This month brought cataract surgery for hubby. He can now see better than he ever has in his life and no longer needs glasses, except low strength readers in some instances.
It took me to the podiatrist regarding my summer long foot discomfort and those two visits were unproductive as I had already done the elevated resting, ice, better supportive shoes, good arch supporting insoles, so she really didn’t know what to say except my 76+ year old feet have arthritis, some bony overgrowth that comes with age, bone spurs on my heels, and to keep doing what I have been doing.
Helene was kinder to us than so many millions of people. We got a lot of rain, wind gusts to 60 MPH that took down trees in the region, but none on our farm that we have seen so far. The ones on our road and the road leading down the mountain have at least been cut back, though many trunks are still leaning over the roadway. Our state maintained gravel road has a 12 to 14″ deep rut that runs from the neighbor above us beyond the one across and down from us. It ran gullies down our driveway that slopes down about 200′ elevation from the top to the house, but I have already regraded with the tractor and blade and improved it, not repaired it. We did lose power for 56 hours. The refrigerator freezer was not opened and the meat in the bottom bin with blue ice blocks remained frozen. Some of the bagged veggies and fruit higher in the freezer thawed and was thrown out. The bags of tomatoes were beginning to thaw so the skins were slipped off, the tomatoes put in a large pot and today I have finally tackled the job of canning 9 pints of them. A bucket of apples was picked, sliced and cooked down for applesauce. The large pot to the right of the tomatoes ended up 6.5 pints of applesauce. The half will be served with tonight’s homecooked meal, the first since Thursday night. The two quart bags of chili paste used as an enchilada sauce base were cooked down and put in half pint jars that will go in the freezer as I don’t have a pressure canner.
The power was out for 56 hours. With no power, we have no water as we are on a well. We do have a gravity fed yard hydrant down near the bottom field, fed from a water catchment system near the house that contains the rain water from the roof. Though that water is not potable, 5 gallon buckets were filled and hauled up to the house to use for handwashing and toilet flushing. Our daughter, 25 minutes away didn’t lose power and she fed us Saturday night, though now since they are are town water, they have a boil notice. Today, we had an appointment in the county seat and the parking lot of the little shopping center had about 25 power company trucks, all from Oklahoma. We made sure to go by and thank the guys standing in the lot, probably awaiting their next assignment as some left while we were there. They seemed surprised that we were thanking them and not yelling at them. That has to be a tough job, working 16 hour shifts in the rain only to be yelled at by people who didn’t get their power back first.
As I said, we were lucky. Several communities in our county and adjacent counties along the New River were flooded and roads blocked off. There are a number of semi permanent campgrounds and people lost their campers, some vehicles, and houses close to the river. It crested as much as 17 feet above flood plain. The news said it is the second highest since records have been kept, the highest was in the 1940’s. The creek at the bottom of our mountain flooded, but didn’t breach the bridge. When will people realize that climate change is fueling these more intense storms. I have friends in western North Carolina that are totally cut off due to washed out bridges and roads. Long lines at grocery stores, taking only cash, and no fuel for generators. We all need to be thankful if we are safe and send good thoughts, goods, and money to help those who have lost it all.
On to a new month tomorrow. Hopefully no more severe storms aimed at the areas already suffering.