade oatmeal cookies, a tall glass of milk, and go through my seed catalog one more time. I have to finalize my order so I can get those seeds in the ground. It's going to be a big year for me!

Dreaming in Color

A preview of my dreams tonight...

Sweet dreams.

Home

I made it back from DC without incident, though the trip home seemed eternal. I had the pleasure of flying, for the first time, in both snow and rain during the course of this trip. In fact, not to sound crude, but my first thought when I got off the plane in DC was, "Wow, rain and black people. I haven't seen these things for awhile." Boulder sees little of either. But there was a couple of inches of snow coming down when I returned. I didn't feel like I was quite ready to leave DC, but it sure did feel good coming home. I like being able to see mountains 50 miles away with nothing but rolling grasslands between us. As amazing as the mega cities of the East are, my heart lives in the West.

This weekend I made easy rounds to the farms that grow my food, milk and yogurt from Taft Hill Dairy, eggs from Jay Hill Farm. I felt more present than usual and the landscape felt more intensely beautiful and grand. I took in the sights and sounds and smells of the Rockies and I was reminded of the first time I laid eyes on them. I like the slower pace of life out here and the open space. A few days in the city makes me appreciate it all the more.

I also picked up and delivered 800 pounds of organic oats that were donated to the Rocky Mountain Horse Rescue. (I received a gift of 50 pounds of these organic oats for myself! That should last us at least a year.) The "ranch" where I picked up the oats is owned by an attorney and his wife (though they weren't the oat donors.) The "ranch" is breathtaking, with sweeping views of the plains, of Boulder, and of the snow-capped peaks beyond. The "ranch" is nearly 30 acres of golden grassy hills with excellent soil and water rights and easy access to Boulder. I have to put "ranch" in quotes because I was told by a woman who works there that the owners are not "horse people" and pay her to completely care for and give attention to their horses which are never ridden. The owners apparently aren't "garden people" either, and on their acreage sits a mansion that looks like it was plucked right out of a million dollar suburb in any generic city. There is an organic garden that the hired hand created, though the owner is thinking about installing a tennis court in that sunny spot. Not that he's a tennis player, but you know, what else is he going to spend his money on? They already had the old barn moved (yes, the whole thing) from its historic location to a less than ideal spot so they could build their own private fitness center with a superb view of the mountains where the barn once stood. What does it matter if the barn is now cold and drafty? After all, they're not "horse people" and they might want to see mountains when they glance up from the exercise bike now and then. (They have 30 dreamy acres on which to exercise yet they build a whole building around an exercise bike. The whole thing made me sick. How does this happen? A lawyer buys 30 acres of absolutely prime farmland in Colorado then buries it under a behemoth house, relegates the horses to a drafty barn shoved to the windy side of the hill which are only there in the first place for his extremely occasional amusement, and is considering paving over the organic garden with a tennis court. And then there's me, who would practically worship a few acres of good dirt and water so I could grow nutritious, local food to feed myself and my community and live lightly on the land, but am stuck in an apartment in the middle of the city because farmland costs a literal fortune because of all the lawyers who aren't "horse people" buying it up and plopping their mansions on it.

Non-farmers should not be allowed to have farms. Period. That is to say, you shouldn't be allowed to have agriculturally productive land if you plan to do nothing with it but grow mansions (or suburban sprawlplexes for that matter). It's a little like clear cutting a National Park so the wealthy can have fancy hardwood cabinetry. We all lose because of the greed of the few.

This is wrong, wrong, wrong. America is losing on average 2 acres of farmland EVERY MINUTE, 24 hours a day due to development. That's over 20,000 acres every single week. That's enough land for over 600 good sized farms. EVERY WEEK. Think about that. Colorado is a great place to see this. Drive through the "country" in many places around here and you'll see rows and rows of cookie cutter houses and condo complexes along the hilltops. They form walls around the remaining farms like armies of pre-fabricated second rate housing for wannabe nobility. (I particularly love it when they bulldoze the farm, install 500 identical houses, and name the monstrosity something like "Wheatland Farm Estates." They're neither farms nor estates!) We're literally burying some of the best farmland in the world under people who think that food magically appears wrapped in plastic at the supermarket. We can live just fine without Wal-Mart and shopping malls, but one thing that every one of us absolutely depends upon is food. We are so short sighted that even as our population increases, we continue turning farmland into suburban mega-sprawlplexes, complete with fertilizer- and pesticide-drenched lawns soaking up billions of gallons of water every year that could be used to grow abundant, healthy food and ease the burden on our rivers, wetlands and groundwater. It's unbelievable.

If I had the means, I'd buy that lawyer's land, disassemble the house and donate the components to Houses for Humanity, and turn it into a working organic farm with a modest farm house. And you can bet your ass I'd be a "horse person" and a "garden person" and lots of people in Boulder would be able to enjoy the land through the fruits of my labor and the beauty such a farm would bring to our community. I'd mentor students and make an effort to educate people about the abundance of benefits to be had from clean, sustainable, local farming. I'd use our resources responsibly and share the wealth with everyone. What I would not do is destroy it all for the sake of my own vanity.

