A leak and a party

If you look at the mid-right hand section of our weather station, it indicates over 13 inches of rain just since last October! That is close to our yearly average and it's only 4 months into the season.

This last week has been one for the books as far as rainfall goes. We've basically received our yearly allotment of rain for the entire rain season already -- and historically February through March are also usually quite rainy, so it looks to be a banner year for this part of California as far as the wet stuff is concerned.

Greening up nicely.

Of course this does not really get us out of our drought since it's so entrenched and has gone on for so long, but it does help on a short-term basis. It will be nice to see our spring wildflowers in moist-enough soil to thrive, and there is standing water everywhere right now and creeks running that we've never even seen before. So I expect everything to stay greener than usual if we keep getting regular installments like we've just had. Fingers crossed.

So last week we had a leak, caused by a loose vent on the roof, which put a little spot in our bedroom closet ceiling and led me into the attic with a flashlight, a bucket and a tarp. Big Ag is having shoulder issues and can't climb up there but I wanted to make sure all my clothes and shoes stayed dry during the deluge. Luckily the leak was easy to find and fix, so now everything just has to dry out -- and our clothes are safe. 

Since our geographic area tends to relocate to the damn surface of the sun in the summertime I have no doubt that the drywall will air out with no mold issues, so that's good. And we already removed all the wet insulation.

Winter Table.

Dig in.

So the middle of the storms and leak, I did the logical thing one does in the face of terrible weather and decided to have a big dinner party at our house (on a night when we only had showers expected instead of a downpour).  We called it "The Essentials" and asked all our friends to bring a bottle of either red or white that they adored, and always made sure to have on hand when they were having wine at home. I made ribs and sous vide turkey breast, so you could sample appropriate food with your wine, as well as roasted potatoes, a pot of beans, and garlic bread. It was sort of barbecue meets elegant, or whatever passes for elegant at this homestead. I thought the brown and white table decor came out rather well.

I am also learning to not be afraid to use shortcuts in some areas when entertaining, in order to make myself more accessible to guests and so I don't need to start drinking at 4 pm to take the edge off my stress. I try not to fix things that need a lot of babysitting, instead doing some store bought things (like the garlic bread) but giving the main courses my full attention. 

Need to call the sommerlier to choose a winner from this bunch.

But even Yoshi the Somm is undecided.

So a lot of wine was drank, massive amounts of food consumed (so glad I don't have self-conscious friends who merely graze on stuff, this group really digs in) and a homemade apple pie, brought by one of my guests, for dessert. A spontaneous after-party ensued at my neighbors' house and featured slot machines, cards, beer drinking, popcorn and karaoke. 

No one even discussed politics, despite the inauguration being held the day before and the marches taking place that same day. Which just goes to prove good wine really does make everything (seem) better.

As you can imagine, Sunday was enormously quiet due to small but significant hangovers for both Big Ag and myself. Oh well. We watched a shameful amount of television, ate what we pleased, and expected nothing productive to occur.  It's been too long since we spent a day doing nothing. And unless you are sick or hung over, doing nothing is harder than it looks. Chores sing the siren song of the Puritan Work Ethic, but sometimes you just need to resist for the sake of resisting.

Without making a resolution of it, I've sort of decided I want to entertain a lot more in 2017 and think the enjoyment of friends, good food and wine may be what it takes to have a great year. Between my garden, my home and those people I most enjoy being around, I'm thinking "Make The Homestead Great Again" will be a mandate we follow through on.

Of course we all know the homestead is already great. But you gotta have a good catch-phrase.

Learning Curve

We're still underneath the mountain of information we've gathered in preparing to make our attic more energy efficient.  This has been a 20-hour crash course in knowledge, often conflicting, sometimes disappointing.  But in the spirit of education, I will share it here, in case you ever need it and would like a truncated course in what we've learned. Here's what we know so far:

1.  Our home has an incredibly under-ventilated attic, which is kind of a crime considering the climate zone we live in. Yes, a construction crime.  I think a badly wired electric chair should be in order for that, but that's just me.

Anyway, in general any house needs about one square foot of net-free ventilation per 300 square feet of home.  That means, for a well-ventilated attic, we would need about 7 feet of ventilation, since our house is about 2100 square feet.  We're way behind the curve there: currently have about 2 feet.

2.  Fire safety has to be taken into account.  The less well-ventilated your attic is, the greater your fire risk from degraded electrical wiring (Duh. Wiring will degrade faster in a 160 degree attic than a 120 degree one).  But in a wildfire area such as ours, you have to be very careful to install ventilation that will not allow embers to enter the attic, in the event of a wildfire.

3.  Most contractors do not believe power fans in the attic, solar or otherwise, are a good idea, except in two story homes.  In a one story home, all they do is draw cool air up from the house, into the attic.  In a two story home, they draw cool air from the ground floor up to the second story (then into the attic), so they are of some help.

As you can see, a simple wish to install an attic fan and whole house fan has turned into a doctoral thesis on ventilation, but at least we are more educated now.  I suppose I should be grateful, as a lot of people would probably have just installed the fans and then wondered why it didn't make much of a difference on their electric bill.

The attic fan is now off the table, for the reasons listed above, and we need more ventilation in our attic before we can make a whole house fan work for us.  Next week we are planning on having a roofer come out and see if we can install some fire-safe ventilation, which may, just by itself, lower the temperature in the attic.  Then, we will move on to the whole house fan.  So we are getting there.  But as Murphy's Law of Life teaches, whatever it is you want to do, build or grow will probably take twice as long as you think and cost twice as much. 

I'm exhausted from the learning curve now and just want to go do some manual labor, or have a drink, whichever comes first.  Or maybe do both at the some time, which could provide some interesting results.

Speaking of which, has anyone been watching the YouTube series of "My Drunk Kitchen?"  Absolutely hilarious.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=atCfBuLmTxo