Summer starting

It is already mid summer here. The temperature hits more than 30 degrees C everyday. No rain at all. It has become a routine work for me to water vegetables and flowers spending half an hour as soon as I finish breakfast. I am afraid this drought may have an adverse effect on farming and, of course, water deficit. Actually, in the western Japan, there are areas with water shortage. Sometimes, there are vigorous rainfalls for short time. But such rain won't be very beneficial for crops. They need long lasting rain typical for the rainy season. 

While making this post, I found the weather bureau announcing that the rainy season was over in this area. It is about 3 weeks earlier than usual and the earliest record start of summer.

Seeing the growing vegetables every morning is still a pleasure for me. We, living things, are in the same flow of life in the world even if our forms of appearance in the world are different each other. 

A pumpkin planted at a corner of the garden. There are several of them around the garden. They are very lively and are growing well. 

A Katsura tree, that is, a Judas tree in the western side of the front garden. Grown very high, the main trunk and big branches were cut several years ago. It still grows as if nothing has happened. What a will for life even though it won't grow from its will but lives as it is scheduled! It should have grown in larger area like a park. So far, I would care for it as it fits this garden.

A few trees of Japanese Stewartia are growing along the fence.

Strongly growing old magnolia in the front garden. It is older than 30 years for now. 

The other day, when pulling the weeds complicatedly grown among lawn, a music has been going around in my mind. Faure's 1st piano quintet. I have introduced it before as one of my most favorite piece of music.  

I often listen to this piece when going to sleep at night. It sure makes me feel at peace. Away from every anxiety and trouble in the world as well as around me, it brings me up to a higher place. It sounds as if Faure himself would talk to me in person. He seemed to have spent a long time to complete composing this piece since he got an idea for this one. It was when he had come into the last chapter of life as a composer that he had finished composing it. It was the time he started to have the hearing issue which was crucial as a composer. 

Is it only a diversion from hardship in life I am confronting to that I am soothed with this music?    

 

  

Alstroemeria

 Alstroemeria is fully blooming in the garden of my parents' house. Chinese knotweed or other weeds are among them. Alstroemeria is still triumphing in the garden. It has been in the shade of the big zelkova for years and has been bothered by the other weeds. With that big tree cut a couple of years ago, it has become vivid again. It's hued elegantly pink. If my parents were still there, they might be very delighted to see them coming out this way. I would care for them even better and this bulbous flower may bloom beautifully for a long time.

It is getting muggy and hot like in mid summer. We should have been accustomed with this high humidity but could not help complaining of the rapid transition to mid summer. Spring crisp is still missed. Summer vegetables are growing. One of radishes was already harvested. Tomatoes are getting ripened. So sweet and fresh.  

As written elsewhere, my father used not to be able to sleep well when he got older. It seems I have inherited that trait from him. After 4 hours sleep, I got fully awake. As he used to, I would spend a few hours with reading and writing before it dawns. I should have been more sympathetic to him when he complained of insomnia. I used to tell him to get up early and to be sunbathed. It could adjust our body clock. But at this age, I again realized our body clock itself could get senile. 

One more topic. I have wondered why our government had provided large amount of reserve fund, which is not necessary to be discussed as for the purpose and use at the diet before it is enforced. It is like the government's free wallet. For the past several years, it is amounted up to 10 trillion JPY per a year. It is comparable to the amount of the budget for education etc. Even the board of audit has questioned about it announcing they could not trace 11 trillion JPY of that reserve fund.

I was astonished our government had spent over 200 trillion JPY for the pandemic since 2000. The expenditure for the vaccine development was only 0.3 trillion JPY. Most of the budget have been executed for "unknown" things. Together with falsification and concealment of official documents the Abe administration has committed, isn't it a sign of "kleptocracy"? It is a grave sign for a democratic society. But very little is discussed or even publicated by the mass media. 

It is another reason why I am prone to suffer from insomnia.  

Beef and potato stew

 I might have posted this menu in the blog. The difference from previous one is that those home grown vegetables, potatoes and onions, were used. Potatoes were really newly harvested ones. Onions were 2 weeks old having been dried under the eaves. 

The probability of failure in cooking this is as scarce as hen's teeth.

Satisfying result. Other menus of potato will follow this since a lot of potatoes are stored in the shed. I will send some to a friend violinist ad well as a few family folks.

