Well, well. Where does the time go. I didn’t even realize I missed a weekly update until I got to looking at this thing. And on a holiday weekend too, tsk. Can’t say I really had anything anyway, maybe some more pictures of my dinner. About the same this week, but I won’t skip consecutive updates on principle. We did get caught up in the first big power shut off of the season. If you haven’t heard of this practice, last year they started cutting power whenever the weather forecast calls for wind. Yep, you read that right. They just flat cut the electricity, for 48 hours or more. We were unaffected last year in our fancy-house, but we’re right square in the middle of it now. We bought a generator several months ago in preparation for this situation, but in true Phil-Fashion it was still in the box, out in the shed. Well, time to figure out how to fire it up I guess. Honestly I’d hoped to return it when our backup-battery system gets installed, but it’s a little murky when or if that is going to happen. So anyway, we woke up to a pitch black house, and trudged outside to figure out the new generator. Wasn’t too hard really, aside from being crazy-heavy to get in place. Most people around here have them wired into their house for a quick hookup; We did the power strip and extension cord method. Hey, we had a fridge, Internet, and a few lights; Good to go. It did get a little old after a few days though, especially the noise. Wow, that thing is wicked loud. Part of the fun I guess. Not having any water was something of an inconvenience also. Not an ideal time to finally look at the well pump and find it’s hardwired to the box and can’t be plugged into an extension cord. Whoops.

The majority of our weekend was spent babysitting our little friend Renfield Cornelius. Being a dog, he is blissfully unaware of his unusual name. Seems to kind of like it as a matter of fact. He joined us Friday night, and we mostly sat out in the back yard watching him and Quinn run around all crazy, until the smoke smell drove us back inside. The smoke is just nasty. While we are in no immediate danger from the wildfires, the haze and the smell are about intolerable. With any luck the wind will kick up and blow it out of here soon. Of course then they’ll shut off our power again; Oh bother.

Saturday we left the dogs to entertain themselves and went wine tasting with friends. It was nice to get out of the house for a few hours, and the temp was a little cooler than it has been. We only went to two places, not wanting to push our luck with the pups back home. Turned out they did just fine as usual. Never hurts to have something to stress about though.

Sunday Renfield’s folks swung by on their way home from Tahoe and picked him up. Being excited to have visitors out in the booneys, we cooked up a little brunch in an attempt to lure them into staying for a bit. In what probably qualifies as the most exciting thing to happen to me this year, I even tried making homemade biscuits. I know that sounds like sheer lunacy, but that’s just how I roll these days. Life on the edge at the Kenagy Ranch. They came out pretty good, or at least good enough that I didn’t feel compelled to fall back on the tube of Grands I had in the fridge “just in case.” I’ll make them again, already got a few adjustments in my head. After that whirlwind of biscuit excitement, we settled in for a day of football on the TV. Speaking of TV, we finally have TV service after going without since June. Honestly we haven’t really missed it, but football did give us a cause for concern. So, we chipped in on youtube TV with some friends, and now we’re back to mindlessly clicking through 100’s of channels of nothing for hours on end. Ah, entertainment.

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