Aerie Report, April 12, 2010

A gorgeous day at the Aerie. It started out quite chilly with the morning temp in the mid 30s but warmed up nicely to 64 degrees under sunny skies and with a very slight breeze out of the northeast, of all directions. It will get colder tonight as the skies remain clear and the breeze has increased in velocity. I expect to see some frost on the ground in the AM.

******

Terry has been working o cleaning out the freezer in preparations for our summer sojourn. As a result she baked a blackberry pie yesterday and today roasted a turkey breast that, if it were a human child, could have walked to the oven on its own. Still, it was nice and moist and delicious with stuffing, gravy, acorn squash and nibblet corn. And the sandwiches we had for our evening meal were doubly good on still-warm-from-the-baker's-oven hard rolls she picked up this morning. Tomorrow she'll use the stock from the ribs and back to make soup and the leftover white meat will go into enchiladas.

******

Time to get the ATV out to haul some of the cut firewood down the hill. I left lengths stacked in place to age over the winter. I'll bring them down and split and stack them for next winter. Then cut and clear more from the tree tops left on the hillside by the loggers. Some of those tree tops are on pretty steep slopes and will take some careful planning before I can get anything out of them.

In preparation for using the ATV, I had the battery on the charger for much of the day. There was still some juice in it from last fall, but I want to play it safe and make sure there's enough to start the engine several times in succession. (There's likely some water condensation in the tank--there always is after a long lay over--and that will cause stalling until I drain it all out.) I did manage to get the engine to turn over and run for a brief period this afternoon before shutting it down.

******

Mr. Bruin returned this evening. I just heard some noise on the deck and, thinking it was the raccoon, I grabbed the flashlight. Nothing in the front so I went to check the side by the sliding door. And there was a big, black butt slowly going down the stairs. He's quite a bit bigger than last year. Looked to be between 250 and 300 pounds. Probably got disappointed by the lack of food on either the deck or the side of the house (where he destroyed the feeders two weeks ago when I was up north). He certainly gave me a dirty look over his shoulder as he meandered about the yard, stopped several times to look at my light (broadside at 15 yards) and then ambled off down the trail.

******

Tomorrow morning Terry goes to the University pool for an "evaluation" of her swimming skills. While she's out, I'll get the ATV running and possibly move it under the deck. Then, in the afternoon we get delivery of two new recliners and get the love seat out of the loft area and into the garage. And, in the evening, we go to a combined photography and Audubon meeting to hear Gary talk about taking pictures of birds.