Pumping on the treadle

Time to make some holiday cards. A bit of green ink on the ink disk and some pumping on the treadle to distribute it on the rollers.

Lock up the chase.

Run the job.

Come back when the ink is dry on the paper and bag up the products. I did four designs.

Outside, a few sprinkles. Not nearly enough, but appreciated.

Waiting for rain

All of us are waiting for rain. A friend's well has gone dry and we are being careful of our water from ours. Here is a tiny fall garden consisting of a few marigolds and beet greens.

On the night of the full moon, I stepped out and looked for the eclipse. The moon was rising already almost at totality, so it took me time to locate it. I dutifully snapped at it with the little cheap camera, and got no result (such as it was) until late in the show:

But it was certainly a show worth watching. I felt thousands of years old, or even millions, witnessing this. 

There was a similar eclipse in May of 1975. I watched that one with many people of my own age, on a farm that had no electricity, not long after my first arrival alone in Oregon. We drank Oly and Rainier and stood around a fire and chatted and howled and danced, and I spent the night in a tipi. None of my four children is as young as I was then.

I'm getting off the farm more, now that the orchard is done and the garden, or most of it, is in fallow. Much of the time is spent hiking nearby trails, of which there are plenty, with the little dog. He can only go so far at his age.

But that's true for me too.