The other batches will be gathered in very soon. This species of potato has shorter resting time and some of them would be planted in fall. 

Four of pumpkins, planted a week or two ago, are growing nicely. Melon and water melon have been also planted. A few of the seedlings of water melon are growing in pots. It is amazing they are growing successfully without fertilizer but only with compost. The soil might be well nourished since this area was a forest owned by my mother's family decades ago. The fallen leaves and even weeds would be a source of the other lives thereafter. A miracle but a reality. Human beings should behave in the same way.

Re-run of nuclear power plants is insane

In Japan, in proportion to the recent rise of the energy cost, the electricity charges are increased by 30 or 40% for the past several months. Some people insist the nuclear power plants should be re-run in order to have the power rate reduced. It seems, however, a plot by the power companies that would not lose the chance to get profit to run the nuclear power plants. Without running them, they are losing so much as billions of Yen in a year to maintain the resting nuclear power plants.

Compared with the renewable energy, the cost of nuclear power generation has turned out to be much more than expected. In addition, there are too many issues regarding nuclear power plant's operation. Risk for another serious accident, no policy/idea to deal with Plutonium produced and with the used nuclear fuel/

contaminated water  and the unforeseeable future of the crippled nuclear power plants in Fukushima and so forth.

As a matter of fact, there are two serious problems in front of us regarding the sequel of the accident in Fukushima. 

The first is the fragility of the pressure vessel supporting structure. There have been a series of pretty big aftershocks around Fukushima. So far, they have not further devastated the plant yet. There could be the other structures vulnerable to further quake. If those structures fail to stand, it will result in further contamination of radiation all around. It would be quite tough for them to manage the situation.

https://www.asahi.com/ajw/articles/14632301?fbclid=IwAR0zENVmMpztmhx4cxsqI8UcjNST--tUQ-hgUGoNUpS_dmYkLspVE7vIUiQ

The other issue is the childhood thyroid cancer in Fukushima. It's been argued as a consequence of mass screening with sensitive ultrasonogram. But during 3 years between two mass screenings in Fukushima, there have been 68 new cases found in 2016, which should be regarded most probably as a sequel of the nuclear accident. A recent research published in Nature has disclosed close relationship between the air radiation dose and the occurrence of childhood thyroid cancer as well as the protective effect of evacuation.  

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32139763/

It takes more than, at least, 20trillion JPY to recover the crippled nuclear power plants in Fukushima. Even if it should be achieved, more than 1000 victims of nuclear power plant accident related deaths and tens of thousand of people eternally losing their home land could not be recovered. Re-run of nuclear power plants in the country of earth quake is an insane decision.   

Unsuccessful hunting, Soba farm, Distant memory of the woods

When I was working in the garden as usual yesterday, Hikaru was rushing toward me with something in his mouth. What? Was the poor victim a mouse? No, it was smaller than it. Any small animal like a mole? Mole could never be in the brightness out of soil. Running around me as if bragging the game, he eventually had it fall before me. It has flapped into the sky. It was a small bird, possibly a sparrow. Hikaru ran after it to the fence. And he has given it up on the top of the fence looking after that bird.

In the drizzly gloomy day, he occupies this place beside the window, where he could monitor around the garden. Mostly, just napping. He has completely recovered from the trauma and septic condition. Regaining even more appetite than before. He still sometimes waits for us before a cupboard where Churu is stored. But dry food is OK for him now. He seems to aim at 10kg of body weight.

It is a typical day of the rainy season. While rain won't drop, I have pulled some weeds. No end of the job. Yesterday, the 2nd batch of potatoes was harvested. Leek was taken from the farm and cooked for side material to boiled mackerel with sweetened miso. I have forgotten taking its picture. It is a common family dish in Japan.

The neighbor farmer has planted soba in his farm. It has grown and is blooming like this. Soba is often used as green manure. It also adjusts the nutrients in the spoil since it absorbs nutrients much. The white flowers look like a carpet.

As reiterated in this blog, there used to be woods like that behind the soba farm when I grew up here. I was here only for a few years and had gone to Tokyo before I entered elementary school. The memory is only sketchy. Wind was blowing among trees in the woods. People in the sanatorium singing hymn every morning. It was the very first memory in my life. The woods has extended a few miles to a town near by. Of course, it has been developed into residential and industrial area now. The woods being there in the same manner as decades ago even if it is smaller in size, it is still deeply moving to me. Starting my life here and going to end the journey at the same place. 

