Bleech!

Was awakened very early this morning by the *^*&%&^$* chipping sparrows. How early? Try 3:45 AM! I suppose the sky was starting to get lighter...or maybe the *#^$%&^%#&^$@ bird saw a lightning bug and thought it was the sun. Whatever the case, the sound of the "police whistle" being blown outside my window brought me out of a deep, sound slumber to which I never returned.

You know what? There's no snooze button on a singing bird. Trust me on this. We used to have mockingbirds when we lived in Dover, NJ that loved the horse chestnut outside our window. They sing the same &^^%$ song over and over again...during the night, too. At least back then, when we were first married, there were pleasant enough reasons to wake up during the middle of the night.


Sigh. I'd sooner be awakened by an owl or a pack of coyotes.

I had been jarred from my sleep--and continuously harassed to get the hell up--by one of the smallest (but loudest) of feathered critters not to have "hummingbird" in its name. I surrendered and rolled out of bed at 6 AM.

Breakfast soon followed and then a swift check of the ATV. (Tire seemed to be holding air--but it did that earlier in the month too. The engine turned over after a little coaxing--not surprising since the fuel had been shut off and it needed to feed through the system. Ran it for two minutes and then turned off the choke and it kept purring right along for another three minutes before I turned it off.) Packed my gear in the truck, drank the milk and OJ, ate the ice cream, washed the dishes, turned off the water heater and pump, and hit the road for the Aerie. It was only 8:30 AM.

******

Turns out the *&^$*^#^%&^% bird did me a favor. Traveling west on the NY Thruway, I started hitting rain around Syracuse. That continued to the Geneva/Route 14 exit and all the way down the west shore of Seneca Lake. At times it rained so hard that my visibility dropped to a mere 30 yards and I reduced speed from 55 mph to less than 30 mph despite having no one in front of me.

The entire time, the weather being given over the radio was for "scattered showers" I had continuous "scattered showers" for more than two-and-a-half hours and 150 miles. I take that back. It did stop raining while I drove through the village of Watkins Glen at the south end of Seneca Lake. Took me all of 5 minutes to do that including two stop lights.

Made it to the Aerie by 1 AM and, lo and behold, the rain stopped as I parked the truck. The sun even emerged for a couple of hours and the temperature--which had been 63 degrees all the way home--rose to 70 degrees. Didn't last. By 4 o'clock there was a distant rumble of thunder to the southwest and by 4:30 the sky had opened up once again and it was pouring. Now, at nearly 5:30 there's blue sky to the west and dark, threatening clouds to the southwest. Guess from whence the wind is blowing? Yeah, the southwest. And it's blowing very, very slowly.

Oh well, it should end later this evening before firing up again tomorrow when there's supposed to be a 60% chance of scattered showers and T-storms on Wednesday and again on Thursday. At least that's what they say.