Yesterday’s sitrep

Yesterday’s sitrep

Thanks to XXXX and her boyfriend I got the wood stove in the main cottage living room emptied out so I am good for another three or four months. It was a traditional “hot ashes dump”. The ashes went to fill some drive way pot holes with rain water in them, so everything is mostly and still dual use at the Hemlocks.  Ashes from the wood stove insert equals pot hole maintenance in the driveway. And UPS used this drive way, later, too.  Basically, these ashes can make concrete which is a science into its own right.

Thanks to myself, the front room has had all the leather furniture mold and mildew cleaned, the leather improved, and the furniture covers washed, dried, and put back on the furniture. It just smells better to me, both as a male and a Marine.

And things were rather windy up here, and that provided a lot of fresh air, too.

Unfortunately, UPS today did not bring my fake mice to hide in the bedding, so I guess I will have to clean up my language and expletives anyway, at least some.  At least the frog, and snakes, and spiders worked OK last night with the Atlanta company as they bedded down. There were no expletives, but there were some discoveries, too.

The large Hemlocks tree I grew up with at the Hemlocks is gone now, like knocked down and the sun is on the ground. I’ve got a circa 1906 picture of the tree when it was very small and transplanted from the woods. Now I have to help clean up the mess and throw some grass seed on the ground, rake the leaves, etc.

Some Indian arrowheads may appear since this was a good hunting area, and I promised the workers any arrowheads they found were theirs.  So far no joy.  This Hemlocks tree was dying anyway. And the Hemlocks’ tree blight is not here, at least not yet. What would be a $3,000 bill in Atlanta is more like a $500 bill in Monterey, but a lot of bartering and patience does help along the way. How about a used backhoe repair as part of the trading?

After all, I have to budget for two new roofs in the next ten or twenty years. Now that is a big bill, too.

So anyway, there is more sun on the ground these days thanks to the Hemlocks tree being taken down, and that means more work for me, which is fine with me, too. Even old people need exercise.

This place in the front yard is starting to look like a century ago.

And I can imagine there are plenty of poorly educated people up here these days.  I can also imagine that many of them are pretty smart, too.

And I will sleep well tonight.

It was a nice fall day, to boot.