Category: Pandemic

Monday, July 12   Deaths  2,797 (+5)   New cases 506

Mostly routine stuff today. E had a yoga class and did some shopping at the Co-op. M did watering chores. We also did some preparation for our camping trip  trip to Humbug Mountain. This involved making chocolate chip cookies.

Tuesday, July 13   Deaths  2,800 (+3)   New cases 340

A bit cooler today. E had her exercise class and tried again to get her teeth cleaned. The electricity was on this time, so all went well. M did his grocery shopping in the morning and in the afternoon started packing the camping things. 

Wednesday, July 14   Deaths  2,803 (+3)   New cases 251

The camping expedition left Corvallis around 10:30 and headed down the I-5. Turned off the freeway at Curtin and took the road to Drain. We stopped at a store there because E felt that the expedition had not packed enough chocolate. M took photos.

From Drain, Highway 38 follows the route of the Umqua River toward the coast. We stopped by the river at Scottsburg Park and ate our lunch of sandwiches, celery, carrots and little cans of Dole pineapple juice imported from the Philippines. In the old days, when the world was right and good, we used to take little cans of Texsun grapefruit juice imported from Texas. Now that things have deteriorated, the only way we can get those is via the internet and that is just too weird.

By 4:00 we had found our spot in the Humbug Mountain State Park campground, which is located just off Highway 101 at the base of…Humbug Mountain. We put up our tent, blew up our mattress and settled in as best we could. When we arrived the site on our right was occupied by a quiet couple and the site on the other side was empty. A small stream flowed just behind us. It was nice but became a bit less nice when a family of four arrived in a Honda Odyssey to occupy that vacant space. They set up their camp quickly and efficiently. As often happens, however, there was a certain amount of tension in the family. This gave Dad a chance to practice some of the techniques he had been learning in his anger management classes. Mom rarely spoke and when she did it was in short, clipped phrases, clear but rapid. Her tone implied that she was just fine thank you; she had restrained herself from hacking anyone to death so far and was pretty sure she could get through at least one more day. We bought some wood and spent much of the evening watching the fire burn. 

It was a really annoying to have to get up in the night–for one thing, it was cold when you got out of the covers–but seeing the stars made it nice once you got out there. It had been years and years since we’d had a proper look at the Milky Way. 

Thursday, July 15   Deaths  2,810 (+7)   New cases 322

In the morning, while the neighbor kids got pancakes (yum!), we ate granola bars and fruit salad. Then it was time to go up the mountain, at least as far up the mountain as we wanted to go. From our campsite, a ten minute walk took us to a foot bridge over the stream and a tunnel under the highway that opened out onto the trailhead. 

The trail starts in a wonderful grove of old myrtle trees and from there climbs up into a mixed old-growth forest of Douglas fir, myrtle, maple, cedar, and hemlock. The firs are the most impressive, the largest being six feet in diameter, but there are some gigantic old maples as well. It’s a steep trail with 1700 feet of elevation gain if you go all the way. That seemed too much for us in our current state, so we stopped at a viewpoint about halfway to the top.  

 

In the evening we walked out to a quarter mile long beach, which is only accessible by a trail from the campground. The beach is partially visible in the lower right of the photo above. To get to the beach, you follow a creekside trail that passes under a highway bridge that is home to many a swallow.

Friday, July 16   Deaths  2,817 (+7)   New cases 369

We had intentions of a short walk in the morning. There is an abandoned stretch of old Highway 101 that looks quite wonderful, all dark and overgrown. But as it happened we didn’t have the energy. It was enough to pack everything away and get on the road. We had a clam chowder lunch in Reedsport at the Lighthouse Cafe and then headed east back to Drain.

 Eventually, we found the freeway, filled up with gas, and changed drivers. Just after that, as we were tooling along northward, we came up a major accident scene involving the southbound lanes. We couldn’t see what happened, but there were at least ten(!) emergency vehicles at the scene. Southbound traffic was backed up for many, many miles. No problem in our northbound lanes, so we made it home just before 5:00.

Saturday, July 17  

E went out for croissants! Which are of course better than pancakes or granola bars. After breakfast we finished putting our camping stuff away and tried to get mentally prepared for our afternoon activity–a vineyard tour and dinner out with J and R. 

The vineyard tour was very fine. We each got a three wine ‘flight’ for tasting. The pourer put the flights into some clever carriers so that we could take our total of twelve glasses out onto the terrace to sit down and sip at our leisure. We were then required, as a condition of taking the tour, to buy a bottle of wine, at which point we got to have the ‘tour’ part of the experience. We loaded into a Polaris ATV and the vineyard manager drove us through the various blocks of grapes. He explained that each of the five blocks produced grapes for one of the five wines they offered. He then dropped us off at the top of the vineyard, where we found another seating area on a shaded wooden pavilion. The pavilion was the highest point in the vicinity, so the views were very nice. 

Our driver had brought along our just-purchased wine, four wine glasses, a thermos of cold water and four water glasses. We had brought our own light lunch of crackers, cheese, and fruit. After getting us settled, our host left us and went back down to the winery, so we had the pavilion to ourselves for a couple of hours. Then we went back down to the winery and bought a couple more bottles to take away. On the way home we had dinner at a logging themed restaurant called the LongTimber where M ate way too much pot roast and mashed potatoes. Will he not learn? Lovely day.

Sunday, July 18   

We had a quiet day with a bit of gardening in the morning and then shopping and other chores. The Oregon Health Authority has stopped issuing COVID statistics on weekends. They are–we think–including the weekend numbers in their Monday reports. We will follow suit.

Monday, July 5   Deaths  2,781 (+0)   New cases 85

M shopped Winco for Winco-type stuff, including sliced almonds for the granola that E plans to make in her slow cooker. The recipe includes maple syrup, so it’s likely to be pretty good. E is also planning gazpacho.

Tuesday, July 6   Deaths  2,782 (+1)   New cases 463

M made BLTs for dinner. E’s sandwich featured Morningstar Vegetarian bacon strips, which aren’t bad tasting, but which have a very long ingredients list–not our favorite thing to see. While dinner was being prepared and eaten, granola was slow cooking. 

Wednesday, July 7   Deaths  2,788 (+6)   New cases 273

M tried the granola. It was great, especially with handful of our own raspberries. For E it was not a cereal day, so she has to wait until tomorrow.

After lunch M went shopping at the Co-op(!) and got himself some pickling vegetables. He then turned around and pickled them. 

E made the gazpacho for dinner. We had a bit of rice with it and some canned fish. Good summer supper. We have strong opinions about gazpacho, both of us believing that the only real gazpacho is the kind popular in Spain during the seventies and eighties when we lived there, which is exactly what E makes. We don’t know much about other gazpachos and we don’t seem to care. We have, over the years, tried gazpacho in several restaurants here in America. It has been uniformly terrible. We find this very sad and at the same time deeply satisfying. As for the wretched stuff that restaurants in Corvallis call sangria, don’t get us started.

Thursday, July 8   Deaths  2,790 (+2)   New cases 212

Adventure day. E went on her annual HEPAJ outing to P’s cottage at the coast. She rode in J’s new Honda CR-V hybrid. Nice. Lunch was at the Drift Inn. One of the group related how she had recently had a somewhat traumatic experience with a pedicurist who had just had cataract surgery and could only see out of one eye… 

Meanwhile M took the Porsche out for a few hours. We won’t describe that here since he’s made a separate post about it.

Friday, July 9   Deaths  2,792 (+2)   New cases 265

It was the first day of the Crazy Days shopping weekend in Corvallis and E was eager to get downtown. But first she had to do some gardening and then several errands. Such self-discipline! Finally she had a few moments to slip down to the Clothes Tree and the Golden Crane and try to remedy her desperate lack of decent clothing. 

Later on we took the Boxster over to Albany to have a dine-in supper at Ba’s, our first time doing that since the beginning of last year. M had Vietnamese sticky rice for the first time ever. He says he hopes it’s not the last.

Saturday, July 10   Deaths  2,??? (+?)   New cases ???

Having had to rush through Crazy Days yesterday, E went back downtown to see what else she could find out on the sidewalks. While she was gone, M got out his 1/16th scale T-90 Russian tank. He reattached its broken radio mast and recharged the main batteries. After relearning how to fire the cannon, he made some cardboard targets and started shooting them up in the living room. Yellow BB’s were flying all over.

