From Sin City to No City: November 2014

Where has the year gone? All we need to do is blink and it is a new month already. As we get ready for Thanksgiving, it's time to reflect on what we are thankful for. As usual we will be having our friends over for dinner. I guess I'll be long gone from this earth before anyone else out here gets a full kitchen to cook in. I hate to cook but there is nothing hard about cooking a turkey and dressing. Our friend Nancy is providing the pies this year so that is one less thing to do. We invited a total of 10 people over this year but 5 of them had other plans.

As for myself, I am so grateful for my good health. Here I am 68 years old and am on no medications. All Pa is doing is some eye drops for his eyes and that is it! How many people our age do you know that is taking no medications? Not too many, I'm sure.

Second: I'm so grateful that we get to live out here away from the hustle and bustle of the roaring crowds. Pa went to Vegas a couple of months ago with plans to visit all sorts of old friends. He came home early because he couldn't stand the traffic and all the stuff going on it the big city. He did take the time to go to Costco and the 99cent only store. I love Kirkland Tuna! And Kirkland coffee and just about anything that Costco sells. Oh why can't we get a Costco in Show Low? Please!!!

Third: I'm grateful for all our friends, old and new. There are people here at the ranch that we can depend on if we ever need help with anything. We help them also. We actually had company this year. When we moved here everyone said they would come to visit and never did. Pa's brother came last year and this year we had visits from my Vegas daughter and her family, our dear friend from Salt Lake, Pa's best friend since high school and his wife and Pa's daughter and husband. It was a bonanza year for visits. So those of you from Illinois and Alabama need to get off your butt and come for a visit! And all you Vegas people who haven't come yet, bring your ATV's and boats and get over here! We have 300 miles of dirt road to play on and there are all sorts of lakes within an hour's drive. We fished a couple of times this year. Trout fishing isn't near exciting as Stripper fishing like at Lake Mead but they sure are tasty!

Fourth: I'm really grateful that I never get bored or lonely out here. I love the stillness and quiet. I love watching the birds and other wild life flitting around. I have my craft room and belong to the PaperbackSwapClub so never have to buy books, just exchange them. There is a small library in town that I frequent once a month or so. I've become friends with a crafty lady who works in the post office. She's been here and I've been to her house. Since she works full time, it's hard to find a day we can get together to craft. And I have my two girlfriends in Holbrook who both work, so it's hard to schedule time with them also. I've not seen any new women at the ranch. For some reason, it's men who move here all by themselves. They are either divorced or never been married. Where are all the pioneer women?

I could go on and on about the things I'm grateful for but I'll talk about my garden instead. It was pretty much a waste of time. My tomatoes never ripened so I only got to can because Tom gave me some of his tomatoes. Pa brought me 10 bags of cukes from the 99cent only store so I was able to make 8 quarts of pickles. The bunnies ate the green beans. The wind blew and dried up all the blossoms on the strawberries. I did get a nice crop of carrots for the first time. I froze 4 quarts of them and ate the rest. My rhubarb just fell over and died so I don't know if it will come up next year. I had a great batch of grapes on the vines and the birds ate them when they were the size of seeds. It's growing on the fence so I don't know if I could put a bird net over them to protect them. This next year, I'm planting thorny blackberries since my thornless ones didn't do a thing in 3 years. Turns out thornless ones start over every year from the ground where thorny ones start growing again from the previous vines, like grapes do. I've decided next year I am only planting the basics, not anything exotic or anything that takes up lots of room by spreading out over the garden. I did save the seeds from those organic mini sweet bells and got a nice crop of them but my regular green bells didn't do much. I bought them from Lowes instead of grew them from seeds.

Let's see, what else is new? I've been posting on Facebook which is why I haven't kept up the blog. We have the ranch running pretty smoothly so there isn't too much exciting to write about.

We do have a resident Roadrunner and he's lots of fun to watch. I wish there was a wild bird food for Roadrunners. They make sounds like a dog whining and a purring sound. He seems to like my truck to perch on. I saw some dried mealy worms at Lowe's and thought of buying a bag of them.

One of the residents here had a big blow up with the rancher because he cut his fence and ran his cattle thru his property. Words were exchanged and the rancher said he would kill the resident and his dog. A couple of months later, someone messed with the residents propane tanks and he could have blown himself up if he had lit a match. He called the sheriff and they wouldn't even come out. A few days later, someone knocked the tops off the propane tanks and that could have been a disaster if they hadn't been checked first. The sheriff isn't interested in finding out who did it.

We haven't been doing much of anything around here. I'm always up to go exploring but when I mention it, my words fall on deaf ears. Guess I could go by myself. I still want to go to El Morro National Monument which is only a couple hours away. Maybe next year?