There is some kind of truly nasty traffic on I-80 this weekend, heading toward San Francisco. I know this because we have been stuck in it, now, twice, and both times, on the trip back home, the traffic has shown no signs of abating. I am not entirely sure what is going on in the Bay Area, but whatever it is, I want no part of it. Anything so crowded that it will back traffic up nearly to Sacramento for days in a row is not my idea of fun.

We got stuck in it the first time on Friday evening, when we had to head back to the old house to do some paperwork. A trip that normally would have taken me about half an hour (since it was right about the time I would have been heading home from work) took nearly twice that long, and that’s only because we were able to take advantage of some of the off-the-highway routes we’re familiar with. The second time was yesterday, driving up to the ranch, although this time we could escape it sooner, and take the back country roads for the longest part of the journey. I feel bad for all the rest of the people stuck in it, though.

Our old house continues to mock me. When we were down there for the paperwork on Friday night we also swung by the house to pick up the house plans (which we’re leaving behind for whoever buys the place), and while we were there I decided to check the fruit trees to see what might have ripened since we’ve been gone. And what do you know. The Granny Smith apple tree which, until this year has managed to produce nothing more than very tiny, oddly shaped inedible apples, is suddenly full of huge apples, many of which were  (mostly) worm free, and ripe. So I found a cloth bag in the trunk of my car, and between the two of us, Richard and I managed to pull over a dozen huge apples off that tree. I dreamed of harvesting apples for years, waiting for that darn tree to finally produce, and now that it has finally decided to get with the apple-growing (apparently dropping a fence on it earlier in the year was just the kick-start it needed), we won’t be around to take advantage of it anymore. First the peach tree; now this. I suppose I can only be grateful that the grapefruit and the tangelo tree never even produced so much as a blossom this year, so at least they won’t be mocking me too.

Anyway. The apples have come home with us and are sitting in the fridge while I ponder what to do with them. I am thinking that there may have to be a pie in our near future, or possibly two (there’s certainly enough apples for them), and I am currently leaning towards the idea of putting the pies together and then freezing them for later. Somehow I think it would be appropriate. We had home-grown white peach cobbler for the family gathering on the Fourth of July; we can have home-grown apple pie for the family gathering this winter. And in the meantime, I guess I had better start mapping out where we could possibly plant a few more fruit trees in our new backyard, so perhaps in about five or six years time, I can do this again.