Quiet nights of quiet stars, quiet chords from my guitar
floating on the silence that surrounds us
Quiet thoughts and quiet dreams, quiet walks by quiet streams
And the window looking on the mountains and the sea, how lovely.
Um cantinho, um violao, Este amor, uma cançao, Pra fazer feliz a quem se ama
Muita calma pra pensar, E ter tempo pra sonhar
Da janela, ve-se o Corcovado, O Redentor, que lindo.
Light but steady, maybe three inches by now. Great ice never lasts long.
Mimi helping out in Oconomowoc, with me goofing around with the kids in Fox Point.
The way it used to be.
I chickened out again. Bri was busy. Tony got in five races and did well.
Couldn’t face the cold. Great ice, and good wind, but too cold for me. Bri and Tony did it though, and got in five races. Mimi and I had plenty of fun hanging out with the Nies kids (mostly indoors).
Too cold and too windy. Some of us around here are actually starting to develop cold-avoidance symptoms and warmer clime infatuations. Interior projects (of limited scope and duration) ruled the day.
From 53 to 13 in a matter of hours. Light rain most of the day. Should be nice ice tomorrow on Pewaukee, where lots of boats—including 65, 351 and 10—are planning to set up.
Foggy, misty, and a little drizzle—nature's Zamboni. With the temp soon to drop, there could be good ice this weekend.
...to some degree. Sue in Oconomowoc for a few days helping out with the twins, leaving me with what would seem plenty of time to get some things done. Alas, no—simply not enough time. I may have to eliminate one dog walk, or the nap.
One incomplete project has been shifted from lacustrine concerns to those of a more aerial variety—in other words, birdhouses. I've been assigned a story about birdhouses.
Here is a rather sad example—poorly designed and poorly built. (You might think college students could do better?) But what I wonder about is all the excavation around the opening. Pooh Bear stuck and trying to claw his way in? Certainly not a woodpecker? Squirrel? Porcupine? College student?
... pull off the gloves. Actually pleasant to be outside.
On one of our walks today we ambled along Whitewater Creek for a while—until Pax sensed quarry on the far side. He then switched into pursuit mode and took off at Pax-speed across the erratically frozen water. Luckily for him, when he's moving that fast his feet don't really touch anything, so he made it across just fine.
A sharp whistle brought him out of his trance, and a reprimand made him feel contrite, but a problem remained—that of dog getting back across stream. Pax considered this complex situation for a good bit of time while I visualized where, when, and how I'd have to go wading in order to pull him out when he fell in.
Oh, me of little faith. Pax eventually found the perfect spot and scampered across without moistening a tone-nail.
Also of interest.........When I went out to run an errand this afternoon I found quite a flat flat on the right front tire of the truck. Running the compressor for 15 minutes got me enough inflation to make it to the Chevy dealer, and repair. Apparently someone ran over something, sometime.....and I don't think it was me.
... and while still below freezing, seemingly rather balmy in spite of a brisk wind. Record heat in the antipodes, so I am resolved to quite complaining about cold.
Tony went sailing at Green Lake, and all was good until a big crack and ice shift made the sailors head closer to shore.
Occasionally I put up more than one post a day. Here's a video of Ellie at her riding lesson. Today's main post is down below. Look at Ellie ride! (Video shot by Mimi.)
Big four.
Sitting under an Afghan, wearing a down vest, with the furnace running, looking over at Mimi who is pretending to read (beneath the hood).
Ready for a warmup.
At Fontana-on-Geneva.
Beautiful, black ice, with hoar frost, on the west end of the lake, but Williams Bay and the middle still open water, somehow. (Wind, actually.)
Buddy Melges was there, but no boats and no-one else recognizable at Chuck's. Of course, it was way too cold even to think about sailing.
...but bitter.
All we have here is a bit of "polar vortex" while the East coast gets a "bomb cyclone" and the associated blizzard. Anyway, it looks like we might be coming out of the deepfreeze in a day or so.
I had to ride my bike in the basement this afternoon, where the scenery is limited and doesn't vary much.
... but barely.
Pax and I had a long, painless walk—around noon, when winds were light, the sun was shining, and the thermometer broke into double digits. We actually stopped occasionally, to smell the flowers—or something. Wind picking up now, and thermometer dropping—dangerous wind chills again in the forecast. I do feel for the wild things, and for letter carriers.
Morning spent on a conference call with people from about 15 Great Lakes Islands, as part of the Great Lakes Islands Coalition (GLIC) initiative. More time also spent trying to build a Manitoulin team to be part of the coalition, and that is a bit like trying to walk through waist high drifts into a biting headwind. Here's the ad I wrote for the Expositor, published weeks ago. Don't ask about the results.
...right in the front yard, near the driveway and sidewalk. I think this is good—better than being TP-ed, or having our tires slashed. But who could have done it? We don't know. Is our faith is being tested?
Pax and I made it all the way around our usual smaller loop today, although we were suffering a bit on the home stretch. Above zero, but breezy. I occasionally had to pull a mitten and hold a paw to thaw.
...not that there’s a shortage of ice. Pewaukee crusted over with snow, but with ice aplenty. Lots of trucks driving out, pulling ice-sheds.
You have to work fast in extreme cold when setting boats up and tearing boats down, except you can't. However, if you don't, you never will—you'll be frozen beyond functionality. It looks like the coming weekend may have moderating temperatures, and possibly some good sailing.
Meanwhile....
The boys are gaining weight and doing well.
I always like it when the year turns—I like looking forward better than looking back So, full steam ahead to daffodils and tulips, rhubarb and lilacs, seed starting and.........sailboats?
Actually, I'm looking forward to some excellent iceboating well before all that—once we get through the current thermographic brutality. Possibly a week from now. Hang in there Pax, we will be walking again soon.
Pax and I disapprove of it.
Ice is being made at the rate of about an inch an hour on every body of water north of the Mason-Dixon Line, but it is way too cold to use any of it... I put Musher's Secret on Pax's paws and we made it around the big block, but we were both hurting by the time we got home....Mimi took advantage of cabin fever to cook up a nice dinner for us, and for the NieSeven (not that the younger members really like chicken yet)....And we have a real starling problem....see below.
Come On Baby, Light My Fire.
This is the Canadian Hemlock planted four years ago and given up for dead. It's thriving, and actually likes this kind of weather.
Starlings have made bird feeding unpleasant. They are big, aggressive, and voracious. To counteract them, we are switching down to smaller, and less fancy food, and putting pinwheels around the feeder. If that doesn't work I'm going to Walmart and getting a shotgun—I've heard they are free with any purchase of $20/or more.
