This is one of those dispatches where I am going to be more honest than I want to be.  This morning I couldn’t find my older red wallet, the one with my passport in it.  Lots of grr, grr, grr.  I became very frustrated because I was digging through piles of stuff in an attempt to find it.  Grr, grr, grr.

I finally started walking around and putting stuff away, in hopes that it might surface.  This took me into the realm of the very cluttered kitchen addition.  I started yanking stuff out of my outer gear drawer and throwing it on the floor.  Nope, no wallet.  I looked in the upper cupboards – it was not there.  Then, just like that, I was in the midst of a major project, one that took all day and was still underway when Pete got home at 11:00 p.m.

I pulled foodstuffs out of drawers. I consolidated it all and put what was in bags, in jars.  I cleaned off shelves and put things back. Those last two sentences make it sound like this was a neat and tidy project. It was not. In short order flour of various kinds and loose tea and spices were all over the floor, counters, and table. The place looked like the Cabin in the Walt Disney movie, where the raccoons got into the cupboards and spilled everything.  My middle name is not, nor will it ever be, Tidy.

I am now at a loss for figurative detail because I had to deal with so much literal detail.  My rationale became:  I have to do this because it will be a good idea to know what we have on hand when the little big one hits.  I am thinking the little big one (perhaps a 7.0 earthquake – this as opposed to the big big one, a nuclear weapon being lobbed by the North Koreans on Anchorage.  The little bag of mung beans that has no jar yet – this will not be a concern.   No, we would not be able to comprehend what the big big one would be like.
Well, we are going into winter in a good way. Pete and I have whittled down our fall list to the point where it’s toothpick thin.  And if we don’t tackle any more things on our list – this will be just fine because the important stuff is done.

When I find the time I am going to go through the jars in the root cellar pantry. I am going to write on the white board that’s attached to the door, how much we have of what.
What we’re tossing – tomorrow I’ll make a mix of what’s left for the chickens and add it to their high protein feed. I’ll also put mix the goat supplements up and put them in containers.
Stormy is now producing a half-gallon of milk a day.  Soon enough, probably by the month’s end, I’ll cross milk the goat off my mental list.  Yep, whittling the list down.

A Postscript:  I found the wallet in the first place I looked – my outer gear drawer. It was up against the side of the drawer.  What were the odds of this? I think that subconsciously, I knew all the time it was there. A scary thought.

Next: 290. 10/20/17: A Letter to Betty Pierce