10 Cuttin Sage

It’s mid-September and I am here at last with my hubby enjoying 10 whole days of vacay time here at 10 Cuttin Sage. I have been planning and longing for this trip for most of the year.  Of course, when you plan and long for something for such a long period of time, you tend to build it up to impossible heights of the imagination, heights unreachable by human effort and maintained by human ability.  So, as I imagined lazy afternoons on the beach, drinking wine and eating shrimp salad and grapes by sunset, kayaking into Autumn-touched marshland laden with herons and egrets who take off in a whoosh as we meander by, getting up at sunrise to run 3 miles every day as I train for the Thanksgiving Drumstick Dash to raise money for our local homeless shelter, and reading spiritually uplifting books on the sunny dock each morning as I drink my coffee (after my run, of course), here’s the reality: The weather is crap. Day 6 of 10 days and we have still not been to the beach. The kayaks are s

Another summer has flown by like a swarm of honeybees searching out a new place to hang their honeycomb shingles. Sorry for the corniness.  I’m using bee similes a lot these days because I’m taking up a new hobby this fall.  I’ve also actually seen bees swarm and it’s quite a sight to behold. If you’ve never seen a swarm in real life, you’re missing a miracle. It’s a Winnie the Pooh experience.  I’ve decided to become a beekeeper (an apiarist if you want to get technical). This hobby is growing in popularity as the population of honeybees has slowly declined over the years due to fewer small farmers who keep hives, the commercialization of farming, and mass use of pesticides. We have a tiny brick building on our homestead that is about 70 years old and suffering about 60 years of neglect. It was originally built as the business office of the builder and first owner of our home before my grandparents bought the place.  We have always called it “the Office”.  It's a simple pine-p