Officially, I retired from CalFire in 2009, and theoretically, I should have been enjoying my summers since then by doing fun things, such as fishing. While I have done some of that, it seems there's always projects to pay for, or "extra" family things to pay for, so each summer, for at least a portion of it, I've gone back and worked in the dispatch center for the Forest Service. With all our moving last year, the workload I took on was light, and I worked somewhere in the neighborhood of 350 hours. With remodeling and moving expenditures/vehicle repair/maintenance stuff over the last 12 months, I decided that this year I'd work as much as possible. I worked a small amount this early spring, then went in 3 days a week in May, and I am currently in the middle of a three cycle assignment covering a LOT of hours. I've had the last 2 nights off, but before that I worked 21 straight nights of 12 hour shifts. I go back in tonight to start my second 21 night run, then I'll have 2 nights off, and then I'll finish off with another 15-16 night cycle. All in all this year I believe I'll push 1,000 hours. In July/August I'll hit 700 hours alone. The money is good, and I'm very thankful for the opportunity to replenish the bank account, but when September rolls around I will definitely be ready for it to end.
Thursday, July 16, 2026
The RV Pad
A couple weeks ago we decided to have our fifth wheel towed out from Montana. We were going to leave it out there in storage, and go use it a bit each summer, but plans have changed, and we figured it was best to have it out here. I'm working out of town, and we needed to make a pad to set the RV on, so it fell to my wife to make it happen. I wasn't worried about her ability to do the job, but she'd never run a tractor in her life, so there would be a slight learning curve. On the first day I showed her how to start, and operate the tractor...from inserting the key, to turning it back off at the end of the work. I showed her how to scoop material into the bucket, how to dump it, and how to back drag it to make things smooth. At first I walked with the tractor and instructed her on the correct bucket angles, and downward pressure, and then I let her go. She took things slow, and got better and better, and after day two she had the 20ft x 48ft pad constructed. I think for her first time she did a fantastic job.
Friday, July 10, 2026
Garden Update
Our garden continues to do well. We planted a variety of things just to see what happened, and most everything is responding well. We've had several squash from it so far, and even a bell pepper. There's a lot more veggies coming on, and now we just wait from them to get big enough to pick. No apples this year, strange, but more grapes on the vine than we'll ever know what to do with. We've discovered lots of things that will help us to have a better setup for next year, but for this year what we have, is what we have. The yellow cherry plumbs in the front have gone nuts, and there's 3 times as many this year as last...and they're much larger.
We also picked up the newest fruit trees...two 4 in 1 pears, a 4 in 1 plumb, and two persimmon trees. Additionally we finally got the three fruiting mulberry trees planted. We're going to have a regular farm here before long.
Saturday, July 4, 2026
More Music
The last week and a half has seen much activity with us, And that has equated to me not posting. Previously, you saw what I was doing with our cargo/camping trailer in preparation for the bluegrass festival. I'm happy to say the new layout worked quite well! We were much more comfortable, and the things we brought were neatly stored in the new cabinets and dresser. Although we had two dogs with us this trip, instead of the usual one, we actually had more room to maneuver inside than we did before. We have a few more improvements to make, but since I'm back working for the summer, those will have to wait a bit.
We left for the festival on the morning of Friday the 19th, and were fully set up at the fairground by dinner. The next morning we headed downtown, and we put up a booth at the farmer's market to advertise for the event. The market was open from 8 - 12, and we played music, handed out fliers, and talked with folks for a full four hours. We met a good number of local folks who had never been to the festival, and several of them ended up coming, so us being there was well worth the effort. The people liked what we presented, the other vendors enjoyed the music, and in the end the organizer waived the booth fee because he too enjoyed the music, and he said we contributed far more to his event than he expected. We thought that was very classy.
The festival ended up being more of a working week for us than we had anticipated. Not only did we do the farmer's market, we also ended up working at the gate all days except one, we played onstage on Saturday and Sunday, and I emceed on Saturday evening. The audience responded quite well to our shows, and we got invited back to play again next year. The first part of the week was hot, with daytime temps in the mid 90's, and the festival weekend was cool with highs in the low 60's. Quite the difference.
On Friday night, we were inside the trailer, and I decided to have an otter pop. I was opening it with my teeth, when I heard a snap! Then I felt something odd. I reached into my mouth, and pulled out a front tooth. As it had been rebuilt 30 years ago, it didn't hurt, but it sure looked funny. However, as I am a banjo player, it was kind of fitting. LOL! My wife, bless her heart, laughed until tears flowed down her cheek. My middle daughter sent me a text that said, "Hey Cletus, how's it going?" All I could do was smile. The next day the audience got a big kick out of the story, and it fit very well with our show. I have an appointment to get it replaced on the 23rd, so no big deal.
A friend of our used his cell phone to capture on of our songs, so I put it into a video, and I'll post it here for you. The footage is grainy, but you might like the song, and it's intro.
