neotoma

I voted on Wednesday evening and they were running out of ballot boxes because they were getting so full they jammed.

In fact, as I put my ballot in, the counter device (like a scantron machine that registers and counts that you submitted a ballot) on the top of the box registered that I had submitted my ballot but said that it had jammed.

I had to stay while two election workers came over, unlocked the top of the box, and watch me push my ballot all the way into the box (the ballot boxes are about the size and shape of wheeled garbage bins) and I could see it was full to the top. Then they locked it up and took it out of service.

I think there were 2, maybe 3, ballot boxes still working when I left and the polls were open for another 1.5 hours and 12 hours the next day.

It's going to be a busy day Tuesday.

Dried figs, dry roasted hazelnuts, gingerdoodle cookies, dark chocolate walnut cookies, bell peppers, shishito peppers, a fennel bulb, a kilo of bread flour (enough for 2 loaves of sourdough), popcorn, Lucy Glo apples (and 1 Ludacrisp apple), empanadas (Old Bay shrimp, 2 Masaco), an apple fritter, a dozen small eggs, slab-bacon, a beefsteak tomato, a quart of apple cider, a tasting set of moonshine, whiskey, and bourbon from Pathfinder Farm.

Picked blue crab meat, crab dip, figs, raspberry, prune plums, bartlett and red rosa pears, garlic, 5lbs of bread flour, chicken empanadas, a pear tart, and honey-cranberry bovre.

I also stopped at People's Book and picked up Robin Ha's new cookbook Instant Noodles & Beyond. The cookbook might wind up gifted to several of my younger relatives this year.

Crab dip, a cheese biscuit, dark chocolate walnut cookies, an arnold palmer made with watermelon lemonade, grapes, 4lbs of peaches, figs, salt-&-pepper pistachios, and my friends' CSA box because they are out of town this week: 5 ears of corn, a beefsteak tomato, a pint of cherry tomatoes, a watermelon, some other kind of melon (or maybe squash?), a zucchini, a bell pepper, two large jalapenos, and some bagged salad -- that was all from a 'medium share' box that is intended for 1 to 3 people for a week.

I might cut up the watermelon for lunch this week, and I will roasted the corn in the oven tonight, but I'm going to have to think about what to do with the rest of it.

Two chicken empanadas, a mango tart, a jar of pickled mushrooms, a dill plant, red and pink raspberries, sour cherries, sweet cherries, blueberries, a loaf of struan bread, chocolate chip cookies, dark chocolate walnut cookies, nectarines, yellow peaches, lemon-ricotta waffles, peach cakette, and a box of mixed yellow and purple plums

Pie cherries (pie♫ cherries♫), red and yellow sweet cherries, methley plums, red raspberries, 3 clingstone peaches, 3 quarts of strawberries, a pint of peach yogurt smoothies, a pint of mixed berry yogurt smoothie, asparagus, lemon-ricotta waffles, cherry cakelette, peach cakelette, a loaf of french country bread, a guava tart, two chicken empanadas, red and yellow onions, and cucumber-lime paleta (that didn't even last through the walk back to the Metro, it was so hot I consumed it immediately).

Bacon-gruyere wheel pastry, spinach feta pastry, lemon tart, a dozen eggs, strawberries, spring onions, potatoes, goat cheese curds, strawberries lemonade, cranberry beans, 4lbs of potatoes, shelled black walnuts, pecans, spicy garlic pistachios, apple schnitz, and Lucy Glo apples.

Lucy Glo apples, shallots, white potatoes, a small head of cabbage, carrots, celery, spicy bratwurst, thick-cut bacon, cranberry chevre, a loaf of whole wheat bread, a gallon of lavendar-lemonade, a pint of shiso-orange mint lemonade, peanut butter cookies, dark chocolate walnut cookies.

Thick-slice bacon, a dozen eggs, bacon-gruyere wheel, spinach pastry, lemon tart, rosemary pull-apart rolls, gingerdoodle cookies, a quart of chicken & dumpling soup, a quart of pickled red onions, cranberry chevre, farmhouse goat cheese, apple cider, apples (Nittany, Braeburn, Stayman), shallots, red onions, garlic heads, white turnips, grilled spiced olives, Greek country mixed olives, and a pound of black beans.

I talked briefly with an elderly woman who had just moved into the area and was attending the market for the first time -- she was trying to find organic apples. I don't think you can really grow apples here as a market farm organically. There are just too many critters that love to chomp on apples here, but I hope she finds something she is willing to buy.

I plan to make another apple-shallot pie tomorrow; I'll be working extra to get ready for the quarterly report at work, but I am also likely to be snowed in, since the forecast is snow, 1 to 5 inches.

My fridge failed Monday and it took the housing office until Wednesday (2 maintenance requests, 2 follow up phone calls, and 1 email to the property mananger cc'd to the county councilor's aide for housing issues) to get it replace. I had to throw out everything but hard cheese and vinegar-based condiments, so I shopped a little more aggressively than usual this week.

I reported through the apartment complex's online service request page that there was water dripping from my bathroom ceiling fan on Sunday 02 Nov 2025, and got no response.

Yesterday (Friday, 07 NOV 2025), I emailed the PM and got the maintenance staff (3 guys names Noel, Vladimir, and Martin (the supervisor) who confirmed that there was leakage and went upstairs to figure out what was causing it.

Apparently my upstairs neighbor's bathtub leaks.

There are plumbers here now, and they're going to have to take my bathroom ceiling apart.

Further documentation as this progress.