I drink tea, not coffee, but word of another Starbucks arriving in our area always gets my attention, because I can’t wait to read what the editor of this newspaper will have to say about it. By now, faithful readers of the ad staff blogs know that Len LeBarth is one caffeinated critter, and he probably needs four Starbucks to relay himself across town.  I also like to see the independent purveyors flourish, especially when they have bad pun names like Daily Grind or cryptic ones like Kaffe T Latta, over on Plumas Street.  (Is the “T” for owner Toni Ruiz?) I wonder if somewhere there is a local coffee joint called “Java, the Hut.”

I was at the DQ last night (Blizzard. small. chocolate. m&ms) and confirmed what I have been observing for the past few months:  Ranch dressing is the new ketchup.  Everybody was asking for ranch dipping sauce to go with their fries.  The staff had it pre-poured into those little plastic cups right at the counter, so apparently the five people I saw getting it weren’t just part of a ranch dressing cult, say, the Hidden Valley Brotherhood, that happened to be meeting on Live Oak last night.  Well, if they are already deep-frying Milky Ways at county fairs, this shouldn’t be a surprise.  Then again, who am I to cavil? Have you ever had the deep-fried pickles at the Silver Dollar Saloon?  I tasted some (reluctantly) at a hotel trade show in New York a few years ago and was looking for them in the wild ever since.  Then I moved to Marysville and, bam!, they got ’em right here.  Maybe I should serve the next batch of onion rings with ranch.  (Only three pounds of onions left!)  

…Organic Veggies arrive today!”  What, you were thinking of something else? This afternoon is the first distribution of the season for shares of the crops from Jim Muck’s organic farm in Wheatland.  Can’t wait to see what I’ll be cooking with for the coming week.  I signed up to share a share, as it were, with another household.  Which turns the old “sharecropper” term on its head; now I am “cropsharer”!  A full share feeds four with vegetables and sometimes fruit, herbs, whatever, for about $20 a week.  The contents each week all depends on what’s ready to be harvested. So as I write this, Jim is busy plucking the stuff right from the soil to bring over here later in the day.  This is part of a growing national trend (and we *are* turning out to be quite the trendsetters here in Yuba-Sutter), called Community Supported Agriculture.  The idea is to pay the local farmer up front so he or she can invest in all the materials and equipment needed for the year’s crops without having to fork over all the cash or even borrow money.  You become a shareholder (sometimes called a “subscriber” or a “member”) in the farm’s production. Don’t know if Jim has any shares left to sell, but you can check his website or give him a call.  For other CSA options, go to the Local Harvest website and pop in your zip code, or Google “Community Supported Agriculture” for many other websites with good info on our region’s agriculture.  Support Your Local Farmer — it builds our local economy and it saves you money, too! 

Just so you know, I am down to only 12 giant onions from the original 50 pounds. Friends can now stop avoiding me for fear I will foist a few on them as they leave. The milestone has been achieved by making yet another four authentic Swiss onion pies, easily two gallons of French onion soup (complete with crouton and cheese topping) and a giant batch of onion rings from a reader recipe.  The Plumas Street Farmer’s Market opens for the year this Saturday (yippee!), so if all else fails maybe I can use them for barter. 

Monday was my third class of six at Yuba College on “Sacred Collage,” in which students learn to explore their inner selves, so to speak, using art and meditation. You don’t need to know how to draw or paint; the collages require nothing more than scissors, rubber cement and your choice of hundreds of photos and other images supplied by the instructor.  It’s one of the many interesting courses offered as part of the Community Education program.  Click this link for a peek at the current offerings; you can brush up on old skills or learn new ones, or just do something for the fun of it. From Home Brewing Basics to Boogie-Woogie Piano, Cardio Kickboxing to Retirement Planning, Quilting to QuickBooks, there’s something for just about everyone. Classes are not too expensive; on-campus parking is just a dollar a visit.  For next semester, I am wavering between “Make Money Selling Books Online” and “Let’s Make a Puppet.”   

