Sometimes I feel as though Grace is watching over me. The device in the picture is an apple peeler/corer; it works like a charm for preparing apples to cook, because all one need do is stick an apple on those spikes and turn the crank, and the apple is peeled, cored, and spiral-sliced in about 30 seconds. But a few weeks ago, I noticed I hadn’t cleaned it thoroughly enough when I put it away last year, and in the process of remedying that I accidentally unseated the spring you can see at lower left. In the past, I would’ve simply taken it to Grace’s workbench and she’d have fixed it in under five minutes, but this time I had to do it myself. It wasn’t easy, but I found some close-up pictures on the internet and was eventually able to get it back together properly. At least, I was fairly sure it was correct; the moment of truth came on Sunday, when I picked a basket of apples to turn into mincemeat. The first apple I tried fell apart, showing me that I had adjusted something incorrectly, but a little examination and a second messed-up apple showed me what I’d done wrong, and I was soon back in business. It’s a small thing, I know, but I’m easily frustrated by problems that are outside of my scope of expertise, so when I suddenly see what I’m doing wrong and I’m able to fix whatever it is, I feel as though Grace is there behind me, invisibly pointing out what I wasn’t able to see by myself. 
Archive for the ‘Diary’ Category
Diary #848
Posted in Diary, Miscellaneous, tagged Grace, psychology, Sunset on September 29, 2026| Leave a Comment »
Diary #847
Posted in Diary, tagged animals, Sunset, video on September 21, 2026| Leave a Comment »
If you compare this video to the one I took several weeks ago, you can see just how much happier and healthier the turkey is now that he can roam around outside of the coop, safe from literal henpecking. When I took this video on Saturday, I got a good look at the area on his back which was so bad before, and it seems largely healed now. He still spends a lot of his time near the fence, but that seems to be because he’s learned I throw feed corn over the fence when I come out around noon; after that, he wanders all over looking for bugs in the grass. A few days ago I even heard him in the north paddock, under the apple trees, when I opened up the living room window in the morning. I’ve been trying to catch him when he’s making his gobbling noises, but as so often happens with animals doing interesting things, he always stops when I grab the phone! So you’ll just have to be satisfied with watching him strut, unless I happen to catch a better video before this publishes on Monday. At least now I know how to handle larger fowl (I’ve always wanted peacocks) when they start getting too large for the henhouse!
Diary #846
Posted in Diary, Miscellaneous, tagged Grace, psychology, recipes, Sunset on September 15, 2026| Leave a Comment »
Since last year was a poor one for tomatoes, I ran out of homemade salsa early this year, and had to make do with store-bought salsa this summer. But I had both time and tomatoes last week, so I made a 4-pint batch on Thursday; because I try to tweak my recipes to make too much rather than too little, that actually gave me four pints for canning and another which went straight into the refrigerator for immediate use. Those of you who remember how Grace and I developed the recipe together will not be surprised to hear that it was a bittersweet experience for me; on the one hand I’m not going to deprive myself of good salsa, and using a recipe which had more input from her than from me (because she was the Queen of Spicy Food) is almost like getting a little present from her. But on the other hand…well, I don’t think I really need to explain. And assuming I have enough tomatoes for a 2-quart batch of mincemeat (which does not remind me of her because she didn’t like mincemeat), I’ll be going through that same mixture of pleasure and pain again when I make another batch in a few weeks.
Diary #845
Posted in Diary, tagged animals, Sunset, video on September 8, 2026| Leave a Comment »
This is the time of year when the pigs, guided by their amazingly acute sense of smell, start spending a lot of time under the apple trees, feasting on drops. Then in the late afternoon, when they know dinnertime is approaching, they head back to the east paddock, where they know I’ll be bringing their dinners. Last week I heard them through the open window, and managed to catch them heading toward dinner; the fuzziness is due to the window screen because I knew if I took the time to go outside, they’d already have passed. Bonus: y’all get to see and hear Louie being a drama queen when Cicero just looks at him too hard.
Lost Update
Posted in Diary, Fiction, Miscellaneous, tagged advertising, imaginative fiction, Lost Angels, psychology, The Essential Maggie McNeill, The Forms of Things Unknown on September 4, 2026| Leave a Comment »
I haven’t forgotten that I estimated Lost Angels would be released around June, but long-time readers know that I’ve never been especially good at estimating when my books would come out; The Essential Maggie McNeill came out six years after I first announced I was working on it, and even The Forms of Things Unknown was much later than originally announced. The main reason my books tend to come out so much later than my most hopeful predictions is that I’m not working from an advance, which means I need to prioritize my bread-and-butter writing first. But another part is that I’m a rather moody person (I know you’re shocked at this revelation) and will sometimes procrastinate some step or another for months until I get into the right frame of mind. But this time, I have what I believe to be a better excuse: Chester Brown has been busy with other projects, and since he does these covers for me out of friendship I don’t like to hassle him as though I were some kind of entitled ingrate. But I recently decided to email him to ask if he was still busy, and he replied that he was, but if we waited until he wasn’t the cover would never be done. So he included a rough sketch of his cover concept and I was pleased and excited by it; I shot back a little input, and I suspect it won’t be terribly long before he is done. So I’m not going to make another estimate which will probably also be wrong, but I will say that I think it’s not improbable that it will be out this year.
