Sunday, August 2, 2009

Thunder and Lightening and Dry Oh My!


You can probably scratch what I said about no large fires in the Northwest. Last nights thunderstorm activity brought with it tons of lightening strikes. Our radios pick up all activity for ODF (Oregon Department of Forestry)among other services and there was a strike about every five minutes around the Rogue Valley. Crews were scrambling out to all sorts of sectors and I know the Applegate and areas around Grants Pass are now dealing with multiple fires. Community Justice sent out at least 2 different teams of 20 and probably more were dispatched. Closer to home smoke plumes in the Emigrant Lake area were spotted. I know our volunteer force was on alert all night and today spotters will go out and head up some of the ridges checking for smoke. For those that are interested here is a pretty nifty site showing all large fires currently burning in WA
and OR. The Large Fire Information Summary at the top left of the page is interesting as it lists all the fires, resources and expected containment. This most likely will be updated through today and tomorrow.

Gene also does work with the State Fire Marshal's office, along with many many other volunteers. On big fires that require a lot of resources a communications team is sent out to set up to allow all the different services a way to communicate with each other in large burn areas. It's pretty important that every firefighter can talk and get information when working in some of these wilderness places. Gene made team leader two years ago and this is his teams rotation week on. I'm betting the piggy bank they get called out.

The blanket is off the loom and it did indeed open up to double width! It's not quite ready for prime time, it needs hemming and some ends woven in, and of course wet finishing. More on that in another post.

Friday again found me heading to town for supplies. Pretty unexciting stuff. Wormer for horses, goats and cats, some new feed buckets and feed to go in them. Our whopping 15 tons of hay is due to arrive towards the end of next week and I have just enough bales left from last years load to cover until then. A lot of cleaning needs to go into the barn before this years hay comes in. The last of the pallets needs to be taken up so I can literally scrape out all the hay chafe with Bob the tractor and re-pallet for the new bales.

I did manage to get a pop in at Web-sters and of course some yarn goodies came home. The fall stuff is arriving daily and there is always something nice and wonderful.
I got my hands on some Buffalo Gold but it's a budget buster and will have to stay in the store for a while. As Gene says, they are keeping it safe for me. What did make it in budget is some lovely Cascade Ecological Wool. This is a softly spun all natural undyed Peruvian Highland Wool. It was love at first touch. I'm thinking a knitted vest or cap sleeved cardi. Each skein is 478 yards of soft puffy goodness and the cost of $16.00/skein was pretty good too!


Today I'm told that the window framing will be done and the windows might even make it in. We'll see, depends on what our spotters spot!

4 comments:

Sharon said...

I'm certainly sorry that you're in the pins and needles situation of electrical activity fires. The West has gotten so dry, what used to be an occasional event is now the norm. I sure hope you don't end up living with smoke. Our fire finally petered out because it ran into an old fire site.

I'm jealous of your yarn prizes. I need to work harder at getting some of my own.

Life Looms Large said...

That would be scary to have lightning on top of such dry conditions - and so many strikes close together. Hope the fires are contained (or out) soon!

Congrats on getting the blanket off the loom!!! That's a big accomplishment.....so we'll give you a pass on the lack of photographic evidence.

Good luck getting prepped for hay!! This year NE farmers have had a terrible time coming up with 3 consecutive dry days for haying....so hay prices are predicted to soar in these parts.

When you first said "heading to town for supplies", I thought "Oh, is that what the cool kids are calling yarn shopping now?"

That yarn does look like it will knit up well. Can't wait to see what you do with it! And now I'm really curious about the Buffalo Gold. I really like the look of the scarf on their website. Hmmmmm. Maybe if I take a trip out west it would make a good souvenir!!

Sue

Theresa said...

Sue,
I'm sure they would herd some of the skeins out your way! Be prepared thought, it runs around $60.00 per.
I did point out to Gene that it costs just about what one of our shelter dogs did and it wouldn't eat or need vet care.....

I don't even want to talk about hay prices. They were a killer last year with the fuel costs so high. This year a bit better. NE always seems to have high prices on hay. It's hard to get that second and third cutting in that we can get.

The fires actually were all contained and not allowed to spread. Everyone was so ready for this and it was a good thing. Your right Sharon, we've had way to much practice on these over the last few years.

Jennifer said...

I'm glad to hear that this is not catching everyone of guard - even despite having to face all those fires.

The yarn looks like great fun and I look forward to the double weave blanket. How does one wet finish something so large?