Mainly treats

Once a year I expect my dog to earn her keep by wearing a silly costume and entertaining me and the entire neighborhood. She's a dog, and is highly evolved to make humans happy, so she complies.

Halloween was a success this year, primarily because I remembered to purchase candy. Last year I forgot, and remembered only on October 31st, as I was returning from a business trip at 8pm dragging my suitcase from the metro stop. I had to sneak in my back door because I didn't want kids to see me coming home and then have to admit that I had no candy.

My current roommate is from Thailand and this was his first Halloween. It's such an American holiday! He had fun passing out candy and complimenting all the little kids on their costumes. I taught him how to gently harass the teenagers who show up without costumes - but of course I give them candy anyway, after ribbing them a bit. I just want to reinforce the social contract: you show up at my door in a costume and say "trick or treat" and I give you a handful of nutritionally deficient food and tell you happy Halloween.

Walking

     On the spur of the moment last week, I decided to go camping. It's getting a little cold for tents, but there were no cabins available at the state parks. However, I found a camper that was being offered on AirBnB. Set up next to someone's house in rural Virginia, it was essentially a cabin plus en suite bathroom and kitchen.
     This was just the place for me to do a little refresher course based on the retreat I did last year. I walked, read books about philosophy, and took stock of the year. I checked in on my goals from last year (prognosis: some I had achieved and some I hadn't even remembered). It was a terrific break from life, and I might even try to do this every year.
     I decided to do some hiking while I was there, and found a five-mile trail rated "moderate" which ran along a tiny portion of the Applachian trail. Alas, the rating turned out to be inaccurate. Up and down mountains, climbing over boulders, on a track so studded with rocks that my foot hardly ever landed on a flat surface. The five miles ended up taking me five hours. Ooof. At the end, having already fallen a few times, I took extra care, as I was starting to worry that either the dog or I would come out of the trip with a sprained ankle (if dogs even have ankles). I haven't done a hike like that since Ben Nevis in Scottland twenty years ago, and I think I can wait another ten or twenty years to repeat the experience.
     I will say that the dog was a trooper. Mile one: lost of tail wagging and sniffing. Mile two: a bit more focused. Mile three and on: head down, still always ahead of me, but never a sideways sniff, as she seemed to figure out that we just needed to slog this out. The good attitude was in spite of her sad discovery that bees have stingers - for years, Ada has been snapping at bees. During the hike, she finally caught her first bee, but then immediately spit it out and pawed at her mouth for a couple of minutes. I felt bad, of course, but there's no other way for a creature with a one-ounce brain (that'd be the dog, not the bee) to learn. And this bigger-brained creature has learned her lesson: read the trail guides REALLY carefully.

Food

 This is the point where I'm really ready for the garden to be done. Luckily, it's easy to coast on the efforts of the early summer. Because it's cool, the weeds grow slowly, and I'll just wait until it freezes to pull them. The last of the peppers, eggplant, and tomatoes are coming in, and I get a few pints of raspberries every week.

      I didn't have time to put in a fall garden, which gives me a breather, although I'm trying to use some of the time to take notes. I've decided I'm done with edamame - they grow really well but they take a ton of space in the freezer. While I like them, I wouldn't miss them if they were gone. Instead, I'd like to try growing more carrots. It would be great to have enough to eat through most of the winter, although I've never come close to that. Also, I've asked my parents to bring some metal fence posts for next year, because I need some way to corral the floppy asparagus so that a 3' wide bed doesn't become a 6' wide bed, which shades everything around it and makes it impossible to mow.
     In other food news, my freezer is stuffed full and I noticed that some of the dry goods in my pantry came with me when I moved into the house two years ago. I think this calls for drastic action, so I decided to restrict my grocery budget until I've eaten through some of these stores. My regular budget is $50/week, but I'm aiming for $10/week until about Christmas. I've even roped in a few people to give me moral support. Another frugal friend is has a goal of $20 weekly grocery bill and my mother has vowed to not buy any meat until Thanksgiving, because she has so much pork and beef stashed in her freezer. I've managed to spend only $5 in two weeks, so I think this might actually work for me. But I'm just a single person, so I shall have to be diligent.