Just after he was done and had put everything away, E came home with her bags of loot: a pretty cloth wine bag, a couple of greeting cards and some gift tags (70% off!). She had also taken a necklace to be fixed at the bead shop and of course had stopped to socialize here and there. Along the way she’d spotted a lamp marked down from $189 to $90. She liked it, but wasn’t sure. After she got home she shared the idea with M and they ended up going back to get it. Its unique feature is that it’s a flip lamp with two positions: one upright for room lighting and another facing down. The down facing position is ideal for E to see her embroidery work while watching TV.

Sunday, July 11   Deaths  2,??? (+?)   New cases ???

We got up and ate Bodhi sugar buns for breakfast. They’re good alone; they’re good with jam. But, being covered with sugar, they are messy to eat. They gave us the strength to do some yard tasks in the cool of the morning. At 10:00 we took off to explore more up country logging roads. The plan was to drive by normal routes up to Grande Ronde and then turn south into the maze of logging roads, though which we hoped to navigate to Falls City, thirty miles away. In this we failed. Sigh. First, we had a hard time even finding our way into the forest. The best option that our Avenza map suggested did not, in fact, exist, having been consumed by an enormous casino parking lot. The next best option was likewise missing. Was this map made by someone in a parallel universe? Or was it just based on old information. Probably the latter. Despite these setbacks we kept trying. We found a way in and climbed high above the South Yamhill River valley. The forest was lovely, the temperature was ten degrees cooler than it had been below, and the scenery was wonderful. It was a nice feeling to be in a place that seemed so large and mostly empty of obvious signs of the earth’s rapacious dominant species. (This was partly an illusion, of course, as we were driving through a human-created tree farm, but it was a fine feeling nevertheless.)

All too soon, however, a locked gate barred the way on the route we had chosen. There were other roads in the area, but the map showed them all as dead ends. We parked in the shade as best we could, took a short walk past the gate, and then returned to the truck for a Nugo bar lunch. Then it was back the way we came, down down down into the valley. 

Our consolation was that on our way back to Corvallis E found us a nice coffee place in the town of Dallas, Oregon. Karma Coffee is its name and they use beans from Allan’s coffee roasters. Later on we made a dinner of cabbage-potato subzi with rice and raita.

Also, E has just finished reading The Wind in the Willows. Her favorite takeaway from the book is a quote from Badger, “Stir your stumps, Toad! We just got your house back for you and you haven’t even offered us so much as a sandwich.”

Monday, June 28   Deaths  2,763 (+0)   New cases 87

A very warm night, but better weather arrived during the day. Afternoon temperatures were in the 80’s leading to low 70’s in the evening. As usual E was busy today. After breakfast she did her Co-op shopping. One of her next projects was to pack up a couple of vinyl albums to be sent away for digitization. One was a record of Dame Judith Anderson reading poems by Edna St. Vincent Millay. The other was an album of folk music by La Tuna de la Universidad de Puerto Rico.

M had an eye doctor appointment at 8:00 a.m., which he managed to remember at 7:40 a.m. Fortunately the clinic is very near. When he returned, he used his pupil dilation as an excuse to take a morning nap. Later on, he did his half of the grocery shopping. After lunch he took another nap for which he offered no excuse whatever. 

Tuesday, June 29   Deaths  2,770 (+7)   New cases 230

E had a Zoom exercise class today, her first after a two-week layoff. The instructor took it easy on them–at least a little. While E did stair steps and such, M made tuna sandwiches and packed a traditional lunch of celery, olives, potato chips, chocolates and Oban Little Bay. At about 10:30 we carried the lunch out to the truck along with a big package to mail and a collection of bags and boxes for Good Will. Once the errands were done, we drove out to the Beazell forest for a hike up Plunkett Creek. We had our lunch down by the stream where it was lovely and cool. The hillsides and uplands of Beazell Memorial Forest are covered in  third or fourth growth Douglas fir, but down in the hollow where the creek flows the trees are are all maples and mountain cherries, as tall and sturdy and old as they naturally can be. 

Wednesday, June 30   Deaths  2,774 (+4)   New cases 196

Oregon Governor Kate Brown has announced the ending of most COVID restrictions as of today. Oregon COVID deaths in June were 40% lower than in May. The average daily rate was 3.40 in June vs. 5.71 in May. The number of new cases and the percentage of positive test results have also been low. 

Mostly cloudy in Corvallis today. We spent the morning outside, catching up on garden work that we had not been able to do in the heat. We also counted several plants that were seriously damaged by the heat wave, perhaps fatally. M’s thimbleberries and salal are looking especially bad. E’s favorites have suffered less serious damage. Could that be because she rigged up a shade-cloth cover for them?

After lunch, M went to the store to get a new hose wand and a refill bottle of windex. He took the Porsche and didn’t return for two and half hours. He says he was exploring covered bridges around Scio and Crabtree. E celebrated by going downtown to her favorite store in search of a pair of shorts. Did she find some nice ones? She did. Did she find a few other nice things? Uh-huh. At check-out, did the shop owner, who is no dummy, give E a bonus discount which encouraged her to buy one more thing than she had planned? E thinks she probably did, but is not complaining.

Thursday, July 1  Deaths  2,778 (+4)   New cases 198

E tried to keep up with her usual hectic schedule. First she dealt with a request to change an medical appointment time. It wasn’t an appointment she needed, so she cancelled instead. She then had her exercise class, and went to Bi-Mart for supplies. After lunch she got ready for a dental appointment and had M drive her over there so she could get some exercise walking home. She got the walking exercise sooner than she expected because just as they were getting started with her cleaning, there was a power failure and they sent her away.

For dinner we went to Sky High Brewing and ate at the rooftop bar. Quite a nice view there. Also an interesting system of ordering. A staff member shows you to a table, but then you’re on your own. There’s a sign on the table with a QR code and a table number. You scan the code with your phone and go to the web menu and decide what you want. Then you get up and go over to the bar, give them your table number, and place your order. You can either pay right then or keep a tab open. We just paid. After a bit, your order is delivered to the table. Easy. Eve had her favorite caesar salad and M ate himself sick with an overly elaborate burger. Hopefully, he has learned never to do that again, at least not for a while.

In the national news we hear that Donald Rumsfeld has died. The media question of the day has become whether he or Robert McNamara was the worst secretary of defense that we’ve ever had. A preachy sort of question. We are who we are in this world. And anyway– as is explained in Dream of the Red Chamber/Story of the Stone/Twelve Beauties of Jinling–the Land of Illusion and the Paradise of Truth are one and the same.

Friday, July 2   Deaths  2,781 (+3)   New cases 209

An important event took place this morning as Eve had her nails done in in honor of the 4th of July. While she was gone M did prep work for touching up the paint on the garden shed. Then it was time for E’s Zoom yoga, followed by moving furniture around to get ready for a tea time visit from E’s friend P. M opened a bottle of Segura Viudas–P is a champagne lover–and also helped grill up some haloumi, which P had never had. We served it with pita and cherry tomatoes, which eventually left us not very eager to have dinner. In the course of conversation, P mentioned that she knew someone else who got sick from a Sky High burger. Hmm.

In COVID news, Oregon has today reached the 70% target level of vaccinated adults and now stands 18th in the nation in percentage of adult population vaccinated. 

Saturday, July 3   Deaths  2,xxx (+x)   New cases xxx

We were up early today. E went off to get some croissants and M went out to do more shed painting, all this before breakfast. That came at around 8:30, and found us happily chewing on fresh pastry and sipping café con leche. Then we took a walk up the top of Garryanna. There were two houses for sale along our route. One is 2,400 sqft for $595,000. The other is 4,100 sqft with a six car garage for $875,000. M wants to make an offer on the latter. It seems like everything sells for 10% over the asking price these days, so he needs to come up with around $950,000. We’re not sure if this is a reasonable price, especially since the only thing M really wants is the six car garage. Problem is, he’d have to sells his cars to come up with the down payment.

After the entertaining part of the day, we faced the matter of refrigerator cleaning, which we had been dreading . Once we got started, we did it all–took everything out, pulled the fridge out of its niche, took it apart, scrubbed all its shelves and bins, and vacuumed and swept behind and underneath. Then we had to put everything back and re-adjust the front height so the door would close by itself. It took us hours, but it was–we suppose–a good thing to do. It hadn’t been thoroughly cleaned since we bought it way back before the pandemic.  

