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A View From the Field |
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July, 2008
July 31 Much to my surprise, the site published with no problems at all last night. Something must have been going on with the connection on Tuesday.
So I went up to the north end and read until midnight. Oh, well. I got up around 10:30, but that didn't seem like enough sleep, so maybe I can make it earlier tonight.
And now July is over, and I am starting on a new year. Amazing. At one point, I really doubted I'd make it this far, so it's nice to know I have. It's nice to see that I don't feel any older than I did at this time last year, and nothing much has changed on the health front.
So I celebrated by doing nothing. Tomorrow, maybe. I did take myself out to dinner, which was nice. It was very quiet in Harbor Haus tonight, which meant I could eat my lamb chops at my leisure. I wanted a piece of Bavarian chocolate torte, but they were out of it, so I had chocolate pecan pie with ice cream instead. I like that pie, but I didn't get my chocolate cake on my birthday. Poo. It was a good dinner anyway, and I came home stuffed.
There was a large family gathering behind me that at first I thought was going to be a problem, because there were half a dozen kids, but they were OK. I will say, though, that for all the time I've been eating out and eating at Harbor Haus, I think that is the first time I have ever heard anybody talking politics. They weren't loud or anything, but I don't believe I've ever heard the topic discussed before. That's good, so far as I'm concerned. Politics is the other thing I don't talk about and don't enjoy hearing talked about, especially this year when the media are full of it all the time.
The weather was interesting. It was quite sunny when I got up, with a temperature in the mid 60s. I put the bird feeders out about 11:45, then I turned my back on the harbor, and when I looked again, we were socked in...from noon until nearly 6:00. That wasn't forecast. It was still foggy out in the lake when I went to dinner. It has now finally gone up to 67º, and there isn't any wind at all, at least here. I've noticed that frequently there is quite a wind blowing at Harbor Haus when it is nearly calm elsewhere. Anyway, while it was foggy out in the harbor, it was nearly clear elsewhere, and it was sunny, so it was a rather nice day after all.
I think I finally got the Google ads going, although it will be interesting to see what happens when I use Explorer to copy this page tonight. Every page that has a left navigation border seems to have ads, and the pages I looked at, they seemed to be fairly relevant. So we'll see what happens tonight.
That was my quiet day, and I'm off to the north end again. I'm nearly done with the white binder, so maybe I can get to bed earlier tonight? Ha.
July 30 Well, that was a mess. The Google thing will work, I'm sure, but after I tried uploading the entire site about 6 times, I just gave up. First, the border didn't get uploaded because FrontPage didn't know I had changed anything. So the links on the left now have capitalized first letters. Then I ran into the problem I've had any number of times, where the FTP times out. Last night, I was getting the message that it couldn't find my FTP server...when I WAS JUST THERE!!! Finally, about midnight, I gave up.
A few pages had been uploaded, though, and when I looked at them, I nearly had a fit. The gallery page had gotten uploaded correctly...and it had four ads for sexy pictures! For heaven's sake, already...I thought I understood that before the web crawler had looked at the site, it would show public service announcements. Believe me, those were no public service. I was all ready to start screaming at Google, but this morning when I looked, that had all cleared up and the ads have at least some relevance to the page.
So tonight I will try again... and again... and again... Eventually I'll get a good upload. I suspect sometimes that somebody between here and the Mountain Lodge downloads movies every so often, which hogs the bandwidth and causes all sorts of other weird problems. Now I know a good reason for ISPs to refuse to allow their customers to download video and long audio. The problem I have is that with my outdated software, every time an upload craps out, I have to reboot to regain my resources, and then I have to say "NO" several hundred times to get around the part of the site that exists only on the server - the camera and the usage statistics. It is all a big pain, which is why I usually use Windows Explorer when I only need to upload the journal.
Anyway, despite my good intentions, I got to reading, and that turned into something else, and it was 2:45 before I got to bed. So it was after 11:00 when I got up this morning. It was a truncated day, but I think (or I hope) I will be getting to bed a bit earlier tonight. That's why I turned off the radio and started writing at 7:30.
I didn't do much today. I did collect up the trash and throw it in the bag in the breezeway, but that was about the extent of my work. I spent a long time reading more Google stuff, and a long time looking at a new clothes tree for my closet. The other night, the one I had collapsed and broke off a leg in a place that I can't repair it. I was thinking about getting a metal one, but I couldn't find one I liked at a reasonable price, so I got one that I think is the same as the one that broke except a different color, and I will just have to remember that there are two or three places where it screws together that need to be kept tight. I really need a clothes tree in my closet, since I don't have anyplace to put hooks for the current set of clothes.
Reading the Google stuff left me feeling again that I don't like to read on the computer. Not to mention that it's some of the most confusing stuff I've read lately. Maybe I should offer to be their online content editor...for a price.
The weather was nice. When I went up to the north end last night, there was a bright star in the west which got covered up by a cloud, that I think was Jupiter, and I could see part of a bright thing over in the south behind some clouds that might have been the moon, but I'm not sure...the timing seems wrong. Anyway, that was all I saw of stars, since the first time I woke up it was light out.
Today was mostly sunny, with just a few clouds in the sky. The temperature got up to 72º. It never cooled off much last night - it got down to 65º at 7:00 - and it was about 70º all day. around 10:00 the wind picked up to the extent that I didn't think it was worth putting out the bird feeders this afternoon, in the 15-30 mph range from the the north. I had the door to the porch open all night long, although I closed it when I got up, because the wind chill was making it chilly inside.
I did go to the post office this afternoon and got a bale of mail, although most of the envelopes went out.
So that was my quiet, truncated day, and now I will try to get this thing to upload, although the length of time it is taking the camera to upload leads me to think it might not work again.
It's a pretty, breezy evening in the field, and I'm tired.
July 29 So I went up to the north end and got to reading again, and it was 12:30 before I got to bed. I am trying to break the story in the white binder into chapters, which isn't very easy, but while I was doing that, I started paying more attention to page numbers, and I discovered that I went from page 429 to page 451 (even pages aren't numbered), so I have had to renumber everything from there on...something like 1300 pages. The whole thing is a pain. I knew I had screwed up the numbering in the blue binder, and I got that straightened out a long time ago, but I thought the white binder was fine...oh, well.
Anyway, I got up at 9:30, which wasn't enough sleep, and I'm feeling it now. But of course, I will read tonight, too...
I was sitting with a cat on my lap, knitting, in the bathroom when I started hearing rumblings far, far away. They started coming nearer and nearer, but they didn't come right over the house. I think the thunder was over the lake. However, we got 0.35" of rain between 11:00 and 12:30. It was a nice shower, but it left it very humid and in the middle 60s.
Then I took the bird feeders out, and I forgave it, even though I got dripped on. It smelled just heavenly under the white pine...of pine and sweet grass and cedar and all those lovely fragrances.
It got very dark and thundery later in the day, but that squall passed south of us, over Bete Gris, and we didn't get any rain from it. There may be more. Although it is nearly clear here right now, there are some pretty big cumulus clouds over in the south, sort of peachy in the setting sun.
The temperature got up to 73º a while ago, so I opened the doors, which we all like. There is a light breeze from the west, and it's nice, but it's still very humid.
One task of the day was to try to get my Google ads going. The problem with it is, the first thing they make you do is read this extremely long and extremely legal agreement, which I really should have printed out, since I had a terrible time understanding what they were saying. I think one thing the government could do for us is mandate that all contracts the the public has to agree to must be written in standard English so that a teenager could understand them. So that is my rant of the day.
I don't think what I was planning to do is going to work, but I won't really know until I publish this thing tonight. I am trying to get the ads into the left border, below the navigation, but I'm not sure it will work. What I did sort of worked around FrontPage, and I'm not sure about it. We'll see when I publish.
Ooohhh! Those clouds look like pink whipped cream! So I went rushing outside, disturbed three squirrels enough that they were swearing at me, and got this. I think it was worth it.
I also finally got the pictures of the latest jewelry into the web. Here is the picture of the three zigzag bracelets, and here is the twisted necklace. The next time I make that necklace, I will be making it four strands instead of three, but I do like the colors.
Late in the afternoon, I moved over to the ugly chair. I did a very little embroidery - I hate having to work in a frame, especially such a big one - and knitted on the afghan for a while with a black cat asleep on my lap.
While I was sitting there, I got to watch the bird feeders a bit, and the hummingbirds are back. There were a bunch of them buzzing around the feeder and chasing each other around. I guess the nesting must be over for a while. I didn't have many other birds, though. I really must get that cedar feeder turned around so I can see both sides. I hope the squirrels aren't eating all the seed in it.
It was so nice to sit in the ugly chair. I must do it some more...maybe sit and read all the magazines that have piled up.
The other item of note is that we are down to 15 hours of daylight. The sun is rising at about 6:30 and setting about 9:30. That's still a pretty long day, but the sun isn't so high in the sky. It was low enough at 5:00 that when I bent over my embroidery, it was in my eyes. Pretty soon it will be low enough that I won't be able to use the computer in the late afternoon - which is probably for the best. I hate to see the days get short.
But then, even when I was a kid, it always felt like my birthday was the end of the summer, even though there was all of August. I've never gotten over that feeling.
The other thing I should mention is that I have a suspicion that the battery in the computer is beginning to go. It is losing time regularly, for one thing, and I have had a few other strange things happen. I was going to call and try to find out what kind of a battery it is, and I may do that, but there is also one in the dead computer which might be OK still.
And this evening, the lady I was going to meet for dinner who had to cut her vacation very short and go back to work called to apologize. That was very nice of her, but I mostly felt bad for her: she hasn't been able to spend much time up here at all, and she loves it, too. Next time, Laura.
