So Much To Say, So Little Room.
I canna believe my last epistle was back before the Summer Solstice!
Here we are at Autumnal Equinox and I've not even made a note since
then. Lot of catch-up to do. So much remembering to do.
Summer Solstice
From the hot tub here the Solstice Sun rises about one solar disk
diameter north of the penultimate power pole. Over the next few weeks
she passes behind that pole, dances through the piñon pines and
moves southward at an ever increasing speed, headed for her Equinox
Rendezvous with The Teeth of The Dike.
The days are getting warmer and Monsoon is commence-able. The Cat [has] Drag'd Inn just in
time for Amateur Radio Field Day so the first task, beyond a good
morning soak in the hot tub, is to string out an aerial and erect other
antennae (the monsoon is busy erecting clouds...). Field Day Operations
for NU7DE consisted mostly of typing
RTTY contacts and replying to such comments as "Are you really?"
My big project this Summer is to build a Labyrinth. 1thousand-2hundred
nicely rounded
river rocks collected from little piles around the yard are moved by
wheelbarrow to one large pile at the start of the Entry Path. Then, by
arm load and basket, to the site where I have laid out a plan for one
stone at a time to be placed in eight circles. Labyrinths were
constructed in the ancient Mediterranean world--the most famous is the
Cretan labyrinth within the intricacies of which lurked the dreadful
Minotaur of legendary fame. [Mysterious
Britain 1974-1979, ISBN
0586081577, Thank you.] This labyrinth in Pie Town would have no
Minotaur, a glass turtle will stand guard. The ingress will be aligned
more or less to the south, to coincide with the passage of Canopus
behind the nub of Allegra.
Summer Camp(s)--Looking for
Adventure
One of the events I have missed in previous years, due to my usual late
July arrival in Pie Town, is the several summer camp groups which come
for one-night-stands at Nita's Caravanserai. Two vans and a chuck wagon
bring in variously 10-30 kids and leaders and a crate of apples. Nita
makes pies and the campers provide supper and breky. Fun for me to
break out my Official Sierra Cup and tin plate which have not seen the
light of day since the 50-Miler back in the '70's.
This Summer Camp spends a week or so travelling around visiting places
of historical interest, rock climbing, camping of course, and cleaning
up after. Here they stay barely twenty hours but in that time, this
time, the kids beat down the path to the labyrinth and moved hundreds
of stones to the outer circles. I also had opportunity to show one
group how to make an oil lamp
from an orange.
Hiking In The Hills
Two miles east, just at the base of the hill which comprises the center
of Pie Town, more or less parallel to Double Bar Road and the CDT, lays
The Dike. There are several such dikes hereabouts, remnants of some
long ago geologic activity, and on the west flank of this one is a
particularly imposing outcrop of red sandstone. One of the local
activities is to carve one's name in this sandstone and then return
every few years to recarve, to make up for the mass weathering which
eventually erases your mark.
Hiking here also includes walking the fence-line to see that no outlaw
bovines have been successful in their efforts to expand their range
into greener pastures. The deer have no problem with fences, they just
jump over. We are going to be in real trouble if the cows ever learn
how to jump. One nice by product of the monsoon is the heightened
humidity. From day to day some mornings will be warm and calm and
positively dripping with moisture, just the right conditions for giant
bubbles. In a clean bucket: twelve cups of water, a cup of dish soap,
and a few kids for chasers on the side. Not in the bucket. Just the
slightest hint of a breeze is helpful.
Continental Divide Trail
From Banff (way north of Pie Town) to Columbus (south of Deming) some
150 (+/- 50) and bicyclists travel 2000 miles north and
or south along the Great Divide
every Summer. In Pie Town there is the
Toaster House hostel the
storey of which would be an entire page by
itself. Most interesting of all the trekkers through this Summer is
this
guy on a really high tech unicycle.
Working With Solar
Fifteen miles south on the Double Bar Road--which eventually becomes
Green's Gap Road--is an enclave consisting of two families who live off
the grid. Two solar arrays of about a thousand watts each power their
homesteads. One array took a lightning hit a while back which knocked
out half the panels and damaged several others. Wind damage from the
same storm ripped two other panels from their array at the solar
powered well. Meanwhile, over at the other homestead, part of their
array was moved a few years ago and never reinstalled correctly. Plenty
of work to keep me in pie money for the Summer.
The tyres on Tiny Truck have 40,000 some miles and are getting down to
the wear-bars. Driving to and fro on the Double Bar/Green's Gap Road,
fifteen miles of sharp gravel and cattle guards is taking a toll.
Another flat. And then another--in through the tread, out the sidewall.
