Wicked Witch of the West

I think she must be from Costco as I have seen at least three of them on my travels around town. She's very difficult to photograph, especially her face hidden under the brim of her hat, but I tried to give an impression of her size. She's quite impressive and beats the blow-up figures which collapse into indistinguishable heaps on the ground during the day when the generators that keep them blown up are turned off.  

I've decided that the headlines in the paper often bear no resemblance to the story within, or perhaps they are just omitting the most important parts of the story. As a case in point, there was a story in the paper the other day about forecasters predicting a third year of La Niña currents and drought. What the story was mostly about, however, was the fact that the North Bay, which includes Sonoma County is caught between Seattle, where higher than 'normal' rain amounts are expected, and Southern California where high temperatures and continued drought is predicted. Apparently there is disagreement, or an inability to predict which way the North Bay will go.

Today the temperatures have been lower than 'normal' for this time of year, the sun is shining, and there is a very chilly wind. This has led to another misleading headline saying that PG&E was planning Public Safety Power Shutoffs (what a joke...) in 13 counties because of drought conditions and 'high winds'. Further perusal of the story yielded the information that '3 people' in Sonoma County would be affected. I don't think anybody has much faith in anything PG&E says, but I'm beginning to suspect that the newspaper headlines are misleading as well.

Getting our automatic switch from mains power to solar battery in working order in case of a power shut off  seems to be all that was needed to prevent our power from being ever being shut off again. And the frequency and length of time we were without power between 2017 and 2020 were what led us to invest in the system in the first place....

The rock garden doesn't feel quite finished, but there's not much more we can do until spring. It certainly doesn't need more rocks. I'll post a picture of it in due course.

The quilt top now has not one but two borders and has been declared finished. I've put away the sewing machine and all the fabric so I can dust the surface of the work table and bring a bit of order to the chaos that ensued during the final push to finish it. I still have to find a good backing fabric but if I manage to measure correctly, I shouldn't have to do anything with it except take it to the quilter. 

Instead of sitting outside for our glass of wine, I think we'll be repairing with it to the television room to turn on the fire.