Audio Books

Nourishing the Journey: The Foods That Fueled the Oregon Trail and a Giveaway!

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Hi! I’m Kirsten Osbourne, and today I’d like to talk about the foods that fueled the Oregon Trail.

In the mid-19th century, at least 500,000 emigrants embarked on one of the arduous trails across the American Wester. The most popular of these being the Oregon Trail. Their hopes and dreams were on the promise of fertile lands and new beginnings, these pioneers faced not just the physical challenges posed by the terrain but also the daily necessity of nourishment on their long journey. The foods that sustained these travelers offer us a poignant glimpse into a pivotal moment in American history, reflecting both the ruggedness of the trail and the strength of those who traversed it.

A Pantry on Wheels
The wagons that creaked and groaned their way towards Oregon were more than just vehicles of migration; they were mobile pantries, carrying the essentials that would sustain families for months on end. Among the staples were flour, hardtack (a durable, dry biscuit), cornmeal, beans, rice, and dried meats such as bacon and salt pork. These items were chosen for their longevity and ease of transport, crucial qualities for food that needed to last through journeys that could span half a year or more.

Simplicity and Sustainability
Cooking on the trail was an exercise in simplicity and sustainability. Meals were often prepared over campfires, with Dutch ovens being a favored tool for their versatility. Beans, a staple of the trail diet, could be simmered slowly in these pots, their hearty and filling nature providing the much-needed energy for the day’s endeavors. Bacon, another trail mainstay, added flavor and calories to otherwise sparse meals. For breakfast, a simple concoction of flour, salt, and water known as “Johnnycakes” or flapjacks would be fried up, providing a quick, energizing start to a long day of travel.

Foraging and Hunting
While the wagon provided the basics, the land itself sometimes offered sustenance to the observant traveler. Wild berries, nuts, and edible plants could supplement the pioneers’ diet, adding variety and vital nutrients. Hunting was another means of procuring fresh food, with buffalo, deer, and rabbits often in the sights of the travelers’ rifles. These practices not only diversified the pioneers’ meals but also connected them deeply to the landscape they were passing through, a reminder of the land’s abundance and the skills required to harvest it.

Unity and Community
Perhaps most importantly, mealtime on the Oregon Trail was a communal affair. It was a time for rest and reflection, for sharing stories and strength. The act of gathering around a fire to break bread (or hardtack) together fostered a sense of unity and mutual support crucial for facing the challenges of the trail. Food, in its essence, became more than just sustenance; it was a symbol of hope and community, a tangible connection to the dreams that propelled the pioneers forward.

A Legacy of Strength
The foods eaten on the Oregon Trail speak to the resilience and adaptability of those who ventured westward. In their simplicity, we find a profound testament to the human spirit’s capacity to endure and thrive in the face of adversity. Today, as we sit down to our meals, we might pause to reflect on the trails we traverse in our own lives and the sustenance, both physical and spiritual, that fuels our journeys. The legacy of the Oregon Trail lives on, not just in the pages of history books but in the stories of perseverance and camaraderie that continue to inspire us.

Working Together
Even the children on the trail had a job that would help their families eat. They carried sharp sticks and bags, and they would poke the sticks into piles of manure. If the stick came out clean, then the manure was dry and suitable for fires. If not, no one would start a fire from it.

If you were to travel the Oregon Trail, what do you think you would miss most about modern life? I’m giving away one free audiobook copy of Hannah’s Hanky to one lucky commenter! 

AI and Virtual Voice. Love it or Hate it? By Pam Crooks

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No doubt our forefathers of yesteryear would have been unable to comprehend what we call artificial intelligence today.  That is, the ability of machines and software to emulate the human mind, our intelligence, and problem-solving abilities.  They’d probably think such a thing was laughable and so farfetched, it was ridiculous to even talk about.

But it’s here today, and in a big way.

With anything as hugely complex and powerful as artificial intelligence, misuse is bound to happen. Examples are fraud, forgery, data manipulation, malware attacks, and so on.  Ditto with some student using AI to do his homework for him.

But there’s benefits from AI, too. You might have heard the recent story about the Vesuvius Challenge where college students worked together to decipher ancient papyrus scrolls that had been carbonized to ashes in Pompeii in 79 A.D. To try to unroll the scrolls would have destroyed them, but this team worked tirelessly to interpret them and succeeded with AI.  They won the $700,000 prize for their efforts, too. I was fascinated by this particular story because one of the students attended our state university less than an hour away from me.  AI also provides huge benefits in medical imaging that can help with more accurate diagnosis in, say, cancers.

There’s a popular site called ChaptGPT where one can ask a question like… “I have lettuce, tomatoes, and hamburger.  Make me a recipe.”  And voila!  One appears.

Another example. Prompt with “Write a story about a cowboy in Montana.”  Again, the words stream across the screen.

Of course, if an author uses AI to write her book, that’s fraudulent and terribly unfair to the reader. I do know some authors use AI to help them with blurbs and taglines. Personally, I don’t have a problem with that, but maybe some would.

