Category Archives: General

Red cool chili peppers

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Here we are in January and our jalapeño plant is finishing up its appointed job of ripening its fruit.

pepper plant

Some websites say jalapeño plants can live several years if protected from weather that’s too cold. Other sites are less optimistic about their survival, or the quality of the fruit they produce in their old age. We’re keeping ours in our office, so I guess we’ll see.

Leah was preparing some shrimp for dinner a few days ago. She suggested making cornbread and using some jalapeños in the mix. That sounded good to me.

chili ready for cutting

As I have mentioned before, our jalapeño plant was a gift from our neighbor Deb. They have a nice chili aroma and a nice, mild chili flavor but absolutely no heat at all. So I cut up a few store-bought green pickled jalapeños for a little spice. Unfortunately I didn’t put enough in.

chili cornbread

You can see plenty of red here, but not much green. I still thought it was pretty good, but Leah wanted more heat. I guess next time I’ll put more green chilis in.

I have saved some seeds from our jalapeño plant. Between them and our current plant, if it survives, we should get more mild chilis next year. I think I’ll buy another plant or seeds and hope for a spicier jalapeño to mix with the mild ones.

I’m looking forward to that.

The iron bridge

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The iron bridge over Armuchee Creek just north of Rome was built in 1935.

iron bridge 1

This photo was taken on Sunday after a weekend of rain, so the creek is running high. On a normal day you can wade across the creek.

The bridge is not quite as old as it seems, but it’s still kind of a thrill to drive over it.

This bridge is located on Scenic Road, which I think used to be Little Texas Valley Road before Little Texas Valley Road was rerouted to enter US 27 a few hundred yards south of the creek. Highway 27 crosses the creek over a modern bridge, from which you may be able to catch a glimpse of the iron bridge a few hundred yards upstream. I usually take the old road.

The bridge is a Warren pony truss bridge. According to dictionary.com, a pony truss bridge has its deck between the top and bottom chords and has no lateral bracing at the top. It is a Warren truss bridge because it has multiple triangles in the truss. It was redecked about seven years ago, but you might not think it when you look carefully.

iron bridge board

According to Bridgehunter.com, it is rated as structurally deficient. This site says that it has average daily traffic of 600 vehicles, which is quite a bit more than I would have expected.

Armuchee, which I have always heard pronounced as if it had a second “r” before the “ch” (“Armurchee”), is a fairly nebulously-defined area today. It used to be a town with its own power-generation dam right about where the iron bridge stands, and quite a few businesses, including a railroad depot. Scenic Road becomes Depot Street when it crosses US 27.

I won’t be surprised if the county decides one day to close the bridge rather than try to update it. Today it really serves no purpose other than nostalgia.

First and last

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It was cloudy, cold and windy all Wednesday morning, but the sun finally came out this afternoon. When we opened the curtains in the bedroom the temperature went from 66 to 68 within a few minutes.

Despite the sun today and the predicted sun on Thursday, the ground will not have dried by the time the next predicted rain comes on Friday. So, there won’t be any more clearing for the new house for a while. Neighbor John’s bulldozer is still sitting quietly on the lot.

This coming year will have some landmark events. I will reach one more milestone on the way to old age: I’ll qualify for Medicare. I look forward to that, because my health insurance costs should go down significantly. Leah will be on a Medicare Advantage plan for the first time since she qualified for Medicare through a disability. Her old Medicare supplement was very expensive; the new plan will save us quite a lot of money in premiums. That will be nice.

Another big event will be (we hope) the completion of a new house. From here and now the process looks like an arduous climb up a steep mountain. Maybe not Everest, but at least Wheeler Peak. But I think we’ll both be pleased with the results.

I hope we can take a couple of trips in the coming year. We had to cancel our last trip because of Leah’s continuing problems with an intestinal blockage. That problem seems to be in abeyance. Leah has an appointment with her surgeon next week; maybe we’ll learn more then. Aside from that, I don’t expect any big events, good or bad, in the coming year. I think I like it that way.

This will be the last post written in 2014 and the first that appears in 2015. I have not been satisfied with my rate of posting in the last few months. Maybe I can change that in the new year.

In the meantime, Leah and I hope you all have a great new year.

Christmas morning 2014

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christmas 2014
We spent a quiet day on Christmas. Leah is still watching her food to try to prevent further digestive problems, so we didn’t have a big Christmas dinner. We didn’t see relatives or friends until my brother, his wife, and his older son came down on Friday. We expect New Year’s Eve to be about the same.

Leah thinks this sounds depressing, but it really wasn’t.

 

Cool peppers

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Our neighbor across the street gave us a jalapeño plant back in the summer. It was a nice, little plant with a couple of little chiles. They grew up, and we (mostly I) ate them. They were  essentially entirely without heat, but quite tasty. We brought it in when the weather turned, and it has been growing new peppers ever since.

jalapeno plant

It’s heavy with fruit now. The leaves are looking kind of ragged but it is still managing to ripen some peppers. I would have eaten a red one and a green on Sunday evening, but I was so tired* I didn’t feel like cooking anything that took longer than 90 seconds. There are a few tiny, little baby jalapeños on the plant, but I doubt that they will get the chance to ripen. Still, there are plenty left to eat.

 

* Leah and I spent a sleepless Saturday night at the ER. She had another episode with her chronic bowel obstruction. She came home Sunday morning, although her doctor would have preferred her to stay. She’ll probably make an appointment to see him later in the week. In the meantime, she’s feeling OK but now on a liquid diet. No jalapeños for her.