Hunting, Fishing, the Garden, and Getting Ready for Advent

Kathleen, Basil, and I went camping last Saturday morning.  We fished (caught nothing) and hunted (shot nothing) at San Luis Reservoir.  It was the first cold night of the winter, getting down to 33F.  While we were there we went by the San Juaqin National Cemetery and the Korean War Memorial.  I wanted to do that because Basil ha heard people say the U.S. is a colonial power that only takes from the world.  I wanted him about my Uncle Fred who fought in Korea, and to see the graves of some of the 33,686 American's who died to save a tiny insignificant county from the gaping maw of Communism. On the way home Sunday afternoon we stopped as Casa de Fruta and had deli sandwiches for supper. 

Yesterday Kathleen and I team taught her American History class.  We were dealing with the Modernist/Fundamentalist conflict in American Protestantism.  In one hour we dealt with Hegel, Marx, Wellhausen, Allbright, Fosdick, Bryan, Darwin, Franklin, Washington, Coolidge, the Mayflower Compact, James Brookes and the Niagara Bible Conference, the split between Princeton University and Princeton Theological Seminary, the Lyman Brothers, the 5-Fundamentals, and much more besides.  It was a lot of fun.  I hope she lets me team teach with her again.  She said her students really enjoyed it.  They were texting questions to her late into the night.

Last night Kathleen and I drove over to the San Antonio Valley.  We were looking for a wildlife preserve where I could shoot turkey and pigs we never fond it.  It appears that the maps were inaccurate.  What we did see were lots of small cattle ranches, a nut orchard, 2 white tale deer (I don't have a deer tag), and 3 amazingly beautiful tule elk bulls. (I don't have an elk tag).

Today at dawn, after finishing morning prayers I went out to the garden.  I saw no squirrels to shoot.  That's a good thing.  Maybe, I've reduced the population enough that they won't be a horrible pest in the spring and summer. There were no raccoons in the live trap.  (There was a juvenile opossum in the trap yesterday.  I set it free.  They don't hurt the garden.)  While I was out there I counted twenty-one ducks (they were flying too high for me to make out what kind of duck.  My guess is mallard, since we have more of that than anything else.), a ruby throated hummingbird, a seagull (Not sure what kind.  It was flying too high.), a pigeon, two crows, a red tailed hawk, five Canada geese, three goldfinches, a red breasted nuthatch, two mourning doves, and some kind of flycatcher.

Right now we have growing cucumbers, green leaf lettuce, red leaf lettuce, onions, garlic, broccoli, kale, radishes, sugar snap peas, acorn squash, bell peppers (IT TAKES THEM FOREVER TO MAtURE!!!!), lots and lots of beets, eggplant, spinach, broccoli, green cabbage, five kinds of basil, thyme, parsley, rosemary, oregano, Brussels sprouts, and, of course, the two lemon trees and three grape vines.  (We are thinking of planting two apple trees.)

Well, it' almost 10 o'clock in the morning.  I should, I guess, eat breakfast.  After that. I'll sart getting ready for the start of Advent on Sunday.