Cider Pressing

A short photo essay.

Spreading the tarps.  It is critical to keep track of the side that stays down to avoid contaminating apples with deer feces.  The best tarps are bi-color.  Brown-goes-down is easy to remember.

Send some skinny, young guys up into the tree to shake the limbs.  They have to check the bottoms of their shoes before they walk across the tarps to ensure that they do not track deer poop onto the tarps.  Deer LOVE apples.

We shook 6 trees.  One Priscilla, two Golden Delicious, two Jonafree and one Northern Spy.  It is desirable to have a mix of sweet, tart and aromatic apples. 

Starting to roll the apples to the center of the tarp

The edges of the tarps were rolled up to puddle the apples in the center.  They were then scooped up and put into boxes and clean bags.

Somebody's Ford diesel has an electrical glitch.  It gave me GREAT pleasure to give it a jump start with the CHEVY Cavalier.

Happy Crew

I wish this was the end of today's post

And now you know....

Therese (far right) and Max (third from left) took the apples to the cider mill for pressing.

They arrived shortly before the Noon cut-off and waited at the end of a long line.  They waited for nearly four hours before they could unload.

The press master refused to press the apples after the first bag was unloaded.  He claimed litigation exposure as the reason.  He said that there were too many leaves in the apples and that was evidence that we raked them off the ground.  He is not held to the standard of proof.  He is held to the standard of what, might have, maybe happened.

Therese showed him photos on her cell phone and was able to get him to finish one "pressing".  He did so very grudgingly.  One pressing used up 4 bags of apples, or about one-seventh of the total we picked.  Those four bags yielded 28 gallons of cider.

Therese and Max took the remaining apples back to the orchard and dumped them.  They were using borrowed equipment and had to return it this evening.

So a conservative estimate is that we lost 180 gallons of cider with a retail value of $4/gallon.  That is $720 to the math impaired.

---Warning: Editorializing about to occur---

There is no value in being bitter or angry.  The press master has to stay in business in a political climate that is extremely anti-business....unless you are a mega contributor to the party that won.  We want him to be in business next year and the year after.

But it is beyond sad when a fabulous, family get-together ends this way.  $720 of wholesome food ends up being left for the deer and raccoons.

And there-in lies that fault of central planning:  Unanticipated consequences.  Reality is infinitely messy and independent actors will almost always act in ways that minimizes their exposure and maximizes their profits.  That rarely aligns with the planner's model of what "should" happen.

---End Warning---

 

Sidebar on food contamination:

Excerpted from FOX article:

• "The owners of a Colorado cantaloupe farm were arrested Thursday..." 
• "...the federal Food and Drug Administration and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention determined the Jensens didn't adequately clean the cantaloupe."
• "The Jensens' farm in southeastern Colorado filed for bankruptcy..."
• "... the case against the Jensens ... do not require intent, just the fact that they shipped contaminated food..." 
• "Asked why it took so long to file charges, Dorschner said officials needed time to develop the case."
• "The illnesses quickly were linked to the Jensens' farm, with the FDA saying on Oct. 19, 2011, that the outbreak probably was caused by pools of water on the floor and old, hard-to-clean packing equipment..."

Forgetfulness is a sign of old age

I forgot my fanny pack (and camera) when I went into town.  So after dropping off my gym partner,  I swung by where I park at the start of my run, I reset the trip odometer, swung by Quality Dairy (a local convenience store that is a block off my route), picked up a couple of bottles of Powerade and spotted them along my route.  I finished driving around my route and parked in the usual place.

5.0 miles.  Hmmmm!

Obviously I could not cut through the soccer and softball complex but I also did not go through the Church campground and come out behind where I parked....so that should be about a wash.

It sounds stupid, but I feel a lot more tired.

Current alternatives to running are to bike and to fish.  Maybe bike on Tuesday and fish on Thursday.  This story is still developing.

Cider:

My wonderful, younger sister Therese organized an apple picking and cider pressing party for tomorrow.  I dropped off 10 clean grain bags and a tarp.  Cider apples do not need to be treated gently.  One can just shake them down from the tree.  The trees are at my mom and dad's cottage.

I walked the orchard and yellow jackets are going to be a pain.

I don't know if I will get out to help.

I started a jug of hard-cider yeast culture just in case my wonderful sister Therese offers me some.  I took a gallon of store-bought cider (from Quality Dairy, no preservatives!) and added a package of  Red Star Cotes des Blancs wine yeast I found while grubbing around in the freezer.  Yeast can double every 2 hours so a 20 hour head start can result in 1000X more viable yeast cells to out-compete the wild.

I also found some small pistol primers in the deep freeze.  Gotta love freezers.

Crazy Squirrel

This tragic scene occurred a half mile north of the Eaton Rapids (Michigan) High School.  These photos are not copyrighted.....if we can save just one squirrel it will be worth it....

Stern

Ironic

Retro

Nerdy

Formula from here.  Mahmood and Paluszny.