So that was my day, and tonight I have to let FrontPage upload the web, so I won't be early to bed tonight, either.
It's a lovely night in the field, with fairly clear skies and a lovely light breeze from the west.
July 28 After I uploaded the journal last night, which was late enough, I started fiddling with the packaging for the cards again, so it was 1:30 or so before I got to bed, with no reading and no knitting. I had a headache when I finally got to bed. I got up around 9:00 anyway, so I really didn't get enough sleep again. Tonight will be early.
As a result of all that, I didn't do much today. I finished the heel of the sock and started the gusset, and I finished getting the cards together, and that was about it.
It was another beautiful day today, with blue skies and no hardly any wind all day long. The temperature finally got up to 70º, although it was in the middle 60s for most of the day. What wind there was seemed to be mostly from the east, so I had the door open all day. It's at the point now where it's hot with the doors closed and too cool with them open - too cool being when the boiler comes on. So today I opted for open.
So I guess that's about all I have to report, and I'm tired. It's a lovely night in the field. Some forecasts are saying it may rain tonight and tomorrow, but that depends upon whose forecast you believe. So it's off to the north end.
July 27 Last night, I read until 12:30, so it was after 1:00 before I got to bed. Tonight will be even later, but more about that later.
Even so, I got up around 9:00. That wasn't enough sleep, and I didn't feel so good all day, but oh, well. It was such a beautiful morning, I didn't want to ignore it. I worked on the heel flap of the sock, but I didn't make a lot of progress, because I had to rip out four or five rows to fix a mistake.
I spent part of the day washing, although I just remembered the last two loads and put them in the dryer. I was running out of compression hose and bras. I seem to have lost a bra, but I haven't looked thoroughly through the wash basket from the last wash. Anyway, the last of the clothes are in the dryer now, so that is over for a while.
This afternoon, I printed a bunch of note cards, and I ran out of card stock for little cards. Now I will have to decide whether to get it online or wait until the next time I go to town. Even though gas is going down a little, I'm not going to make a 100-mile round trip just to get card stock. The printing went well, and evidently the cleaning I did the last time has worked, because I only got one card that was streaky, and when I shook up the cartridges and wiped them off, the next one was fine.
I went to Harbor Haus for dinner, and it wasn't very busy, so I guess everybody who was here for the weekend has gone home. Of course, I brought half my dinner home with me.
This evening, my friend Sandi came over and we had a nice long talk. She is a nice lady, and we seem to have a lot in common, so it was nice to see her, but of course when you get two women together, they talk forever. So that is why I'm late.
It was a nice day. It was beautiful, but rather windy this morning, clear and blue, with a few whitecaps on the harbor. The temperature got up to 69º for a while early in the afternoon before it started to drop back into the low 60s as the wind shifted to the north. The wind was in the 10-20 mph range for most of the day, although it was stronger early and died down later. There were a few clouds between 7:00 and 9:00, but it looked to be pretty clear in the last pictures from the camera.
Buster met Sandi over the winter, so he came to say hello and get petted, but wonder of wonders, Jasmine came out, too. First she went up to the loft and sat at the top of the stairs looking at us, then for a few minutes, she came down to just outside the office door - we were sitting in the office. I was amazed. She didn't stay long, but she did come out, and Sandi saw her. Maybe one of these years, she will become a regular cat after all!
So that was my day. I had decided to forego the bath tonight anyway, and it's a good thing, because it's late and I'm tired.
It's a quiet night in the field tonight.
July 26 I read again, so it was 12:30 when I got to bed. I could hear that it had begun to get windy by the time I went to bed, and it has been blowing ever since. I got up about 10:00, and since Buster was someplace where he didn't hear me, I got the leg of the sock done and started the heel before he appeared.
That was about all I did, although I will finish packing the dishwasher before I go up to the north end tonight.
It was so windy all day that I didn't put out the bird feeders. I'm sure the little critters were disappointed - I know a hummingbird came by tonight and couldn't believe there was no feeder, but with the wind in the 20-36 mph range all day long, and copious whitecaps on the harbor, all the nectar would have spilled out anyway, and I never get many birds at the feeders when it is so windy.
The temperature got up to 77º at 6:00, but it dropped off when it started to blow really hard - so hard that the NWS station made an off-hour report. At 7:21, the temperature had dropped to 70º, the sustained winds were 23 mph, and we had a 43 mph gust. I'm sure the readings out in the harbor and here were higher. Watching the water was neat around then. The whitecaps were beginning to break off a the tops and throw spray around. We also had a little rain, enough to put some drops on the window and wet the deck. The rain has gone away now, but it is still blowing in the 20-30 mph range. All the wind was from the northwest.
It was clear until about 6:30, when all of a sudden a bunch of clouds came in. That wasn't forecast, either. It was a pretty day.
I was just checking what got uploaded to the website, because Mt. Horace Greeley was down for a good part of the afternoon...from about 2:15 to 4:30, when we got one picture, then it didn't come back until 6:30. I called about it, and Charlie said he thought it was some sort of power problem brought about by the high winds. It's up now, though.
I don't think our NWS station reports are accurate for northwest winds. It sure was windier out here than they were reporting (still is, for that matter), and since Horace Greeley is, I think, the highest point in Keweenaw, I'm sure it was even windier there.
So I did nothing with my time offline, and now it's time to load up the dishwasher and toddle off to the north end. I did have a nice dinner. When I was cleaning out the fridge the other day, I stumbled across a package of asparagus I bought. I also discovered, after I took it out of the package, that the package is microwaveable, but I used a glass pan instead, like I always do. Anyway, I had a nice steak and a nice bunch of asparagus, which is a pretty good dinner, in my opinion.
So that is all I have to report, and it's a half-cloudy, half-clear, very windy night in the field.
July 25 I read for a while last night, so it was after midnight when I got to bed, and it was 10:30 before I got up this morning, and I didn't feel like I had enough sleep. Oh, well. Tonight is another night.
It was warm when I got up - around 70º, but then the wind picked up and the temperature went down enough that I was cold, so I closed the doors, and then it warmed up again. Sigh. It eventually got up to about 79º at 5:00, but then a thunderstorm cell went by to the north, and we had a gust of 47 mph between 5:00 and 6:00. It was mostly bright-cloudy all day. A while ago, there was some thunder out over the lake (or someplace not around here), but now the sky overhead is quite clear, although there are clouds on all the horizons. A strange day.
I spent the day getting the beads ready for Peggy. I made a necklace I have been thinking about - one of the twisted seed bead ones I made a lot of a couple of years ago - and I was happy to see that the tools I have acquired in the meantime help make it a lot easier to make them. I did take some pictures, but I don't feel like fiddling with FrontPage tonight. Maybe tomorrow.
Anyway, I took the jewelry I have off to dinner with me, and Peggy took it, as well as the two packs of note cards and the two big note cards, but she took them on consignment...sigh. Maybe on toward the middle of next month, she will be able to pay me. I hope. I knew when I got into this that I would probably be selling mostly on consignment, but I don't have to like it.
There were a lot of people in Mariner tonight, I'm glad to say, and there were a lot of big family groups. Part of the reason for that is that the Fort is apparently having their Civil War reenactment this weekend. Or I guess they are. They fired the cannons this morning - "we" didn't like that very well, but it didn't bother us as much as it used to bother DC - and as I was coming home tonight, an older lady in costume, complete with black apron and mop cap (meaning widowed, I think) crossed the road with a couple of little kids also in costume.
The price of gas may be keeping some people away, but there are still a lot of people here, which is a good thing.
Now I am going to go up to the north end a bit earlier and try to get to bed a bit earlier tonight. Hah. I get to reading, and that's that.
We are still under a severe thunderstorm watch, but unless something happens in the next hour, the worst thunder there is likely to be is the cannons going off...which they are again. It's a lovely summer night in the field.
July 24 Well, we are sliding inexorably toward the end of July. Sigh.
I read until nearly midnight last night, so it was 12:30 or so before I got to bed, but I got up at 9:00 anyway. I actually woke up shortly after 8:00, and when I got back into bed, it was clear I wasn't going back to sleep, so I got up. It is nice to have such long days, but I haven't been taking very good advantage of them. I don't remember what I did for most of the day.
I have gotten over half of the leg of the sock done, and tonight I finished the first Copper Harbor bracelet and started the second one. So I guess I accomplished something.
My rolling stool came today, but I have to break out the crescent wrenches to put it together, and while I have them out, I will put together my garden scoot, too.
I could have used the rolling stool this afternoon. I had to make a fast trip to the post office. Something vital got misfiled, and I forgot to take a letter when I went yesterday. On my way home, I got the last two bags of Hughes Farm strawberries, and since they had been around for a week or more, I wanted to get them washed and cut up as soon as possible. They were in remarkably good shape, actually, and they are so good! I negotiated a deal on the price, so I didn't feel so bad about it.
Anyway, I had to cut up almost two quarts of strawberries, and I knew I could never stand up long enough to do it. So I sat down in the chair I keep in the kitchen and used my little rolling cart as a table. That worked pretty well, except that the top of the cart isn't very big. However, I got my strawberries prepared. Yum.
The weather was much nicer than the forecasts said. It was partly cloudy all day, but the temperature got up to 77º early this afternoon. It has been sliding down slowly ever since, but I had the doors open, and it was lovely. There wasn't very much wind at all, and what there was came from the southwest. It is so nice to have the house open! Now it is quite cloudy but quite nice.
This morning, all morning long, when the breeze came in the office window, I could smell bear - strong, nasty bear. Yuck. They have a strong, sort of musky odor that is unmistakable. There wasn't any bear around then, so I gather he was wandering around before it got light. Good thing I'm bringing in the bird feeders. I suppose he is attracted by the seed that falls down under the deck, although there isn't enough there for him to eat.
