Chili Chill . . . Almost

Okay, so the chill is still infrequent, but it IS there at times -- like this morning. To me, that means one thing -- time to make a pot of "red".  Which I plan to do this afternoon.  I guess it means many other things as well. There's is a lot of "harvest" activity going on in our neck-of-the-woods.

The lightning and thunder (which we did not see or hear) apparently went on a great deal this week. The wineries are scrambling to get the job of collecting all the ripe grapes as fast as possible.

The sights and sounds of this particular time of year are all around and the aroma of chili will soon be apparent. It is so nice to have portion sized bowls of chili in the freezer ready for the table in just a few moments (and in time for the game).

If we look at the 18th Great-Grandparents row there are over One Million ancestors . . .

I haven't been able to look that far back, but on some lines, we have gone back to the 12th or 13th Great-Grandparents range and that still means a high amount of folks.

The graphics on the right shows a few of the ancestors in my paternal line -- I hope to uncover more and to be able to learn more about them as well.

Going just one level up on my maternal line -- to my mother -- from her photo shoebox to the left are a couple of random photos from her life.

To the far left it looks to be when she must have been about 6 or so being held by an unidentified woman, who is most likely a relative.

In the center is a picture of mom with three friends and they are identified on the back of the photo. The person taking the photo, Pauley, can be seen as a silhouette at the bottom of the photo.

On the bottom left are some photos of mom and her brother Stewart, mostly with unidentified folks.


Well, it is that time of the year when planning for the "holidays" begins anew:

There are less than 100 days until Christmas, 2017 -- 99 to be specific.

That means the truck traffic on our street will be increasing as the UPS, FedEx, and other delivery companies gear into their prime season.

We already have a fair amount of delivery services throughout the day but from here on out it will only get intense. Nothin' says Christmas like the sounds of a UPS truck -- how the times have changed . . .

Or, we could shop locally as the picture to the right indicates. There are a ton of attractive gifting items displayed in the storefronts in downtown Healdsburg.

Usually, we wind up spending some time in the local stores just to get the flavor of the old-time Christmas "rush".

I still remember very well walking on cold snowy sidewalks heading from Montgomery Wards to Sears to several other of the local stores in La Grange, Illinois during the Christmas shopping season.

As baseball season gears up for the final games in the coming weeks (Giants only need 8 more losses to make 100) football, on the other hand, is just beginning their season.

The first game for the "new" 49ers was last weekend -- it looked eerily like the way the 2016 season played out -- losing . . .

The attendance as well looked a bit light -- as shown in the photo to the left.

We'll see how the season progresses or doesn't in the coming few weeks. So far, the usual magic draw of the NFL is not there yet -- hopefully that will change.

On the other hand, our attention to puzzles have increased and we continually find a great deal of satisfaction out of struggling with putting "just one more piece together" . . .

That's a flavor of our week, see you all "in a few"!