I never paid too much attention to AI, however, until last month when Amazon contacted me with an invitation to participate in their Virtual Voice audiobooks.  Amazon launched this capability in November, but I hadn’t heard of it until the invitation arrived in my Inbox in February.  Not everyone got the offer (I checked), but I was quick to give it a try.

Amazon’s motivation was that, in all the hundreds of thousands of books they offer, only 4% are in audiobooks.  No doubt they are trying to increase their income stream, and one can’t blame them, especially when they make the offer too good for an author to ignore.

I found the experience pretty amazing.  With the touch of a keystroke, I could change the virtual voice from man to woman, or from American to British.  Within seconds.  The audiobook is hooked with my ebook.  If I make a change in the ebook, it automatically carries over to the audiobook.  Pretty slick.

The biggest complaint from authors is the lack of human inflections. I get that.  Some claim the virtual voice is too monotone.  Somewhat, yes, but not bad, and truly, you get used to it.

There were parts where I wish my villains sounded harsher than what they did.  But I felt that way with human narrators, too.  There are human narrators who are female and try to imitate a man’s voice and vice versa.  A little amusing, so both ways aren’t perfect, by any means.

Yes, a change this big is hard to accept.  I’ve been in this business a long, long time.  I remember in 2007, the first e-reader was introduced.  No one I knew had ever heard of such a thing, but a techy writer named Connie Crow, who belonged to my Romance Writers of America chapter, was one of the first to have her book available on an e-reader.  She took the publishing world–and Romance Writers of America–by storm, let me tell you.  Many authors decried the use of e-readers as being detrimental to brick and mortar stores and even the timber industry.  Readers refused to read off an electronic device, determined to keep hard copies of books in their hands and on their shelves.  Heck, I was the same way at first.

Suffice to say, the Kindle and Nook grew in huge popularity, changed MANY opinions, and none of us can imagine a world now without them.  There are some that are saying the virtual voice audiobook will be the same way, and at a huge savings to authors (albeit at the cost of narrators losing their jobs, as with the Kindle). Like the Kindle’s technology has evolved, so will the virtual voice audiobooks’. It’s been said that these virtual voice audiobooks “is poised to revolutionize the audiobook industry.”  (Hidden Gems Books)

I invite you to listen and decide for yourself.

So far, I’ve made three books as audiobooks (WYOMING WILDFLOWER, HANNAH’S VOW, and CHRISTIANA) with virtual voice.  Amazon makes very clear to the consumer about it, so she knows what she’s getting.

Please take a look.  ARMED & MARVELOUS is narrated by a human.  HANNAH’S VOW is narrated by virtual voice.  Just click the image for a brief sample, located below the cover on Amazon.

 

Virtual Voice vs Human Voice.  I’d love to know what you think!

Bears and Books (but mostly bears)

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A couple years ago the hubs and girls and I were driving down the mountain – a back road with hairpin turns and you can’t go very fast – when my youngest daughter said, “Hey! I just saw a bear. Or a cat. It might have been a cat, but it looked like a bear.”

We weren’t going anywhere important and we weren’t going that fast, the road was deserted and so my husband stops and backs up.

As we’re backing up my daughter says, “Maybe it was a dog. Actually, yeah, I think it was a dog.”

At this point, I’m thinking to myself, she saw a wet rock.

So, we’re kind of laughing, thinking we’re going to see a interesting rock or possibly a house cat on the side of the mountain, or maybe a lost dog, but when we get back to the culvert where she saw it, sure enough, not five feet off the road was a mama bear with two little cubs.

Of course my husband winds his window down and hangs out of it with my phone. I’m remembering all the cautions to NOT mess with a mother bear with cubs, and I’m also having a little chat with the Lord. It went something like this:  if that bear attacks him, am I obligated to throw myself between them? I mean, I did voice my opinion- only once, Lord, so he wouldn’t say I was nagging – that I didn’t think it was a good idea to be so close, and, shockingly – that’s sarcasm – he didn’t listen to me, so really, Lord? Am I off the hook for this one?

Yeah, I know. You spiritual ladies would have been praying for safety and protection and probably wouldn’t even mention to the Good Lord one time about how good bear roast with mashed potatoes and gravy is.

Seriously, safety is of the Lord, and I believe that, but a person needs to show a little common sense, too, right?

Regardless, we didn’t get attacked and I actually got a picture of the bear (the real bear, not me – the hubs insisted I clarify).

I’ve told you we live way out, and seeing bears isn’t exactly a novelty. We have our dumpster about seventy-five yards below our house and we’ve had bears in it and around it and on it (that’s a real pain because they push the lids in and they – the lids not the bears – get stuck and are hard to pull out, and one of our kids – the one that’s named Not Me – will throw garbage on top of the lid without pulling it out, etc). We’ve stood on our deck with spotlights watching them. It’s always been at night, although a few times in the evening when we’re driving down our driveway we’ll see one.

Once, when I was picking blueberries I happened to look over and there was one in the field beside me. I think it saw me about the same time I saw it and conveniently we both ran in opposite directions and never did meet. Which, in my opinion, was a good thing.