I guess I haven't mentioned my little girl squirrel. Every morning, when I go to put out the feeders, she is around, sometimes in the tree, this morning on the deck. She can hardly wait for me to get everything out. She has been within three feet of me, and I think if I wanted to, I could train her to eat out of my hand. I know that gray, black and fox squirrels love sweet things, but I don't know if my little red squirrels do. Sometime I will have to get some cheap cookies and see if she will eat them. Anyway, she is a cutie, and I talk to her and try not to make any fast moves so she will learn to trust me.
The chipmunks are coming around at last. While I was hanging out the feeders, I looked under the deck and the granddaddy of the clan was down there gleaning. He is as big as my pet squirrel, only fatter. It wouldn't surprise me to know he is the same chipmunk I have had since I've been here. I think he lives under the pallet for the generator. The smaller guys were up on the deck, but they are really skittish.
Of course, the kitties have been enchanted. They spent hours in front of the screen door watching the critters outside. Somehow the critters don't even see them.
Now it is a cloudy evening in the field, and it is perfectly quiet, except for a tiny breeze and the water softly shushing on itself...a lovely night in the field.
July 23 I was in bed by 10:15 last night, I was only up once, and I got up at 8:45. Now, if I could only do that every night...I read for a while last night, and I knitted for a while this morning, but still I was in the office by 10:00.
The task of the day was trash, and that included cat pans. I did get it done, with effort. The cat pan drill included hauling about 70 lbs of clean kitty litter downstairs and about 40 lbs of dirty litter upstairs...two steps at a time, both ways. Before I got the bags into the car, I had to locate a sweat band to keep the sweat off my glasses. I didn't get everything that was in the car out of it - I still have that to do, maybe tomorrow - but I took 4 large bags and 4 small bags to the compactor. Whew! It's not just having to schlep the bags myself. I was as bad about it when all I had to do was pull the barrel out into the middle of the driveway. I just don't like to deal with trash. And here, since there is no recyclable collection, I have tons of cans, plastic bottles and stuff like that.
Well, it's over with for a while. Of course, I found a few things I missed, but I do think this time I got most everything, including some stuff from the fridge. So now I can go on to the next task.
It was another glorious day, with no clouds and no wind and copious quantities of sunshine, blue skies and blue waters. The humidity has gone back up and the barometer has gone down a bit, which means I sweat a lot but I didn't have a headache. The temperature peaked at 66º. We are having a very cool, damp summer, for sure. The average temperature, at least for the 8 years or so that the Weather Underground has been keeping statistics, is 69º, and we haven't hit that very many times so far this summer. Not that I am complaining...
I remember back in 2001 (just when, I don't recall) when I would lie in bed with all the windows open and the fan on and wonder if I'd made a mistake by not installing air conditioning. Of course, that summer I was still recovering from the stem cell transplant, and heat and humidity affected me much more than it does now. We've had some hot weather since, but it doesn't bother me so much. It usually cools down at night, although maybe not until 3:00 or 4:00 in the morning. Doesn't seem to keep me from sleeping, though.
I did open the patio doors, and the door from the kitchen to the porch, and that was nice. The kitties love it when the office door is open, because then they can get right up close to the critters and hear and smell them as well as see them.
One of the critters was the very little chipmunk, who was a little too shy to stick his nose into the feeder with the squirrels around.
I like having the doors and windows open, too, to hear the birds singing, although we don't have much of that at this time of year. This evening, though, there was a song sparrow singing, and several times this afternoon, I heard the chickadee. The goldfinches don't have much of a song, nor do the siskins, but they twitter away. I filled the thistle feeders today, and that made them happy. I got a thistle sock that is about 15" long, and I was thinking I had made a mistake, until the siskins and goldfinches started rallying around. They love the sock, and the bigger it is, the more of them can eat on it. For some reason, they like to hang upside down to eat.
So that was my day, and it's time to toddle up to the north end and see if I can make it an early night again. I do like getting up a little earlier in the day, but that means I have to go to bed earlier, too. I feel like I accomplished something today, and it would be nice to have a few more days like that.
It's a lovely clear, calm night in the field tonight.
July 22 It started out with some weirdness with the computer, and I think I had to reboot half a dozen times or more before I got things back together last night. I thought my connection had been working rather slowly, so I tried it with a site I'd heard about, and then I found that whatever it downloads to do its speed test causes my version of Internet Explorer to write over part of the operating system (oops!) and it goes into a loop on the error. That can only be cured by shutting the computer off. Then on one reboot, the driver for the camera didn't load, and then I had to power fail the broadband receiver three or four times to get it to load right. By the time I got everything together properly, it must have been 10:30.
When I finally got up to the north end, I got to reading again, so it was about 12:30 when I got to bed, but even though I didn't sleep as well as I might have, I woke up around 9:00 and decided to get up. Part of it was that it was a gorgeous morning, and part of it was that I didn't think I'd go back to sleep. So hopefully it will be an early night tonight.
I didn't do much with my time, unfortunately. I worked on the sock for a while, and I worked on the bracelet for a while, and I spent most of the afternoon trying to place an order for some of the drugstore stuff I can't get around here. I finally succeeded, but it was frustrating.
It was a really beautiful day. There might have been a few little cirrus clouds this morning, but it was mostly clear for the entire day. The temperature has finally gotten up to 68º, after being in the low 60s for most of the afternoon. there was almost no wind, and the best part about it is that the humidity has finally gone down below 50%!
The bad part of that is that the barometer is very high, and as a result, I have a nasty sinus headache. Between my allergies, the weirdness in the plumbing in my head and the bug I'm fighting off, my sinuses are stuffed, and then when the barometer goes up, I can't equalize the pressure inside and outside, which means headaches. My eyes have been watering all day, my sinuses are so plugged. Oh, well. Usually I can sleep pretty well in spite of all that.
So that is about all I have to report. I was going to get the stuff out of the car and maybe try the weed whacker, but I sort of forgot about all of that while I was trying to get my glucosamine.
So now I will chase the chattering squirrels away from the feeders so I can take them in, and I will go up to the north end and read some more.
It's a beautifully clear, dry night in the field tonight, and maybe we'll even see a star or two before the moon rises.
July 21 After something like 14 hours in bed, I do feel some better, but not exactly robust. I think I am fighting off something, like a summer cold or something. I was in bed by 8:45, and I didn't get up for good until about 10:30. By that time my back was so sore from lying in bed I couldn't have slept anymore anyway.
I can't say I slept well. I was up any number of times - my diuretic fish, I guess - and I had a lot of really wild dreams, but time passed, so I guess I was sort of asleep. It's later now, but I think it will be another early night.
It rained between 9:00 and 10:00, and every time I looked out, it was very foggy. It is really cool to see the light in the lighthouse when it's foggy. I can see the whole cone of the beam for quite a way on its trip around. Even such a bright light doesn't go very far when it's that foggy. It was stopping about halfway across the harbor last night.
We didn't have any more rain, but it was so humid (over 95% all night!) that there was still rain on the screens this morning. Now, that's humid!
The temperature did finally get up to 64º this afternoon, and the humidity went down to 70%, but that isn't very warm and that isn't very dry.
I did not much except to unload the dishwasher, start to reload it, and wash the pots and pans, so the sink is now clear for a while. I worked on the sock for a while this morning, and I worked on the bracelet for a while this afternoon, and that was about it.
It was cloudy this morning, with the fog, but about the time the fog began to lift, the sky began to clear and it was mostly sunny all afternoon. There was almost no wind at all all day long, so even though it wasn't very warm, I had the window open all day, and I opened the door when it began to get warm in here.
The open door just fascinated the cats. There were squirrels and chipmunks out on the deck, including a medium sized chipmunk. The big ones are about the same size as the red squirrels, and the little ones are about the size of a healthy mouse. There are several sizes in between. This one was on the small side.
Which reminds me, there was a little larger on sitting right at the edge of the stairs from the deck last night when I closed the great room door. It was eating what it had stashed away in its cheeks. The noise of the door worried it a bit, but when nothing happened, it went right on eating. I guess I have a pretty good habitat for wildlife around here.
Anyway, the activity on the deck fascinated the cats. A while ago they were crouched side-by-side by the screen, staring out at what I assume was a squirrel.
So that was another quiet, nonproductive day, and my head is feeling like it needs to be put back to bed, so off I go. I discovered last night that I can knit plain on a sock and read, too, so maybe I will do that for a while tonight.
It's another calm, moist night in the field.
July 20 Well, it's early, but I don't feel so good, so I think I'll do this now.
I read for a little while longer than I'd planned last night, so it was about 1:00 when I got to bed. I woke up around 9:00 and decided that wasn't enough sleep, so when I got up it was 11:30. Oops. My timing was way off. I still don't feel like I had enough sleep, so maybe I can get to bed a bit earlier tonight.
After I got up and petted a cat, I filled my pill dispensers, and then I finished the ribbing on the sock, so it was nearly 1:00 when I got to the office.
It was another sort of yucky day. The temperature spent most of the day between 55º and 60º. although it did get up to 63º briefly. late in the afternoon. The humidity was over 80% all day, and there was almost no wind. Between 3:00 and 5:00 we had a little rain. Yuck.
I was so late that I didn't do anything, although I think I will work on the bracelet for a bit before I go up to the north end. The birdies didn't get much time to eat today, so I will give them another hour or so.
I feel very sleepy and headachy, so I think it would be a good night to go to bed early and try to catch up. We'll see how well that works...
July 19 I read for a while again, and got into bed a little before midnight. I have to say I didn't sleep very well, at least after my first wakeup. I think it was because I was sore - back, hips, knees, the whole thing. This weather just is not good for my joints.