My mother arrived Wednesday, and it is probably no coincidence that my apricot and peach trees fruited just about overnight.  There must be 200 teeny apricots on the one tree and several dozen even smaller beginning peaches.  Can’t wait to taste them.  And, no doubt, give some away. I am still harvesting two dozen oranges a day, along with a few lemons from those younger trees. A girl can only drink so much freshly squeezed orange juice.  Now I am making orange chicken, orange cupcakes, orange sorbet…. And, of course, I am still busy freezing chopped onions — 20 pounds left in the bag.  I now am giving away oranges and onions; I should find a recipe that uses both so I can tuck that into the bag when I foist off the produce on my neighbors. I think I’ll check the Food Network’s website; they have literally thousands of free recipes from all the shows and their celeb chefs.

It’s also no coincidence that, with the start of my mother’s visit, I spent the last hour running a WeedEater in the South Meadow.  She’s the plant whisperer, and already has attacked the extensive needs of the backyard. Yesterday, we went to the plant sale put on by the Sutter Buttes Garden Club (of which we are new members), and came away with a few items and some good suggestions from the Master Gardener on duty.  We also bought our tickets for the club’s May 3 Garden Tour.  Then we buzzed back to the house, dropped off the box of plants, picked up Jet and went over to the Marysville Cemetery to see how the bi-annual work party was going.  Sure enough, there were people out there weeding and moving bricks and raking and mowing.  If you want a free glimpse into Marysville’s history, just walk around and read some of the headstones.

OK, back to the garden….

If you are reading this on Saturday, you should be over at the spring book sale at the Yuba County Library, organized by the Friends of the Yuba County Library.  I was helping set up yesterday and I can tell you that there are LOADS of wonderful books. Except for a few exceptional volumes priced at $3, you can get any hardcover for just a buck, trade paperbacks (some look brand new!) for 50 cents and pocket-size paperbacks for a mere two bits.  All the proceeds go to supporting the Library’s many wonderful programs.

On the other hand, if you are reading this on Sunday, you have two more bites at the apple of knowledge: the book sale continues on Monday and Tuesday.  Be there or be square.  I am sure you know where the Library is, but just in case — it’s in historic downtown Marysville at C and 3.

When it comes to all things horticultural, like the Peter Sellars’ character, I like to watch. While my brother’s several fruit trees keep his whole block in citrus for most of the year and my mother can grow a gardenia on a guava graft, I specialize in keeping drought-resistant succulents from total desiccation. Gardening skills apparently are not hereditary. Fortunately, having been an apartment dweller since middle childhood, I have had only to deal with a few window boxes and terrace planters, and the occasional well-meaning gift of a plant or tree. (Ask me about my poetic masterpiece, “Ode to a Dead Palm.” ) At some points during the year, friends would find it difficult getting through my front door because of the two overgrown ficus trees that flanked it, and would ask, “Isn’t it time for your mother to come visit?”

Now, here in Marysville, I have a house that came with a front yard, a back yard, and even a side yard, complete with seven fruit trees, roses, camellias, hydrangea and wisteria. Make that eight fruit trees; Kelly Richcreek just up and gave me a Meyer Lemon tree. (There are other flowers and shrubs and trees; I just don’t know what they are yet.) Amazingly, everything is blossoming beautifully, despite my semi-benign neglect. I have yet to mow or weed or prune on my own. (Turning liability into asset, I refer to the overgrown side yard with two-foot grass as “The Meadow.” ) I have remembered to water (most of the time), and a few weeks ago my neighbor Merry Finch showed up at the front door with her shears and gardening shoes and said “I am here to prune your fruit trees.” She worked some magic with the apricot and the peach (or nectarine). Since Merry is a stone fruit person, the citrus trees remain wild, albeit productive.

Aside from watering, I harvest. Harvesting consists of going out every morning with a big bowl and a garbage bag and picking up all the oranges that have fallen during the night, culling the good ones for my new breakfast juice ritual. Freshly squeezed OJ is one of nature’s greatest delights. I have been getting so much juice, I had to get a bigger juicer. ($ 9.97 Osterizer on sale!)

