Writing Class and an Eclipse

I saw the eclipse of the moon last night. No pictures, my electronics, computers, cameras and I seem to be on the outs. 

My sister told me she spent two hours yesterday on the phone with Dell getting M/S 10 back off her laptop and restored to its original configuration. I'm considering the same thing. We are both writing letters to Microsoft. Of course they have nothing to do with my camera and phone problems.

I signed up for a writing class on that focusses on memoire.  It just said writing in the title, nothing about memoire but I'm in. I didn't realize memoire seems to have morphed into something a little different than when I was in college or maybe I wasn't paying attention.  We are working very short stories of something personal we have experienced with which we might be struggling. I decided this morning to write about why I used to cry when I heard fire or ambulance sirens. I have always pulled over for them but I used to cry so hard sometimes I couldn't drive on for a bit and had no idea why.

Reading personal stuff face to face with an audience that at this point is composed of people I don't know right now is a challenge too.  I write here before people I mostly have never seen or spoken with in person.  I have often admired writers who have courageously laid their lives out in print and wanted to do the same.  I never expected at 73 to be thinking "what will they think of me if I say this or that?"

I 'll do it. I'd like to go out of my life being who I really am not just in writing but in my behavior and actions.  I no longer have an employer to worry about. I got called on the carpet by a boss once in the 70's for picketing with farmworkers. And for not signing up for the favorite company charity. I did what I thought was right anyway but really worried about it. The people I love know almost all my secrets anyway. Almost.

Electronics figure here.  MS 10 has disabled my MS Office and I can't get my laptop to talk to my printer. My work station is just having fits, and keeps shutting itself down.  I will write on my laptop and if all else fails put it on a thumb drive and print it at my son's house.  I'm calling someone I know who does this professionally for help. I'm ready to pay for help now. I surrender.

Crab Apples

It is a nice but cloudy day. Hoping for a little rain.  Another 10,000 acre fire bloomed in the night here a few days ago. Because it was grass it spread fast cutting off both 720 in Oregon and highway 12 where it turns to go to Kennewick, WA. And, because it was grass the firefighters managed to contain it right away and now it is nearly out. Fearsome. The air here is clear again and the roads are open.

My sojourn in the hospital's gratis exercise program is over. They divided their clients into heart and pulmonary and assigned pulmonary, that would be me, 2 days instead of three on Tuesday and Thursday. I can't come on Tuesdays so I re-joined my old gym. Not an expense I wanted but c'est la vie. I just can't walk often outside here in the land of smoke and dust most days with my grumpy and underpowered airways. Move it or lose it.

Yesterday was a pretty day and I took two grandkids, Isabel and Adam for a "school outing" at the Whitman Mission National Park. Not much of a school budget here for field trips and one child is home-schooled.  Last Tuesday we went to the Fort Walla Walla Museum. Turns out the Mission visitors' center is closed on Tuesdays so as a school trip it missed a piece but we'll try another day.  I have two pair binoculars in the van and they were thrilled to take them and hike clear up the hill to the monument there on their own.

 

Photo courtesy Wikipedia. My phone picture was a fail. You can see the covered wagon across the Mill Pond.

I found a bench near the mill pond and watched the birds and the sky. The turtles that occupy the mill pond in season had already left for their winter digs. Fall is coming fast.

There is a surviving piece of Oregon Trail here, more of a side trip for pioneers, especially those too late to make it over the mountains before snowfall.  Below is the view from the Mission grounds looking east towards Walla Walla.

 

When we were driving the circle out of the Mission parking area we saw a young buck with a small set of horns approaching.  There was also a tour bus with people sitting at many picnic tables and the deer was very cautious of us all but seemed to want to come into the area anyway.

I stopped and the kids were thrilled when he strolled up and looked in the window at them. Adam had never seen a real deer close up. Then it went around the back of the van and stopped in the drive and watched the tourists who by this time were all very still and watching him.  More few steps and more watching and he made the grassy area in the center of the drive. Scanning the area he bent down and started eating. That's when I realized the small trees in the grassy center were crab apples and the ground beneath was covered in them.  He'd come for dinner and found it surrounded by two legged visitors.  Once again phone no pictures. Operator error. Instead we had the privilege of spending the moment with the deer. Probably better for me to be in it than be recording it,

We celebrated grandgirl Julia's 16th birthday last night at the Tuesday night family dinner. She asked me to buy her a specific kind of Bath and Body lotion and I did, online, no store here. It didn't arrive until yesterday's mail.  Her birthday was last week but she was sick but she'll never know the stuff didn't arrive on time. She opened her gifts including a Walla Walla High School hoody sweatshirt. She thought the 16 candles on her cake were too many. Oh dear. I hope she didn't mean what I think she means. I suspect the thought of growing up and being on her own is intimidating. One foot in young adulthood.

I made the main dish, chicken in a sauce made from a yam soup recipe I altered. It has cinnamon sticks and some maple syrup in it among other things. Everyone seemed to like it including those who wouldn't touch a yam with a 10 foot pole. My daughter-in-law Heather made a nice rice dish and someone else brought salad and small homemade corn muffins. It was a satisfying meal.  Heather picked up my chicken dish when she came by to get Adam and Isabel. Too heavy for me to carry. Over a certain weight the likelihood I will drop it goes up exponentially.  I did split it into two Tupperwear containers.  I am making a small collection of 18 person recipes. Who'd have thought it?

Must be nap time; the young men who do the condo lawns are here. Wednesdays are a recovery day from Tuesday for me.  Just about the time I think I could lie down they show up.  These guys are very nice and do a nice job.  It just seems like a little joke from the universe. 

Fall creeps in...

 

Again this morning my laptop with its recently downloaded M/S10 refused to download photos of any kind to my blog. This photo was loaded by copying and pasting manually. It won't let me make it bigger.  I am not happy.  It keeps insisting I want to use Cortana "Your personal Assistant." I do not.  I removed it from my start-up menu, sometimes it complains anyway.

These are two of my granddaughters, Natty and Mya. I think they were five or so then.  They are giving their attention to a frog they found in front of the campground potty.  They named it Potty Frog of course. Now they are 14 now and newly minted high school freshmen.

Been home too much lately so I signed up to volunteer at the Fort Walla Walla Museum.  I told them I want to drive the golf carts around. I also hope to work in the store.  Then I signed up for a writing class. I think I used to write better than I do now.  Having others to critique material is a good thing for me.  And I'm going on two day-long tours. They are both something I could do on my own but...I find between friends moving and expiring my pool of local friends has shrunk almost to nothing. One of the trips is steam train trip organized by a woman I know and like.  I love me some train rides of any kind.  One of my dream trips would be to take a train trip across Canada.  The hard part is getting someone to go with me.

Up until this week we've had much cooler weather with a couple of days of steady rain.  That tamped down the three nearby wildfires. The 75,000 acre Grizzly Complex fire is 44% contained and got two inches of snow one night. Poor firefighters going from hotter than hades to freezing at night. I am so grateful to them. We can't see the smoke any longer but they are still up there.

A final note: I got my flu shot.  I like to get it done early in hopes it will actually work and will kick in before the flu season begins.  Last year's, as I'm sure you all know, was a big zero.