The problem is, the temperature was between 50º and 60º all day, and the humidity was between 83% and 96%...cool and damp (this is summer?)...and there was almost no wind, although there was enough of a breeze from the east this afternoon that I had to shut the window in the office. On the other hand, I had the patio door open all day, and it didn't cool things off in here very much.
It was foggy. When I was awake briefly at 7:30 this morning, the fog was so heavy it was shrouding the trees in the backyard. That went away by noon, but there was fog or low-hanging clouds at the other end of the harbor all day long. I expect it to come back tonight.
I knitted on the Tofutsies sock for a while this morning, and I am about halfway through with the ribbing. There certainly are a lot of stitches in a sock on #1 needles! However, I like the colors in this one, and it would be nice to be able to wear them. We'll see. Typically, it takes a very long time for me to do a sock on #1s.
Otherwise, I packed up the two packages of note cards I have done, and I finished the bracelet with the blue zigzag. I started what I have referred to as the "Copper Harbor" bracelet - dark blue and green with a copper zigzag. I never published the picture I took of the three flavors of zigzags, and when I looked at it, I can see why - it isn't very much in focus. When I get through with the one I'm doing now, I will try to take a better picture and publish it. Although those bracelets are very simple and easy to do, I like them, and if Peggy is any indicator, so do a lot of other people.
I think I've said before that one of my aims for my jewelry is to make things I could have worn when I was working. I worked for a bank, and as an officer, I had to look professional. Wild jewelry just wouldn't have done. I like the flat Peyote stitch bracelets, because I can wear them when I have to do a lot of writing. Bracelets that are thick or have lots of bangles on them dig into my arm and hurt, especially since the mastectomy.
Anyway, I was facing the harbor for most of the afternoon, so I got to watch the birds and listen to them. The squirrels set up a terrific racket for most of the afternoon. I wonder if they just aren't talking to each other, but the conversations seem to be between the guy in the feeder and the one who wants to be or between two or three who are sharing the feeder. There were goldfinches and pine siskins in fairly large numbers, and I heard at least one chickadee singing, although I don't know if he came to the feeder. They like the big cedar feeder, and the way it is hanging, I can only see one side of it, so they could come and I'd never know it.
I couldn't see the hummingbird feeder, either, but the level of the nectar is going down steadily, so I know they are around. Along about 9:00, even though it isn't dark yet (sunset isn't until 9:40), almost everybody went away. They are on a better schedule than I am.
The fur faces were rather droopy today, undoubtedly because of the weather. Jasmine seems to have claimed grandpa's rocker on the porch. It is an old white wicker rocker with a high back and arms, and she probably feels safe there. I'm sure both of them would use the other rocker, which is sort of a barrel chair, except that the seat is covered with plastic, and none of us like that. One of my tasks is to make new covers for both those cushions, too, and I am not quite sure what is under the plastic on the one seat: it has to be 50 years old, and I have no idea what it might be stuffed with.
I might add that I also startled Jasmine out of the ugly chair the other day. We all like that chair. I know in his last couple of years, DC claimed it - I couldn't sit in it because he was always there.
So that was another quiet day, and soon I'll be off to the north end to do some more reading.
It's a cool, calm, moist night in the field tonight.
July 18 I got to reading again, and it was after midnight when I got to bed - not long after, though. When my eyes acclimated, I could see that I couldn't see the lights of town - fog again! It was still foggy this morning, and in fact, it didn't go completely away until 2:30 this afternoon, although overhead the sky was nearly clear and it was sunny. It is still very humid.
The afternoon has been very pretty, with lots of sunshine. The temperature finally made it up to 72º a while ago, but it has dropped back again to 64º, and it felt cool all day around here. There was a moderate wind - 10-20 mph out of the north, and that is no doubt what cooled it off. It was much warmer in town.
I ended up going to town twice today, once for the mail and again for dinner. My weed whacker came, so now I have something else to do.
Dinner was nice, although I didn't think there were many people in town, but the nicest thing about it was that Peggy gave me a check! She still has the rose quartz things on consignment, and she decided she couldn't sell the big necklaces with the white spotted beads and gave them back to me. I took back one of my favorite helix bracelets - dark pink with gold - which I just discovered I never posted a picture of. Good.
I made one of those for myself, because I liked the colors so well, and then I discovered that after wearing it two or three times, all the gold had worn off those beads, leaving them mostly clear. Drat. I sure do hope the gold I used with the garnet beads and the copper don't do that, or my reputation, such as it is, will be ruined.
Anyway, if anybody wants a funky necklace, they're about $10 plus shipping. They are a completely different style from everything else I've done, so it doesn't surprise me too much that she decided they didn't go. Well, live and learn. It was just a trial anyway. I have four of them.
I showed her the bracelets I've done and the note cards, and she was enthusiastic about all of them, so I will be making more note cards and tagging the bracelets.
I wish I could get myself really motivated to do something...anything would do.
Anyway, I finished the yellow sock this morning, so that pair is done, then I did a row on the Tofutsies sock, so I was late getting to the office. I had so much trouble with my elimination yesterday that I took some Imodium last night, but after I ate this morning, I started gurgling like crazy, and I didn't quite make it to the powder room again. Sigh.
That set me up for a nothing day, and that is what I did - nothing.
When I finally remembered to take out the bird feeders this afternoon, there was a rather large chipmunk - about squirrel size - sitting quietly on a branch of the pine tree near the trunk. He ran off before I had everything out, but clearly the squirrels aren't the only things eating my birdseed. I wondered, because the little seeds keep disappearing, and the squirrels don't eat those. I think the chipmunks probably do. Anyway, he was cute.
So that was my day, and I would like to make it an earlier night tonight, although I think I will work on the current bracelet for a while, after I answer some emails.
I can't say what the evening will be like yet, but so far, it looks like it might be nice.
July 17 I was sitting in the bathroom reading last night when Buster came trotting in holding a little gray mouse by its tail . He dropped it, and when it moved, he batted it a couple of times and either stunned it or killed it. Before I could extricate myself from my book and get up, Jasmine came running in and grabbed the mouse and ran off. Since I haven't found any remains this morning, I assume she ate it. So Buster hasn't given up the mousing duties completely. He wasn't particularly interested in it after it stopped moving, so I guess his original idea was to bring it into the bathroom to play with it. He always does that, unfortunately.
I read for a while and got to bed about 11:30, but my mind was in high gear, so it was after 12:30 when I finally fell asleep. I got up around 9:30 this morning, I think, but I finished the foot of the sock and did the first two rows of the toe. I am glad to be almost finished with it. I don't like those socks very well, but they are another pair of spring and fall socks, which I need. Next I will do the second Tofutsies sock, then I think I'll go back to the Maizy or Panda Cotton and do another pair of summer socks. I have a rather interesting pattern for Maizy that has a knit and purl pattern, and that might be fun to do for a change.
The problem with the current socks is something I knew theoretically but haven't seen too much in practice. The colors in the yarn are magenta, cyan and yellow, with a little orange thrown in for good measure. There is actually more blue (cyan) than any of the other colors, but the sock looks yellow. Blue is a receding color, and yellow comes forward, so you don't notice the blue so much. Mostly what you notice is yellow and magenta. So even though I don't like it very well, it is a good lesson in color theory. It is also another good lesson that what you see in the ball of yarn may not bear much resemblance to what you see in the knitted fabric. I learned that one thoroughly last winter with the wool socks I knitted.
I really didn't feel very good today. I woke up with a scratchy throat, which may have gone away, I can't tell yet. My ankles hurt and my legs are rather rubbery. I have kind of a sinus headache, and when I tried to do something, my back was awful.
Part of my problem, no doubt, is the weather. It was cool and damp again, in the upper 50s and lower 60s, and around 4:00 it started to rain lightly. Ugh. Most of the rain went south of us, as frequently happens, but there was just enough here (0.02") to make it really, really humid. It was cloudy all day and there was almost no wind.
When I came out of the bathroom this morning, I noticed something dark yellow over in front of the lilacs, and when I looked carefully at it, I realized that I have quite a large patch of coreopsis over there. Yesterday, when I drove into the driveway, I noticed that my Sweet William is in bloom, too, so I do still have some of my wildflowers that haven't been crowded out by the tansy and the knapweed. I am not particularly enamored of yellow flowers, but in a big patch like that, they certainly are cheerful.
This is a pretty good year for daisies, too. The problem is, it's been damp enough that the tansy and the knapweed are at least 4' high in spots. I really must try to get rid of that stuff. My electric weed whacker with a cord is on its way, and I still hope to hear from Adam sometime. If I can cut down some of the knapweed, maybe I can get him at the tansy. It's too high now to spray - I'd use too much - so my plan is to get it cut down and then spray what's left. We'll see.
This afternoon, I finally got my hair cut. Whew! It was so long it was getting in my eyes and annoying me anytime I wore something with a collar...it needed to be either longer or shorter, and I opted for shorter. I don't much like it short, but it looks OK and it is easier to take care of. My hair is so fine that it tangles like mad. If I were so inclined, I could have dreadlocks in about two days. When it is really short - most of it is less than 4" long - it doesn't tangle so badly and it is easier to comb out the tangles. Nancy is a nice lady and a wonderful barber, and I certainly am glad I found her.
Just before she got here, I finally got around to washing the towels, and they are now in the dryer. It has been so humid that the towels haven't been drying overnight, and I'm thinking of putting them in the dryer before I take my bath every night to try to get them dry...or maybe right after?
It isn't as easy to notice the dampness here because it is so much cooler than down south most of the time, but little things like damp towels and bad backs and knees tell the story. Sometimes, though, when it is damp, a little breeze will come in the window and it smells just heavenly...pine and cedar and sweet grass and who knows what. Mmmmm....