 

Tempura

Yesterday, the dinner menu was Tempura. I rarely cook that dish. One reason is that it is not easy to do with the used oil after cooking. But its simplicity as a dish has made me try it yesterday.

Wow, messy table. I should have cleaned it before taking this photo.

The right one is sardines, of course, fried. It was my first experience to fillet it. Chicken was seasoned with sake and soy sauce before being cooked. A few vegetables as well were fried. As a conclusion, pretty successful.

It reminded me of my father who used to cook this dish pretty often. He has fried everything in Tempura. However, one day, the oil fired itself. The small dining kitchen was choked with soot and the ceiling got literally black with it. He was lucky not to have it burned. Ever since, I believe, he has stopped cooking Tempura. I could have made the same trouble without the timer built in the stove. Again, I realize I am following the same milestone of life after him.

Still busy to cut/pull the weeds in the garden. I need to prepare a bit more spots for pumpkins and water melons. Even if my place is large compared with the standard homes in our country, it is not east to get spots for several of them, which require about 2 or 3 sq meters for each of them. The spots should be well drained as well as well sunny. When I find such a place, I plow and put some compost there. I am not using fertilizer or other chemicals as a rule. You may find those tiny farms at separated places in our garden. Kind of funny.

It was brightly sunny this afternoon. Cool and breezy. We are still in the rainy season and may have damp days again from tomorrow. It is not very comfortable but is necessary for vegetables and crops to grow. Snow pea and onion are over. Potatoes are being harvested. If I count all the vegetables growing here, they are okra, leek, spinach, sweet potato, water spinach, radish, carrot, egg plant, ginger, common bean, soy bean, pumpkin, water melon, melon and tomapi depicted in another post.  I have forgotten adding tomato to the list. It is getting gorgeously ripened. It sounds like a real farm even though the size is very small. It is just a result having worked in the garden farm every day. Not boasting at all. There are a lot of troubles around me, the society and the world. I could be free from them so far as I am working in the garden. 

The First Batch

 I have dug out the 1st batch of potatoes. From two plants. Small and big, mostly less than medium sized. I have not used fertilizer at all. Despite of modest size, they still satisfied me. It was exciting to see them rolling out from the ground. Ten or even twenty times of this amount may follow.

News told that the cost of fertilizers is has risen up to 190% recently. The highest cost ever. It is due to the Ukrainian war and the decline of Japanese Yen. 

In addition, the working population of agriculture has fallen by 25% for the past 5 years. It might drop rapidly since the most of the farmers are older than 65 years of age. 

It is the crisis of food self sufficiency, the rate being only 38% at present, in our country. Politics, either of ruling party or of the biggest opposition party, is too optimistic for the crisis. They are concerned about military expansion confronted with the war in Ukraine. 

My duty is to avoid starvation for the family. I will be hustling planting vegetables for fall.

Defeated and wounded

Hikaru has been ill for several days. One day, he suddenly became inactive and feverish. My wife has taken him to a vet doctor nearby. Nothing wrong found except for fever. In a day, he has developed a mass, a soft tissue mass, apparently an abscess on a submandibular area as described like a chart. Even inspecting his neck more precisely, he has had a wound, pretty big, next to the mass. 

We have concluded he was fighting somewhere outdoor with a certain invader, possibly, the big black cat often seen in the garden, and was wounded badly by him/her in a fight. It has caused a big abscess. Even, septic. He was rushed to another vet who cared for him nicely. He was given a slowly effective antibiotic intramuscularly. In a day or two, the mass has started shrinking and became drained the pus through a spontaneous fistula.

Yesterday, he has asked me to let go out at the kitchen door. Hesitatingly, I opened the door and he went out a step or two. Then, he came back inside. What a pitty! He always loved walking around the property vigilantly against any invader. But he has learned that there had been even stronger invaders who could defeat him. Even if he had been praised for his well-muscled body by a nurse of the end vet clinic.

Two things good for him might be being served with the good meal. And we have a bit of medical knowledge for him even if I have been far away from the clinical practice for years and my wife has been only a shrink head doc.

Hopefully, when he is fully recovered, he might enjoy going out for a short time.