Week 9 Results

With four games matching Top 25 teams there were bound to be some good contests this weekend. There certainly were some very high scoring events. Here’s the wrap-up of the weeks action. (Except for #22 Tulsa which doesn’t play until Sunday night. [UPDATE: Tulsa won 49-19. More below.)

Incidentally, one of the bad things about being at the Bolt Hole is the lack of cable or dish TV. It's mere rabbit ears for me. That restricts my channel selection--and choice of games--considerably. And if I don't go and get me one of those digital converters...well, I won't have any TV.

(Poll numbers are those of the teams entering Week 9. Rankings are from the AP Writers’ Poll/the Coaches Poll/CBSSports.com in that order. NR= Not Ranked)

1/1/1 Texas The Longhorns faced off against the #7 Cowboys of Oklahoma State in Austin and had all they could handle. Despite controlling the ball for much of the game and scoring touchdowns on four drives that were 80 yards or more (two started inside the 10), the Longhorns managed to hang on in the second half for a 28-24 victory. Next up for Texas is undefeated Texas Tech. Sheesh!

2/2/2 Alabama The Crimson Tide defeated the Tennessee Volunteers by 29-9.

3/3/3 Penn State The Nittany Lions hadn’t won in Columbus, Ohio in 30 years. While they didn’t score a ton of points, they did score enough to defeat the #10 Ohio State Buckeyes 13-6 and improve to 9-0.

4/5/4 Oklahoma The Sooners squared off against Kansas State on the road. The final score was 58-35, Sooners.

5/7/7 Florida The Gators hosted roasted Kentucky by a score of 63-5.

6/4/5 Southern California USC found the dry heat at Arizona a bit of a challenge. The Trojans did come away with a 17-10 victory, however.

7/8/8 Oklahoma State The Cowboys played tough but eventually got thrown by the #1 Longhorns and Colt McCoy, 28-24.

8/6/6 Texas Tech The Aggies traveled north to play #19 Kansas. The Jayhawks probably wished they hadn’t. Texas Tech improved to 9-0 with a 63-21 romp. Next week they get to play #1 Texas at home.

9/9/9 Georgia The Bulldogs beat the #11 LSU Tigers, 52-38.

10/10/10 Ohio State The Buckeyes played host to #3 Penn State and both defenses were dominant. PSU came away with a 13-6 win.

11/11/11 LSU The Tigers played host to #9 Georgia and were gracious hosts indeed. The Bulldogs won 52-38.

12/12/12 Utah The Utes had the week off.

13/13/13 Boise State The Broncos were off the blue carpet as they played at San Jose State. They went home with a33-16 win and a 7-0 record.

14/14/14 South Florida The Bulls went up to Louisville where they lost a close one 24-20.

15/15/15 TCU The Horned Frogs toyed with their guests from Wyoming as they won 54-7.

16/16/18 Missouri The Tigers beat Colorado 38-0. A shutout is quite the rarity these days.

17/20/16 Pittsburgh The Panthers hosted Rutgers. They probably wish they hadn’t. RU QB Mike Teel finally showed the arm everyone was expecting to see. He completed 14 of 21 attempts for 361 yards, 6 touchdowns and just one interception. The Scarlet Knights still need a running attack but Kordell Young did rush 20 times for 83 yards (mostly in the second half when RU was well ahead) and scored 2 touchdowns on the ground. RU also could use some D-E-F-E-N-S-E. The final: 54-34, RU.

18/17/17 Brigham Young The Cougars hosted UNLV in another high scoring affair but came away 42-35.

19/18/22 Kansas The Jayhawks lost to #8 Texas Tech—big. 63-21 was the final score.

20/22/19 Ball State The Cardinals improved their record to 8-0 with a 38-16 victory at home against Eastern Michigan.

21/21/21 Georgia Tech (NR/NR/NR) GT showed up in the Top 25 for the first time last weekend. They won’t be here next week. They dropped a close one to Virginia, 24-17.

22/19/20 Tulsa If you watched just the first half of Tulsa vs UCF before switching over to the World Series game, you're probably wondering how the Golden Hurrican ever got to be undefeated and #22 in the polls. Tulsa trailed UCF 19-14 at the half and looked completely inept on offense and defense. After the break--not so much. Tulsa scored 35 points in the second half while allowing the UCF Knights nothing. The final was 49-19.