I cooked tonight, and I discovered something I've been hearing about lately. Packages of boneless chicken breasts have always been 1¼ lb...until this time. These packages are 1 lb. So now if I want similar sized portions to what I was eating before, I will either have to cook two packages or only get two meals out of one package. I heard something on the radio about food manufacturers downsizing packages rather than increasing the prices, but I don't buy most of the things they're doing that to (like cold cereal). So this was my first experience with another annoying side effect of inflation. Of course, I suppose I could downsize my portions...nah. That's too much like dieting.
And that was my quiet day. It's a quiet, cloudy night in the field.
July 16 So I got to reading again, and it was 12:15 before I turned out the light. I did make it out of bed by 9:30, but of course, I had to pet a cat, do my requisite 10 rows on the sock, and do my surfing, so it was about noon when I started for town.
It was a lovely day, mostly sunny and quite warm (relatively), and I had the road to myself going south. The whole trip, at least down to Calumet, is nice at this time of year, with the trees such restful shades of green and the wildflowers at the edges of the road. I took Cliff Drive, and I also took the camera, but I didn't see anything worthy of a picture.
It was only about 60º when I left the harbor, but it got into the 70s before I got to Mohawk, and it got into the upper 70s in Houghton. I was hot. That was partly because it was humid, and partly because they don't keep the air conditioning very cold in the stores. Of course, the car was like an oven.
I had to go to Wal-Mart, which tired me out for starters, but I needed cat food (at last), and their prices are lower than Econo's. They have gone up, though. Of course, everything is going up.
I almost made the mistake of getting two big packages of card stock. The price was right - but fortunately I quickly remembered that there were no envelopes, and all the cards in the world are no good without envelopes. I might have some that would fit the 4¼" x 5½" cards, because when these charities send me their awful cards, I throw the cards away, but I keep the envelopes, but I know I wouldn't have any for the 5½" x 8½" ones...so I put the cardstock back on the shelf. I guess I am going to have to send for the smaller cards. I did get a small (25) package of the larger ones, but I don't think I will be making many of those.
Instead, I stocked up on the parchment-look paper that I make the tags for my jewelry from. Now I have enough for lots and lots of cards, and all the colors are right. I also got a few more beads to match some I got earlier. They are shades of tan and copper, and one kind has some off-white beads, and they will make some really nice twisted necklaces. It's just for something a little different. I know everyone doesn't like blue the way I do, but these are colors I would wear, too. They go with off-white and camel and shades like that.
So then it was off to Econo, and my feet were already getting sore. When I get hot and I'm on my feet for any length of time, they swell, and then my size 12D shoes aren't big enough anymore and they start to compress my toes and rub. I guess I will have to try the Crocs the next time I go to town and see how they work. I've been eating TV dinners lately anyway, and that always makes my feet swell. So when I got home, I had very sore feet.
I can tell I'm going to have elimination problems. I came home with a boatload of fruit, as well as my usual veggie tray. The nectarines are in, and I just love them, as are the Rainier cherries. I didn't get any plums...that's for next time.
I did good, though, and had the lowest total I've had for a while. I don't know how that happened, but I won't complain. I haven't looked at my bill yet, but I may have gotten my senior discount again, and that has to help.
Then there was the gas situation. On the way down, I noticed that two stations in Hancock had gas for $4.16, which I thought was pretty good. Then I discovered that Wal-Mart had it for $4.15...and at my usual station at Econo, it was $4.26. Well...so I swung around to Wal-Mart and filled up there. I needed about half a tank - 13 gallons - and 11¢ a gallon makes a difference. This is awful.
Going home was more difficult, because there was a lot of traffic going north, but I made it around 4:30. I usually sit down and relax a bit when I get home - my legs were still sore - and I was about to start bringing things in when Ron called. I haven't heard from him for quite a while, and we had a nice conversation, although he had some sort of sad news, that one of our full-time residents has moved away. I was sorry to hear that. Anyway, we had to talk about the power failure, and some other things, including the price of food and fuel, which is hitting those of us on a fixed income pretty hard.
So it was late when I fetched all the perishables in and stuffed them into the fridge, but now I can eat for another month.
The weather started out nearly clear, but even before I left, it was beginning to get a bit cloudy, and there were high clouds I think they call cirrostratus over the area all day. There was quite a bit of sunshine, though, at least until a while ago. It is supposed to rain tonight, and it looks like it might.
The Weather Underground situation rectified itself before I left this morning. Thanks to everyone who sent me the forums that had the explanations, and especially to the person who sent me the IP address. What happened was that someone at the company that manages Weather Underground's domain names managed to modify the basic record for their domain and point it at something other than Weather Underground. Apparently WU found out about it pretty fast (as I thought, they are a very popular site - I'm not the only one who thinks they have the best weather information on the web), but getting it fixed took 18 hours or so. It was a matter of correcting the record, then getting it out to all the DNS servers in the world, and there are a lot of those. I bet somebody at Network Concepts is in hot water about now.
Reminded me of an incident that happened when I was working, where a colleague of mine managed to wipe out a vital production file in the middle of the afternoon. I managed to get the file back, minus some records that were added that day, but it took a couple of hours for me to gather together the information I needed (so does the recovery program work in octal or decimal...), then I had to fiddle around a bit to find out just how to fix it so it was readable. Ah, the memories...Incidents like that are one reason I retired when I was 55.
Anyway, the weather. It was 70º here when I got home, with almost no wind from the east-southeast. It got up to 71º and it is now dropping off again, with lots of thick clouds. There is some rain around, and it might get here.
Oh, I'm forgetting. I've been neglecting the bird front lately. Yesterday morning, I spied a couple of cedar waxwings in the trees at the north end of my property, and tonight, my feeders were overtaken by a small flock of pine siskins. Both are eruptive, and it's been several years - nearly 6 for the siskins - since I've seen any. It's nice that they are back. This is going to be a good year for berries, which is no doubt one reason the waxwings are back. I don't have a clue what determines when the siskins will be around.
The siskins get along all right with the goldfinches, but they don't get along very well with each other. Several times I saw one stop eating to peck at a neighbor on a feeder. They particularly like the thistle socks, so I'm glad I have some of those...especially since Wal-Mart didn't have any today.
The hummingbirds are coming back slowly, so I guess the height of the nesting season must be winding down.
Last night, it was late when I went out to bring in the feeders, and there were three flying squirrels around the feeder on the deck. They almost didn't leave. They seem very tame, even more tame than the red squirrels. They are nocturnal, of course, and I suppose they were overjoyed to find the feeders still out at 11:00. Not so tonight, I'm afraid. I expect to go to bed early and sleep long and hard.
So that was my day, and I'm glad that's over with for another month.
It's a quiet, cloudy evening in the field, and it may be a wet night.
July 15 Random thoughts: - July is half over already. - Thank heaven for a working generator. - This was a strange day.
I got to reading again, and it was after 2:00 when I got to bed. While I was sitting there, I started hearing grumbling, and it rained, although the center of the storm was out over the lake. I woke up at about 3:00 and 7:30 - it was a beautiful morning - and the next time I woke up, the clock was flashing 12:15. Oh no! A power failure! It was actually about 10:45, so the power went out at 10:30. I thought I might be hearing the generator, but it wasn't until I got down to the office that I was sure. I was running on generator power, and it was soooo nice!
It was even nicer later, because the power didn't come back on until 3:30 this afternoon. When I called the power company, I discovered that there had been a major outage for the entire northern half of Keweenaw County, from Allouez north. So we lost power for five hours, and it sure was nice to have the generator and be able to cook and flush the toilet.
It was really great when the power came back on, too. There was a "thunk!" from the basement, and the generator went to low speed for a couple of minutes before it shut off, and nothing in the house even saw the cutover. Amazing.
I did lose the sound in the computer, so I had to shut off power to it and restart it - that has happened before - but otherwise, it was all very straightforward. Of course, since it was a general power failure, even though I had power, all the broadband receivers were down, so no pictures were uploaded to the website.
So I did my morning surfing rather late today, and in the meantime, I reread one of the stories I had transcribed, with the idea of maybe doing a little writing. Unfortunately, it is too long, and I just finished it, and now it's too late.
I checked the Weather Underground, but the NWS station hadn't reported, then I went on to some other sites. When I came back to look at the weather, it wasn't there! The Weather Underground had gone away altogether. A while later, I got a page that said it was under construction, and lately, I've gotten an error message that said I don't have authorization to look at the site. I can't imagine what is going on, particularly since the "under construction" page said it came from Network Concepts, not Weather Underground. I certainly hope my main weather pages haven't gone away! The stuff they report is much more complete than I can get from any other source, even the NWS itself.
Anyway, we had 0.55 inches of rain overnight, in two showers, I think, and it was so humid this morning that even though the sky was clear at 10:45, there was still rain on the windows. The temperature finally got up to 71º this evening, although it was in the middle 60s for most of the day, with a stiff wind from the north. It was perfectly clear for most of the day, and so pretty, with blue skies, blue water, and whitecaps on the harbor.
I spent most of the day reading, which wasn't very productive, but about all I felt like. I should have gone to the post office, but I didn't. Oh, well. Tomorrow I need to go to town (I wrote want, but that isn't true - I'm only going because I need to).
So that was my interesting day, and it's time to toddle up to the north end and hope the Weather Underground is back in business tomorrow.
July 14 Happy Bastille Day!
I guess I'd better write this before I fall asleep. I have one of the fatigue headaches, mostly in and behind my eyes.
