easing in autumn

It took longer than usual, but fall fell on the farm October 18th and we’ve had 175mm (@ 7 inches) of rain since. Our micro-hydro is running so heartily that we only need to have it half open. Jude has become a whiz at wood splitting. We already have a month’s worth put up, so we likely won’t bother today since we’re supposed to get another huge dose of precipitation this afternoon.

It’s the perfect time to sit in front of the wood stove and read. I’m reading or re-reading Tom Robbins’s Fierce Invalids Home From Hot Climates. It really doesn’t matter. One of the most prominent features of my PTSD is that I can’t retain much of what I read. I can read a ripping good passage from Robbins, set the book down, turn around, pick it back up and read it again anew. I could probably have a full life with one book, and that book would be Robbins’s Jitterbug Perfume. I love all his stuff, but that one stays with me most, likely because it’s set in New Orleans and Seattle.

Speaking of the Big Easy, have you had a chance to catch any of CNN’s series about my favourite city? So far it has covered the city’s cuisine and music. It could have done much more on the music, but it’s still well worth your time. It also covers the polar opposite impacts Mardi Gras and Hurricane Katrina have and had on it. And if that’s not enough, seek out HBO’s superlative series Treme, which chronicles the lives of its citizens after Katrina.