23/NR/23 Boston College (NR/NR/NR) BC debuted on the Top 25 list this week for the first time. Then they traveled to North Carolina. They will be leaving both behind after losing 45-24.

24/23/NR Florida State The Seminoles beat the Virginia Tech Hokies, 30-20.

25/25/24 Minnesota The Gophers topped the Purdue Boilermakers, 17-6.

NR/24/25 Northwestern (NR/NR/NR) Northwestern will be leaving the Top 25 after losing a close one 21-19 at Indiana.

Health News

From the Instapundit:

A PROMISING NEW OBESITY DRUG: If it works, the market will be huge.

posted at 08:35 AM by Glenn Reynolds

Possibly, but if it works, I see the market as a shrinking one.

Weigh in Saturday (5?)

I admit it, I've lost track of the number of weeks the weight challenge has been going on. I am, however, happy with the report of the scale this morning. The thing said I weighed 214 at 6 AM, if it can be trusted. This is a digital scale but it's not the Weight Watchers' scale of the Aerie. I believe it came from a CVS store. It reads low (God bless it!) but I've made something of a conversion factor to bring it in line. The estimated difference is added to the actual reading for these reports when I'm here at the Aerie.

The last three readings (including today's) have been done on this scale. They were 219, 217, and 214. If they are accurate, I've dropped 3 pounds since last Saturday and the same from the beginning of the Challenge. And considering I was up to 237-240 back in May....

It's still a long way from where I would like to be by the end of the year (200 or less) but at least the last two weeks have been in the right direction. Of course, the tough part will be going back to Terry's cooking and Thanksgiving Dinner.

Jumping Jehoshaphat!

When I arrived here in the north country I filled up the gas tank of the Tundra on October 10th. The price of gasoline (10% ethanol) at the local Stewart's was $3.41.9 a gallon. This morning (October 25th) I drove town to top off the tank for the ride home tomorrow and paid $2.85.9 a gallon. That's a drop of 56 cents in 15 days. And that's the NYS price I'm talking about. I wonder what it has fallen to down near the Aerie where the tab is usually 20 cents (or more) less. And to think, I was surprised last weekend when it was $3.03.

Why was I filling the gas tank instead of hunting? It's pouring outside and even though there were a slew of vehicles coming up to the hunting camps on the road I sincerely doubt anyone is out in the woods. There's no radio transmissions being made at any rate and there usually is if there are parties of hunters abroad. Besides, if I'm heading back to the aerie tomorrow with the three cats in their carry cases, I want to make as few stops as possible to get them home swiftly.

Another thing I considered was the high wind warnings that have been issued for the area. NOAA weather has said we could see gusts in the 50 mph range this afternoon coming from the southeast as a cold front, with possible thunderstorms, sweeps in from the west. Most of our strong winds have been from the west or southwest during the past year. The shift in direction could mean trees down and power outages. I'd rather have a full tank now and be here with the kitties than have to worry about not making it back to the Bolt Hole if I ran down to fill the tank later in the day.

The Bolt Hole itself is on the west-northwest side of a hill and the strongest winds could/might just blow overhead. Also, there's a bit of an open field to the south and that too should provide protection against any trees falling on the buildings.

As I said yesterday, it's a good day to be packing up and then watching some college football/World Series action--if the power stays on.

Hunting Report from the Bolt Hole, more--or less

I wish I had something positive to report vis-a-vis hunting success, but....

It finally stopped raining around 2 PM on Tuesday but that didn't improve my luck any during the evening. I sat out back hoping to catch sight of a wandering deer but only spotted a doe and her two fawns. No bucks.

Wednesday morning I took a slow walk through the woods searching not only for deer but signs of the impending rut: ground scrapes and tree rubs. I found neither and after spending three hours came back to the cabin for lunch. Wednesday evening found me sitting in the woods again but I was alone. The bucks were elsewhere, apparently.

Thursday morning I went and sat in the woods where I could look over a fairly wide expanse. The view was nice but it was just me and the chickadees. I returned to the cabin for lunch and moved some wood around. I also moved some old wood stoves from the bedroom of the cabin into the garage and rearranged the "tools" in the garage. The brush hog and lawn mower were put in the rear while the snowblower got moved to the front...just in case.

Then this morning I went and sat in the woods yet again. It's like playing the lottery: you can't win it if you're not in it. Once again, it was a lovely morning, just not terribly eventful.

