Chanterelle Heaven

On Thursday, my buddy Seth and I took off into the woods to go mushroom hunting. It was an awesome time in the woods with the rain coming down on us. I forgot to bring the camera, but the weather was so cool, sideways rain, and a chill wind added to the appeal of the day.
We went in search of the most tasty of fungi, the Chanterelle mushroom, and we found success at each stop, some patches were bigger than the others, but a few could always be gathered.
After a stretch, we decided to head the last miles to the coast for a beer and a walk on the beach. The walk was cold and wet, and amazing! The sea was rolling and crashing with turbulent waves, our clothes instantly wet with the misty rain coming down.
Once our beers were consumed and our bones were warmed, we set out again in search of the delicious mushrooms in the woods. Our last effort was thwarted by darkness, but we found our biggest patches of gold for the day at the last moment! Caring a huge bag of amazing tasting mushrooms home felt so good!
We set out to begin eating them instantly, and I began washing and prepping the mushrooms. It was an awesome day, and I thank my buddy Seth for taking me out there, showing me what to look for and driving us around the beautiful Oregon woods, to wonder about stuff...

Trailer Park Boys!!!

Last night we went to the Aladdin Theatre to see Ricky, Julian, and Bubbles. It was a lot of fun! I laughed alot, and we had a good time all around.

A Dirty Dozen!

We have been getting a steady stream of eggs coming in from Ethel, but also from Mabel, our barred rock hen.
We stopped buying eggs in the store about three weeks ago, and although we have been letting them build up the last eight days, we have been eating eggs, and still have a dozen! It just feels good after all the time is put in, you start to get something back.

It feels the same way with the tomatoes. All the work put in, you start to see some tasty results at the end of the season. Since this was such a short summer, I am glad we have got any to eat!

Since it seems the weather is holding on, we are getting ripe tomatoes on all of the plants!

Pumpkin Carving!

We had a great night carving pumpkins! Mine is a dragon type thing, and Trox did Captain Jack Sparrow! We had so much fun...

Po Ta To!

The season has been kind of a disappointment for our garden. We worked real hard on getting things right, and then the weather screwed us over! We have enjoyed many treats from our labors, though. Strawberries, zucchini, yellow squash, cabbage, and few tomatoes have been consumed and loved.
Last month we had a few organic russet potatoes hanging around, sprouting roots, and Trox decided to plant them to see what happens. Since the season is pretty much over, and we were so late in planting them, we decided to dig them up. To my surprise, we got some tasty looking baby russets! We are gonna treat these babies right somehow, I can't wait to eat them. Also, next year, planting them earlier and taking care of them all year!

Speaking of potatoes, Trox used to go to this website that had funny flash videos, this is one of them...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ihMMw0rnKz4

E G G !

Well, it has begun! I was at work this morning and Trox called around noon, very excited. Ethel, our Golden Sexlink, produced our first egg! We were so excited, and I couldn't wait to get home to check it out.
The egg was a little smaller than ones you get in the store, but it had a nice shape and real good brown color.

We decided to scramble it with a little salt and pepper, and it was most delicious, very rich and tasty.

We had a celebratory tequila shot, Ethel, here is to you!

He He

I was bored last night, looking through some photos. I came across this bad boy...

I love going to Comic Cons, one of the things I love, is thinking about all the time put into making the props and costumes for these things. Some dude (pud?) sitting there, sewing a Captain America suit while watching Buffy, The Vampire Slayer.
I have gone to several of these things in the North West through the years, but never made any attempt to dress up. Below is what I think something like that would look like...

September?

Man, oh man. I really enjoy summer with all its delights. It always saddens me when it comes to an end...

Wilderness Band Photos!

This post is really so my buddy Seth can browse through all the pictures we took on our camera when we were taking photos at Lost Lake. I look like I am from Tron in some of them!

Bread, From Scratch!

Trox made her first attempt at making bread from scratch. It was a French bread type thing. It was fluffy and delicious!

Champoeg!!!

We live so close to Champoeg, that its been criminal we hadn't been there yet. We checked out the 1800's garden, and barn, then went for a bit of a hike along the river.
A ways into the trail, a fisherman came out of a little path. I asked him if the fish were biting, and he said they were. We decided to see if the path took us to the shoreline. It opened up to a wide area of sandy beach. I stripped to my boxers and got in, of course at first it was cold, but I soon acclimated and began enjoying the swim!
We are gonna head back soon, I am real excited. We are gonna pack a light lunch and some beer, and make a day of it!