The reason for that is, after I got the journal published and all, I started working on a new book of charted patterns I got, converting them to Peyote stitch, and it was after 2:00 when I got to bed. Oh, I didn't want to get up this morning, but I had a massage scheduled, so I got up about 9:45. Ugh.
I feel much better for the massage, though.
When I got home, I didn't do anything, as usual, although I worked on my charting some more. I'm not sure any of it will translate into bracelets, because the patterns I like best are up to 2" wide, and I don't particularly want to make bracelets that wide. We'll see.
I got the bird feeders put out this morning, and while they blew around some, the birds seemed grateful. There were a few goldfinches that I saw, and a few hummingbirds.
The wind has finally died down completely. The only thing good about it was that it blew the bugs away. Every time I back out of the garage, I scare off a whole flock of small dragonflies who are, I hope, feasting on the mosquitoes and other nasties that congregate in the lee of the house.
The weather was OK. The temperature was between 60º and 65º all day, and the wind was still in the 15-30 mph range for most of the day, although by afternoon it has switched around to the north. now it is perfectly calm. It was clear to partly cloudy until late in the afternoon, and it has now pretty much clouded over. Pretty nice day, actually.
So now I really need to go to bed and close my weary eyes. It's a quiet cloudy evening in the field.
July 13 It was a hairy night in the field last night. The wind blew and beat against the house, and the lake was fussing, although the wind was so noisy it was hard to hear the lake. I fiddled around and didn't get to bed until after 2:00, and it was about 10:15 when I got up this morning, after a weird dream where my parents and I went back to the house on Champine after a vacation, and it was altogether different, with a brick garage that had no driveway to it (and a big tree right where the driveway should be) and nothing but grass growing in the backyard. It was our house - the key fit the door - but I woke up while we were trying to figure out what had happened. How strange are the ways one's unconscious mind puts things together!
It was still too windy to put out the bird feeders, so the birdies didn't get anything to eat for a second day. The wind is finally beginning to die down, so tomorrow I will put the feeders out again.
The wind was gusting up to 36 mph all day, from the northwest, and it was cloudy. The temperature went up and down between 60º and 65º all day, so I ignored everything.
Since I didn't do anything, I don't have anything to report, and I feel like it would be a good idea to go to bed early tonight.
It's a cloudy, breezy night in the field.
July 12 Well, since it's tomorrow, I guess I'd better get this written, not that I have much to say.
I was sitting in the bathroom when I began to hear thunder, so I quick jumped into the shower, and as I did so, the heavens opened. After I turned out the light, there was a lot of lightning, but I didn't hear much thunder, which means the center of the storm must have been out in the lake someplace. We only got about 0.10 inch of rain, but it rained for about three hours. I didn't notice.
It was one of those mornings when I was up briefly at about 6:30, then the next time I woke up it was 10:30. Oh, well.
It was a beautiful, sunny day, with just a few clouds, and it was warm, but it was extremely windy. The NWS station was reporting northwest winds in the 15-30 mph range all day, but I think it was windier out here. The wind has been interesting. It seems to come in waves. For a few minutes, it will seem to die down to around 10 mph, then another blast in the 20-30 mph range will come in. I would like to see a continuous plot of the winds. I think there are some trees in the way of west to northwest winds at the NWS station, and anyway, I am further from the lee of the hill than it is. But it was fun to watch, and there were whitecaps on the harbor all day long. The temperature actually got up to 78º for a little while, and it was in the mid 70s for most of the day. Of course, the wind made it feel cooler, but it was a nice day.
I didn't do much, again. I began to try to get the trash together, but otherwise, not much.
A while ago, when I went to close the door in the great room, there was a little more than first quarter moon shining brightly in the southwest and leaving a glitter trail on the harbor, so it is pretty clear out tonight.
And now I will go to bed. It's going to be a good night to sleep, with all that wind beating around the house.
July 11 I think it was about midnight when I turned out the light last night, and I got up around 9:30 this morning...maybe 9:00? I don't remember, but anyway it was earlier than I've gotten up for quite a while. So did I do anything with all my time? Uh-uh. Of course not.
It was foggy until about 8:30, and then it looked like it might be a nice day, but by 10:30 there were clouds hiding the mountain. Whether you thought it was fog or just very low clouds depends on your point of view, I guess. It was socked in on top of the mountain until about 12:30. That was neat to watch. So it turned into a cloudy and not very nice day. The temperature finally got up to 67º, but that was late this afternoon. Most of the day it was in the low 60s. There was a wind from the south for most of the day.
Currently, I am watching weather radar with interest. There is a pretty strong thunderstorm right off Copper Harbor and extending north into the lake. It is blowing hard, with gusts up to 35 mph, and every so often there will be a crack of thunder, but whether we'll get any rain out of it is debatable. I do find it fascinating to watch the radar when storms come through.
The excitement of the day was the ATT repairman, who came in the middle of the afternoon. He didn't want to admit that the hum I've had in my phones was anything much, even though I told him I hadn't had it before, but when we listened to the computer line, not only was there a hum, there was static. So he went off and climbed poles and discovered that down toward Lake Lily there was a junction box that had been left open, and the wires in it were corroded almost through. So at least he had something to repair, and it is better now. The point, though, is that if I hadn't complained, one of these days, those wires would have broken and everybody this side of Lake Lily would have been without any phone service at all. So I felt it was worth the hassle.
Then my friend Sandi called, and they are here for the rest of the summer, and that is nice. What she had to say about the weather in southeastern Michigan made me very glad I'm here. It has apparently been very hot and very humid - just the weather I hate most. So I will try hard not to complain about our cool, damp weather, even though it is buggy and it makes my arthritis ache. It's much better than hot.
It looks like the rain may miss us, and the wind has died down considerably. I do love to watch the weather. There is a really dark cloud off to the north, but the wind is blowing it out into the lake, I think. It looks like there may be some more rain coming into our area from the west, but it will be later. I guess it's time to bring in the bird feeders.
I did have some birds today. There were some goldfinches, and some hummingbirds. I still wonder where the chickadees and nuthatches are. I miss them.
So that was my quiet day. I ate in. After eating out three times in the past week and getting another meal of each one, I decided it was time to sit tight and eat in, so I had some of my nice Schwan's stuff that I got today.
It's going to be an active night in the field, I think.
July 10 Last night, I turned out the light at about 11:30, but I was wakeful in the middle of the night for a while for some unknown reason. I woke up at 9:00 and I decided that was too early, so it was 10:30 before I got up. Oh, well. Then I finished the gusset on the sock. So I am making progress on the sock I don't like, and soon it will be over.
While I was knitting, it began to rain hard, and it rained for a couple of hours, which is part of the reason the bird feeders were late getting out. I also had to fill the pail with sunflower seed, and that took a while. I didn't have many birds, but I did see a couple of finches and a hummingbird or two. I'm sure the squirrels are happy to have their sunflower seeds back.
I spent a lot of time on the computer, looking at things I might want to order and then not. It's nice to be able to list a whole bunch of things, look at the total, and just close the window. The latest is some Polartec fleece with a curly, sort of furry surface. Gee, that would make a nice jacket... But I didn't, at least not yet.
I finished the bracelet I was working on - blue with copper - and started another one. A bracelet a day...
Then there was the weather. As I mentioned, it rained this morning, but the temperature was in the upper 50s, so it wasn't bad outside. However, around 6:00, it dropped off to 53º, and then the fog rolled in, and boy did it. There has been no visibility at all since 6:00, and even the tops of the trees behind the house are wreathed in fog. The temperature has dropped off and is now 48º. There wasn't a lot of wind all day, and now it is calm and cold and damp. Sort of yucky, frankly.
I was going to look at a story a while ago, but instead I decided it was past time to back up my files to the TravelDisk, so I did that instead. Not that I am anticipating a problem. It's just for safekeeping.
So that was another quiet day, and I'm off to the north end again. I feel like the weather, and that means sleep, and lots of it.
It's a foggy night in the field tonight.
July 9 So last night I went right back to my old habits. It was 1:30 before I turned out the light. Sigh. I got up around 10:45 this morning, and I knitted a while after I petted the cat, so it was noon before I got to the office again. Sigh.
The bird feeders didn't get put out today at all, because for most of the day the wind was in the 25-35 mph range, and no birds would have come to them anyway. Tomorrow.
Most of the day was windy and cloudy, with a temperature that hung right about 60º. It made it up to 62º at 4:00, and the next reading, at 5:00, was 52º. I don't know why that was. The wind had turned north, but it was beginning to die down by that time. It did recover a bit, to 59º, and now it is dropping again, and the wind is calm. When the temperature dropped, the sky did begin to clear, and it is now just beautifully clear.
I didn't do much, although I got about two-thirds of a copper and blue bracelet done. Those zigzag bracelets go pretty fast if I can just keep at them.
This evening, a friend from Dallas who comes up here in July with his son, who is in hockey camp, took me to dinner. It was certainly nice to see him again - he is a really nice person - and we had a lovely time. Harbor Haus two times in one week! What will happen next? It seems like some years are very social and some years aren't, and this one looks to be social. Anyway, Joe is a very nice guy and it was good to see him. He went to Tech and he just loves it up here, and his daughter is going there in the fall, which he is delighted about - more reasons to come up! He is very active both on the Tech finance board and on the Smart Zone board, so he comes frequently.
However, when he dropped me off, the wind had died to nothing, and it is incredibly buggy outside. The moral of that story is, don't go outside after about 7:00 in the evening or you will be carried away by the bugs.
So now I am going up to the north end and take my bath and read for a while. Maybe I'll even get to bed earlier for a change.
It's a calm, clear, beautiful night in the field.