The northern rut has not started. Last year it didn't start until mid-November. When it does, the bachelor groups break up and they start fighting amongst themselves for breeding rights. They'll start searching for and chasing any doe that might be receptive to their advances. The bucks act stupid and lose some of their wariness. Kinda like a bunch of frat guys.

The weather has been typical Indian Summer. The temperatures drop below freezing at night but then shoot up to the high 40s and low 50s during the sun drenched days.

Tomorrow promises to be a washout according to the weather.com forecast. We'll have showers in the morning and some serious rain in the afternoon. I'll probably spend the day packing up to head back to the Aerie on Sunday.

I plan on returning to the Bolt Hole for one more round of hunting "action" after the election. That will be for a two week stint since I'll have to get back to the Aerie to take Terry to the Rutgers vs Army football game on November 22. We'll pick her mom up to bring her to the Aerie for Thanksgiving. Once the holiday is over, it will be time for the start of PA's firearms season, so I'll be staying home for a long while.

Food for thought.

From over at Hot Air; The comprehensive argument against Barack Obama

Indeed!

Wet, Wet Weather at the Bolt Hole

It's raining pretty good this morning and the temperatures started in the high 30s/low 40s at 8:30 AM.

Why 8:30 AM? That's when I finally got out of bed. There was no 3 AM critter working int he wall/floor but there was a crash of material from a stack beneath the normal mouse corridor. Perhaps my 3 AM critter opted for a new commuting route to its workplace and got spied by one or more of the watch kitties. Perhaps they put the fear of Ceiling Cat in him and he decided to go elsewhere. (There was no sign that the cats actually caught the little bugger, however. Even if they had, they would have played with it til death overcame it. The last one they did catch, in the fall of 2006 I believe, was left at the bottom of the stairs as a gift and didn't have a mark on the body.)

When the alarm went off at 5:45 AM it was raining so I shut it off and rolled over. Chester protested feebly and then shut up and allowed me to sleep until 8:30. He's a good boy...most of the time.

I do believe that today will be another day to do some cleaning up of burnable trash (papers, cardboard, etc.) that will also help to keep the cabin warm and dry. Unless something drastic happens and the spigot of Mother Nature is shut off soon, it's far too wet to be traipsing about in the woods.

Hunting Report from the Bolt Hole: Rifle, issue 2

After taking yesterday off from hunting to go do some shopping and then settle in front of the tube and watch the Giants (yea!) and the Jets (BOOOOO!) it was time to venture out on the hunting trail again this morning.

The mouse in the wall must not have gotten the notice about Daylight Savings Time ending a couple weeks later this year. Instead of its usual 3 AM work, it started at 2 AM. Like I said, it missed the notice and turned its clock back two weeks early. I managed to convince the critter to go away and went back to sleep to awake to the alarm at 5:45 AM.

Feed the cats, make some coffee, eat some hot oatmeal, and then get dressed for the 17-20 degree temperatures. All that and I was out the door at 6:30 AM with my folding stool, rifle and backpack. I walked down an old skidway under the light of the now near third quarter moon and was able to miss almost all of the puddles along the way to a spot where I hoped to ambush a deer heading northeast.

As I neared the point where I wanted to find a seat, at 7:05 AM (before legal shooting hours or sufficient light to shoot under any circumstances), it happened. Fifteen or twenty yards ahead of me in some very thick beech saplings and the slash (tree tops) left from last winters logging, a deer snorted, jumped deeper into the woods, snorted a half dozen more times and then trotted back to the southwest from whence I assume it came.

I have no way of knowing if this was a buck or a doe. Does will sometimes snort like that to communicate with their fawns I am told and we have one doe in the area that is still nursing two fawns she birthed in late July. There is another that is still hanging around with her daughter from last year. A buck will snort like this as an alarm call or just to say he is pissed that something he can't quite identify is walking about in his woods. It sounded like it was just one deer but, hey, you never know.

I stood frozen in my tracks for five minutes hoping it would be as curious as the deer I played tag with on Friday, but it didn't return. Even if it did come back, the growth was so thick that even in the early, brightening, light of dawn, a shot would have been very difficult.

When the deer did not return after nearly 10 minutes, I moved on down the skidway to a small knoll where I found an area that was relatively open and offered a hundred-yard view for about 270 degrees. I picked out a tree to set up against, unfolded my little stool and shucked my backpack, and sat.

And sat some more.

