Thank you, ladies! I will have to try some of these suggestions. That's odd that no one else has this strange arbitrary rising thing with their sourdoughs.
This one last night finally rose enough at 9:30 pm so I baked it then. I took it out to cool and went to bed. I admit I woke up at 2am and had a piece.
When you consider kitchen temperature and variations in humidity, it makes sense to me that there would be *some* variation in rising time...but not *that* much.
I think if I didn't grind my own grain by hand I wouldn't be so upset. But doggone, that's a lot of work.