Sunday, July 4   Deaths  2,xxx (+x)   New cases xxx

The Oregon Health Authority is taking a holiday and we have no current COVID data. So let’s us take a holiday also, and just share some photos of the 4th of July party we went to at K and J’s in Salem. 

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Monday, June 21   Deaths  2,756 (+2)   New cases 78

M went grocery shopping and dropped by the liquor store for a couple of agave wine cocktails, that we thought we might enjoy with dinner at the camp. We did a lot of packing and a certain amount of garden watering. E rigged up shade cloth to protect her pansies. It seemed that all was well.

Tuesday, June 22   Deaths  2,757 (+1)   New cases 267

Our camping expedition left Corvallis at about 7:30, headed east in the Nissan truck. We arrived at the Sisters Bakery by 10:00. We found a new policy in place–no donuts on Tuesdays or Wednesdays. Well. Fortunately they have lots of other good stuff. We got a couple of Marionberry scones. Very nice. The land around Sisters and Bend is good ranch land, but as you go east the terrain rapidly becomes drier and unsuited to agriculture of any kind. There are miles and miles of empty sage brush vistas as you drive on roads that run dead straight for ten miles at a time. We didn’t see a single solitary cow for over a hour. But then, near a place called Hampton, suddenly there it was: we saw a cow, a single solitary cow, in an otherwise empty landscape. Then, five minutes later, we started seeing lots of cows. We passed Riley and Hines and stopped for a break in Burns. We went to the little park next to the highway on the east end of town. Whoa. There were three or four police cars there. There wasn’t much action though. The incident that brought them seemed to have ended. We found a rickety table and ate our lunch. Then it was back onto the road.

Our first hint of trouble was when we arrived at the address of the vacation rental where we had planned to stay on our first night.  

Now we have to admit that this was not actually the one in the photo. In fact we hadn’t got a ‘vacation rental’ at all and we don’t know how this photo even got in here. We actually had a reservation in a Best Western in Ontario on the Oregon/Idaho border. It was fine. All still seemed well.

Wednesday, June 23   Deaths  2,759 (+2)   New cases 233

Our Best Western breakfast was not all that great but it sufficed. We got on our way about nine and decided to top up the gas tank. So…uh…should we buy Idaho gas (self-serve) or Oregon gas, where an attendant must pump it for you? Very confusingly, we ended up at a self-serve Chevron on the Oregon side! Huh? What? It seems that a change in Oregon law has allowed a few exceptions to the prohibition against self-serve. We had heard about this radical new idea, but we’d never seen an example. 

On our way to Lake Owyhee we passed some onion fields. The leaves were a rich dark green; each plant consisting of a tight bunch of vertical spears about a foot high. There were lots of onion fields, miles and miles of onion fields. So exciting. And then there were the sugar beet fields. There were lots of them too. And the biggest excitement? An actual sugar factory! For Eve it had an awesome grandeur. She said that it was too bad we didn’t have time to stop and take a factory tour. To M, this factory looked like it would be very unlikely to be offering factory tours. But who knows? The factory had no obvious company name, but there was a large sign with a picture of a bag of White Satin sugar. So we can guess that the factory is owned by the Amalgamated Sugar Company. Although its headquarters is currently in Boise, that company was originally founded in M’s hometown of Ogden, Utah in 1897. About 55% of the sugar produced in the U.S. is made from sugar beets; 45% from sugar cane.

 

So that was exciting, but what about camping? Well, we went down to the town of Nyssa, and thence to the small town of Adrian, then a few miles farther. Suddenly we had left farm country and were traveling into a range of low and barren mountains, following the course of the Owyhee river. We were a little anxious about finding a campsite because there were very few campgrounds in the area and none of the tent sites are reservable. When we arrived at the campground, we were pleased to see that in fact we had our pick of any site we wanted.

So that seemed pretty good. But then we got some bad news. As we were putting up our tent, we were informed that there was a strong likelihood of a severe storm developing in the early evening, with winds gusting to 85 mph. Well. Pitching our tent did not seem wise. Sleeping in the truck did not seem pleasant. (It’s a small truck.) We couldn’t know how severe the storm might be, or even if it would come at all. As you can see from the photos, the weather was pretty nice at the moment. But still. We decided to retreat to a motel and continue our visit as a series of day trips. Off we went. But then we got more bad news. There were no motel rooms available anywhere nearby. Zero. None of the search engines offered us any options. As soon as we entered any date from June 23 to 25, we got the simplest possible message. “No rooms available.” By searching farther afield, we did find an opening at a La Quinta in Boise; they had one room left at $379 plus 20% tax. That seemed like a lot, especially since Boise was nearly a hundred miles away in the wrong direction. Late June is a busy travel time in normal years, but this year is special. It seems pretty clear that large masses of people are feeling confident about getting out on the road again and staying in motels.

We decided to just abort and go home. It was a long drive, but interesting in its way. Here’s a view out the windshield as E had us tearing along at 73 miles per hour. We know it was 73 because…well, never mind.

E was still at the wheel when we reached Bend. It was clouding up a little as we reached the town; perhaps a few sprinkles were in the offing. We went on through town, planning to stop for a picnic dinner in Sisters, twenty miles farther on. Just we were leaving Bend, however, we ran into major drama–an intense hail storm. Hail the size of mothballs started banging on the hood and cab of the truck. What a racket. We did not have the presence of mind to take a video. What we did have was time. The storm went on and on. Visibility was very low and we pulled off to the side of the road for a bit, as did some other drivers. After a while, even though the racket continued unabated, the view ahead cleared just a little. We realized that we might as well push on through. The storm, after all, came from the west; the quickest way out was to drive straight through it. 

And how about our planned picnic in Sisters, a few miles down the road? It was fine–a peaceful 80 degrees and sunny. M drove from there across the mountains to home. 

Thursday, June 24   Deaths  2,760 (+1)   New cases 232

Here we are home again, where we are quite comfortable and where the winds are only gusting up to 8 mph. We did a little shopping and a lot of putting things away. We dined on smoked salmon, steamed chard, and a rice salad. Later we watched another long episode of Bitter Daisies, a Spanish series set in Galicia. It’s funny how some many shows these days seem to be descended from Twin Peaks. In this one, a young Guardia Civil officer tries to solve a series of murders. Galicia is in the northwest part of Spain and includes the city of Santiago de Compostela, which is the end point of the Camino de Santiago (The Way of St. James), perhaps the best known pilgrimage route in Europe. The show is exposing us to Galician Spanish, which is quite strange in places. The series is well-done and we like the actors, but we’ve been put off by some gratuitous sexual content.

Friday, June 25   Deaths  2,761 (+1)   New cases 232

E got a flat of raspberries today and made two batches low sugar freezer jam. We missed out last year because of a serious and inexplicable shortage of low sugar recipe pectin. So this is a major event. Besides the purchased berries, the new jam includes a pint or so of our own raspberries, which are small but very tasty. E made a total of 15 jars. Here are some of them. The two tall ones in the back are jars that we brought back from Turkey twelve years ago. They have been used many a time since.

M did reading, writing and weeding. For dinner we went off to J and B’s for a Cypriot meze dinner featuring grilled haloumi and stuffed grape leaves. We contributed fava beans and baklava. 

Saturday, June 26   Deaths  2,763 (+2)   New cases 227

It’s Becca’s birthday today. We went out and got ourselves a piece of cake to mark the occasion. Eve talked for a long time with A and also spoke via Zoom to an old friend who was close by when Becca was born in Madrid, forty-six years ago. Several of E’s friends faithfully remember Becca’s birthday. It means a lot. 

Ninety-nine degrees today, 109 forecast for tomorrow.

We watched the ending of Bitter Daisies. It was very good. It had a couple of nice surprise twists  and also some very satisfying developments which confirmed a couple of things that we had suspected.  

Sunday, June 27   Deaths  2,763 (+0)   New cases 138

Toast and jam for breakfast. Delightful. We did some watering in the morning. E worries that about the heat and its effect on plants, bugs, birds and everything else. 

