It was a gorgeous weekend here — blue skies, yellow leaves falling off trees, sunshine, snow on the peaks. It was so gorgeous that even though we’d done a nice hike early in the day, I couldn’t stay home yesterday afternoon so I took Raymond for a little bike ride. It’s our newest trick — I get on the Happy Bike with Ray on the leash and off we go. He runs alongside with that rocking-horse run that really happy dogs get. The trick though, is that I need to keep reminding him to “be careful” and to “watch out”…
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Yup — although it sounded like rain outside my window all night — look what I found when the sun came up this morning — let’s hope what’s left of the tomatoes are okay under that plastic. Oh, and maybe it’s time to put the folding chairs and the outdoor cushions away for the winter (except that it’ll be warm and sunny again in a couple of days and everything will need to dry out).
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I got a little carried away at Lowe’s last weekend and bought this ginormous pile of bulbs. There are 80 King Arthur daffodils (the really big ones), 160 mixed tulips, 100 scilla and almost 100 crocus bulbs. Oh, and some narcissus — most of which I’ll put away for winter because I like to force them in the house — Patrick used to hate the smell of them, but since it’s four years today that he made that terrible error in judgement (don’t drive drunk, people), I guess one upside is that I can force as many narcissus bulbs in…
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Fall has arrived here in Montana — the trees are turning gold, there’s snow on the peaks, and I found an 18-inch zucchini hiding on the backside of one of my feral zucchini plants the other day. We’re a tiny big behind the ball here at LivingSmall at the moment, so go look at the lovely photo of the Crazy Mountains and I’ll be back very soon.
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“Do you want some moose liver?” the MH asked this weekend. “I’ve got 30 pounds of it.” “Sure,” I answered. “I’ll take some — I’ll probably just make paté though.” I mean, I was game for antelope liver last fall, but moose? Moose are enormous — the one that the MH’s son shot this weekend was six hundred pounds! And it wasn’t even a particularly large moose. I have to admit, I have mixed feelings about the moose. The MH was so excited when Robbie won the tag in the lottery this year, and the photo he sent me of…
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Because it’s Friday, and because we ate and drank just a tiny bit too much last night at Patrick’s Posthumous Birthday party (which was delightful and jolly and because our friend Jim hung Patrick’s picture on the restaurant wall, it sort of felt like he was among us) — this morning LivingSmall brings you that staple of the exhausted blogger: a list of links. Hugh Fearnly-Wittingstall expounds on the joys of hunting mushrooms (and I wish I lived in England so I could have gotten the free mushroom guide with my copy of the Guardian). If it ever manages to…
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Patrick would be 42 today — it’s always a bittersweet day, to say the least. But even though he’s no longer with us, I like to celebrate his memory on his birthday. Like the Day of the Dead when we decorate graves with flowers and take our dead relatives their favorite foods and drinks as a way of reminding them, and ourselves, that although we’ve been separated, we never really do lose on another. So tonight we’re all having dinner tonight at our friend Jim’s restaurant. We had Patrick’s last birthday there — it was a fun and festive evening…
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It’s fall in Montana which means that the bears are on the move — there’s been a black bear down in the creekbed woods behind the dog park where we walk and last night Raymond came home covered in bear shit. Bad dog! Bad dog got washed with cold water from the hose in the backyard. Bad dog got washed with the stinky leftover orange-rosemary shampoo that he hates — I keep hoping this will deter him from rolling in stinky dead things, however, I seem to be hoping in vain. I haven’t seen the bear, but we’re all having…
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Somehow we’ve managed to live a little too large here at LivingSmall, the debt-to-savings ratio has gotten itself upside down, and so we’re trying to cut back wherever we can. I’m the kind of person who buys pantry staples when I’m feeling existentially anxious, and so, in the spirit of economizing, I’ve found myself looking in the pantry and remembering that I can feed myself a whole week’s worth of lunches, for example, off a nice pot of pea soup. Pea soup costs almost nothing. Today I made a batch — I pulled a couple of carrots and a late…
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Once the heat wave passed it seems like everyone in town has been riding around on those retro-cruiser bikes. I was on the verge of going to buy one when I remembered that duh! I have a bike! I bought this bike a couple of years ago for forty bucks at the pawn shop around the block, and so instead of buying a new bike, I took it to our local bike shop and got it tuned up. New tires, brake pads, shifter cables (which came undone yesterday so back it goes on today) and the crowning glory, the cargo…