I went to both of the Rummage Sales at the two Methodist churches (MVL and YC) on Friday, and at one picked up a Sunset book on pruning for just 10 cents. So now I am studying all the do’s and don’ts for each plant and tree, but I am holding out for my mother’s arrival on the 16th, confident that she and her two green thumbs will come to my rescue. There are two pairs of green rubber gardening shoes sitting by my back door; mine and my mother’s. Although mine are a size larger, I could never fill hers.

Hurry up, Mom. The Sedlers said we can borrow their roto-tiller!

I went to the Home and Garden Show on Saturday, looking for some information and inspiration, and I found a little bit of both.  I
-  learned a lot about the names, prices and grades of hardscape materials;
- found an alternative to pink panther style insulation (being installed later this month; I work fast!);
- bought some Chili y Limòn roasted almonds from The Nutty Gourmet from over in Arbuckle; 
- located a bathtub refinisher;
- had a lengthy discussion with Keith Buttacavoli about bathroom window options;
- checked in with Rahma and Victor Krambo at the All Electric stand to see if solar sales were sunny;
- said “Hi” to Vanessa Helder, whose Julia Morgan-designed photography studio I toured for tile ideas;
- got an application for the Sutter Buttes Garden Club for my mother (their annual Plant Sale is Saturday, April 19 and their annual Garden Tour is on May 3);
- had a tri-tip sandwich for lunch;
- watched that pots and pans guy sell, well, pots and pans, in his 25-seat “theatre”;
- had my post-surgical right meniscus electrically stimulated by some acu-contraption and
- picked up the spring catalogs from Pampered Chef and Tupperware.
I just unpacked some of my own Tupperware yesterday; I got some of these pieces from my mother when I moved into my own place about a thousand years ago.  I think some of them were from when I was a kid, when Mom was a Tupperware party-giver.  I guess I am a Tupperware purist; I go for the pale pastels of the ’50s, and find the square units stack best. But they have this new line of cheery cherry red stuff and since my new kitchen is black and white with red accents, it was very tempting. I may have to call Lori Texeira and see when her next demo is. 

Big thrill:  I pulled a purple egg at the Pooh Dooty stand and won $50 worth of services.  Sandy and Glenn Diggs were kind enough to let me keep the prize, even though Jet and I are already loyal customers. 

Finally, I went over to chat with the rep from Costco to tell her how many of us here are waiting for Costco to show up with a nice big store for us.  She said someone at the show told *her* that a Yuba-Sutter location was on the drawing board, but she had no official word from HQ about it.  Come on, guys! 

I ended up my day at the Fairgrounds with a purchase of some beef jerky from Tuff Stuff Jerky over in Browns Valley. I was tempted by the chipotle flavor but went with the peppered teriyaki.  Their website gave me a chuckle — the homepage includes an invitation to the public to stop by for the “famous 90-second tour off our establishment.” 

We have the most amazing food things being grown and made around here.  I think Yuba-Sutter is ripe for big-time agritourism and I love the Chamber of Commerce’s guide to local ag places.  Placer County next door has leveraged their agricultural attributes to great effect; we should do the same.

I hear there is a new drama playing around town and it’s by request only. It’s a one-hour historical set piece, performed by three Yuba County residents who have taken on the task of portraying the three Murphy sisters — Sarah, Harriet and our very own Mary – who crossed into California one fateful winter over what is now known as the Donner Pass. They settled in for a while in what is now Marysville, re-named after Mary married Mr. Covillaud and he became mayor. Apparently political office came with naming rights in those days, or maybe it was because he owned most of the land!  So that is why we don’t today live in a place called Cordua Ranch or Featherriverville.  The current Murphy Sisters, who made their first general public appearance during the recent Bok Kai parade (they were in the prairie schooner), are played by a trio of history buffs:  Sarah, the eldest, by Kathy Sedler, president of YubaRoots; Harriet, the middle sister, by Sue Cejner-Moyers, president of the Friends for the Preservation of Yuba County History, and Meriam (a.k.a Mary), the youngest, by Karen Compton, who organized the wonderful Golden Days of Marysville festival earlier this year. 