M, being a kind of masochist, went to a minor league baseball game down in Eugene. Originally he was to go in company with four other Corvallis guys. Tickets were bought and all arrangements made. Then came the forecast of 110 degree temperatures. Four of the group, not being masochists, decided to take a pass and go some other time. But M had already had to change plans once this week due to weather. He wasn’t ready to change plans again.

The crowd was sparse, but the game was pretty good. If the young players were suffering, they didn’t show it. M’s reserved seat–originally picked out by his savvy friend R–was as good as it could be, being in deep shade just behind home plate. Attendance was on the sparse side.

The home team has a dual identity. Usually they are the Eugene Emeralds, part of the San Francisco Giants organization, and are clad in green. Occasionally, though, they transform themselves into the Monarcas, who wear black. And so it was on this day. 

It was 102 when M arrived with a small but welcome breeze blowing out toward left. M saw four home runs hit in that direction. Between innings there was usually a bit of entertainment. One of those was an interview with Eugene outfielder Ismael Munguia, who is from Nicaragua. They asked him what got him into baseball–his father. Who was his favorite player–Jose Altuve. What was his best baseball memory–winning the Nicaraguan championship. Then they asked him what he liked best about being in Eugene, Oregon. “The heat,” he said. “I hate the cold. Baseball is really good in the heat.” It was about 108 at that point, so we must assume that he was happy. By the end of the seventh inning it was 110 and the home team was up 7-2. M decided that was enough and took a nice walk in the sun back to his truck. He found out later that 7-2 was also the final score.

Monday, June 14   Deaths  2,730 (+0)   New cases 127

It’s nice to start the week with good news on the COVID front: no new deaths and a relatively low number of new cases. 

Shopping in the morning: E to the Co-op, M to Market of Choice and Trader Joe’ . Around 10:30, when the weather cleared, M went out to attend to the weakest section of the front rain gutter. Armed with drill, hammer, spikes and ferrules, up the ladder he went. A titanic struggle ensued, but finally success was won and that which was weak is now strong(ish). M found that some gutter cleaning was also in order. Messy work, but satisfying.

In the afternoon we had a visit from R who showed up in a new Honda Accord, a very nice car. M approves the choice and says that R and G’s former car, a Honda Fit, did not actually ‘fit’ with R’s personality.  

Tuesday, June 15   Deaths  2,737 (+7)   New cases 314

So E went to two different doctors today and found both visits quite helpful. She also visited the jewelry store–which required making an appointment in advance. She decided to reward herself by having a Bodhi’s scone for lunch along with a banana. That lunch was delicious but also a little rich for her system. Bohdi’s scones are that way. She then went for a walk in the OSU forest, went downtown again to trade her five pound dumbbells for some four pound dumbbells, and finally returned home and announced that she was hungry and that we needed to eat at 4:30. Too bad, said M, our slow cooker meal will not be done until 5:30. Somehow she managed to wait and was rewarded with a dish that the vegetarian slow cooker cookbook calls Arroz Con Pollo. Of course it has no pollo, and instead has a host of other things including chick peas, carrots, green beans, bell peppers, tomatoes, olives and fresh salsa. M, who was the one who got to put it all together, calls it Arroz Con Todo. Anyway, he served it with chard and a California cabernet to rave reviews.

Before serving up that delicious meal, M spent most of the day on a Porsche trip to the an area southwest of Eugene where some of the forest roads are paved. They are also narrow, winding (see below) and mainly empty. At one point M drove for an hour without seeing another moving vehicle. All told, he was gone five hours. The day was warm and beautiful, with lots of sun punctuated with the occasional sudden, drenching shower. The Porsche top went up and down three or four times.

 

Wednesday, June 16   Deaths  2,744 (+7)   New cases 247

We took a short hike today, up in the Dunn Forest, just a mile up and a mile back on Road 420. We climbed the equivalent of eight floors, or so our phones tell us. Back home M started planning for next week’s camping trip. He wants to buy an air mattress. They have really nice ones now. 

Our camping destination is the Owyhee River canyon in southeastern Oregon. The river got its name in 1819, when two Hawaiian fur trappers working for the North West Fur Company were killed there. Company administrators decided to name the river in their honor. “Owyhee” is how Captain James Cook spelled the “native name” of the Hawaiian islands when he first made report of them in 1778. His spelling persisted for most of a century but was eventually replaced by the one we use now.

Here in 2021, E zipped down to the OSU Thrift Shop and bought a couple of sherry glasses that she had had her eye on. The two glasses were identical, obviously part of a set, but one was marked $3.00 and the other was marked $1.00. The volunteer who was staffing the cash register decided that $2.00 for the pair would be fine. Now if we only had some sherry.

Thursday, June 17   Deaths  2,745 (+1)   New cases 300

Tertulia on J and R’s deck this morning. J had made chocolate chip scones; R made cappuccinos. Excellent all around. We got to see the progress on their new addition–a main floor master bedroom with bath and an adjoining deck. So far the foundations and subfloors are done, along with the framing for the exterior walls. Today was interior wall framing day. Roof trusses arrive next Monday. We also got to see their five-year old granddaughter, who did not wish to socialize but instead watched us from afar. Maybe next time.

Next up came hair appointments. M went to see his favorite barber, who is harder and harder to find these days because he is focusing more on his other career as a house painter. E, whose long-time stylist retired, went to try out a new person. Decidedly mixed results. Nice cut, strange color. 

After lunch it was off to Portland to buy an air mattress and some camp food at REI and look for shoes at the New Balance Store. Success in the first case, no luck with the latter.

M provided take-out dinner from Tacovore. Our order included a generous glass of Tacovore’s own virgin margarita mix, which we deflowered by adding our own ice and t’kill ya. Yum.

Friday, June 18   Deaths  2,750 (+5)   New cases 315

Big doings today, we’ve invited H and daughter T for dinner. We thought we might eat outside on the patio, so E spent a lot of time bringing table and chairs out of hibernation and generally spiffing up the area. She was also corresponding with the Extension Office about what’s wrong with our poor sick lilacs. M did a bit of garden work and then rummaged around in the camping equipment that hasn’t been used for ages. We need to sort out what’s relevant to our upcoming trip and what is not. As for dinner prep, we already had a couple of main courses prepared (one by M and one by E) and H had promised to bring a salad, but what about dessert? E decided on chocolate mousse, to be served in demitasse cups. This latter method has the advantage that the cups are so small that accepting a second helping seems quite natural. It is required, really, out of simple courtesy. In the end we had a lovely evening and appreciated being able to socialize in person with good friends. 

Saturday, June 19   Deaths  2,753 (+2)   New cases 289

We did trip planning and equipment sorting, then continued on with list making. This camping thing seems to require so much preparation. Was it always that way? Later E went foraging out in the country to get eggs and then paid a visit to Natural Grocers. M went to Bi-Mart to secure a sufficient stock of dark chocolate M&M’s. E also found time to issue a Zoom invite to her siblings. Soon it was time to make a flying visit to Albany and pick up our online order from Ba’s Vietnamese Comfort Food. They make these wonderful noodle salad dinner bowls, a meaty one and a vegan one, either being just right for a warm evening. 

Sunday, June 20   Deaths  2,754 (+1)   New cases 200

Took a walk in the OSU forest this morning. Quite beautiful. It seems like early summer now, with clear skies and lots of sun. Thankfully, the severe heat is still to the south of us, in California and Nevada. For now, even in the desert where we plan to go camping next week, the forecast is for highs mostly in the eighties. 

We had a good Zoom meeting with brothers J and J. (Hard to tell those two apart, isn’t it?) They are well. J the younger showed us a present he got for Father’s Day, a wooden nameplate to be attached to his newly built cottage at the lake. Pine Ledge will be its name. E showed the sibs a freeze-dried ice cream sandwich, one of two that we just acquired. 

The garden is in fine fettle. So far, only the grass is heat stressed. We have to announce that the most successful plant in our yard was not actually planted by us. It’s a giant sunflower, which we have accepted even though we did not invite it. It’s already seven feet tall and if you look closely, you can see that it appears to be hosting of its own ecosystem. Here’s a pic of the one of the top predators.

