In Which Miss Ingu is Served Breakfast In Bed

The sun returned today and everyone's mood is much improved! In fact, I was surprised today when Mr. Beachy brought me breakfast in bed.

Coffee had been made and a sweet fruit and cheese plate delivered to my bedside. Yum-m-m! The cheese brought back good memories and it was a special gift because I'm sure Mr. Beachy doesn't even like cheese. I don't know anyone besides myself who likes this kind of cheese. Perhaps he's making up for the past week's silent treatment.

The cheese was Ektegjetost from Norway. It's a sweet brown cheese that taste almost like carmelized sweetened condensed milk. You put a sliver in your mouth and let it melt. When our first child was born everyone we knew was church mouse poor. Our baby was just a day or two old when a friend of ours, named Richard Birnbaum, showed up with a gift of this cheese. I knew that he probably spent all the extra money he had for it. It was like a gift from a magi.

Richard was a tall, thin graduate student from Columbia who had dark curly hair and a scraggly beard. He was very shy and soft spoken. He wouldn't sit down, just wanted to stop by for a moment, but we made him hold the baby and share some of the cheese. He must have been her first visitor. And she was most certainly the first baby he'd ever held! I heard later that he had become a legal advocate for immigrants.

Mr. Beachy had also prepared a mango cut in half with the seed removed. He filled it with my favorite plain Greek yogurt and chopped almonds. A meal fit for the gods!

A Thousand Splendid Suns

This book was so good I can't even describe it. I'd heard it wasn't as good as The Kite Runner so I was expecting it to be along the same lines. But it was so very much better that I can't even remember that 1st book. My heart went so much into these characters that I found myself praying for them! Now a much stronger awareness of Afghan women.

Post Number 100 - Why I Like Portland

Do You Know What Pure Joy Looks Like?

Answer: Three dogs jumping out of the jeep and running through the fields at the farm. I wish they could put words to how they feel. It is so much fun to see how excited they are!

Been away from the farm and the internet too long, so we decided to drive up here today for a few hours. It's strange how addicted I've become to having www capabilities. And nothing has changed out here on the farm, so I'm relieved. I'd worried that the pipes might have frozen or something disturbed while I've been gone. It's funny how wet it's been in Portland, but the ground out here is still frozen and large patches of snow on the ground. The dogs and I walked all over (well, that's not quite accurate...I walked, they ran circles around me as I walked) to check out Blue's and my trails. I found another bone to add to my collection - will write about that sometime soon. We filled the bird feeders and dug up the rose and clematis so they'll be ready to take to a new home when the time comes.

We are sorely missing our little family, but we did get an e-mail from them today. They are warm and having a wonderful time...no kidnappings or banditos. Can't wait to hear their stories. They'll be back Sat. at midnight, which means I'll return to the farm Sunday or Monday. Talk to ya'll then.

Equal Time

Noble Blue

Hammy

Best hamster ever!

In Which Miss Ingu Gives a Tour of Her Office

I had to laugh the other morning when I woke up and thought about the sight of my office space. My little home here is really only one and a half rooms. Ever since before Christmas I've had all my projects stacked around on every available surface. There's a "day bed" in the kitchen, and two desks in the main room. At some point I took out a folding table left by my landlords and filled that up. And recently I pulled out my ironing board and put it at the right height to work while sitting on the couch. Handily, the ironing board and everything on top of it can slide under the folding table when I'm not working on things. And what am I working on? I am still trying to write out Xmas cards!!! Is it time to give up? Maybe so. I think Lent starts soon. I also have 4 mouse houses underway and a painting or two. That's just the stuff that's taking up space. Soon it will all be finished and the sufaces in my house will be bare.

Two Thousand Eight

A new year filled with good health, world peace, and lots of laughter to ye!

Today has been a quiet beginning to a new year. I felt like sleeping instead of doing anything today. My alarm went off at 6; then at 7; finally got up around 8. Took the first cup of coffee out for a walk with Blue. It was 39 degrees, but SO windy it felt really, really cold. There's still snow on the ground. We haven't seen any deer since hunting season and I've been worried about them. But today we saw their tracks. I'm glad they're here. Also tracks from a really big racoon, I think. Cute little hands and feet with long toes went from the back birdfeeder half way down through the pasture. H-m-m. I'll have to check with Mr. Beachy. The tracks ended right about his house.

I made an attempt to write my Christmas cards out, but only finished one. I've been working on a couple paintings, but I'm not pleased with them. I thought I'd work on one of them a little more before pitching it, but I never got out the paints. I did start 3 more mouse houses! It's an obsession. I love thinking up the little tiny things a mouse might need in his house.