The Murphy Sisters (or rather their 21st-century stand-ins) are available for living history performances. For more information, email “Harriet,” er, Sue.   

Anybody need any onions?  I made the ultimate impulse purchase at the Cash & Carry the other day. I went in to get some of those paper napkins you put in a dispenser like they have in a diner. (I had found a very cool Jade-ite green plastic one from the 40s or 50s in a thrift shop. Martha Stewart must have missed that one.)  I came out with a bundle of napkins and a 50-pound bag of onions.  Hey, I could not resist: it was only four (yes, 4) bucks.  For the onions, not the napkins. They were even cheaper. So now I am handing them out (the onions, not the napkins) to friends and neighbors (as well as friends who also are neighbors). And I am getting ready to make Marysville’s largest-ever vat of onion soup, some Swiss onion pies, roasted onions and root vegetables and then I’ll chop up some to freeze.  All onion recipes welcome, provided they call for at least 5 large yellow ones.

Is this cool or what?  I wrote a post yesterday about The Beatles, and when I clicked over to my blog just now, there was a HUGE picture of the Fab Four in the right hand column, a keyword-generated ad for Beatles ringtones.  I love Google !!  See if it worked for you, too.  Look over to the right. See any Beatles?  John? Paul? George? Ringo?  Note how I am using Beatles keywords in order to drive up the relevance score.  How am I doing?  Go ahead, hit refresh and see if you get a Beatles photo.  Again.  Again.  Thanks, I need the clicks!! 

[Disclaimer: This post has absolutely nothing to do with Marysville except that I am betting there are a few Beatles fans in town to whom this might be a compelling topic.] 

I just read about the death of “the Fifth Beatle,” Neil Aspinall.  Sorry to hear he is gone, but…who? He was the Fifth Beatle??  Then what about the 2006 headline, “Fifth Beatle Billy Preston dies” or the ongoing career of “Fifth Beatle” Sir George Martin (record-producing Beatle pianist still alive and kicking at 82), or Beatles discoverer/manager Brian Epstein, the “Fifth Beatle” who died in 1967? (For the record, Paul, and he oughta know, said if anyone was the Fifth Beatle, it would have been Brian.) Then again, considering that Pete Best was the band’s original drummer, that would make Ringo the actual Fifth Beatle (he joined them only in 1962). I won’t even go into how Ringo could actually be considered the sixth Beatle since there was that original fifth band member, Stu Sutcliffe, who stayed behind in Hamburg when the boys went back to Liverpool. (Paul just switched from lead to bass, and then there were four.) Wait, I have all this Beatles trivia stuffed in my head, accumulating since I first saw them on the Ed Sullivan Show  and, yes, went to their concert at Shea Stadium (with, I can now admit, my mom).   Maybe *I* am the Fifth Beatle.  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Fundraising chairman Dan Rosaschi gave me the tally for the take from the Paws-ta dinner in support of the new Off the Leash dog park:  $2,245 !!   The dinner was delicious, thanks in part to incredible brownies for dessert and the fact that the pasta sauce didn’t come out of a can; it was donated by the Dancing Tomato Caffé.   Petco came through with coupons and dog treats for table favors, and Miss Charlotte’s donated several gorgeous gift baskets for the drawing.  Grrrrrazie!  The next fundraiser is coming up soon: a rummage sale. Date to be advised, but save that stuff (non-clothing) you don’t need anymore and donate it to the doggies. For more info, email yubasutterdogpark@yahoo.com.