Lastly, the one that tipped the scale, tread separation. Over an
hundred miles to the nearest preferred tyre store in either direction
became an all day trip to Show Low where Tiny Truck got four new
sneakers for the price of three. The tread separation was a road hazard
failure and covered by warranty. Yeah!
Well, I didn't need all that pie anyhow.
Speaking of tyres... Several miles of U.S.60 are being resurfaced by an
interesting newly patented process. Four large trucks hauling trailers.
Each trailer contains a 6,000 gallon propane tank and a burner as wide
as a traffic lane. The driver walks alongside, steering the truck from
a control panel whilst the mechanism will heat & eat the old
surface, grind up the material and lay down a windrow. These trucks are
followed by a spreader and two rollers as well as a few broom pushers
who clean up the orts.
Pie Town Pie Festival
The Umpteenth Annual, first weekend after Lab our Day, draws pie bakers
and eaters from all round, near and far. Guests galore! Two people flew
in from Sweden
this year. Was that the longest distance travelled? Last year I was
rolling [in] dough. This year with a drippy nose and runny eyes I did
the baking instead. One hundred ei8ht pies in and out of three ovens
during the course of the Thursday before. Several other folks baked a
bunch more pies. Pies for selling, by the slice or by the whole, pies
in three sizes for the pie-eating contest, and then there were all the
pies baked by entrants to the pie baking contest. This year's grand
champion was a sweet potato pie.
Cleaning Up After
Not much to write about this subject. Cleaning Up After just is. Dead
water balloons seem to be the most numerous single item for me to
collect. Birds and ants have already taken care of the pie crusts.
Another Cleaning Up involved a Dead Mouse Smell emanating from under
the hot tub. Been there for a while. Moth balls didn't help any--wrong
animal perhaps? Then one week the Ground Fault Breaker was found to be
tripped most mornings. Day by day worse and worse, more and more often,
until finally it would not stay on even for a few seconds. With the
cover removed from the controller we found a toasty mouse with nose on
the red wire, feet on the black wire and tail on the ground bus.
Autumnal Equinox
Such a party has not been seen hereabouts since the days of Stonehenge!
Orion has been in the morning sky for several weeks now, since about
early august rising out of the mists of dawn over the dike two miles
east--the same dike that engenders one green flash after another as
Father Sol marches south. Orion's belt points generally south towards
the horizon where, in the twilight just prior to dawn, a few days
before equinox, rises Canopus a first-magnitude star in the
constellation Carina: the second brightest star in the heavens. Canopus
is not visible at all north of N37° latitude and here, at
N34° 17', he skips across the bulk of Allegra as would a flat
stone across a still pond.
Last year at Autumnal Equinox on the 21st of september the
sun rose
behind The Teeth of the dike with a display of multiple green
flashes--easily a Number Seven on Little Jon's Ritegurd Scale. Viewers
in the hot tub that morning had all they could do to hang on tight to
the sides and not slip beneath the steaming surface.
This year's Autumnal Equinox was forecast to occur on the 22nd.
The
dregs of Monsoon were leaving trails of cloudy mornings--would the sky
be clear? And on which morning would Sol rise behind The Teeth? The
21st as it did last year? Or the 22nd, on the
Equinox. Witnesses were
assembled. The tub was especially cleaned for the occasion. Sunrise on
21st was brilliant, and just a little-finger's width to the
north of
The Teeth. But just because we were not sure we had our Equinox Pot
Luck Breakfast anyhow.
Early on the 22nd the witnesses assembled again. Clouds
danced in the
sky, the tub was steaming. A column of light stood above the dike,
sliding slowly southward as Sol neared the rim of the world. Magical
times these are. Birds chorused, clouds parted, The Teeth sparkled as
green diamonds flashed through and the sun rose in exactly the right
place. Our own chorus joined that of the birds and we all trooped off
for a second Equinox breky, of leftovers this time. Now I have a much
better appreciation for the generations of ancient priests and wise
observers who set the standing stones which yet mark the passing of the
seasons.
Such a nice month September was! Pie Festival, Grandparents Day, Rosh
Hashana, Autumnal Equinox. Gluttony, Elderly, Chronologically,
Astronomically; a Special Day for just about everyone, eh? And Winterly
too. This Observer feels the First Frost on the 14th happened more as a
result of evaporative cooling than any ambient temperature below
freezing. But the signs are there all over. The heat is on, the clothes
are on, and Christmas Decorations are on all the big box stores.
Soon time to depart here. Sara(h) is anxious to get going, she's been
practicing in Tiny Truck. Which pedal did you say was the clutch?
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Greetings Virtual
Travellers:
I do not know what I may
appear to the world; but
to
myself I seem to have been only like a boy playing on the seashore, and
diverting myself in now and then finding a smoother pebble or a
prettier
shell than ordinary, whilst the great ocean of truth lay all
undiscovered
before me. 