Monday, June 7   Deaths  2,694 (+0)   New cases 125

Our second day at the coast. As usual it was cloudy, but still we had a nice view of the ocean as we ate our modest breakfast. Then we walked a fourth of a mile or so over to the Devil’s Punchbowl, which was in fine form at near high tide. For lunch we drove down to the Newport bay front to Local Ocean restaurant. E had a crab and avocado po’r boy and M had a breaded rockfish sandwich. They were delicious and right-sized (not too big). The cabbage and fennel slaw was a new thing for us. It was very good and looked to be very simple to make. While we were eating we couldn’t help but notice a very noisy orange and white Lamborghini as it passed by, first in one direction and then in another. After lunch we drove about twenty miles up the coast to Depot Bay in search of the Spouting Horn. Alas, the tide was wrong to see spouting. We did see the Lambo again though. Hard to miss. 

Otter Crest is a resort about ten miles north of Newport. E and her family had a time share there in the 80’s and 90’s. E and A both have lots of good memories of the place and it does E good to see it again once in a while.

Otter Crest is aging now, but it is pretty well-maintained and E says that the grounds are more beautiful than ever since it’s a bit overgrown with some native species creeping back.

Tuesday, June 8   Deaths  2,700(+6)   New cases 307

We had to leave Otter Crest at 9:00 so as to get back in time for the Mazda’s oil change appointment at 11:00. With the Mazda delivered to the shop, we walked over to Tried and True for a coffee, then stepped into Peak Sports, which is always fun. E got sunglasses and a very lightweight Patagonia rain shell made from recycled nylon. M got an Osprey daypack. Soon we were all back home and the rest of the day was mostly quiet, though E did track down the Joe Coffee mystery. She did not lose any money, but she did have to get a new credit card number. Sigh. 

M spent some time working an a more detailed posting about last Sundays trip to Valsetz and the Siletz River Gorge.

In Oregon COVID news, we’re seeing that positive test rates have been quite low lately, averaging only 2.78% over the last 21 days.

Wednesday, June 9   Deaths  2,716 (+16)   New cases 269

Sixteen Oregon COVID deaths today! Where did that come from?

Lovely spring day, mostly sunny with temps in the seventies. E mowed the front lawn and worked on dead heading; M pulled some weeds and tied up the ninebark next to the clematis. The clematis is doing fine, by the way. The brown towards the bottom is the ninebark. We’re going to make them grow together whether they like it or not. 

Thursday, June 10   Deaths  2,726 (+10)   New cases 370

The rate of positive tests remains low, but Oregon deaths have spiked in the last few days. Not what we want to see. Here in Benton county, reports for the last 24 hours show eight new cases but no new deaths. 

Another almost normal tertulia today. While M and E had been dodging potholes in the forest on the weekend, J and R had been serenely kayaking on a calm lake. Sensible people. After her tea and zen roll, E had to get back home for exercise class. It was the last one of the term, so now she gets two weeks off. After class, we worked in the garden a bit and then decided that it was time to buy more plants! Off we went to the nursery and returned with five marigolds, one coreopsis, and a pair of thimbleberries. The first six are for E; the last two for M. There they sit on the patio, as neither of us felt like running out and planting them.

E then had a HEPAJ meeting at Common Fields, a new food cart pod on the edge of downtown. The pod is on a property that used to be a transmission shop. Times change. 

While she was gone, M pretended to be an electrician and replaced a broken wall outlet in the sewing room. Or was it the guest room? Whatever it is, it’s in the older part of the house, where the wiring dates from the early sixties. That wiring did not include ground wires for either ceiling lights or wall outlets. So the old outlets have only two slots and will not accept modern three pronged plugs. This is annoying, of course, when you’re trying to plug in anything newish. Generally, you can get around this in any number of fun ways. For one, you can just take a pair of pliers and rip out the third prong on the cord you’re trying to plug in. Simple and effective, but inelegant and destructive. Another method is to just replace the old outlet with a modern outlet, which does accept three-pronged plugs. The new outlet will have a place to connect a ground wire; but since you don’t have a ground wire, you just ignore it. The new fixture costs three dollars or so and is not difficult to install. (Unless you forget to turn off the power first, then it could be hardish.) One potential problem is that anyone who sees the new outlet is likely to believe that it really is grounded, which conceivably could have serious safety issues. You’d have to put a little sign on the outlet with a warning stating that it is not what it appears. That would be quite inelegant, at least until it fell off and was lost. 

The best option, short of rewiring, is to replace the old outlet with a new GFCI outlet, which provides a different kind of fault protection without requiring a ground wire. M chose this option, though he grumbled about the GFCI outlet costing four times as much as the normal one. Once he got the new outlet installed he tested it and found that it didn’t work. Deadsville. Eventually he realized that it needed to be turned on. 

After that, M needed a nap and E had Laughter Yoga. For TV we watched an episode of the PBS’s Mrs. Wilson. It’s good, but we’re struggling to figure out if we’ve seen it before. 

Friday, June 11   Deaths  2,726 (+0)   New cases 308

Rain in the morning kept us indoors for a while, but soon we were out putting yesterday’s plant purchases into the ground. Eve had Zoom yoga in the early afternoon and later on went to visit her friend P. M mounted his newly arrived license plates onto the Nissan. Dinner was tempeh, squash and sautéed mushrooms, followed by the last piece of anniversary cake. 

Saturday, June 12   Deaths  2,729 (+3)   New cases 285

The morning was cloudy, damp but rainless. Having given up on the too-crowded Patissier, E went to the grocery early and got some fresh kalamata olive bread for breakfast. She promptly slathered hers with peanut butter, raspberry jam, and Divina Sour Cherry Fruit Spread. She says she had to include that last ingredient because it comes from Greece and thus complements the olives in the bread. M dabbed a bit of jam on his but was more focused on the butter.

Then we did some yard work. E trimmed azaleas and M made some emergency repairs to the rain gutters, which were failing in two different places. Clearly, the gutters are old and need replacing. But M wants to try shoring up the weak spots first and see how long he can extend the old gutters’ useful life. Now if that sounds like a dumb idea, that’s because it probably is. You can’t tell M that, though; he has already ordered some 7” gutter spikes with 5” ferrules. And he’s thrilled to have learned a new word: ferrule. So we’ll see how that goes. 

Rain began in the early afternoon and kept us inside. E did correspondence and M did various sorts of route planning. In the evening E spent time with her book about Ladybird Johnson, which she is liking more and more as she gets into it. Johnson was an early proponent of natural landscaping with native plants and was also a powerful force in efforts to create and preserve green spaces in disadvantaged neighborhoods. Johnson’s predecessor as First Lady had been the quite glamorous Jacqueline Kennedy. When a reporter asked Ladybird what kind of clothes she liked, she is said to have replied that unfortunately her clothes were completely unremarkable and to have suggested that they talk about something else. The biography, which is subtitled Hiding in Plain Sight, is by Julia Sweig and is based largely upon Lady Bird’s White House diaries.

Sunday, June 13   Deaths  2,730 (+1)   New cases 167

We had rain off and on through the night, then a quiet overcast morning. The yard was damp and beautiful. It looked pleased with itself and asked for no immediate attention. We stayed in and did some trip planning. We’ve reserved a campsite at a state park in the Wallowa mountains. We took the first free dates we could find, which were in the second week of September. 

The rain started up again around noon and continued all afternoon. We went out anyway and took a walk up to the natural area by the water tanks. The foliage is getting thick up there. Everything is leafed out and growing madly. We saw a doe with a little fawn, the smallest either of us had ever seen. It was amazing to watch it bouncing along behind its mother.

Alas, we fear that both doe and fawn could be in grave danger. A powerful predator has been seen in the neighborhood.

Monday, May 31   Deaths  2,671 (+3)   New cases 220

COVID continued taking its toll in May, with daily average deaths returning to about the level of March.

Tuesday, June 1   Deaths  2,674 (+3)   New cases 177

On Memorial Day, M and E went for a drive in the mountains and forests west of Corvallis. The holiday meant that no log trucks would be about. We went to the same area where M had gotten lost more than once on his previous journeys. While he did succeed in finding his way out of the forest on those occasions, he never managed to come out of the forest where he had planned to come out. Ah, but this time would be different, because we now have a detailed map. Here’s a  portion of it, showing some of the area M had been trying to cross. As you see, there are lots of roads, most of which are dead ends and none of which are straight. Plus there is very little useful signage down there. The squares are one-mile sections.

