Books, People and Pork Roast - A Bit of Something for Everyone on a Rainy Tuesday

It's raining in waves this morning - heavy downpour for a few minutes, then quiet. Totally weird, and leaving me quite unsure about appropriate attire for standing outside the gym doors this morning. I always have an umbrella in my car, but if we're also getting wind along with the rain, an umbrella won't be a lot of assistance. I can pull my yellow "Paddington Bear" slicker from the closet and wear that, I suppose. My Mother-in-Law gave it to me during my first year up here. I'd never needed one before - we didn't get long periods of heavy rain back in the desert areas where I was from. 

We've had our copy of "Crockett's Victory 
Garden" since the early 1980's and use it 
extensively. I remember watching the show 
on PBS when I was younger. I really enjoyed 
him - plain spoken and so very knowledgeable. 

There are times in the rainy days, when I stand in front of the YMCA doors and wonder if I could just swim through the raindrops - they can be that heavy. Today, however, seems like bands of rain followed by total quiet and no drops. Quite unusual and challenging for appropriate dress. My yellow slicker will probably be taken out of the closet for today. I'll use my umbrella too. But maybe I'll be lucky and the 5 minutes or so that I'm standing outside the doors waiting for our Gate Gargoyle to unlock will be in a dry period. 

Chanda is moving with her family from "I am very 
complex, really. I am kind of my own region." in the 
center north, all the way east to "I only use you for 
your lakes." It's not a large parish, but it'll be a good 
one for her husband to build and strengthen. He's 
excited, everyone else is working hard to allow him 
to live his dream. 

Speaking of our Gate Gargoyle, she's leaving us. Next week will be her last week before she moves to a small town in Ohio where her husband (a pastor) has taken a job. It's been a lot for her to do - getting the household and the kids packed up and ready to move, getting her current house onto the market, and generally, high stress. But she goes where her husband finds a job, and he found a church that needed him in Ohio. I hope things go well for her, but it's a pain. We just got Chanda trained and she's leaving us. She won't even be here when the outdoor pool opens. Instead, we'll need to train in another new Gate Gargoyle. *sigh* 

I love cooking my roasted pork loin. I put it into 
the oven with the thermometer in it, and just let it 
cook until it's at temp. I marinate it 1-2 days before, 
so it gets all flavorful. It's easy and it's delicious. 
A total win/win. If you're interested in the exact 
recipe, look up "Fall-Apart Roasted Pork Shoulder 
with Rosemary, Mustard and Garlic". It's a winner! 

Sunday's pork loin cooked up wonderfully - that recipe is a keeper. I've made it several times now and it's always perfect. It's the kind of meal that I love - little muss, little fuss, and great results. We're getting several more meals out of the roast, so it's definitely something I'd do again. I love easy in the summer months when I'd rather be outdoors in the garden than cooking in the kitchen on my Sundays. I'm wrapping this up and getting ready to get wet. Have an excellent Tuesday and I'll be back tomorrow. Slava Ukraini and חיים למען ישראל. 

It Was a Good Sunday - One Step for Improved Palestinian/Jewish Relations

DH and I awakened, dressed in appropriate clothing, and started working on collecting and piling wood for the county compost yard fairly quickly after breakfast on Sunday. We were shortly joined by Laura, and as soon as we had our own stuff collected and ready to put into the pickup truck bed, we started work on taking her small pile. And then I looked over to my right, and saw a HUGE collection of brush and limbs that also needed to go. Suddenly what had looked like a small job was turning into a huge one. 

The piles of brush they had were quite large. We made a 
good sized dent in them with our two loads taken to the 
compost, but there's still more there for them to deal with 
at a later date. 

We dove right in, and were shortly joined by Laura's husband, Fakhri, as well as their two young sons. The kids, of course wandered off to play, but Fakhri stuck around and helped pull things from the pile, cut things down to a manageable size, and generally be quite helpful. In talking with him, he's originally from Palestine, but has lived in the USA for 30 years now. He'll be returning to Palestine, bringing the two boys with him to meet their grandparents and other relations who still live over there. They'll be gone for most of the summer. Laura will go with them for a short time, but then have to return because she has a job, and can only be gone from it for a while. I figure I did my part for improved Jewish/Palestinian relations with yesterday's loads - LOL. 

Fakhri was telling me that he still owns their old house in 
Minneapolis, and will fix it up and rent it out. He also mentioned
that when the University of Minnesota spoke with all of the 
different Jewish groups on campus about the Palestinian 
issues and unrest, they spoke with every group EXCEPT 
Jewish Students for Peace. If this is true, then SHAME 
on them! 

Fakhri and Laura are really delightful people, and it was a pleasure helping them get rid of some stuff. With the truck, we could haul a lot more than they could in their smaller SUV. We'll let them take care of the rest, but we did take two full truck loads over for them. Deed well done. 

The mitre saw is actually mine - I purchased it when I was 
doing picture framing for the shop and for customers who 
purchased unframed artwork from us. He's getting a lot 
of use from it, though, so I'm pleased about that (I just 
wish he would clean the saw off more frequently and take 
a bit better care of his equipment). 

Then DH set up the mitre saw on the patio and we cut lengths from some of the old fence posts from the fallen fencing. DH is going to build us a new 3-compartment compost bin - we had one at the old house that we used a lot, and we've got the ability to put one up here now - we know where we want to put it, and we have all of this lumber from the broken fence that we can use for construction. It's like a gift - a rather expensive gift - since we're getting a new fence installed later this summer - LOL. 

We're building a compost system similar to this one. We had 
one like this at our old house that DH had built, and we loved 
it and used it a lot. I'm not sure we'll put the lids on it, but the 
structure and the fencing grids along the sides and back works 
really well. We have all of the old lumber from the fence that 
we can use, so we're set on the necessary parts, without having 
to put in a lot of extra funds. 

So all in all, it was a good Sunday. Lots of physical activity, and the pork shoulder recipe once again worked beautifully - it was delicious, and we have lots of leftovers for tonight, and maybe Tuesday's dinners. I hope all of you had an equally lovely weekend. I'm going to wrap this up, have breakfast, and head over to the shop. It's a Monday, and I'm sure to be busy with a bunch of stuff. Have an excellent day and I'll be back tomorrow. Slava Ukraini and חיים למען ישראל.