Big Changes on the Wild Geezer Ranch

Since my last post our homeowner's hangover has definitely improved, not the least for the addition of professionals to counter our own "Abbott and Costello" incompetence. The well pump guys finally showed up and within minutes had ascertained the problem and replaced the "Psi switch," whatever that is. It seems ants had gotten in there and fouled up the wiring. $140 later and water was once again flowing properly.

Ken Speck in the trees

Next we welcomed the team of lumberjacks and weed-whackers from Speck and Sons Tree Service. What a great job they did! With dad Ken Speck climbing up trees and lopping off huge top sections, scuttling down a few yards and whacking off another big section, the 40-foot, fire-prone Digger Pines were soon on the ground where sons Jake and Matt chopped the big lengths into 16" rounds ready to be split for firewood. Although we don't burn resin-rich pine in our wood stove because of creosote deposits in the chimney, our neighbor Butch - himself something of a lumberjack - plans to split the pine and take it for his own wood needs. 

The big Digger Pine coming down

Jake hard at work

The Live Oaks Ken and his crew cut down we will keep as firewood for our next tenants. Hauling the small piles of cut oak from around the property and stacking it for seasoning made for another long, hot and exhausting morning for me and Layne. We miss our John Deere lawn tractor. Instead of motorized hauling, we had to resort to pulling the little red wagon loaded down with six to eight logs back and forth dozens of times.

Before: 2 large pines next to the storage barn...

After: Nothing but chopped wood!

Ken clowning around with a cut wedge

Two days of steady work by the Speck crew yielded a well-trimmed bunch of trees with firebreaks between them, weeds mowed down to about 100 feet from the house and all the smaller branches chipped and hauled away. Although it cost a bit, when compared to the thought of our house burning down, it was a bargain.

Now we're in the midst of another major project: replacing kitchen, dining room and entryway flooring with ceramic tiles. After we had made plans and put down a deposit on linoleum for the kitchen and dining room only, our contractor friend Michael returned from a distant job that had kept him out of cell phone range and was horrified to learn what we were paying for the flooring. 

Grey tiles, white linoleum, beige carpet

For the same amount he said he could install long-lasting ceramic tile not only in the kitchen and dining area but in the foyer as well. The idea was very attractive to us since the foyer was covered in grey tiles, the floor of the dining room in white linoleum and the living room adjacent to it in beige carpet, giving the large space a chopped up feeling. With tiles throughout it will have a "great room" feel that will be much more attractive. So we canceled our linoleum order, paying a hefty re-stocking fee, but we are convinced that the tile is a much better option. Progress so far confirms that opinion. We are thrilled with how it is beginning to look.

Foyer tiles coming up - a dusty mess!

Yours Truly swinging the sledge hammer!

New tiles going in!

The new floor will likely not be finished until next Monday and even after that we face a number of other projects before we return to Costa Rica in just over two weeks. We will be replacing the dishwasher, the ceiling fan/light in our bedroom and running both water and electricity under the driveway to the horse pasture shelter. And those are just the jobs that Michael will do for us. For our part we still have numerous smaller tasks to accomplish in the few days left to us, plus packing and storing our goods. But it will all get done, no doubt, and we hope our new tenants appreciate the improvements.

Ruth, Elizabeth, Layne and Ralph

Meanwhile, we still find time to visit with friends like our good friend Elizabeth and her husband Ralph, who joined us for dinner this week at our friend Ruth's place in Auburn. Here at home, we relax at the end of the day and watch the hummingbirds devour the sugar water or the backyard birds clean out their feeder while we water the new tomato plants and petunias, which the deer then gobble down at night. Oh well, I guess the doe and her two fawns that we've seen around the pasture need the food more than we need the flowers!

Livin' It Up at the Hotel California

Yours Truly doing shovel duty

Washing windows, selling "stuff," having garage sales, cleaning out the barn, dumping old files, sorting through photographs for scanning, moving boxes out of the barn, moving boxes back into the barn, shoveling dirt from rotten planter boxes -- oh, and long walks on Cronan Ranch trails. Welcome to life in California! Other than some nice dinners with our good friend Ruth, our social life is just about non-existent here, at least compared to the busy schedule of dinner parties around Marcial and Seidy's outdoor firepit, philosophical discussions with Marc, trips to the beach with Sally and Leonard, breakfasts with Mark and Nancy, chili cook-offs, dances at Kay's Cafe and such that we enjoy in Costa Rica. Quite a change!