This is part of a downloadable map that cost us $5.99 and opens in an app on the iPhone. We didn’t get turn-by-turn directions, but the phone was able to tell us exactly where we were in the maze.

So, did we go in where we planned and come out where we planned? Of course we did. With E helping with navigation, we made nary a wrong turn. It was lovely and cool up there among the trees. And once in a while, big clearcuts would open up the scene to the big picture.

Wednesday, June 2   Deaths  2,676 (+2)   New cases 356

The New York Times–according to our sources–has revealed that some New Yorkers are now able to “show they were vaccinated using a phone app.” Exciting news. It is not yet clear when this might be available in the rest of the country. 

We’ve made reservations to spend a couple of nights in Newport, on the Oregon coast, starting on Sunday. Although there is fine paved highway that leads directly from Corvallis to Newport, M has suggested a different route for the trip over. Of course he has. 

That fine paved highway, by the way, is U.S. Highway 20, currently the longest active Federal highway. From Corvallis to the west it goes 49 miles to Newport where it ends at the junction with U.S. Highway 101, half a mile from the Pacific Ocean. To the east it goes 3,310 miles, ending at Kenmore Square in ___________? 

Thursday, June 3   Deaths  2,683 (+7)   New cases 267

A full day today, whew. M got up at 4:30 to set his drip irrigation timers. Later, but not much later, E got up and went out to do watering. Then it was time for Tertulia at 8:00 at Coffee Culture. J and R arrived on their electric bikes, but M and E, prosaically, came by car. It was nice, warm enough to sit outside. And with no mask requirement it seemed like old times. J and R’s house addition has progressed through foundation work and now has floor joists. 

We had to rush off so as to get E home for her Zoom exercise class and for M to get busy on his edging project. After class E prepared for her last infusion session, which involved packing up bakery treats to give to the staff at center. After the last infusion, the PICC tube was removed and the staff made a kind of completion ceremony, which included telling her that they never wanted to see her there again. After all, 5 weeks of daily infusions is enough!

After lunch, M took a long nap while E used her time to have a phone call with her brother John. At 4:00 she had her weekly laughter yoga session. M woke up in time to cook some spinach and open some sardines and kippers that we could have for dinner along with E’s potato salad. 

After our post dinner walk we watched a Tom Hanks movie called News of the World. It’s about a young girl who was taken captive by Kiowa Indians when she was very young and then ‘rescued’ by the U.S. Army about 10 years later. The story comes from a novel by Paulette Jiles and contains some basis in fact. 

Friday, June 4   Deaths  2,686 (+3)   New cases 436

A routine day today. E celebrated her first day of freedom from infusion by working in the garden waging war on spider mites. Her weapon is a garden hose. M worked on spreading compost and bark mulch on good old Hummock #3. That project has to be done soon, doesn’t it? Later on we looked at bank statements and paid some bills. Why, asks E, am I paying another $4.75 to Joe Coffee when they are doing nothing for me?  

Saturday, June 5   Deaths  2,691 (+5)   New cases 330

We planned to get some croissants this morning at Le Patissier. Arriving at 8:10 in the morning, we saw perhaps thirty other folks standing in line outside with the same idea. Oh, that’s a long line, and, as we know, it is not a line that moves fast. Fond as we are of those pastries…just a few hundred yards away, the  Mother of Markets also had croissants and they’re weren’t bad.

Then came another morning of weeding and fighting the mite wars. It was great weather to be outside and we got a lot done. Then it was time for grocery shopping and rhubarb harvesting. Sadly, there was not enough time to turn around and make a pie. Hopefully sometime soon. 

Later in the afternoon, E had a phone conference to discuss Cousin’s Week accommodation issues. We made progress there too. 

Sunday, June 6   Deaths  2,694 (+3)   New cases 258

Time to head for the ocean, which is just the other side of the Coast Range. We took the scenic route, leaving the pavement at Falls City and traveling from there to the site of the old company town of Valsetz. The road was washboarded in places, but also wide and pretty easy to follow. We had the same basic GPS as our last trip but hardly needed it. We stopped to eat our tuna sandwiches at the site of the old Valsetz mill. Valsetz was founded in 1924 and continued in existence until 1979. It was a company town in the true sense. Everything was company owned. When the company shut down operations, they also removed all structures and replanted. Just forty years later there are no obvious signs that the town even existed. That’s probably enough of that, but M is planning a separate post about Valsetz, in case anyone would like to know more. It will be in the Road Trips category

After lunch our problem was how to get down off the highlands and make our way to the ocean. In theory, the route was simple, just follow the North Fork of the Siletz River from its headwaters near Valsetz down to where it passes a hamlet called Upper Farm, from which a paved road would take us to the Newport highway. This part of the trip was more of an adventure–no GPS and a narrow, pot-holed road–but eventually it took us through a lovely area called the Siletz River Gorge. 

Monday, May 24   Deaths  2,624 (+2)   New cases 284

After more than a year of the pandemic our charts are getting crowded with too many data points. It’s time to simplify, time to focus on the overall trend of the pandemic. So, rather than reporting at ten-day intervals, the Pandemic Diary will henceforth publish monthly COVID severity charts. We hope this change will make it easier to see the big picture. The first of these charts is below. It shows data collected through April 30. Our next chart will come at the end of May.

Tuesday, May 25   Deaths  2,628 (+4)   New cases 424

It seemed like just another ordinary day: exercise class and infusion for E, garage/yard chores for M. Then more errands. Later on, though, our attention turned to matters anniversarial. Were there gifts? Cards? Dinner out? At a good restaurant? Inside with table service? Was there cake? Taittinger? There may well have been.

Wednesday, May 26   Deaths  2,639 (+11)   New cases 399

E went for her infusion and M set up his new streaming box. Then H dropped by and brought us a cheesecake! Was it the goopity kind with the sweet toppings and the cutesy crust, the restauranty kind of cheesecake? Nope. H makes the real stuff and it’s really tasty. In other news, we both took long naps. E provided Cirello’s pizza and green salad for dinner.

In COVID news, there is renewed interest in the possibility that the virus was produced in a lab and was then accidentally released into the wild. CNN did a feature on it and Biden has just asked the CIA to investigate it. Donald McNeil, a former NYT science reporter who initially resisted the idea, has published an interesting piece on why he has changed his mind. As McNeil puts it:

We still do not know the source of this awful pandemic. We may never know. But the argument that it could have leaked out of the Wuhan Institute of Virology or a sister lab in Wuhan has become considerably stronger than it was a year ago, when the screaming was so loud that it drowned out serious discussion.

One thing McNeil mentions is that early scientific dismissals of the lab leak possibility were based on the idea that genetic engineering of this type always leaves a particular tell-tale mark in the genetic structure of the new product. Since this COVID virus did not have the tell-tale, it must have been of natural origin. It turns out, however, that this argument was based on obsolete science. In recent years papers have been published that describe new techniques that do not leave such a tell-tale.

Thursday, May 27   Deaths  2,660 (+21)   New cases 433

Tertulia at Coffee Culture. It was raining a bit, but J and R got there early enough to get an outside table beneath the eaves. E brought our four sit-upons to make the cold metal chairs more tolerable. The rain soon faded away. We still wore our masks to go inside and order, then took them off outside. Everything is so much more relaxed than it was.

Friday, May 28   Deaths  2,665 (+5)   New cases 433

E is counting down her remaining infusion sessions. She has just six more to go. In the afternoon she did her usual Zoom yoga, which was slightly marred by audio difficulties. M is in the mood to get rid of unnecessary stuff. He has disposed of some stereo components and the old Apple TV via Craig’s List. (A pair of “vintage speakers” fetched $50.) This morning he put several items out by the sidewalk with a Free sign, and all but one of them are gone. (Nobody seems to want an eleven foot long length of garden hose. What’s wrong with people?) And he’s about to mail his old laptop to some buyback outfit in Cincinnati, who have offered him $118 for it despite it’s warped case and iffy battery. 

In the afternoon we had a nice visit with P. She came over at 4:00 and we sat at the patio table and had margarita wine cocktails, spanakopita, olives, and slivers of cheesecake. The weather was breezy but not too cold. A pleasure to see P, who is always gracious. 

In the evening we started watching a Spanish language series called Well Hidden Secret (Secreto Bien Guardado). The series is divided into ten 25-minute episodes. We were interested enough to watch three of them. In Argentina in 1940, a young Jewish girl and youngish Nazi lawyer fall in love. Oh boy. 