Diary #844
Posted in Diary, tagged animals, Sunset, video on September 1, 2026| Leave a Comment »
I did realize that a full-grown turkey could not live comfortably in a henhouse with chickens, but what I did not realize was just how much trouble it would be. First, he injured himself trying to get through the chicken door, so I had to let him in and out through the walk-through door for the past couple of months. He also kept trying to flap his wings inside, which meant every day I had to deal with the feeder getting knocked loose (and the feed consumed 50% faster), most of the water being dumped on the ground, electrical cords being knocked loose, and nasty shit getting everywhere, producing a reek that was intolerable even by chicken standards. But then I realized that in addition to all that, the hens were pecking him so badly he had bloody sores under his tail and on his back between the wings. So last week I shooed him out into the paddock, which was not easy; he whacked me with his wings (which are much stronger than one would expect) and kept running in every direction other than the one where I wanted him to go. That was through the open gate, which meant several of the chickens took advantage of it even though he wouldn’t, which meant they needed to be shooed back in once I finally got him out. He then spent several days just lurking outside the fence, staring in with an expression I interpreted as the avian equivalent of a child with no money pressing his runny nose against the window of a candy store. But on Saturday he started wandering around a bit, and on Sunday he was up in the north paddock hunting for bugs in the grass. He later joined the pigs and goat eating the corn I throw over the fence; I’d been giving him some separately from the pigs, but on Sunday he joined them so I just doubled the amount. All in all, this looks like the way to do it, should I choose to raise more large fowl in the future, but next time I’ll do it before the injuries start accumulating.
Diary #843
Posted in Diary, tagged Sunset on August 25, 2026| Leave a Comment »
We didn’t have a bumper crop of plums this year, but the ones we got are plump and juicy. I made a plum pie, and though Jae loves plum pastries I find them more tart than I care for. I do like plum bread, though, and plum sauce, so I think I’ll make some this week. The tomatoes are just about big enough to make fried green tomatoes; this year I bought only two of a cherry-tomato variety and four of a table-tomato variety, but the former grew so quickly and so large they’ve really overwhelmed the latter, so next year I’m only going to buy one and plant it in a separate planter so the table-tomato plants have more room to grow. I’ve never had a green thumb and I don’t particularly like digging in the dirt, so my gardening is limited to plants I can basically ignore other than ensuring they get enough water. And that typically works out just fine for me.
Diary #842
Posted in Diary, tagged Sunset on August 18, 2026| 2 Comments »
One really nice thing about the climate here at Sunset is that when I pick blackberries, I can wear a long-sleeved top to protect my arms from the thorns; in Louisiana and Oklahoma it’s much too hot for that. So when I noticed late last week that there were plenty of ripe blackberries, I put on this old work shirt of Matt’s that I have used as a light jacket for almost 15 years, and in half an hour I had what you see here. And this represents only about a third of what was there; because I’m the only one eating them I didn’t bother with anything but the biggest, nicest ones. Another nice thing was that, since it was overcast (as it so often is here), I was not fooled into picking some of those that were still somewhat red, as happens regularly when it’s very sunny; as you can see, all of these were at the peak of color, which is also the peak of sweetness. On Saturday I made a blackberry pie, and it was one of the best ones I’ve ever made, as sweet and flavorful as one could wish. There are also lots of plums on the trees, and it looks like I’ll be getting enough tomatoes and apples for my needs as well. So because I know this year’s weather was a fluke of the changing climate and it may not be this way next year, I’m going to enjoy it while it lasts.
Diary #841
Posted in Diary, Miscellaneous, tagged animals, recipes, Sunset on August 11, 2026| Leave a Comment »
Chekhov and Yellowbird gave me this cool egg rack last Christmas. Typically, I use it to hold regular “large” size eggs (and put the extra-large and jumbo ones in the basket at the bottom). But right from the start I realized that it would be an excellent way to hold undersized pullet eggs once the young hens started laying. And as you can see, they have! When I first started keeping chickens 20 years ago, I realized that when a recipe calls for x number of eggs, that meant large-grade eggs, so if I wanted to use pullet eggs in a recipe more would be required. So while I still had my last carton of store-bought eggs around, I measured the volume of a typical egg and discovered it to be 1/4 cup. So if a recipe calls for 3 eggs, that really means 3/4 cup of eggs, and if I want to use pullet eggs I just crack them into a measuring cup until I get to the right amount. If I’m cooking something less finicky (for example, just regular scrambled eggs) I just use 2 for 1 at this stage, then later when they are just small rather than tiny I move to roughly 3 for 2. And if I want to use normal-sized eggs for whatever reason (or give them to friends), the eggs from the mature chickens are still stored in the cupboard like usual.
Diary #840
Posted in Diary, tagged Sunset on August 4, 2026| Leave a Comment »
I reckon it’s a good sign that one of the buds of my magnolia has already opened, considering that I only planted it two weeks ago. Though it has been unusually cool this summer, it has also been sunny, with an unusual number of rainy days; even though I’m not much of a gardener, I would think that’s a good combination for young plants. It certainly seems to be good for the tomatoes, too; by the end of the month I should be able to make fried green tomatoes, a treat I missed out on last summer due to weird weather killing the plants early. I also couldn’t make much salsa last year, and in June I used up the last of the batch Grace and I made together two years ago, so I’m hoping this year I can make at least enough to last a whole year. I don’t know about the other fruit yet, but I should be able to tell in a few weeks; the return of autumn feels even better to me when I have enough fruit to make the autumn recipes I enjoy.
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