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December 16, 2020 (Countdown to the New Year, another 15 days.)

Back when I lived in LA, a pair of successful realtor-brokers, both blondes, called their company, “The Bizzy Blondes”. Their theme was: “If you want to get things done, hire a bizzy person.” Well, they were right.

My hours at Costco almost suck the air out of anything else I could or should do. My job is part-time, but weekly means five days of dressing and showing up. My wearable electronics indicate that working in the store daily has me averaging 13,000 steps. Arriving home isn’t a rest for the weary, for eager pets need cleaning-up after, feeding, and attention.

The thing is, I’m on the go like a buzzy blonde and can’t stop. I’m into cleaning and organizing activities usually ignored in my off times. After all, an un-bizzy can clean and organize anytime, chores become set-asides.

But not now for me, and there’s assistance.

While dusting a console and glancing beneath it, I re-discovered my iRoomba vacuum–parked there on its charger, forgotten a couple of years. I pushed its “clean” button and that little robot took off! It ran in a helter-skelter pattern for an hour or more, over carpet and tile, did a yeoman’s job.

That sent me online for a shopping spree. Now, en route are a second iRoomba-Vac and an iRoomba-Scrubber. Experience teaches to expect the vac will work well. I know little about robot floor scrubbers but feel confident. Years ago, a Costco customer explained that she had small kids and a couple of German Shepherds, and she daily ran a scrubbing robot and loved it. Although my work is sales-related, I’m often sold things by customers. Soon, I’ll see a working robot floor scrubber.

I’m not highly organized, don’t make lists and careful plans. My nature resembles an iRoomba’s roaming and handling what next pops into the path. In these days of increasing work-related activities, my brain’s organizing parts are re-activating. I’m becoming “more bizzier”.

Dear Friends: Spot-on, Blondes! Doing more work inspires more self-challenges. Diana

Tuesday, December 15, 2020 (16 days until)

These days the hour may be early, when home from work I’m at the barn to feed large animals, but it’s too dark to take photos. Last night, I had to use my new camera. Early that morning I’d discovered it forgotten from the night before, atop a feed storage can and encased in a glassy coat of early-falling ice. My heart sank for sheer neglect had ruined it. I carried it into the house, wrapped it in a towel to absorb thawing moisture. Full of self anger I hurried off to work.

On coming home, I found a dry camera, could turn it on and off. Now to hurry to the barn, feed, and try to use the camera. Of course, no natural light for picture-taking, but I wore a headlight and with it illuminated areas. To my relief that light, and the camera working properly, created visuals, and they’re interesting.

This slightly-claustrophobic capture, among my favs, is a staircase toward the lower level.

And finally, welcoming holiday lights! Arching over my across-the-road neighbor’s entry gate.

The camera still works; and lesson learned!

Dear Friends: Modern technology astounds, amazing new electronics often cost less. Diana

Monday, December 14, 2020 (Seventeen days more in 2020)

Isabel Wilkerson is a very bright, educated, excellent writer. Her readable first book, The Warmth of Other Suns, won a Pulitzer Prize. It describes in the early twenties, a migration of Black Americans from the “Jim Crow South. I’d heard that label but little understood it. Maybe I preferred to avoid understanding more, but Wilkerson gave me an education. It was appalling to comprehend the inhumanity in a Jim Crow society. That perspective’s not a bygone, and many forms remains evident.

Wilkerson’s latest work, Caste, is a brilliant explanation of the origins and rationale behind common categorizations in populated areas of human worth, based on skin colors, religious beliefs, and monetary accumulations. She compares frequent rises and falls of contagions (AIDs, Covid-19); and political situations (ascensions of Nazism and Trump); and social categories (India’s stringent ranking of “untouchables” as lowliest); and early America’s Native People (stolen from and pushed-aside).

Caste is a compelling read, not based just on history, but also on Wilkerson’s personal experiences with undeserved confrontations. Like all women socially, she’s considered a “set aside”, but regardless of smartness, education, and social standing, she’s also a “Black Woman”.

This book has forced me to rethink my Oklahoma upbringing, the attitudes taught to me that for years hindered my ability to appreciate an individual’s worth. It’s making me now in maturity to rethink my current attitudes, and wonder how often, how much, and if somehow I still try to categorize others.

Recently, I spoke of wishing for all people to understand that among forest trees’ roots and fungi, a thriving relationship exists underground, with trees and fungi actively communicating and exchanging beneficial nutrients. Wilkerson’s readable and understandable Caste focuses our attention to “above ground”, to human social impulses, how they’ve been employed to accumulate, categorize, communicate, and manipulate.

Both her books are must reads.

