Bolt Hole Report, October 14, 2009

I made the trip to the Bolt Hole without a problem. There were only a few sprinkles as I drove along the shores of Seneca Lake. I did not that many of the vineyards appear to have been hit by a hard frost. The leaves of the grape vines were blackened and withered. Hopefully, they were able to harvest the grapes before that happened. Other vineyards seemed not to have been hit at all so perhaps it was a matter of location or grape variety.

Mark left a nice roaring fire going before he headed off to work this morning and the cabin was almost too hot inside. He also had turned the water pump and water heater on, as well as put temporary blocks over the basement windows to cut off the air circulation. Tomorrow I'll put some more permanent foam panels in the openings and try to figure a way to block off the opening under the north sill which leads into the unheated wood shed. If there's a large piece of foam in the barn, I may be able to cut one to fit the irregularly shaped space.

The large sugar maple in front of the house has nearly shed all its leaves so I spent an hour raking most of them up and moving them into the field across the street. Only those leaves under the truck remain to be raked up. I cold have moved the truck and gotten them too, but I succumbed to laziness. Sue me.

I stopped at Wally World on the way up and picked up some groceries, enough to get me through the next few days and some for the larder. I'll pick up more when I come back from New Jersey on Sunday. I'm already making a list and at the very top is "coffee" and "bacon."

I also picked up a digital indoor/outdoor thermometer so as to take the guess work out of the morning readings. I put the outdoor sensor on the north side of the sugar maple which is about 10 yards away from the house. It's out of the direct sunlight and should not be affected by the house or the truck which is parked between it and the house. At 6 PM the sun is setting in the west and the thermometer already reads 33.9 degrees. It's overcast and threatening. The weather quacks are saying tonight will be into the 20s (probably the low 20s here) and tomorrow should be nice albeit chill but then things take a turn for the worse. There's a chance of snow showers for Thursday night and again on Friday. *sigh*

Well, that's about all for now.