Saturday, May 29   Deaths  2,666 (+1)   New cases 376

The Pandemic Diary is excited to report that sometime this morning M’s offer of a free eleven-foot garden hose was finally accepted. That stuff is gone. And, just before lunch, a new thing arrived, an accent chest from India. It is part of the Global Archives Collection from Jofran, Inc. which is headquartered in Massachusetts. But it was shipped from California in its original Indian cardboard and is being sold through Wayfair via Kelley Clarkson Home. So we know it must be good. 

E went downtown in the afternoon, primarily for the purpose of a 15-minute consultation with a potential hair stylist, but then also to be able to look around all over the place for a bunch of things she needs for her multitude of projects. She didn’t find much to her liking, though. After three and a half hours, all she brought back was a tiger. What does E need with a tiger? you might ask. And how did she manage to get it into her car?

Sunday, May 30   Deaths  2,668 (+2)   New cases 257

E went straight to work watering the front yard this morning, while M made waffles. Not too long afterward, E was off to her infusion appointment and M worked on downloading some forest maps and an app to read them off-line. Before lunch E had a Skype call with her friend M in Madrid. M and her husband, the other M, are planning to go out and celebrate because it has been two weeks since their second vaccine doses. 

Later on we worked on summer vacation plans. We looked at car rental and E spoke to Mrs. H and MB about some things she wants to do as part of our trip to the northeast in August. Then we made holiday plans for Memorial Day, mainly focusing on potato salad(!) and hot dogs. Then it was time for a walk, followed by a dinner of leftover pizza and salad on the back patio. The temperature was in the eighties today, dropping into the seventies just in time for dinner. The back yard looks just ridiculous these days–peonies, poppies, iris, yarrow, upright phlox, plus roses all over the place. One of our milkweed plants is doing especially well. 

After dinner we finished watching Well Kept Secret. Was it deep? No, uh-uh, wouldn’t call it deep; wouldn’t call it believable either; might call it contrived. It moved right along though and it had its own unique style. Plus, the cars and the clothes were very good. M noticed the patina on the hubcap of the period correct Chrysler. E admired the spunky character and elegance of the main actress. Plus, the show was well-meaning in its way. It was earnest, kind of sweet. And, as such series go, mercifully short.

Monday, May 17   Deaths  2,590 (+3)   New cases 310

At the beginning of March, the rate at which people in Oregon tested positive for COVID was fairly low, about 3%. At the end of March, though, the rate started to creep up. It April it rose to more than 5% and this rate continued into the first week of May. It is interesting to see that in the middle of that period the daily death rate also began rising. So, first came a rise in the positive test rate and then, a little later, came the rise in deaths. If we look at the present time, we see that deaths are still a little high, but the positive test rate is falling. Hopefully that’s a good sign.

Today E had not one, not two, not three, but four visits to various medical facilities. That’s a first for her, a new personal best you might say. Or you might not. But all told, the news is good, so we are not complaining. And between appointments, E bought a new pair of shoes. We also thought about ice cream, but, alas, did not eat any. We had a good dinner though. Leftover boeuf bourguignon.

On 20 Minutes, Melek is definitely dead. Dead and buried. Sad.

Tuesday, May 18   Deaths  2,594 (+4)   New cases 484

Just one medical appointment today for E. How dull. No challenge to that. After her infusion we went to the Vietnamese Baguette to get some sandwiches. We get the same sandwiches there every time, a number seven and a number ten. What a rut we’re in! And happy to be in it! We took the sandwiches to Avery Park and had our lunch at a picnic table near the rose garden. There weren’t many roses blooming. The roses there are in a sunny but exposed location, which may explain why our backyard roses are blooming sooner.

In the late afternoon E attended a meeting of the Lemon Meringue Pie Society. The full membership was in attendance. Over the past year the Society’s meeting schedule has been irregular due to the pandemic, so there was a lot to catch up on, especially pie eating. 

On 20 Minutes, Melek is very much alive. It was all a trick! (Or maybe she is dead and these scenes of a living Melek are just dreams from which Ali will wake. It’s hard to be sure.) M has been pondering about the difference between an actor pretending to be a character who is sad and an actor pretending to be a character who is pretending to be sad. M may include a chapter about it in his next book, “Reality III.”

Wednesday, May 19   Deaths  2,601 (+7)   New cases 394

We had some rain today, not much but very welcome. E had a fairly quiet day with no Zoom classes and only one medical appointment. She used this free time to prepare a rather complicated vegetarian meal involving sauerkraut, potatoes, tempeh, meatless sausage, and juniper berries. M worked outside for a little while, then spent much of the day reading an Ivan Doig novel. In the afternoon E did some sewing and M made refrigerator pickles. 

In the evening we watched the last episodes of 20 Minutes. The ending was good. And of course the plot was not resolved until the final seven minutes of this 59-episode show. In both of these last two episodes things moved so fast that we didn’t have time to pay too much attention to the many, many details that made no sense whatever. And besides, there was no point in chasing plausibility at this point. That critter went extinct 50 episodes back. No, the main thing you want after watching a show like this is an ending that is emotionally satisfying. And they got that right. As usual, a couple of secondary good characters had to die. But the main characters survived, the younger lovers found each other, and the main villains all went down in very appropriate ways. The very last scene began at the graves of the two good characters who had died. Their graves were on a verdant hillside above a beautiful and secluded beach. Down on the beach Ali, Melek, and the kids were laughing and chasing each other around, with Melek and Duru both wearing two-piece(!) swimsuits. Where was this scene? A private island maybe? Or maybe it was heaven and it only happened after the whole family died? It was kind of ridiculous, but also…just right.

Thursday, May 20   Deaths  2,606 (+5)   New cases 603

It’s the 420th day of pandemic record keeping. About a month ago the Oregon COVID fatality rate fell to its lowest point since July of last year. Since then, however, it has been rising again. Here’s the new chart.

Tertulia today in the morning sunshine at Coffee Culture. Construction has begun on J & R’s house addition. During preliminary excavations, workers accidentally severed an underground cable, leading to J & R being left without wireless internet. A repair person from the cable company has promised to come sometime today. To get that arranged, of course, was a major triumph. Nothing is ever easy when dealing with the cable company.

In the morning M did some work on the edging for Hummock #3, breaking off when it started to rain. E had her exercise class and then went for her infusion. During these infusion sessions, the staff at the center usually offer her a juice or some tea. Yesterday, she was disappointed to have been offered nothing. But today? Today she got an egg salad sandwich! Life is good.

We’re having H over for dinner tonight. E and H have long had the custom of taking each other out to dinner for their birthdays and H’s birthday is imminent. Since going out to eat is not so pleasant these days, we’re dining here and getting take-out from one of her favorite restaurants.

M has been transported back to his childhood by a passage in the novel he’s reading. There’s a long section that describes haying as it was done back in the 1930’s. One of the jobs at harvest time was to drive the team that pulled the horse-drawn scatter rake. M is much too young to have seen a horse-drawn hay rake in action, but on the farm where he lived when he was ten, there was a long obsolete example rusting away in one corner of the barnyard. It looked pretty much like the one in the photo below. M used to spend hours sitting on the comfortable iron seat, occasionally trying to work the rust-bound control lever. What exactly he was imagining all that time we do not know. 

Friday, May 21   Deaths  2,613  (+7)   New cases 504

A certain amount of living room rearranging went on today, after which we both napped. Thus refreshed, we proceeded to do some late afternoon anniversary present shopping at the jewelry store. Perked us right up. Apparently some kind of geegaw was purchased. For the next few days M’s job is to keep the package hidden and E’s job is to try and forget what’s in it so that she can be pleasantly surprised on Tuesday.