Dear Friends: Underground is about health; above ground is about money and power. Diana

Sunday, December 13, 2020 Eighteen more days, is all.

Taken from beside my barn on a icy frozen-out afternoon, that’s the South Sister, about twenty miles away as the crow flies. I’m practicing with my new camera, a fine one that makes me both happy and a little disappointed. My older version of this zoom Canon had an eye-view, which the new one lacks. The pressure of my forehead helped to stabilize that old camera as I tried to shoot birds.

Yesterday for sure, the new camera easily sighted a perched bird atop a 60-foot tree. My hands couldn’t stay steady enough while trying to grab a good shot. Here obviously, the bird’s a Robin, resting nicely and unmoving, but see! My unsteady hands disturbed the opportunity.

Practice helped.

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Close-up captures were a piece of cake, and the camera stopped action of some birds flying toward the water.

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I’ll learn more and be happier with this camera. Meanwhile yesterday, the most interesting visuals beside nearby visiting bluebirds were distant icy-blue mountains. I liked the composition of today’s header photo, with the nearby trees suggesting distance from the South Sister. Again, here’s that Sister in full zoom.

And another in the Range, compelling Broken Top, my favorite among the Cascades, and also, a beautiful area for horseback riding.

Dear Friends: Snow that began falling early might make today a visual delight. Diana

Saturday, December 12, 2020 (Nineteen days left in 2020)

I spent this morning’s wee hours studying how to use my new Canon SX540HS (point & shoot with a 50X zoom) that arrived last evening. This compact camera is lighter-weight, with many more features and greater power than an early predecessor that for years served me well. My wanting this powerful zoom is to shoot birds, perched high or in flight, to capture animals as they run and play, and to record impressive landscapes.

Having an earlier model, I knew how to turn this camera on and to point to shoot. Unfortunately, this early morning’s murky darkness made it impossible to find even a slightly-visible photo op. My searching for light took me to a one and only shot. Taken through a glass door, the string of lights bordering my small deck isn’t a prize photo, but I like it. Even without appropriate lighting and shot in autofocus mode, the capture is moody and suggestive.

Right now, that’s all I understand of this camera’s features. Unfortunately, my brain couldn’t process correctly the steps needed to connect the camera via wi-fi to other devices. Later, I’ll re-tackle the wi-fi challenge and hope to do better. Another possibility is to borrow a bit of another’s brain for assistance.

Dear Friends: Photography technology is exciting, so many creative possibilities. Diana

Friday, December 11, 2020 Only 20 days remain in this year.

Occasionally, I read something that’s mind-stretching and transports me from my known world. A recent NYT Magazine issue has an article entitled, “The Social Life of Forests”–a stunner that describes “the underground life of forests”. That’s a lifelong passion of Suzanne Simard (Professor of Forest Ecology, University of British Columbia). She’s proved that a forest ecosystem exists, in which trees exchange communications and nutrients through a “subterranean circuit”–the web of roots and fungi comprising an underground network. The article, written by Ferris Jabr, with Brendan George Ko’s gorgeous photographs, can expand common ideas about this planet’s environmental and evolutionary processes.

Simard’s work today is featured in textbooks, and widely taught in graduate-level classes on forestry and ecology. Also, her work was the inspiration for a central character in a 2019 Pulitzer Prize-winning novel, “The Overstory”, by Richard Powers, which impacted many readers.

Here’s a link to the NYT Magazine article, not a quick read, but well-worth time and thought: https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/12/02/magazine/tree-communication-mycorrhiza.html

Dear Friends: In Nature, everything living and thriving relies on effective social structures. Diana

Thursday, December 10, 2020 (21 days remain in 2020)

The girls again are grazing on a wonderful pasture down the road. Early yesterday, I walked them there and left them for all day. As daylight waned, Sunni was the first to spot me returning and still at a distance. She alerted the others and initiated an elaborate group display of running, bucking, and faux-kicking.

Rosie in her early twenties still is drop-dead gorgeous, and in action moves beautifully, a dream to behold. Sunni is Rosie’s full sister, younger and built slightly differently. When, as yesterday, Sunni’s rear goes into full-drive action, she’s a mirror image to her big sister, a moving beauty.

Pimmy donkey follows her horses and imitates their action. It’s fun to see her energy up and watch her cute, stiff-legged canter. She keeps enough distance from the bigger girls to dodge the action and faux-kicks, does some faux-kicking herself.

