I haven't blogged recently because of our daughter's and older grandson's health problems that began in mid-October. Nothing life-threatening, but they require a lot of care and concern all the same.
On Thanksgiving Day, Phil and I drove (9 hours) to our cabin in Ohio. We celebrated on Friday. When the rain stopped, we raked a ton of oak leaves over the space of a few days. We visited with neighbors. Phil's sister and husband came up from Marietta and stayed Saturday night.
Life is different in Knox County. We encountered an Amish buggy on Route 514. We've never seen one on that road before. Most of the Amish live in neighboring Holmes County, but many more Amish are buying farms in Knox Country than they did a decade ago. At Miller's Hardware, I picked up a copy of The Vendor, a biweekly paper serving "plain folk everywhere" and turned immediately to the ads for buggy horses. All the horses were "traffic safe and sound" except for one that was "sound, but not quite traffic safe." An ad for an 8-year-old black Morgan standardbred mare stated that she was an "excellent traveler" that "some women can drive." Asking price, $1200.00. I fondly remember the recent ad that warned, "Not a horse for seniors."
The sign on the door of Dale's Cardinal grocery store in Danville said, "No tobacco or snuff chewing in the store." Who knew that you could chew snuff? A notice on the bulletin board offered "cur" pups for sale. What kind of dog is that?
The week-long gun season for white-tail deer began on Monday, the 29th. While raking leaves, we heard shooting in the distance. Phil allows deer hunting on our property. (His sister doesn't allow it on hers.) Phil likes to plant trees; the deer like to eat them. They also damage mature trees and shrubs with their relentless browsing. Although Phil feels ambivalent about deer hunting, he realizes that, with no natural predators, too many deer are competing with each other for food.
This year many newcomers asked for hunting permits. One man even researched land records at the court house in Mount Vernon and called us. He is interested in securing "good hunting land" in the future for himself and his son, who is now just two years old. Phil keeps a calendar showing who is hunting on which parcel on a given day. He certainly doesn't want the hunters shooting one another.
The local fire chief apologized for requesting permission at the last minute. He said he'd been involved in the investigation of the recent murder of two adults and a child near Mount Vernon.