 Anxiety

Melancholy

************************************

The four mile run turned into a 4.7 mile run when I had to find an empty beer can.

Squirrel was not moved.  Can fit like it belonged there.

I counted 14 squirrels (13 live and one road kill) on my 4.7 mile run.  Ironically, I only saw one in the White Oak Cathedral.   

 

Whining is NOT a Leadership skill

We all find ourselves in leadership positions.

It is not always due to authority that is granted from above.

The signal man was the guy who directed planes that were landing on the WWII aircraft carriers.  They were not Admirals who graduated from the top of their class in Annapolis.  Nor did they did have college degrees like the pilots.

But at the time of the landing, they had the best look at the plane.  They had the best information, the most timely information.  Those guys with the ping-pong paddles were in a leadership position.

One-person-in-forty is "primarily motivated by achieving results through other people."    That is, one person in forty is hard wired to be a leader.

Given that we must all function as leaders and that only 1-in-40 is hardwired to be that way;  then it is critical that we practice and model what looks like Leadership.  Because we play like we practice and we become what we do.

Whining:

Nothing says "I have no power" like a person in a leadership position who whines.

How is it possible for the troops to have power after the leader abdicated his?

We seem to be in a race of learned helplessness.  A cult of victimhood.  Sadly, it works in the short term for some of the players.

Cowbird out-competing legitimate nestlings.  Picture from here.

Whining is not a leaderships skill.  I checked.  It is not listed in the Lominger competencies....although it may show up there soon.

I deplore whiners.

St Cosmos and Damien:

One of my goals is to attend Mass more often.

One of the things I appreciate about the priest who presides over these Masses is that he gives a quick review of the "Saint of the Day."

Today's saints were  a couple of martyrs from early Rome.  They were both doctors.  They were both beheaded because they refused to comply with a system that demanded collusion.   They refused to conform to the "standard rate schedule".  They were put to the death when they professed a higher loyalty to God than to the corrupt system.  They did not whine.

The priest ended his homily by requesting that we pray for a constructive result from the Affordable Healthcare Act.

Mr De

 

Mr De emigrated from Sicily as a young man.  He busted his butt and retired in his early sixties.  Even though he is 5'6" in his wingtips, he is a scrapper.  He works at staying physically fit, but like many of us wears a blanket of "good living".

His kids make sport of him behind his back because he finished his workouts by punching himself in the stomach 25 times as hard as he can.

Mr De spends part of his retirement in Northern Michigan.  He was riding his bike around Higgins Lake (thirty mile trip) when two young thugs pulled in front of him and dumped him into the ditch.  They jumped out of their car.

"Give us your wallet." they said.  This looked like a move that they had practiced before.

"COME AND GET IT!" Mr De snarled back.

"What the F___!"  They replied in surprise.  "Don't you know we are going to beat your azz if you don't give it to us?"

"COME AND GET IT!" Mr De snarled again.

No whining.  No bargaining.  No cringing or grovelling.

The two thugs looked at each other, shrugged, got back into the car and drove away.  Either they did not want to get dew on their athletic shoes or they wanted no part of a crazy old man.

The funny thing is, to his kids, their old man did not carry a wallet when riding his bike.

Mr De is one of my heroes.

In town run

Today's 4 mile "in-town" run went much better.

I started out hydrated.  Temp was 68.  Humidity was low.  I carried two, half liters of electrolyte.  My pace was about one minute a mile slower than yesterday.

Looking east down Greyhound Drive.  Kousa Dogwood in foreground.

Band practice.  I pretend they are playing for me as I run by.  They were playing something with lots of slinky sounding brass.  It sounded like this 

Running through the Softball and Tennis Complex

Running through the Soccer Complex.  I watch a bunch of soccer games here and even coached a few.

Running north down Smithville Rd.  Yup, those are oil wells on the left.

Trashy people are everywhere.  All they needed to do is call Grampa Ed at 663-8745 or Danny Hector at 663-8996

Disclosure statement:  I nicked an apple from this tree yesterday and it was delightful.  Probably a MacIntosh seedling.

After Picking by Andrew Wyeth....He captured it, didn't he?

West down Barnes Hwy.  I ran on the north side of the road today and it felt better.  Part of the reason is that the Mail Truck wore a path that widened the shoulder giving me a little bit more wiggle room.

Gnarly!  Sugar Maple limb by Hastay's Nursery

One of the many municipal Eaton Rapids boat launches.  This one on North River Street.

An old stone church.

A pretty girl walking her younger sister

A Buick Commercial.

McArthur Park.  Looking up-river

Another municipal boat launch

Finish....12 minutes early so I have enough time to screw around.  This church camp abuts the school complex and is a serene and peaceful place.  It is an ideal place for my cool-down walk, even though I probably smell like a wart hog's underarm.

There are about 50 charming gingerbread cottages like this one.

A Cathedral of White Oak.  Many campers park beneath these during the peak season.