Once when my oldest son was around twelve, maybe, he had a friend over. They’re tough dudes and wanted to sleep in a tent outside in the yard. I’m fine with that. I’ve told you about my oldest son, and I wasn’t worried about anything getting him.

I know none of you all ever did this, but I admit, I kind of messed with my kids some. Still do, I’m sorry. I said to my kid as he walked out with his sleeping bag, “You’ll be fine. Just make sure your tent is zipped up the whole way because bears can’t unzip it. Oh, and you did brush your teeth, correct? Because what smells like bad breath to humans smells like lunch to a black bear.”

Bears weren’t on his radar until I said that. : )

He kinda looked at his friend, then back at me trying to pretend his eyes weren’t the size of navel oranges. “Do you really think there are bears out there?”

I shook my head, hiding my evil smile with a fake worried look. “Nah. I was just messing with ya.”

Maybe some of you will be able to relate to this, but my husband is about a thirteen-year-old boy in a man’s body. I would like to say I’m more mature, but I can’t remember which of us had the idea.

About an hour after dark, the hubs and I crept through the yard, stopped about twenty feet from the boys’ tent and started to growl.

After about five seconds, our growls got increasingly loud and angry-sounding. (I’m actually pretty good at growling, and my whole family will agree with that statement. : )

There was some scrambling in the tent. Some yelling back and forth. More scrambling. The sound of the zipper yanking.

Then the boys shot out of the tent, flew down to the house, screaming like girls. Seriously. They were screaming so loud, they never heard the hubs and I rolling on the ground laughing until they were pounding on the door, which they couldn’t open because the hubs and I had locked it. : )

I know, I know. People like us should never have had kids. Our poor children. It’s pretty amazing that they seemed to have turned out almost normal and even more amazing that they still talk to us.

My son’s friend never came back, but I think that had more to do with the fact that we had beets for supper than any lingering issues over the bear noises.

But, you know, you reap what you sow and all that…

One June a few years after that – back when we just had a few chickens and not the big laying houses we have now – I had gone over to grab some eggs for breakfast before my kids got up. On my way back over to the house, when I was directly between the coop and the house – maybe sixty yards to both…you know how you just have this sensation that someone is watching you? You get that chill up your spine and the hair on the back of your neck raises? Know what I mean?

Seriously, I felt that, but knew it had to be nothing. My husband had left for work before daylight and our trucks were all on the road. The garage was behind me, beside the chicken coop, but it was locked up tight.

Still, that feeling had a hold on my neck and I couldn’t shake it. I stopped and turned around, scanning behind me.

Nothing.

I started to turn back around, thinking I was being silly, but still not feeling right, when my eye caught something off to the side at the edge of the woods just a dozen or so yards away.

So, yeah, I’m sure you already know it was a bear. It was sitting there – like a bear in a circus might sit, on its butt with its paws hanging down. I’m not very visual, but I can still see it, shiny black and perfectly outlined by the lush green just behind it. The round ears pricked and the nose lifted, a rectangular spot of brown on its chest.

It was staring at me.

To be fair, I was now staring right back at it, more because I was frozen and couldn’t move than to actually be rude or anything.

You know that feeling when your stomach is trying to run to the house but your heart and lungs have stopped working and your legs feel like logs caught in a pile up? It’s like the opposite of the warm fuzzies.

So, I was kinda racking my brain trying to figure out what to do. Do any of you know what to do in a situation like that? If you run, they chase you, right? I kinda felt like there must be cubs around or something, because why else would it just be staring at me?

So, I moved my eyes around (not my head, lol) but couldn’t see any little black bodies.

I thought about setting the eggs down (Do bears eat eggs?) kind of like a peace offering. But there went my kids’ breakfast. (Better to lose breakfast than to have mom get eaten? Maybe. Not sure on that one. I did have boys.)

So, I finally decide, it’s either going to eat me or it’s not. Right?

I don’t want anyone to get the mistaken idea that I was brave or anything. I seriously didn’t know what else to do – I turned around and finished walking to the house.

When I reached the door, I looked back over my shoulder and it was still sitting there, watching me. Honestly, I never even thought to go get a camera. I walked in the door, closed it and sat down on the floor. The kids found me there an hour or so later, and it was a little longer than that before my legs stopped feeling like Jello.

 

Ha. Okay, I love telling stories of life on the farm, but I actually do write books, too. I’ve been doing a little project with my life-time narrator, or-as-long-as-he’ll-have-me, Jay Dyess, and I wanted to share it with you.

 

We’ve been putting my audios up on YouTube where you can listen to the for FREE! We have around twenty of the fifty or so audios that we’ve made together up on Say with Jay – Jay’s channel. You can listen to any of them or all of them without paying a thing. I love that! I honestly can’t wait until they’re all up. I know you all work hard for your money and I love being able to give readers a bargain. : )

 

Here is the link to Say with Jay: https://www.youtube.com/c/SaywithJay/ Check it out. Listen to anything that catches your fancy and I’d love it if you’d hit the “Subscribe” button and leave a few comments!

Thanks so much for spending time with me today.