Unbelievable.

DC

As strange, improbable, totally out of left field as it may sound, I'm completely at home in DC.

Okay, not completely. I have no intention of leaving Boulder for DC but I must say I'm having a most unexpectedly moving experience and I do feel far more comfortable here than I would ever have imagined.

I'm here on travel for a few days with some co-workers to present a scientific paper which I co-authored. As usual, I was initially nervous about going to a "big dirty city" but, if New York was any guide, as usual I turned out to have a completely different opinion of the place having actually been there. That's one of the things I love about travel. It expands my horizons and generally turns my pre-conceived notions upside down.

Of course I always wanted to come to DC, but I expected a big dirty city full of crowds and traffic and crime and headache. But maybe, just maybe, the "headache" part all depends on the perspective and attitude of the observer. I think this is something I'm still trying to extract from my personality which I may only have in the first place because of my small town Texas upbringing. Whatever the case, I love DC and no one is more surprised to hear me say that than I am.

My first day was mostly flying and arriving and checking in and finding food and conferencing. Today was much more relaxed. I already know downtown pretty well as I've walked it about a million times. You know one of the things that's cool about this city? You can't go anywhere without bumping into some major history. My first day we were walking to find a quick bite to eat and someone pointed out, "Oh there's the theater where Lincoln was shot. Oh and that's where he died."

WHAT!?!? I felt like I'd been whisked into a history textbook. Everywhere someone very important died, something historic happened or there's a 200 year old Romanesque building of great significance.

Other than the actual presentation which was today (Thursday) I managed to ditch my co-workers and set about doing my own thing. For lunch I went down to Bread Line which Google tells me is a "must eat" place here in DC. Truly it is. I daresay I've never had a better sandwich, though the service is a bit like the soup nazi. You better know what you want when you get in the very long line or you may well be skipped when the shaved head guy points to you and expects you to call it out. Crazy, but awesome. We don't have that kind of thing in Texas or Colorado. And the walk to Bread Line took me right by the front steps of the White House. We most definitely do not have that out west.

Tonight, after the presentation was done and the co-workers were organizing dinner plans, I headed to the National Mall. I heard the famous monuments were best viewed at night. I heard correctly.

I decided not to change out of my suit and tie to walk the mall. Everyone in DC dresses, and men almost universally are dressed in suit and tie and long black trenchcoat. It was 24 degrees and breezy tonight so I stopped into one of the clothiers downtown and picked up a trenchcoat myself. Now I really look like I belong here. I felt like it too.

So I walked down to the mall and before I knew it there I was. The Washington Monument. Wow. It's huge. And white. And, wow. I ascended the long walkway to the monument. It was cold, quiet. There were few people on the mall tonight and I had a lot of time to thing and soak up my surroundings. I walked slowly around the monument, running my hand along it as I went. As I rounded the east side a most unexpected sight greeted me. A whole group of kids was running up the hill gasping at the enormity of the thing, at at the very same moment a massive helicopter painted like Air Force One appeared out of nowhere not 150 feet above my head. I thought it was going to land on me, but I watched as it landed on the White House lawn. So there I stood, among a sea of children marveling at the Washington monument, with the Capitol in the distance to my right, the Lincoln Memorial in the distance to my left, the city sprawled before me and watching Air Force One deliver someone important to the White House (Obama? I'll never know.) I was frozen with awe.

It wasn't until I reached the World War II Memorial that my emotions finally caught up with me. I was completely alone in the night now. The sounds of the city were distant and faint and there wasn't a soul in sight. The memorial is a huge ring of massive stone pillars with the state names individually inscribed on each. As I ascended the walkway, a crisp wind blew a swirl of dead leaves around my feet. The lights cast my 20 foot tall shadow across each pillar as I walked slowly past reading the state names. A million thoughts about war and death and history swirled through my mind and I couldn't help being swept away by the moment. Tears came down my face and all I could think about was the ties that bind us all as humans, gay or straight, republicans or democrats, conservative or liberal. We're all Americans, and despite our problems and our mistakes I'm proud to be a citizen of this nation.

And then there was the Lincoln Memorial. I'm really at a loss for words. I just stood there silently in the cold looking up at the image of that great man and thinking. The whole experience really moved me in unexpected ways. I want to express it in writing but I just can't. Lordy it was a beautiful thing. I did buy a flag pin at the Lincoln Memorial and pinned it to my lapel.

I spent hours walking the mall and still didn't make it all the way around. I'm told it's over 4 miles round trip. By this time hunger and the cold wind were starting to get the better of me. I stopped into an exquisite looking restaurant that had caught my eye earlier. I found a choice seat at the bar right next to a young, fun, very nice looking gay man and his female friend. I was attended by a hot gay bartender, a beautiful female bartender, and a riotous host of servers who had me rolling with laughter. Between them all I was never without someone to entertain me. I think I ended up staying about three hours and having at least as many drinks. What a truly fantastic night.