July 8 I was a little earlier last night - 11:45 - but I didn't get up until 10:45 this morning. That wasn't because I turned over at 8:30 or anything. The last time I was up was about 5:30. I guess I needed the sleep. Unfortunately, I'll be a little later tonight.
Then I got to knitting, and I turned the heel on the sock and picked up the gusset stitches, and it was after noon before I left the north end. So my day was rather truncated again.
This afternoon I started reading - and editing - the story I transcribed a while ago that isn't finished, and that took most of the afternoon. Add to that, there was a segment of Morning Edition (on NPR) that I wanted to either hear or read, so I read it, and, well...now it's 11:30 again. Maybe someday I'll get back to something like normal hours, but it doesn't look hopeful.
It was a nice day. I just discovered that we had some fog early in the morning while I was asleep, and it was still cloudy when I put the bird feeders out, but it cleared up later, and the late afternoon was lovely. The temperature got into the low 60s, then rather abruptly, between 3:00 and 4:00, it rose to a lovely 73º for a couple of hours before it stated to drop back. It was hard to tell, though, because it was very windy. in the 15-25 mph range (at least!) from the northwest. That was at the NWS station, and I think it was windier here. At least the bird feeders were blowing around quite a bit.
It was nearly clear at sunset, and when I went out to the kitchen a little while ago, there was a lovely crescent moon low in the west. When I came back to take in the feeders, there was a cloud in front of it, though, so it might not be a clear night after all.
I discovered this morning that I got a black fly bite on the outside of each hand last night, and I must have had more mosquitoes in the house than I thought, because one bit me on the leg, which is under my compression hose when I have them on, and another got me on the back of my upper arm. So I itch.
I didn't do much else today. I discovered this morning that I was supposed to run the dishwasher last night, and I was out of my regular cat dishes, so I have now packed up the dishwasher to run tonight. I got to thinking about how I had positioned the silverware baskets in it, so I changed them, and we'll see how this works out. It's not so convenient for loading it, but it does seem to give me more room for dishes...but maybe not when I'm washing casseroles. So we'll see.
Oh, yes, I finished the second green zigzag bracelet and started a blue one. I'm not doing a bracelet a day, but I am getting a few done.
So now it's time to toddle back to the north end again, and this time it's bath and bed...no reading, and no knitting.
It's a lovely night in the field tonight.
July 7 Maybe tonight...
After I uploaded the journal, I started reading the story I had finished transcribing, fixing up the typos MS doesn't find and putting in chapter headings, and when I finally got to bed it was after 2:00. By the time I went up to the north end, I was having trouble seeing the screen and getting dizzy I was so tired, but I had to take a bath. because I had a dinner date tonight.
So it was something like 10:30 or 11:00 before I got up, and the day was rather truncated. The task of the day was to pay some bills, and I did that, and I got to the post office, where my big box of English muffins had arrived as well as my stimulus check, at long last.
If those guys in the government think I am going to go out and buy something I wouldn't have otherwise, they should think again. This one just goes for gas and food. Maybe a dinner out, although I haven't been having to pay for my own meals out lately, which is nice.
Of course, I will have to go to the post office again tomorrow to put the check in the mail to be deposited, but that's all right, because today's mail was just coming in when I left.
As for the English muffins, they were half off, and there are some flavors I hadn't tried, so why not? I'm not sure about the ones with chocolate chips in them, but I will probably like the ones with fruit.
Tonight Jean invited me to dinner at Harbor Haus, with her daughter, and that was very pleasant. They are both nice people. I must say Jean has better terminal facilities than almost any other woman I've ever met, and I wish I could take lessons. That's fine, and we had a most pleasant time. I had fish, and Buster will be pleased, because I brought half of it home with me.
They picked me up, and when we came back, I have never seen it quite so buggy as it was out behind the house. Yie! brought several mosquitoes in with me. One I killed as it was buzzing around Buster, and I just squashed another one that was buzzing around my ear.
Buster is a canny little cat. He ran off when the car came up to pick me up, but when we came back, he was waiting at the door for us. Funny little cat.
Jasmine is a funny little cat, too. She felt really, really good this afternoon. She was dancing around with her tail like a bottle brush. She went running up the stairs to the loft, and she went through the railing, but she left her tail hanging out where I could see it, and when I walked by, she was staring at me with her eyes big and round, then she came running down the stairs, through the hall, and down to the basement. All this was while Buster was asleep someplace.
It was a partly cloudy day, with some sunshine, and it was cold. For most of the day the temperature was in the lower 50s, although it has finally risen to 58º. There was almost no wind.
Speaking of the wind, while I was sitting here reading last night, all of a sudden, the wind began to blow hard - 25 mph with a 38 mph gust, amazing enough that the NWS station made and off-hour report - for about five minutes, then it went away completely, like it had never happened. I sometimes wonder what causes things like that.
That was after the temperature dropped from 82º to 68º in about half an hour. The weather is so interesting here on the shores of the big lake!
So that was my truncated day, and I am going to go up to the north end tonight and, while I will probably read a bit, I am going to try hard to get to bed at a reasonable hour for a change.
It's a quiet, cloudy night in the field.
July 6 I was really switched around yesterday and as a result, it was 3:30 before I finally got to bed, and I didn't get up until noon. That should have been enough sleep, but I think I will try it earlier tonight and see what happens.
It was very windy all night. The window I have open onto the porch howls when it is open, but that didn't keep me awake. The temperature never went below 66º all night, and it was on its way up when I got up at noon. It was in the lower 80s all afternoon, and the wind was light, enough to keep it relatively comfortable, but not strong.
Needless to say, the house is opened up again, and even so, it's warm in here. It was partly cloudy to clear all day, and it was a nice day. I would like it a bit cooler, but then, I'm picky. Summer is here.
I finished transcribing the story this afternoon, and I'm glad that's over. I will go back over it, probably many times, to edit it, and it needs to be broken up into chapters, which is one thing I really don't know how to do. I will try, though, and see what I come up with. I wish I knew how many words there are in a typical chapter of a typical book.
I had one tense moment. I made the mistake of minimizing Word while it was doing its grammar check, and when it was done, I couldn't get the window back...arrgghh!!! I know Word saves intermediate results (every 10 minutes, in my case), and that might have helped, but I didn't want to have to type the last couple of pages over again. Fortunately, when I closed it, it asked if I wanted to save my changes, and when I reopened it, everything was there. How to make the sweat a little thicker on the brow!
My hummingbirds are coming back, slowly, but the level in the feeder is going down now. I don't think there were many birds around today, but I imagine they are busy nesting, and even most of the seed eaters feed bugs to their nestlings. Once they fledge, I hope to have more. I do wonder what happened to my chickadees and nuthatches, but maybe they will come back later in the summer. I need to fill the pail with sunflower seed again. The squirrels are always hungry.
Every morning (or afternoon) when I put out the feeders, there is one little squirrel waiting in the tree. She is a little nervous of me, but I think if I wanted to, I could tame her. At least she stood on a branch and stared at me today. They are cute. I haven't had any chipmunks at the feeders after the first few days I had them out, but a lot of seed falls through the deck and I suppose they are gleaning down below. I hope all my chipmunks haven't gone away!
This evening, Mark the window washer called, and I had to tell him not to come. I just can't afford him this year. I hope I can next year, because by then my windows will be horrible. His business is way down, too, but I'm not surprised, with the economy the way it is in Detroit.
So that was my truncated day, and maybe I can get back on schedule again. Um...what's that?
It's a lovely summer night in the field, and maybe all the noisy tourists left this afternoon. Right now, it's completely quiet.
Ooohhh! All of a sudden there is a teensy breeze coming in the east windows, and it is at least 10º cooler than what was coming in the west side a few minutes ago. Nice! If you don't like the weather, just wait a minute!
July 5 Well, it's tomorrow already. I was transcribing and I got to the climax of the story, so I just kept typing. Now my hands are sore.
I forgot to mention last night that there was a very good crowd in Copper Harbor for the fireworks. They were parked almost all the way to the sewage treatment plant along both sides of US-41, and I had to drive very carefully to avoid running down groups of pedestrians. I have the feeling that most of the population of Keweenaw north of Calumet comes to the Copper Harbor fireworks, since there were clearly more people here than live in all of Keweenaw County. And when the fireworks were over, they cheered loud enough that I could hear them way down here. I sure don't envy those people trying to get out of town, but I'm grateful that they came and undoubtedly spent money. They got a good show.
I was so tired last night that I jumped into bed without a bath at about midnight, and I got up about 10:30 this morning. That ought to be enough sleep, but I was a little droopy today for some reason.
It wasn't the weather, which was the summer weather I've been waiting for. It was already in the upper 70s when I got up and the temperature was between 75º and 80º all afternoon, except for a while around 4:00 when the wind shifted to the east for an hour or so and the temperature fell to 69º. I don't know what that was all about, but it shifted back to the southwest and it got warm again. In fact, when it was 80º and the wind dropped, it got a little too warm and I had to turn on the ceiling fan in the office. Now it's blowing a lot harder out here than the NWS station is reporting, and it's in the low 70s and it's lovely. The NWS station is quite sheltered on the south and southwest, and I know its readings are off when the wind comes from those directions. There was a lot of sunshine, although there was a glaze of high cirrus clouds in the sky all day. Altogether, it was a lovely summer day, and I hope we get more of them soon.
I opened up the house. All the back windows in the great room and the office are open, the patio doors and the doors to the porch are open, and when it got warm, I opened a south window in the office. I will close that one when I go north, because it might cool down tonight, but I will take the chance and leave the east windows open. I always close the patio doors and the door from the kitchen to the porch, just in case a bear comes.
I didn't do much. I didn't feel very robust, and I woke up with an extremely sore right knee that didn't clear up until late this afternoon. My back was creaky, too. I don't know why; it was warm and it wasn't very humid, so I don't know what happened.