Lost Lake, the Next Week!

Well, we just got back from another amazing adventure in the woods! We drove around for a time, trying to see if any spots were open, and almost everything was filled to the brim. We wanted to be by the water, but all those were snatched early.

We ended up at the exact same camp spot as before, in Lost Lake! It was pretty awesome there, as always, and we set up camp fast because we had all been talking about swimming all day. We even went all the way up to Gordon Lakes to see about camping and swimming, but the Lakes are not the best for swimming. Since Big Lake is just a few miles up from Lost Lake, we took some road beers and headed out for a swim.
The swimming was so awesome! Last week, Brandon, Seth, and I swam there, I couldn't stop thinking about it afterwards. We had to go back, and back we did go. We swam awhile longer than before, and it was so much fun. I really enjoy it up there.
Camping is always a delight, and the conversations are engaging and jovial. Whenever I go into the woods, I feel so relaxed and I can let my mind wander.
Last week at Lost Lake there were tons of small toads at the shore. This week there were hardly any. We decided to head down the road to the end of the campsites, where we heard a bubbling creek. My buddy Seth was in the lead and before he took a step down, I saw a ton of movement underneath. I warned him and we stepped back to see thousands of the little guys, migrating their way to the sweet double creek ahead.

We stayed there for awhile and on the way back, Gina, Trox, and I smelled a peculiar odor coming from the shoulder of the road. We glanced at each other, and started to giggle because the smell resembled, uh, jizz.

I still don't now what these plants are, but they are nasty smelling, we all kept smelling them, and getting grossed out! What the hell are those things!
It was a great trip, and I always look forward to the next time...

I Am Iron Mountain...

Where to begin! This last Thursday, Seth took me, Trox, and Brandon out to the cascades to have an awesome adventure! We ended up staying at a campsite in the Lost Lake area. The campsite was awesome. The sites are spread out enough so that you never really even see anyone else camping.
Before we got setup for the camp, however, we had spent a good part of the day hiking around some cool areas. We started out heading up Iron Mountain. This hike was too cool. The area is very unique due to changes in one of the last ice ages, it maintained a diverse wild flower population that was a wonder to behold! This article my buddy Seth gave me, really explains the wonder of Iron Mountain, http://blog.oregonlive.com/terryrichard/2010/07/oregons_mountain_wildflowers_a.html!



After we had set up camp, we were grimy and ready to swim! We waded into Lost Lake, but it never reached above our waists, and it was a muddy mess! After we got out, we decided to head up to Big Lake, just a few miles up the road. Trox stayed at camp to watch the stuff and examine the wildlife, but Brandon, Seth and I swam in Big Lake for a bit. It was so cool to be swimming around these mountain tops at over 4500 elevation! The water was amazing, and it felt so good to go swimming again!
We got back started to really get to it, had some drinks and food, waiting for it to get dark. The real reason we had come out was to check out the peak of a meteor shower! There were not as many meteors as I had hoped there would be, but the ones we saw were so cool looking. We would chat at the lake's shore, hanging out, when a meteor would soar across the sky, we would all stop and go "Aaaaaaaah" or "whoooooa". It was a great night. Thanks again to my buddy Seth, for setting it all up in the first place!

Mechanics BeWARE!

Well, we were on our way to my buddy Seth's house for a sweet, sweet barbecue, when the car felt real funny! We turned around, decided to go to Seth's anyway, then turned around again, as the problem was getting worse.
We stopped at a Jiffy Lube, the only place open still, and the guy checked it out, but said it was a dealership problem, maybe four to five hundred bucks! Jiffy Lube is about two miles from my house and traveling that far almost overheated the engine. We decided we were stuck until we could find out what to do next.
The next day, I called a the closest dealership, and it was indeed going to cost a lot of money to tow and repair the vehicle.
We had an idea of what the problem was, so I called my old boss, Dave, to see if we could use his tools for the job. He did us one better, and let us borrow his truck for the night to go get the new parts and all the tools we needed for the job.
We started by taking the wheel and splash guard off, which gave us access to the bottom motor mount to the tensioner, which was the issue.


After getting the S-Belt off, we took the upper mount off, and replaced that bad boy. Trox did a lot of the work and it was great to see her get in there and kick ass.


We took it for a test drive, and it ran like new! We felt so satisfied and accomplished getting it done ourselves. Maybe we won't even get our oil changed at the businesses.