We did go somewhere new for new year's mass. Blue and I drove up to Kalama, Washington which is up the highway two towns. The parish I go to sometimes in Woodland has a church in Kalama, too. Same priest. Later mass. I'd been past there along the highway, but never into the town. It reminded me so much of Mount Adams in Cincinnati. The little church, St. Joseph's, is a miniature of Immaculata. It sits at the top of a hill, lots of steps winding up to the front door. The view from there was amazing. Just like Immaculata looks out over the Ohio, this little church looks out over the Columbia River at a point where you can see the river curving up into the mountains.

In my mind,Oregon looks like a rectangle and the Columbia River goes straight across the top of Oregon to the Pacific. But it really doesn't go straight across. At Portland, the river turns right (North) for maybe 50 miles, then turns left (West again) until it gets to the ocean. When I drive to the farm, I drive North to La Center, and really I'm driving parallel to the Columbia River, but that's easy to forget because at this point the highway is more inland. After La Center comes Woodland. There's still a port in Woodland and the Lewis River comes in there. After Woodland is Kalama. By the time you are past Woodland, the highway starts running along the Columbia River. The exit to Kalama is right on the Riverfront where large barges are coming in. It's all uphill from there. We drove around the town and it looks like every house has a view of the river and Oregon's hills, and some have incredible views of mountains rolling into more mountains and the river winding through. This section of the Columbia had really big boats going down river toward Portland which I don't get to see much because they dock before getting to the North East side of Portland where Sie lives. Kalama is such a sweet little old town. I could be an old lady there. Just sit in the window with my binoculars all day and night, and walk to church, too!

In Which Miss Ingu Looks for Comments

Ah! It's a delight to read a "comment" and know you're not alone with your thoughts. I know Mr. B & Miss I have 4 faithful followers because they've left their comments on occassion. Thinking that there may be more faithful or even once-in-a-while readers that would like to add a comment, but don't know how...I will now tell you the easy way to do it. First, click on the tiny little word "comments" at the bottom of a blog. A comment page will appear on your screen. It might say: "This page has unsafe material, etc., etc., etc.," Don't worry - it's not unsafe. If this happens, just click the phrase that says, "Open it up anyway." So now you have the comment page and sometimes you will see the comments others have made. There is a box to the right of their comments where you can type your own. Anything you want...even just "hi" so I'll know you're there. Then go down to the spot that says, "Nickname" and put a name or initials in there. Next, copy the crazy, wiggly letters into the box beneath them. (This prevents a zillion computerized scam ads from appearing on the comment page) Last step, click on "Publish Comment"....and there ye be. It's not so hard. I would even say it's one of the easiest computer skills to master!!!

In Which Miss Ingu Opens the EST files

We got up this morning and looked out to see a rose colored sky to the East, the sun just beginning to rise. It was beautiful even though my first thought was, "red sky at morning, sailor take warning." I was planning to drive into Portland today, but woke up feeling yucky from the cold I picked up 10 days ago! I just wanted to crawl back into bed and vegitate. That's one of the worst feelings esp. if you've been hoping to get a ton of things done. But then, one of the best things happened. I got a call from a friend, Lady M. She called really early (10:00 AM her time). She was excited because she was able to find a new Kris Kristofferson CD at the library and played me parts of it. We had been talking about wanting a CD of his voice as it is now - rough and gravely. Recently I'd heard a song, Far Side Banks of Jordan, that made me wish for more. Yay, Lady M!

Later, after Blue bugged me with all the energy she could muster, I gave in and went for a walk down into the woods. It was 54 degrees out, but I felt really cold and had to go back to put on another sweater. Blue was running ahead, making motions that I should hurry. By the time we got across the pasture and started down the path to the woods, I was ready for a nice walk. But here comes Blue with a mole in her mouth determined to return home with it - right now! That was the end of the walk for her. After expending all that energy to getting me out. Blue didn't put the mole down - its feet and snout sticking out one side of her mouth and a pink tail out the other side - until burying at the base of an apple tree by our shed. I wished I'd just stayed in bed!

This evening we went out again. With the time change the dark came on sooner than expected. By the time we crossed the pasture it was dark enough that I couldn't see real well and I wasn't about to walk into the woods in the dark. We used a path around the pasture, past the neighbor's well to circle around back to our house. I've seen deer down there. It's one of the nicest things to see the deer crossing the pasture at dusk. I squinted trying to see into the field and behind us I saw a dark figure. I wasn't sure if it was just a piece of brush, but I stood still and looked at it thinking it might be a deer. The figure didn't move, but all of a sudden barked. Just one LOUD bark. I hope it was Champ or Zeus. Coyotes don't bark. But I jumped all the same and Blue, running ahead, never even seemed to notice. Then it was gone. I never saw it move.

With a blurry head I close this strangest day.