My problem is walking all three equines to and from this pasture. Long-legged Rosie has a big walk. Pimmy is slow, a drag. I constantly try to slow Rosie while pulling Pimmy forward. The donkey naturally prefers to move cautiously. Most irritating is that Rosie knows how to walk with a handler, to keep her head at the handler’s shoulder. She takes advantage when I’m coping with several lead ropes. Thankfully Sunni is easy, but leading all three is hard work.

Heading into another winter of pasturing, I try to reassure myself. (1) Challenging physical work is good for me. (2) Our continuing group walks will have the animals becoming easier to handle. Unfortunately, in a shadowing yawn, we’ve been there, done that, it don’t get better.

Dear Friends: It’s a life process: we get up, hope for the best, and carry on. Diana

Wednesday, December 09, 2020 (22 days remain in 2020)

Yesterday, an astonishingly beautiful day, warm with clear skies, invited outdoor activities. In my world, of course, outside translates often to horseback riding. My friend Anna came over, helped to gather the horses from a pasture down the road and lead them home. We saddled, rode, and even in this familiar neighborhood, explored and discovered a new pretty path to ride.

We also “discovered” my neighbor, Frank, outside and about to drive to Worthy’s to pick up his beer order. He paused, we briefly caught up with one another. I’ve been working nearly full time and missing formerly frequent visits with Frank and/or Annette over the fence between our properties. They’re comfortable friends, and so yesterday, I self-invited myself over soon for one of Frank’s fancy beers.

Nothing compares to great neighbors. Early this year with Covid fears running very high, Annette became concerned about aging neighbors at risk for the virus. She walked the local area, knocked on doors and introduced herself, offering to shop for others. While gathering groceries for herself and Frank, she filled others’ needs-lists and delivered. She shared some hard-to-find supplies. I was in self-isolation, fearing the virus, and grateful for Annette’s kindness.

More about Frank and Annette. Years of living next door has shown me they’re special. Now, writing in a thoughtful mode, here’s an explanation. Frank and Annette are strong individuals, able to care about others and willing to assist when needs are appropriate to circumstances.

Dear Friends: They, and similarly fine others, make this neighborhood wonderful. Diana

Tuesday, December 08, 2020 (In 23 days, 2021 will arrive.)

Today begins my weekend and will be busy. A neighbor, whose pasture is a quarter mile from my house, is allowing my horses daily to graze there same as last winter. Traveling to and from his pasture will have me walking with three equines on a road with light vehicle traffic. Last year, on seeing us, vehicle drivers kindly slowed and waved.

My plan early today is to walk the horses to that pasture and leave them for several hours, until early afternoon when my friend Anna will arrive to ride horseback. We’ll stroll through the neighborhood, and afterwards, might have enough daylight remaining to practice loading the horses into my straight-in trailer. With practice, they’ll begin entering the small trailer confidently, and exiting backwards without fearing its ramp.

Yesterday, my friend and coworker, Annabelle, helped me lift a large utility sled (with runners, vehicle tow package, and rear reflectors) into a shopping cart. We somehow stuffed everything into my small car, and at my barn, dragged all from the vehicle. Thank you, Annabelle!

During past snowy years, a smaller utility sled has carried hay to my horses. Sometimes I’ve wished it capable of hauling more hay in a single trip. That’s what made a bigger sled appealing. Initially, the store had in stock eight or nine sleds. As I hesitated they disappeared, and yesterday, the remaining one fed my impulse. It must have had my name on it for Annabelle was available, and now, it’s parked in my barn, will help mucho during our next snow.

By the way, whether snow falls this winter is a gamble. The news have reported that last month was the warmest November on record–wonderful for horseback riders and confusing to ranchers. Nonetheless, experience teaches that regardless of the odds, one always must be at-the-ready. So now, awaits a hay chariot.

Dear Friends: Relationships between the natural world and climate are mind-bending. Diana

Monday, December 07, 2020 Pearl Harbor Day. Another 24 days remaining in 2020.

This must be a short hello. It’s early-early a.m. and soon I must tread toward the barn to feed horses. Only a very tight early schedule will let me clock-in at work close to an eight a.m. starting time.

I’ve written about working mostly part-time in Central Oregon’s single Costco. Only those who’ve been inside a Costco in early mornings before the store opens, know it’s totally “another world”. Pre-opening Costco is a busy, zipping go-car track. Costco’s crazy-zippers aren’t go-cars but honking herds of fork lifts, speeding and noisily rambunctious, until exactly the moment Costco’s doors open to its waiting public. Then suddenly for a couple of moments, there’s a miracle of absolute silence.

Trying to describe Costco in early mornings has consumed the available writing time. For now this morning, and until tomorrow, here’s wishing everybody a good day.

Dear Friends: Effective pre-work schedules underline good workplace performance. Diana