So now I'm sitting here in the lobby of my $350/night hotel at 3AM DC time (1AM Colorado time which I'm still functioning on) and trying unsuccessfully to put into words how amazing this trip has been. The presentation went as perfectly as I could have hoped for and I made some really interesting contacts at the conference. And then there's all the amazing DC stuff which I've only touched on here. I still have a full day tomorrow to spend museum hopping before I have to catch my flight home in the evening.

I feel like the luckiest person in the world.

Cultivating Passion

Sometimes during the course of the daily grind I start thinking things like, "Am I wasting my time seeking out local and organic food and dreaming of being a farmer/rancher? Wouldn't my energy be better focused on something that might, say, enhance my current career skills? Am I even making any kind of a difference? Is there any real point? Why can't you just be content with all the blessings you already have and enjoy the fruits of modern society?"

And then I pick up a book like Deep Economy by Bill McKibben and reality beats me over the head with a genetically modified, toxin filled, chemical-tasting frozen "dinner" that consumed 12 times as many oil calories as it offers and left staggering environmental, economic and social destruction in its wake. I read half of it this evening. I was only able to put it down because I had the overwhelming urge to tell someone (Gerard and my blog) a little about it. On the rare occasion when the flames of passion start to cool and I start to question my own philosophy (ie. I get lazy and doubt myself), a book like this is just what I need to remind me of the moral reasons why I care so much and why these things are so important that I've restructured my life around them.

People just don't understand what they're doing to the world and to themselves when they buy food at Wal-Mart or Safeway. It's huge. As much as I've learned about it over the years, it still boggles my mind. And the more I learn the stronger my convictions. I don't even like Whole Foods all that much anymore (gasp!) nor many of their suppliers. The very nature of a corporation and what it must do to survive (let alone thrive) goes against nearly everything I stand for. The single most profound effect you can have on this world is buying local and organic food because it touches EVERYTHING. I'll stop there before I end up rewriting the book, but I have to put Deep Economy on my "highy recommended reading" list.

Practice Makes Perfect

Today I made the most perfect crust ever.

It was a crust for one of the last pumpkin pies of the season. I didn't change any proportions or use any different ingredients or leave anything out, so my technique must be improving. In fact, the pie itself appears to have come out perfect as well. This one didn't crack or get too dark around the edges or overflow, and looks like it could be on the cover of Fine Cooking. But that's not the most exciting part.

The best part was what I did with the extra crust. I normally make cinnamon rolls with it, and they normally come out good. I again made cinnamon rolls, but only with half the dough. With the other half I experimented, starting with the dough and my homemade peach butter which I canned last summer. When finished, I sat Gerard down and served the results with tall glasses of raw milk. By his reaction I knew I had really scored with this one. The crust, I kid you not, was as buttery and flaky as any good croissant, and it was filled with hot peaches. "You have to teach me how to make this crust," he said. Unfortunately it disappeared before I thought to get any pictures, but I did give it a name: Everything's Peachy.

The cinnamon rolls, pictured above, will be breakfast tomorrow. With this crust I'm expecting them to reach new heights of tastiness.

A Fine Weekend

It's one of those Saturday nights where I'm so grateful it's just that. I don't have to do a darn thing tomorrow and I can completely relax tonight in the peace and quiet of my home and sleep in as late as I want tomorrow. Of course "sleep in" usually means 7:30 at the latest. Still, it's a luxury knowing I don't have to get up.

Actually I am going to do some things tomorrow. I'm planning to make pancakes for brunch, which will go well with the butter I churned today, and at some point in the day I plan to bake a pumpkin pie and two loaves of bread. But since I consider those to be incredibly joyful activities I don't really consider them "to do" items. Baking will also make the place nice and cozy. We're supposed to get some sloppy wet snow tomorrow and I have no reason to venture outside.

Today was a really fantastic day in terms of weather. With the exception a few arctic blasts that put us in the deep freeze for a few days, it has been a really warm winter, with most days being sunny and in the 60's. We've even had a few days in the 70's. This morning Gerard and I got up early and hiked into the mountains just outside our door. It was a crisp, sunny morning. Gerard even wore shorts. We both noticed right away the first sign of spring: the birds are back! Seems a bit early to me, but maybe they're getting a jump on spring with all the warm weather. Robins, flickers and all kinds of song birds were flitting about the mountains and singing in the trees. We even saw the first Steller's Jay (one of my favorites) since last year. We also came across something else fairly exciting today. Near a nameless peak west of Mount Sanitas we found what appeared to be the remnants of a mountain lion's kill. It was the hoof and lower leg of a very young mule deer. The bone near the detachment point had been snapped off and knawed. It was pretty cool, though slightly unnerving since lions tend to stay in the area and guard their kills. We looked around but couldn't find the rest of the carcass and thought it likely that a fox or some other critter had scavenged a kill and left this tidbit near the trail.

The rest of the day was mostly spent loafing. I did manage to get out to the farm to pick up a couple dozen eggs and a few winter squash, and I prepared smoked pork chops and mashed potatoes for dinner which was followed up with an evening walk downtown. But otherwise I had a perfectly, wonderfully unproductive day. As for the rest of the evening, I think I'll try to decide on my next book selection and see if I can't get a couple of chapters in. I'm going to try to resist reading Animal Vegetable Miracle again.