Saturday, May 22   Deaths  2,618 (+5)   New cases 509

Something of an unusual Saturday. We started with a very light breakfast before E’s 9 AM infusion appointment. M did something in the yard while she was gone. But he didn’t stay out for long because when E returned she was carrying chocolate croissants so that we could have a real breakfast. Very sensible. A while later M went out the grocery store to buy some salmon and asparagus for supper. Normally Saturday is take-out day, but we just had a big Indian meal with H and we are planning to actually go out and eat in a restaurant on Tuesday. So. Let’s do something simple at home. E’s project for the day was to clean her car, inside and out. First she went to the car wash to use their vacuum and to rinse off the bark dust. Bark dust? Well, it seems that while she was parked at one of the many lots in the sprawling medical complex that her infusers call home, the bark mulch unit arrived to spread a new layer on all the flowerbeds. The bark mulch is applied via a giant air hose that spews tons of the stuff, some of which drifts off into the air and covers any vehicles who happen to be near. So that was one reason for the cleaning, and that part of the process was done at the car wash. Another issue, was that the interior hadn’t been thoroughly cleaned since last fall. E attacked that aspect here in the driveway in front of the garage. It was a long process and when it was done, the car looked beautiful. But it wouldn’t start. Deadsville. E scrubbed it so hard she killed it. 

Or…it could have been more or less coincidental. The battery had already shown some signs that it was wearing out. Today turned out the be the first day of actual failure. Well. What to do? E was counting on having the car to get to tomorrow’s 9 AM appointment. Could we get it fixed today? Let’s see, it’s 5:30 now, how late is the parts store open? Till six? No, actually till 10:00. Okay then.

M removed the old battery, put it in the back of the truck, and went off to AutoZone to trade it for a new one. When M returned, we stopped for dinner, which was pretty good, and then M skipped dessert and went out to install the new battery. E offered to help and when her assistance was declined, she had some maple sugar candy instead.

Sunday, May 23   Deaths  2,622 (+4)   New cases 334

After an early morning infusion in an mostly deserted medical facility, E did weekly chores at home and went card shopping. M went into the woods again–into the Coast Range where it rains a lot. Today, for example, it rained for fifteen minutes in Corvallis where E was, but it rained for about three hours where M was, just 35 miles west. M saw mostly just trees and got lost twice; all he really found was a old Ford log truck.

When M got back to town, his own truck was in a such a state that it required a visit to the car wash before it could return to the driveway. A little later on we had a Zoom meeting with E’s brothers. We discussed plans for the summer at the lake and were invited to drop in for ice cream any time. The suggestion was well-received. 

On TV we watched episode 8 of Templanza, a Spanish series set in the Jerez wine country in the late 1800’s. More on that later. We also finished up Atlantic Crossing.

Monday, May 10   Deaths  2,533 (+3)   New cases 388

It’s the 410th day of Pandemic Diary record keeping and time for another chart.

The Oregon Health Authority reported today that 1,467,659 people have been fully vaccinated and that another 514,824 have received first doses and are awaiting a second. The total population of Oregon is about 4,240,000. Speaking of vaccinations, there was interesting news today from Buffalo, N.Y., where Erie County is partnering with a microbrewery to encourage vaccinations. Anyone who gets a shot of the Moderna vaccine gets a voucher for a free drink at the brewery. When they come back for a second shot (of the vaccine) they get another free beer.

The plants have been left mostly unsupervised for a few days. They seem to be getting along anyway.

Tuesday, May 11   Deaths  2,549 (+16)   New cases 660

M has been thinking that the Porsche needed some proper exercise. The best Porsche roads are many miles away. But it couldn’t be put off any longer. So this morning M packed himself a lunch and an overnight bag, extricated the Porsche from the garage, and drove off.

E had her exercise class and then went off for her daily infusion. She spent the afternoon preparing a complicated vegetarian meal and ate it by herself. Either that or she went to Pastini’s with H. One of those.

It took M two hours to get to the other side of the Cascades and and another hour and a half to get across the boring flatlands that came next. In the mirror there’s a snowcapped peak slowly disappearing far behind.  

M ate his lunch at a park in the town of Silver Lake. It was quiet in Silver Lake and there was an awful lot of space in all directions. 

Past Silver Lake Oregon Highway 31 stops being straight and flat and the drive gets more interesting. M’s route led him to the end of 31, where it meets U.S. 395 near the south end of Lake Abert. At the junction M turned north. The highway follows the east shore of the long, mostly dry lake. It’s a wonderful driving road: smooth pavement, excellent visibility, very little traffic, lots of sweeping curves. The Porsche is magic here. 

Wednesday, May 12   Deaths  2,558 (+9)   New cases 616

M woke up at about 7:00 in a motel in Burns, Oregon. After a pretty bad hotel breakfast, he was on the road again, this time going farther north on another very fine segment of U.S. 395. It’s lovely country and the road has some places where you could go pretty fast if you wanted to. It’s also where you find the Silvies Ranch. It’s a 400,000-acre working cattle ranch and also a destination resort with a golf course and spa. It’s a fly-in kind of place, so the highway stays empty.

When he reached John Day, M finally turned west toward home. For a while his route took him down the John Day river canyon on U.S. Highway 26. Here’s where 26 enters the canyon.

M got home around 4:00. He was tired and the car was a horror show of splattered insects. Seven hundred miles total.

Thursday, May 13   Deaths  2,572 (+14)   New cases 733

M got up early and washed the Porsche. Once it was presentable, we took it to tertulia with J&R sans R. The two of them had just returned from a trip to St. George, Utah. J said they did some lovely slot canyon hikes, avoiding the big national parks in the area and finding more out of the way things. Their son had some problems in the cycling segment of his Iron Man, and so had a disappointing finish. 

In the early afternoon, we once more found ourselves in a nursery buying plants. Is there no way out of this nightmare? When we got home, we took naps. Then E did laughter yoga. Finally M made dinner and all was well.

Friday, May 14   Deaths  2,582 (+10)   New cases 713

Busy day. In the morning E planted another Lewisia and then went off for an infusion. M spent a couple of hours doing more planting..  

After lunch E did Zoom yoga and then went to visit with her friend S, who is leaving town soon to be close to her family in Nebraska. E is trying to plan a farewell get together in the next few days.

For dinner M made beef bourguignon. (E is thinking that she needs extra protein for healing.)

Saturday, May 15   Deaths  2,585 (+3)   New cases 751

More yard work. E did more planting. M mowed. E also wrote a letter to a friend, a real letter, in long hand. Yes. We mailed it on the way to MofC to get sushi for dinner.

We’re nearing the end of our Turkish TV series and things are really hopping. Ali and the Cat have succeeded in helping Melek break out of custody. They did it by intercepting the prison van in which she was being transferred from a prison in Istanbul to a prison somewhere in the back of beyond. But she was wounded in the process and died of her wounds! But wait, Melek can’t die! Melek is innocent and good; we knew that she could never have actually had an affair with that awful jerk and we were sure it was someone else who stabbed him eight or ten times, which should have killed him but unfortunately did not. At least, we thought we knew those things. But then we learned that Melek is not really Melek! She is Mevre and Melek was her younger sister. And now we learn that she is not really innocent either. She didn’t have an affair with the awful jerk, but she did try to kill him. He was actually stalking her and she recognized him as the man who raped her younger sister fifteen years ago, the younger sister who then committed suicide and whose name her sister Mevre took for herself. So whoever she is, this M woman is kind of interesting. And the series is not over. So did she really die? She was taken to the morgue and Ali sure thinks she’s dead. He’s mad with grief. But only Özan and Mirel know for sure. Either way, that jerk Kerim is going to make trouble. Fully recovered from his stabbing-induced coma–you know how that is–he seems primed to take over his father’s evil empire of thugs and torturers. 

Sunday, May 16   Deaths  2,587(+2)   New cases 507

M went four wheeling in the mountains and was frustrated at every turn. E, on the other hand, besides getting infused, hosted a farewell party for S. Several of S’s former Yoga students came by to offer best wishes. They all gathered at long outdoor table. E provided cherry tomatoes, lemon cookies, Tazo teas, and a bouquet of iris and lilies from our garden. S was in good spirits and all was well.

M had planned well for his tour, noting exactly which roads would take him up one side and down the other. But did this planning do him any good? Nicht! Did he go up one side and end up coming down the same side? Alas yes. He tried Road 1509 southwest–snow. He tried Road 1509 southeast–snow. He then tried Road 2024 northeast but he took a wrong turn and came to dead end, but then he found the correct turn only to be thwarted by…snow. What is snow even doing there when the temperature is in the seventies? Ninety-nine point nine percent of the road is dry dusty gravel. Well, it’s just in a few of the deepest shady places on north facing slopes, but that was enough.