Mission Creep

Mission Creep, in the industrial context, is when a maintenance task increases in scope to the point where the pre-task planning no longer comprehends and armors against all hazards.

I find myself in Retirement Mission Creep.

My mission morphed into transporting a person to/from a gym every weekday.  Afterward I have an hour to kill before I pick up Kubota at school.

I need ideas on how to productively fill that hour.

Yesterday I ran four miles and it was a hard four miles.  I had given blood the day before.  I started out slightly dehydrated.  I had water on my run instead of electrolyte.

I am going to try again today with electrolyte and see if that makes it anymore fun.

Garden cover crop:

Expand the picture and see if you can find the white, five gallon bucket.

Need a hint?

It is about mid-way between the photographer and the door of the barn.

Look for the rim.

Daikon and turnips are about ping-pong ball diameter.

Politics in Four Short Lessons

Political power is the ability to make viable claims on resources.

Political power is an extremely perishable commodity.

Extinction of political power is prevented ONLY by the continuous exercise of that power.

The only way to increase political power is to invent conflicts and use those conflicts to make preemptive claims.

Bathrooms:

We were late for a 7:15 AM meeting this morning.  That event triggered this cascade of thoughts.

Being late was an easy-to-predict outcome.

Both of my at-home kids compete to see:

• Who can use the most bathroom time
• Who can be last person in the vehicle

I swear, the only way they could move any slower would be if they walked backwards.

I have a sister-in-law who has 5 sisters.  Her dad was an engineer and thought he solved the problem when he built his house.  He put the wash basins/make-up application stations outside the shower/throne portion of the bathrooms.  He had 6 basins!

And they were still late.

Because the wash basin/mirror/make-application station was merely the agreed upon field of battle.

It was about the maintenance of relative power positions via the exercise of there-of.

Funny?  Really, it is cut-throat business.  Who can guarantee that we will never be confronted with Sophie's Choice? 

Children's continuous demands erode well-worn paths, ruts, in our value landscape.  The children are preparing for the day when we must choose who gets the last morsel of food, or who we will drag into our life-boats.

Muffy:

I had a boss who talked too much about his private life.  He was married to "Muffy".

Muffy came from a wealthy family and Bossman was very proud of the fact that he could continue to support her in that fashion.

Every three years the credit cards would be maxed out.  Bossman went to the bank and took out  another home equity loan which was always enough (it was a very large house in an elite neighborhood, of course) to zero out the credit card balances.

Then it happened that he went into the bank.  He was shuffled to a side office.  "Mr Bossman, you now owe more on your house that it is worth.  We cannot extend you a home equity loan.  So sorry."

Bossman went home and told Muffy that they needed to economize.

Muffy, not the sharpest pencil in the box, decided that Bossman had a piece of fluff on the side and divorced him.  In her universe, the only way there could "not be enough" was if there was competition.

Bossman shook his head.  100% was not enough for seven.  Somehow, in her mind, she was sure that she and the five children would have more with only 50%.

Diminishing prospects creates its own mathematics.

 

Sequester:

The exercise of power does not change as we get older and political horizons become bigger than the family.  It is still about access to resources.  It is still about avoiding the extinction of political power via continuous exercise.

Those of us who flatter ourselves by thinking of ourselves as "Productive members of society" instinctively fear those who practice the exercise of power.  We know that we are rookies at the game.  We know that they are the predators and we are the meat.  Becoming one of them would make us non-productive.

This is not a recent phenomena.  The following was written almost two thousand years ago.

First of all, I ask that supplications, prayers,
petitions, and thanksgivings be offered for everyone,
for kings and for all in authority,
that we may lead a quiet and tranquil life
in all devotion and dignity.  1-Timothy 2:1 

 

Technology:

Author Marvin Harris defines technology as "science which results in the definition of new resources."

Case in point:  Prior to 1765, the year that James Watt is credited with inventing a steam engine that represented a quantum leap in efficiency, coal was mostly considered a very inferior stone.  It was not strong.  It was rapidly degraded by the weather.  And God forbid you should think to build a chimney from coal.

Technology elevated coal.   No longer was it a piss-poor example of masonry.  It because a source of energy and made it very valuable.

Before Watt coal was not a valued resource.  After Watt it was.

Strategy:

My strategy, much to my children's dismay, is to divide my "wealth".

I have a utility portion of my wealth.  I have minimal risk of others coveting my house (1400 square feet, 40 years old), or my vehicles, or my clothes or my bling (flip phone and wedding ring).  I have what I need and I wear it out.

I have a vaporous portion.  It is real to me but it is fog or smoke to any who would try to make a viable claim on it.  My faith.  My skills.  My character.  I lump all these under "Character Equity".

The last portion I don't count because I expect the spasms of diminishing prospects to smash it.

My gut feel is that opportunity exists to use technology to morph the last portion into items that are like polarized light.  That wealth will be visible to me but not visible to those wearing the lenses of kings and authoritarians.