Of course, we do enjoy wildlife sightings here, such as deer on the front and back acres and a wild turkey wandering around the front yard now and then. The neighborhood dog Abby pays regular visits to demand some petting and we enjoy having her come around.

A busy location for a nest

One delightful little wildlife vignette involves a bird that had foolishly built its nest, apparently while the house was empty, right in the jumble of jasmine vines along our back patio next to the gate. It took me a while to realize it because the nest is virtually invisible unless you move the vines aside. But when we first moved back in, whenever I would walk toward the gate, a bird would suddenly fly out of the foliage up into a nearby tree. Finally, I pushed the jasmine leaves out of the way and found the nest with four small eggs in it. Since then we've tried to be sensitive to her need to stay with her little ones but it's tough since we have to walk through that gate frequently. My curiosity prompted me to look in the nest occasionally and I soon saw little fuzzy heads in there, meaning the eggs had hatched. The other day when I looked in, I came face to face with momma-bird, who looked at me with a frightened eye, then zoomed out of the nest. How she'll teach the little ones to fly I'm not sure, but we await that development with great interest.

Images of the eclipse on our wall

The solar eclipse yesterday offered us a unique vision when we went outside to watch the oddly dimming light from the setting sun. Naturally, we couldn't look directly at the sun but what a surprise we had when we turned away from the western skies and noticed the shadows being cast on the wall of our house. Somehow - and I certainly don't understand this - as the sunlight filtered through the trees, it created multiple images of the eclipse on the wall. What an eerie effect and quite amazing to us.

Dinner out to celebrate!

Our really big news of the last month is that Layne finished his novel, I completed the formatting for electronic publishing and it has been published on Smashwords.com. It is available for downloading and can be read on computers or electronic readers such as the Kindle or Nook; there is no print version. It's been about two weeks now and we anxiously await approval for inclusion in their Premium Catalog so the book can be sold through Amazon, Apple and other major retailers. Entitled "Moral Turpitude," it's quite an adventure story, a real page-turner, I think. (No I'm not prejudiced!) Here's a description:

Davis Sheffield, formerly Robert Davis Jones, is the billionaire majority shareholder of Sheffield Industries, a private defense contractor. When Sheffield family members accuse Davis of “moral turpitude,” based on kinky exploits from his past, he faces a civil suit to remove him from management. Warned by Ange Parker, a young, idealistic attorney, he must go into hiding to avoid being served even as he sends Ange, armed with proxies and powers of attorney, into the corporate lion's den to represent his interests. Enjoying his sudden freedom and anonymity, playboy Davis heads for San Francisco where he indulges in fanciful and erotic adventures involving street people, city officials and a beautiful Pagan dominatrix. Meanwhile, Ange has learned she must face far greater dangers than she bargained for as she maneuvers between corporate intrigues, the ruthlessness of a drug cartel and a paranoid arms dealer, all while struggling with inner demons that threaten her confidence. Only the protection of her female Zulu bodyguard and unlimited financial resources from Davis help her avoid disaster. Under desperate circumstances in far-flung corners of the world from Costa Rica to the jungles of Borneo, Ange and Davis fight for survival against a sadistic killer, hungry tigers and corrupt CIA agents. Finding unexpected strength in their growing love while devising creative strategies to survive, Ange and Davis learn how precious life and love can be.

I hope my readers will take a moment to visit his page: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/159570 and download a free sample - or just buy the book! It's only $2.99 and I don't think you'll be disappointed.

So as the days heat up here in the foothills and the dry air begins to turn the grasses golden brown, we fill our time working on the house and clearing out the barn. Although we enjoy seeing the yellow flowers open up each day, the smell of the jasmine and the majesty of the blue oaks, we still miss the world we came to love in Costa Rica. One of these days....