Acorn Season

After the rains and general chills last week, it warmed up over the weekend and is hot enough for A/C most days. This is what we in California call: Indian Summer. It comes after the first rains, usually in October, and goes away again in a few weeks. Nights are cool enough to sleep, mornings are chilly, and leaves fall all day, even if the breeze is hot. We also get Acorns. The house where I live is surrounded by deciduous oak trees, not to be confused with live oaks such as where I grew up near the coast. These trees produce serious acorns a couple inches long and an inch across, weighing an ounce each. The POP when the hit the roof or back deck. We're getting those falling every twenty or thirty minutes now. The squirrels go nuts over this, hiding them everywhere, then forgetting. This hiding behavior includes lifting up the gutter guards, which in theory allows water into the rain gutters but allows acorns and leaves to roll off to the ground, and cram acorns in the gutter. Those float, then completely plug the downspouts. This is a common problem around here, and if you have pines instead, you get pine needles and even bigger pinecones, large enough to brain you. Yes, around here pinecones are over a foot long and weigh up to 5 pounds when full of nuts. Usually they fall when they're empty, thankfully, and the squirrels tear them open to get the pine nuts. Still, this being fall the critters are doing fall things. I'm hearing migrating geese more often, and hopefully there's enough in the high country to keep the bears up there for hibernation, rather than breaking into homes down in Nevada City, which is only 5 miles away.

The big upside of this time of year? Time for stews, soup, breads, baking, slow cooked foods like roasts, red wine, dark beer, cheeses, squash, tomato sauces, and once it rains again, clam chowder. Good foods to eat that suit the season. And its cool enough in the mornings I can exercise hard without getting all sweaty. So that's a plus as well. Might go for a bicycle ride tomorrow. Good for the heart and respiration rate.