Last night there was a very light frost in low lying areas. Predictions are for lower temperatures tonight, though not likely a killing frost. Farmers worry about frost in September before crops mature. This mid-October first frost is very late.
It's very dry, it's been weeks since the last rain. It's so dry that some farmers are eschewing fall tillage because the dry soil is hard on equipment. A local electrician reports finding no moisture when digging for electrical work. I've given both my evergreen tree and lilac bush a good drink.
Weather talk is the resort when the writer lacks original thought.😀
Takk for alt,
Al
Today's random photo is in the Opera House in Budapest. Hungary.
Who needs periods? Not Norwegian Jon Fosse who wrote 670 page Septology without one. Fosse, the winner of the 2023 Nobel Prize for literature apparently has been writing in that style for years. It matters little reading his stream of consciousness books. Michele lent my his Aliss At The Fire, first published in 2004, and also written without a period... it doesn't matter.
Unlike Septology, which now may be my favorite book ever, replacing Suskao Endo's Silence, is brief, at only 107 pages. One sitting was enough to complete it. Should one want to tackle reading Fosse before attempting Septology, which I read twice for benefit, either Aliss or The Shining are brief books. Perhaps The Shining is the better of the two.
In 2002 Aliss still waits for her husband to return from boating on the fjord in 1979. While she waits family history is played out in her imagination. It was an eerie read because a friend in Norway, Knut's, brother was lost in similar circumstances. It's a very thought provoking book which will ruminate in my mind for a ling time.
I recommend it and reading Jon Fosse.
Takk for alt,
Al
By nature I'm a very linear person. Typically I read one book at a time, unlike others who have several books going simultaneously. However, I started a lengthy book but was moved also to read Sigrid Unset's Kristen Lavransdatter I: The Bridal Wreath. Naively thinking it was a single book, and not a trilogy, I first bought the second book. When I discovered my mistake it made me even more keen to read book One. Unset received the Nobel Prize for literature in 1928, and this book passes the test of time.
The books tell the story of a rich woman's life in thirteenth century Norway. While many of the customs are unfamiliar the human emotions and personal foibles are not. The book has been in continuous print since its first publication testifying to its enduring appeal.
Kristin is raised in a Norwegian manor house. It was personally intriguing to me becasue in our travels in Norway Joanne and I stayed in a manor house near Opdal, Norway. Our hosts were her second cousin and wife. Many of the place names in the book were also familiar from our travels in the country.
Reading Kristen engaged me from the outset and became even more compelling. Fortunately I have volume two so I can read on. These are books I'm finally reading that should have been read long ago.
Takk for alt,
Al
PS In the time in which the book is set daughters were clearly the property of their fathers until they were married. Even in our day there was vestige of this is in the wedding ceremonies when thee question was asked "Who gives this woman to this man?"
More digging has revealed the scope of the rock. (see yesterday's blog) It's dome shaped and digging has revealed that it's more than a rock, it's a boulder! With a surface of about four feet across it is clear I'm not going to get it out of the ground. The next step is conversation with the farmer who hays the land to see if he has an excavator.
Recovering the boulder is a possibility. Apparently its been farmer over as long as that land has been under the plow. So just leaving it is an option. Yet, now that it's uncovered it doesn't seem proper to just leave it. 10,000 years it has rested there, time to move?
Takk for alt,
Al
On the surface it was about the size of two dinner plates. Probing around it with the rod I use to pry out rocks revealed a much larger rock. Returning with a shovel and a crow bar I went to work. After clearing the dirt off the edges and top I found a place where the crow bar could get purchase for a pry. Pry I did without even being able to make the rock wiggle. The tip of the iceberg analogy fits for obviously this is much larger than revealed by its surface. . How did farm tillage implements avoid this stone? Because the top is rounded perhaps they slid over it. 10,000 years ago a glacier deposited it on this hillside and there it has been ever since. Now it is something for me to play with. Working until I tire I leave it assured that it will remain until I return.
This experience made me think of my grandfather, Lars Negstad. He began homesteading in 1885. On the land were many large rocks, much too large to be moved with horses. With my Dad when I was a boy I saw a flat rock with hole through it in a rock pile on the farm. When I asked Dad about that hole he explained. His father would chisel a hole deep into the rock, fill it with black powder, ignite the powder and fracture the rock. The pieces could then be removed. This was before dynamite. Even as a boy I recognized the labor it would take to chisel a rock so I asked Dad how long it would take. He said he probably could do it in a day. It boggles my mind to think of the labor and tedium to accomplish this, pounding for a day on a chisel. It also explains the sledgehammer we had on the farm with the working surface rounded into a mushroom shape.
Takk for alt,
Al
The field that holds the stone.
