The Darkness Before Dawn

There seems to be nothing quite so dark as the Island at 5am in Autumn. The temperature isn't cold enough to be uncomfortable but the fog is thick enough to cause concern. One doesn't drive Route 20, as much as one aims for it. Watching the dual sweeps of light from the airport beacons becomes surreal. giant windshield wipers on the horizon. As Route 20 curves and winds through farming country, the beacons are the only way to orient through the darkness.

Drawing my eyes away from the road, the cattle move slowly in the pre-dawn hours. It will be several more before the ranchers make their morning feed rounds, but this first movement begins the day. Finding the small entrance to our community is difficult, with no lights to guide me and fog filling the landmark fields.

I pull slowly into the driveway, waiting for the cottontails to clear before parking, gently smiling at the chaos of their crossings. Inside the house, the satiated dogs are tucking in for their early morning naps. I pour another cup of coffee and stretch, considering the day ahead.

Fun with Inventory

I just finished the last of the Autumnal Equinox and Samhain incense orders, pretty much running dry on each at this point so I removed them from the product catalog until next year. By the end of the weekend I hope to add multiple Winter Solstice/Yule and Imbolc incenses and by the end of the month hope to add Archangel incenses (Gabriel, Michael, Ariel & Raphael). There's about 40 classic formulary incenses I'd like to add altogether in the next 3 months, the plan at the moment is to add them in batches of 12 each month. Lots to do by the end of October.

This month's inventory went well, beginning with moving all the Triple Pillars ingredients into one cabinet and the remaining ones into another. Much easier now, as there's roughly 60 basic incense ingredients. Which makes me wonder at how low that number is. Something to think about going forward - using more exotic ingredients in the Unique Incense line.

At any given point, I try to keep at least one batch of prepared incense on hand and 4 oz minimum of each ingredient as finances allow. Priorities, sadly, must be made for now.

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