Pretty Not Bad
Amy and I drove up to Disappearing Lake. The water level is dropping fast; I think it will be a short season. We talked about paddling the beaver pond but the shore was teeming with mosquitos so we went back down to South Prairie and put in. ...
A Day Spent on the Water
My friend, Joe Castaldi, built a beautiful, sixteen foot gaff-rigged Melonseed Skiff from the original plans. He sent word he was planning to launch her for a maiden voyage down at the Hood River Marina, so I showed up yesterday, bright and early to...
Well, That Was Dumb.
My last week before I retired, I decided to ride the moto to work. People expected it of me and I enjoy the ride. It was December, with temperatures down around 15f (-9.4c). I suited up and went out to the garage. The bike had been plugged into a tender, so the...
Good Afternoon
5/27/25 3:30 80f (26.6c) Clear sky, warm breeze. Mike and I went up the mountain to have a look around. Found coral mushrooms, shaggy manes, and a handful of morels at between 3000 and 4000' under mixed conifers. ...
Mardingtop 25L Backpack M6347A
For years my EDC was a Wolfman tankbag. When I was still working, I kept it filled with maps and tools and fuses for my moto, emergency kit, knife, a roll of T.P. and my lunch. I could leave straight from work for the woods when the notion took me. When that bag wore...
Good Morning
2/3/26 6:15 38F (3.3C) Calm, overcast, with a light mist tickling my face. Not much going on yet. A few cars headed to town. Walter is taking a nap between rounds of the perimeter. The rooster has crowed but is not yet insistent. I slept well and am...
Good Morning
2/2/26 6:00 38F (3.3C) Overcast, calm, dry. When I went to bed it was cold. The full moon shone brightly in the clear indigo sky. This morning it is temperate. The moon is dropping through the clouds towards the west ridge, a dim light glowing through...
Good Morning
2/1/26 6:00 42F (5.5C) Overcast, relatively dry, no wind. Somewhere behind the clouds the full moon is hiding. 42F (5.5C) is pretty damned warm for before sunrise on the first day of February. It was a quiet Sunday morning until the folks living in the RV...
Good Morning
1/31/26 6:00 40F (4.4C) Calm, cloudy, dry. It is a dark morning. Niether moon nor stars can pierce the cloud cover. The only light comes from the glare of the neighbor's paranoid light. Walter has returned from his tour of the perimeter. The rooster crowing...
Good Morning
1/30/26 7:30 40F (4.4C) Calm air, fog, not raining. Yesterday it rained all day. Not hard, but persistently. Wood smoke hung on the ground, clinging to the trees and pooling in the low spots and swales in the orchards, mixing with the light fog....
Lobster Mushroom Hash Browns
The combination of shredded Lobster mushrooms, potato, sunchokes and a little diced red onion, give these hash browns a unique flavor, filled with the umami of Autumn. Ingredients 1-2 potatoes, grated sunchokes, grated, equal to the amount of potatoes used an...
Plaki with Lobster Mushrooms
Plaki with lobster mushrooms over rice pilaf Plaki is a Greek fish casserole. This is another very flexible recipe: essentially any seafood available with whatever vegetables and mushrooms which may be in season, baked in a tomato sauce, and served over rice or bulgur...
Beef Stroganov
What can you do with a bucket of chanterelles? I don’t like them dried and you can only eat so many omelets. You can freeze or can them, but they are never as good as when they are fresh. Ah, Stroganov… Stroganov is tasty, and you can use a ton of mushrooms if you...
Roast Bacon Wrapped Chanterelles
Roast Bacon Wrapped Chanterelles Fall mushroom season is just around the corner. Soon we will be tromping through the woods and, with a little luck, collecting buckets full of chanterelles. There is no better way to conclude a successful foray than to sit around a...
Broth
Waste not, want not. Take every opportunity to turn left overs and the scraps from carving meat into broth and stock. The turkey carcass after Thanksgiving, the bone from a roast or that steak, wings, scraps, what’s left over from that deli rotisserie chicken...
