Author Archives: bilborg

On the Water

This weekend, we celebrated my birthday a few weeks late. Marcia had been unwell (no Covid, but no fun, either) and she’s now mostly much better, thanks for asking. The best part is that in the interval between birthday actual and birthday celebrated, we took delivery on our AlumaCraft 165S boat. We got it into the water on Friday, and took it out for some fishing both Saturday and Sunday. Note that I said fishing, and not catching – it’s pretty early in the season here yet, and we have lots to learn about fishing techniques/baits that vary with the seasons up here. I think that I had fish on the hook maybe three times, and boated approximately none of them. Marcia did a bit of fishing, but spent time re-rigging and getting gear setup for future trips. That’s time I should probably take, too… Here’s Marcia enjoying our new mode of transportation over the weekend:

It’s been asked, what will we name this boat. Not sure that I need to name a boat, if I’m going to be mocked for naming cars (which I totally didn’t do). But while “Bob” and “Baldrick”, and perhaps even “I have a cunning plan” are on the list, I’m voting for holding off on a naming ceremony for the first year, after which, if the fishing was good, we can name it nicely. If, however, a boat of our own that doesn’t improve our fishing capabilities is found to have been the result, then perhaps just “UPoS” on the transom will be sufficient (“Useless Piece of —-“).

Spring has (finally) sprung

The weather has finally reached the point where we can call is Spring. It’s been greening up for a while, and the daffodils have been up and out for a while. But the trees and shrubs are finally starting to leaf, the tulips are in bloom, and I’m going to have to mow the lawn for the first time this year, real soon now.

The bit of lawn visible behind that flower bed doesn’t seem so bad, but other patches of the lawn have been unevenly fertilized by the dog over the last three months, such that the front yard now looks much like the result of an old man shaving: splotchy and uneven. My initial goal will be to make it flat.

Springing

In the last few days I managed a variety of outdoor chores around the new homestead. This includes stuff that should have been done during the Fall cleanup, but weren’t since Lorraine was getting ready to move out, and we were not in, yet. By the time I got settled enough to do a small amount of yardwork, there was a tiny window of time before the snows started. So all I managed was to get the bulk of the leaves off the lawns, then.

Now a couple of the front beds have been raked out, and the leaves blown off into a holding area. Then yesterday, I raked out some more leaves around back, and fired up the Cub Cadet for the first time. Works like a champ. The chain-driven leaf collector does a sufficient job at picking up most of large piles of leaves, then I could drive them down to where I stockpiled the Fall accumulation. Eventually I’ll turn that stack over a few times a year and compost them.

In and around that, I did some more lower-garage cleanup and organization, as well as gluing up another bit of the table saw assembly that needed repair after the move. This one was sort of on me, as I had not fully disassembled a bracket from the top, and of course they moved it bracket-down, breaking out the end of the edge. It’ll be fine, though, once re-assembled.

Georgia likes napping in the sun, in my home office. But she’d rather not be disturbed by being photographed while in the act of napping.

Friday the Thirteenth

Friday the thirteenth falls on a Sunday this month. Sorry for the lag in posts, but settling into a new house and getting a new rescue mutt makes for a busy time.

Georgia is settling in pretty well. She’s testing a lot of boundaries, and it’ll be a few months of getting her expectations aligned with actual reality, we’re sure. We are doing formal training with this dog, as Marcia can’t walk her right now – Georgia would pull her over right away. But it’ll all work out. Hardest thing at the moment: finding her toys that she can’t destroy quickly that won’t instead destroy her teeth and gums.

Georgia and I took a walk up to the nearby (retired?) quarry last week. She had fun sniffing everything and trying to pull me over. I had fun looking at the rusty old gear, and trying to keep my feet on a mostly ice-based walking surface.

Chores

Maine remains a chore-filled place. Today, for example… Due to extraordinarily good planning on my part, I had to be up at 0630 on the morning of Daylight Stealing Time, to do production OS patching at work. Following that, I did the following activities today:

• The bi-weekly cleaning of the pellet stove and the wood stove.
• Shoveled the driveway by hand, since we only got about 2.5″ of snow yesterday afternoon into evening. The downside of not shoveling a light fall is that it partly melts, then turns into an ice rink. So it’s better to clear it quickly. And it’s faster by shovel than by machine, with a light fall.
• Roasted coffee (the second pound of a tasty Guatemalan from Sweet Maria’s Coffee)
• Fabricated a new wood rack for near the basement wood stove, to make it easier to manage for Marcia when she’s downstairs sewing, etc.
• Used wedge and sledge to split some more of the large split wood into smaller split wood – more appropriate sizes for Marcia and our particular woodstove.