Anyway, late in the day I started transcribing the story again, and I got through the climax, which is rather good, I think, so I just kept on typing. It was time to stop, though. My left index finger is stiff and sore, and my right and left hands are getting quite out of sync, which is usually a sign it's time to stop.
Tonight, with all the windows open, I was treated to the summer sound of motorcycles and diesel busses accelerating away from the fort. In fact, it sounded like the motorcycles were running up and down US-41 trying to make as much noise as possible. That has finally stopped, thankfully. I guess some people just don't understand the concept of "quiet". But then, it's Saturday night of a long weekend, so I guess I have to put up with it. It does mean there are lots of people in town spending money, and that's good.
So now it's time to toddle up to the north end, and I must take a bath, but I think it's warm enough to dry off in the wind, which is one thing I just love about summer here.
It's a lovely summer night in the field and it's time for bed.
July 4 - Independence Day Well, happy Independence Day. I hope you had a nice one.
I didn't get to bed until after 2:00 this morning, but this time I can blame the wash. I needed to get that last load into the dryer, so I had to wait until the one before it was done. I will try not to do that the next time. I was up around 10:30, so that was all right.
I didn't do a lot. I transcribed quite a bit of the story that was done, and I folded all the laundry that I did yesterday. I started filling the dishwasher. I have gotten into the bad habit of leaving the dirty dishes on the counter, and as a result, I have some of the littlest ants I have ever seen running around on my counter. So I shall have to be more careful to keep the counter clean, I guess. I've never had ants before, but there's a first time for everything.
Tonight I met the nice people at Harbor Haus for a farewell dinner. Two of the couples are leaving tomorrow, so they wanted one last get-together. They are such nice people, and it was a very good meal. We ate late, so it was nearly 10:00 when I got home.
It was a beautiful day, but not very warm again. The temperature was just over 60º all day except for a blip around 7:00 this evening when it went up to 70º and then right back down again. There was a moderate wind out of the north - 15 mph - for most of the day, which died down around 9:00. It was mostly sunny, although there were a few little cumulus clouds early in the day and some high cirrus clouds late in the day.
The highlight of the whole day was the fireworks, which just got over with. It was a perfect evening for them, not too cold and not too windy - and no fog or rain or anything like that. It was a good show, about half an hour long, with lots of pretty things, including some I've never seen before. A few of them were so high and so huge they even made an real show down here. I'm sorry that I didn't get any pictures, but the pictures from the webcam don't show what it looks like, and if I am trying to take pictures, I am not watching the fireworks. Sorry.
Anyway, my neighbors to the south set off a mini-show of their own, which was also pretty, except there were too many screamers and big bangs, both of which I hate. So does Buster. He came and sat on my lap while I was watching, and he watched, too, for a while, but it wasn't very interesting to him. I don't think he liked the noise very much, although he isn't as spooky as some of the other cats I've had.
While I was sitting there, watching the show down the harbor, I kept seeing lights fly by out on the deck: there are fireflies out. I haven't seen any of those for a couple of years, and they're fun. It was cool enough that they weren't blinking very much, so I kept seeing these little streaks of light go down the deck. The people at dinner were talking about them, and I guess I haven't seen them because I usually have some light on when I'm here in the office, and after I turn out the lights, I go to sleep - and then when I wake up it's getting light already.
So that was a very nice Fourth of July, and now I think I will go up to the north end and try to get a good night's sleep again.
July 3 I was a little earlier to bed last night - around midnight - and I slept well, although I was as stiff as a board when I got up in the night. When I woke up this morning, my entire left shoulder area, all the way around, was stiff, and my back was a mess.
By early in the afternoon, I couldn't move without pain, so I put on a fleece jacket, and now I feel fine, except for my legs. Apparently I was cold. I didn't feel cold overnight, but clearly I was, and I think I sat in a draft yesterday as well.
One of the reasons I was cold is that it was a cold day. The high temperature was 63º, and there was a 15 mph wind out of the north that made it feel a lot colder, at least around here. I even closed the window to the porch for a while.
However, it was a beautifully clear, blue day. There were almost no clouds in the sky, and the sun was so strong the temperature in the office got up to 77º before I finally decided that was too warm and opened the door. By the time I did that, though, the wind was dying down, so it didn't get cold in here and there were no drafts.
The task of the day was wash, and I'm not through yet. Two loads are in the dryer and one is in the washer, almost done. I need to stay up until the last load is in the dryer, unfortunately. I have a lot more to wash. Not only are there sheets and towels I'm using, all the bedding from the other house is in the laundry room, and it all needs to be washed before I take it upstairs. The complete bedding for the double bed and two single beds is sitting on the floor. Ugh. Maybe I can at least get my current stuff done tomorrow.
I also finished transcribing the story I was working on. This is another one where I know how it ends, I just have to figure out how to get there. And now the disadvantage of writing on the computer is beginning to become apparent. It is very hard to page back and forth and find what I'm looking for (or I find it so). I'm trying to divide this one into chapters as I go, and I feel the need to visualize the pages. Of course, if it were a book, it wouldn't be on 8½ x 11 paper, either, so that makes it doubly hard. I did write a few new paragraphs, and we'll see how it goes.
Now it is a lovely clear night in the field, and I will fiddle around until the clothes are dried. It is quite calm, but the water is still a bit unsteady from the wind earlier, so it is swishing around and occasionally there is a little gurgle. Nice music to go to sleep to.
July 2 I was late again last night. I got to fiddling around and it was late before I went up to the north end, then I sat staring at the floor for a while. While I was doing that, I started hearing rumbling in the distance, and after it began to get rather loud and I heard a fistful of rain hit the house, I quick jumped in the shower just in case. We didn't have a power failure, although they did down in Eagle River, and I made it into bed just fine...just as the heavens opened.
It was as good a thunderstorm as we've had in a long time, with lots of thunder and lightning, and this one came right over the house...loudly. Unfortunately, most of the lightning was up in the clouds, so I didn't get to see those lovely bolts across the sky, but otherwise, it was wonderful. I went to sleep before it was over. Buster wasn't so happy, so he was sitting beside my head when I drifted off. He is not really afraid of thunder, he just doesn't like it very well, and he'd rather be close to me in case something happens. We got 0.37 inches of rain in about 3 hours, which should go a long way toward easing our dry spell.
It was cool and foggy when I got up this morning, in time to have something to eat before my massage. I feel much better for that. I think I've been sleeping funny again, and my back was sore in strange places. It's much better now.
However, as usual, I didn't do anything for the rest of the day. I really need to do some wash - the laundry baskets are overflowing - and I need to continue to clean off the desk and around the sewing machine. Oh, well. I transcribed most of another chapter of the story and I did a few rows on the bracelet. Another session like that and it should be done.
Ron came to park the tractor in my garage for the summer, and we had a nice conversation. It was nice out around 4:00, and of course, since we were in the garage, we were out of the wind. There were a few bugs, but I don't think I got bitten.
It was a coolish day. After a warm night, the temperature dropped abruptly to 55º at 8:00, and it never got over 62º for the rest of the day. There was a north wind in the 15 mph range, which no doubt accounts for the cold temperatures. It was humid, too, which doesn't do the arthritis a bit of good. Even after the fog lifted, it was hazy across the harbor all day, but there was a lot of sunshine until close to sunset, when it clouded over. That wasn't forecast. It was supposed to be clear tonight.
So that was my quiet day, and I'm yawning again. It's a cool, quiet night in the field.
July 1 I still can't believe I'm writing July. Where did the year go??
I went up to the north end late last night, and then I started playing around with my notes for the porch cushions, and it was after 1:00 when I jumped into bed. I was awake briefly around 6:30, and the next time I woke up was around 10:15.
I was sitting in the bathroom when I heard voices, so I got dressed as fast as I could, and when the ladies came back from walking my beach, I was making my breakfast. They didn't stay long, but they did get to see the house. Not that it's in the most beautiful shape, but at least the kitchen was relatively clean!
Their coming seemed to energize me, and I accomplished something today. I got the dishwasher unloaded, and I began cleaning off the desk. I'm not through with that, because there are a lot of things I don't know quite what to do with, but I'm making some progress. A lot of stuff that shouldn't be there at all had gotten piled up on it, so it was time to clear the decks anyway.
When I got up this morning, I thought it felt a bit warm, and so I opened the porch door, and it was. It was around 78º, and there was a strong northwest wind. The temperature stayed about the same until close to 6:00, when it abruptly dropped to 63º, then it recovered and it was 82º at 8:00 before it started to drop back. For most of the afternoon, there was a very strong northwest wind. The strongest gust, sometime between noon and 1:00, was 38 mph. Whoosh! The changes in the temperature didn't have anything to do with the wind, because it was from the north to northwest all day, although it was dying down when the temperature peaked. Another one of those interesting weather days.
It was partly cloudy all day. There was sun, but there were those hazy clouds with some cumulus in them that can turn into thunderclouds, although today they didn't.
I had the doors open all day, although the front door and the porch door into the kitchen both blew shut. It was nice to have a strong wind and not be freezing.
I was sitting at the computer with my back to the deck this evening, when I heard something strange, and when I turned around, Jasmine was up at the top of the screen! For heaven's sake! I don't know what she was doing there. She must not weigh very much at all, because she didn't make any pulls in the screen. I wonder what she saw that she thought she could get up there?
So that was my day. I am going to be late tonight, too, and I need to be up at a reasonable hour, because I have an appointment for a massage. I came up with some sore muscles in my back this morning, which I think means I need to be worked over a bit.
Now it's a quiet night in the field and it's time to go to bed.
Last updated 08/04/11 08:45 PM
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