I have to get a bigger calendar.  There are so many events and goings-on around town that I want to experience, and that’s just what’s printed in the A-D!  Friday I played hooky for half a day and went to JoAnn (or is it Joann?) to buy a small piece of red and gold Chinese brocade. My intention was to make a bandana for Jet to wear to the Bok Kai festivities. (When I put it on him Saturday he was indignant and I agreed he looked too much the dandy, so we decided his red harness would be enough of an homage.)  Back to Friday, I went to Joann (or is it JoAnn?) with Kathy Sedler, the genealogy whiz whose YubaRoots website is a primo source of historical records for our county. She was looking for some 1850-ish fabric to add aother dress to the wardrobe of Sarah Murphy Foster, the sister of Mary, after whom our town is named.  Then I went with her to Michaels (or is it Michael’s?) to look for an old-fashioned dip pen with which she would be writing her letters back home from the trail west.  (More on these living history bits later.)   From there, we went to Red Robin for lunch and then could not resist a quick stop at the Goodwill.  Scored a valance made of the same material as a set of sheets I got there the week before.  (I will delve into thrifts in a later post, and in the meantime welcome all suggestions for where to go.) 

Back at the house, it was a quick change of clothes and then a walk over to the First United Methodist for the annual spaghetti dinner and Pie Auction.  A lemon meringue garnered the top bid of $55.  I was outbid on a pecan and a cinnamon coffee cake, (I note that there are a lot of spaghetti dinners scheduled; I guess this is the preferred menu for fundraisers around here.  Speaking of which, don’t forget the upcoming Paws-ta dinner - $15 for grown-ups - to raise $ for the new off-leash dog park. See earlier post for details.)   

Saturday, I was up early to run over to the rummage sale at the Senior Center on 14th Street, then doubled back to St. John’s Episcopal for the second day of their book sale.  I have stacks and stacks of boxed books crowding my dining room right now, but, hey, I found a few more I could not live without.  Best find was a 1950s era pamphlet with 500 snack recipes, profusely illustrated.  The pamphlet, not the snacks.  I’ll find a good one to share (but it will not be the first one I happened to flip to: Balls on Sticks.) 

By then the crowds were gathering for the Bok Kai parade and I got home just in time to snag the last remaining parking space in front of my own house.   At 10:30 Jet and I headed off, equipped with camera, dog treats and a plastic bag (just in case).  We went down to D and 5th to find a good vantage point; Jet trotted along unphased by the crowds or even the horses.  The Chinese cymbals gave him a start, but the firecrackers are what did him in.  Poor little guy was huddled up against a store window waiting for it to all go away.   (Needless to say, I cancelled plans to take him to Sunday’s Bomb Day events.)  Favorite floats?  The Murphy Sisters’ prairie schooner, all the marching bands and Shriners, Shriners, Shriners!  Shriners on go-karts, Shriners on trucks, Shriners in vintage cars, Shriners on big long bikes, Shriners on foot.  (But what was with the gurney and the fake baby?  I know about and applaud the Shriners‘ good deeds to help sick children, but, may I say, that was a little creepy.)

After the parade tailed off, we trotted on down to the street fair area and stopped at the Bok Kai Association’s table for some info.  More on that later.  After a refreshing frozen lemonade slushie for me and some ice cubes for Jet, we walked back to The Brick and had lunch on the patio, from which vantage point we could watch the tail end (literally) of the great dragon being walked back up D Street to its lair.  Then we walked back to the house and I went over to the Arts center for the 3:30 pm performance of the Grant Avenue Follies, straight from San Francisco.  Highlight:  a hula routine danced to Tiny Bubbles while a troupe member went through the auditorium cranking out bubbles from a kid’s bubble maker.  Can’t decide if it was supposed to be post-modern ironic or just good fun. Fun, it was.  Once again, the audience was pretty sparse.  Where are all you people when there are free cultural events being offered?  Maybe at a spaghetti dinner.   To finish the day’s celebrations in appropriate fashion, we were invited for take-out from China Moon at the Sedlers.  Jet again declined to wear his late-Qing Dynasty bandana, thematic continuity be damned.  He did start to beg for a bit of eggroll, but I think he was holding out for a Ball on a Stick.