I am very excited that the cooking season is upon us. Thanksgiving is right around the corner, and Christmas is mere weeks away.

Where did the year go? I don't know about yours, but mine was swallowed by days of waiting for phone calls and emails concerning selling our farm and then the buyers backed out, and then working on getting the farm house torn down so meth labs could not move into it while we try to find another buyer for the next 5 to 15 years waiting for the market to turn around in our area.

Two months were wasted on that non-sale, and four weeks were wasted waiting for the realtor's buddy to give us a bid on tearing down the house (never did find out what he was going to charge). Weeks were spent applying for state permits, and then county permits, and waiting for the asbestos removal guys, and the asbestos inspectors, and the electric company, and the demolition contractors.

I was also working on straightening out the boundary lines on my mountain cabins so I would no longer have two houses on one parcel. Four weeks were wasted waiting for an appointment with the county planner, and another four weeks waiting for the new guy at the city electric department to get around to my letter.

In all those cases I ended up going over their heads and complaining to their bosses about the delays, and the balls would start rolling again, only to stop at the next guy on the list. Meanwhile, spring turned to summer turned to fall and turned to winter.

Some of it is completed: the farm house is finally gone, but the boundary line is going to have to wait for next year unless the last bits of it can be handled by mail.

This started out to be about food, but the words wouldn't flow until I got this other out of my system.