We’re about halfway through our regular stock of pellets for the stove. I’ll have to go out and pick up another load in about a week and a half. That batch might carry us right through into the warm (though I doubt it). I buy (25) forty pound bags of pellets at a time, and stock them into the upper garage, bringing a bag in to the house as needed. Here’s what three and a half weeks of heating for the house looks like in the back of the truck:

As we start to ramp our days back up into 40+ degree Fahrenheit temperatures, the pellet stove shuts itself off for several hours in the middle of the day, so our consumption of pellets should go down by twenty or twenty five percent over the next month.

That’s all I’ve got for you at the moment. Time to go grab a shower, and get ready to start another week… Be well.

Broken Things Fixed

Of course, a Friday the thirteenth that happens to fall on a Thursday this month is the perfect time to fix some broken things. In this case, I fixed the broken 2FA bits on all of our sites. Better yet, I fixed up the broken sites – once again you can delve into the deeper history of this place, probably by starting at https://legacy.orbdesigns.com/bpages/metajour.html. Now I can do silly stuff like point you at what was going on twenty years ago today: https://legacy.orbdesigns.com/bpages/2002/z20020107.html#sunday. You’re welcome – I sure liked seeing a couple of pictures of our very first rescue dog, Sally.

Georgia Aileen

This is the name, I’m given to understand, of our next rescue dog. We’re signed up to adopt a young adult dog of uncertain heritage but robust health who was picked up as a stray in South Carolina. With luck, she’ll be ours in a few weeks. More when we know more.

Heating

Heating is a persistent topic, the further north you go. We have lots of options in this new-to-us house, but we’d held off on using the wood-fired choices until after cleaning and inspection, because we weren’t sure of the state of the flues and stoves. Both were cleaned and approved of, so last week we were able to spin up the basement wood stove, and the main floor pellet stove…

The brand is Harman, and the maintenance dude says it’s one of the best on the market. We like it.

Winding Down

It’s tough, going through all the continuing waves of COVID, and we’re thinking of you and your families. Be sane, be safe, and take care of one another.

Veteran’s Day

Today we take a break in our busy lives to give thought and honor to those who have served in our country’s military. Thank you all! I’m long enough in the tooth to have known members of our family who served in both World Wars, in Korea, in Vietnam, and on military and humanitarian missions around the world. We will remember your service and your sacrifices on behalf of our country.

Missing Lexi (in context)

Yes, we’re missing Lexi quite a lot. Thank y’all for the kind comments. We were really hoping she’d be here with us for this otherwise exciting (and tiring) time… two days after we said good bye to Lexi, we got in the car and the truck, and drove north.

Maine Bound

A busy week:

• On that Thursday, we drove up (here) to Maine.
• On the Friday, we closed on our new house, and we unloaded stuff from both vehicles.
• On Saturday, I drove the F-150 back to Maryland
• On Sunday, I did the final bits of packing and prepared for…
• Monday, November 1, 18 years to the day after the moving van rolled in, the moving van rolled out, with all of our stuff.
• Tuesday was the last long drive for a while, another 10 hours back up to Maine.
• Wednesday was a day of unloading the pickup again, and preparing for…
• Thursday, when the moving van arrived here, and they unloaded all our stuff.

Since then, it’s been a whirlwind of setting up, unpacking what’s needed, and trying to avoid buying things that we KNOW are still in a box somewhere and just need to be found. The main floor, which encompasses two bedrooms, one bath, a foyer/office, and the “great room” which is kitchen, dining and living rooms all together, is mostly in place. I had my home office mostly functional by Monday morning, which is when I continued to work, only more remotely than before.

The house is compatible with one-floor living, for the time when that is needed for us. Everything important is on the main level of the house, from two car garage, through the rest of the rooms described above. The house is laid out like a Pennsylvania bank barn, build into a slope, with the driveway, and main level of the house all on one level. The basement is a full walkout with two sliding doors out the back, and the second, BIGGER garage leading out level-ish on the down slope.

All the hobbies and stuff that requires people who can do stairs will be in the basement. When we can’t get there any more, we won’t need those hobbies anymore, either. Grin.

And now you know why I featured a picture of a dumpster a few weeks back – trash from the cleanup, stuff that we couldn’t donate or sell or use or even give away (very disappointing, really….)

Winding Down

Truth be told, we really wanted Lexi on this new adventure with us. I think she would have had fun up here. Once we’re settled, we’ll find another dog to rescue … but not this week.

A Hint