And sat even more.

I sat from around 7:20 AM until 10 AM and then decided to pack it in as I watched clouds start to roll in. There was still some wood out in the open that needed stacking (I took almost all of Sunday off) and the latest forecast I had heard on Sunday night was calling for rain showers late Monday and through much of Tuesday.

I found Mark still hanging around his place when I returned. The creep never even went out. Nor had he answered my radio calls at 9 and 10 AM. He was outside his place doing chores--he says. To be fair, he's been complaining about a cold coming on and downed nearly a full bottle of night time cold medicine that had him conked out in the middle of the Sunday Night Football game. I'm not sure I would have wanted him in the woods with a rifle under those conditions.

Marls a bit discouraged by the lack of sign and pattern by the bucks right now. He says he wants to see signs that the deer have gone into the rut. Currently, the bucks are still hanging out in bachelor packs and there are no scrapes or tree rubs to be found. (Except in the apple orchard right behind my garage and barn where several maple saplings and small apple trees got themselves rubbed quite badly the end of September. One small poplar in the bunch got rubbed for a second time in two years and has been knocked over. That's a 15 foot tall and 3-4 inch thick tree at waist height I'm talking about.) Rubs and, especially, scrapes made on the ground are signs of territorial behavior by the bucks. With any luck, the rut should be beginning this week as the moon wanes toward the new.

Also, with a little luck, we might have some tracking snow on Wednesday morning. The weather gurus are forecasting showers tomorrow, as I mentioned. That's a cold front moving through that will drag the night time lows even lower. Tuesday's showers will become snow flurries and may accumulate 1-3 inches by Wednesday morning.

I may pass on going out Tuesday morning if the showers are around. I've got sufficient rain gear but my rifle doesn't. Scopes and such do not care for water. besides, with the promise of snow for Wednesday morning I'll want all my energy to try walking up a deer.

This afternoon was spent putting the rest of the wood in the barn and into the woodshed. All that is left out now is stuff that will go back to the Aerie and that is under a cover of several sheets of tin roofing.

Pre Week 9 College Football Report

Okay, so where do the teams stand heading into Week 9 and who is playing whom this weekend?

Only a few upsets in Week 8. BYU was the only Top 10 to fall. They were joined by North Carolina and California in losing to unranked opponents. Several other ranked teams lost to higher ranked teams which resulted in their moving down in, and sometimes out of, the polls for Week 9. There are lots of new teams at the bottom of the list that were not there last week.

(Poll numbers are those of the teams entering Week 9. The numbers on parentheses after the teams’ names are their rankings after Week 8. Rankings are from the AP Writers’ Poll/the Coaches Poll/CBSSports.com in that order. NR= Not Ranked)

1/1/1 Texas (1/1/1) The Longhorns will face the #7 Cowboys of Oklahoma State at home.

2/2/2 Alabama (2/2/2) The Crimson Tide will be on the road to face the Tennessee Volunteers.

3/3/3 Penn State (3/3/3) The Nittany Lions will be squaring off with the #10 Ohio State Buckeyes in Columbus, Ohio.

4/5/4 Oklahoma (4/6/4) The Sooners are on the road against Kansas State.

5/7/7 Florida (5/7/8) The Gators host Kentucky.

6/4/5 Southern California (6/4/6) USC will be at Arizona.

7/8/8 Oklahoma State (8/10/10) The Cowboys will try to rope the #1 Longhorns in Texas.

8/6/6 Texas Tech (7/5/5) The Aggies will be on the road to play #19 Kansas.

9/9/9 Georgia (10/9/9) The Bulldogs will be at #11 LSU.

10/10/10 Ohio State (12/11/11) The Buckeyes host #3 Penn State.

11/11/11 LSU (13/14/14) The Tigers play host to #9 Georgia.

12/12/12 Utah (14/13/13) The Utes have the week off.

13/13/13 Boise State (15/16/115) The Broncos are off to play at San Jose State.

14/14/14 South Florida (19/20/18) The Bulls will be at Louisville.

15/15/15 TCU (NR/24/NR) The Horned Frogs will host Wyoming.

16/16/18 Missouri (11/12/12) The Tigers host Colorado.

17/20/16 Pittsburgh (23/NR/21) The Panthers will host Rutgers.

18/17/17 Brigham Young (9/8/7) The Cougars host UNLV.

19/18/22 Kansas (16/15/16) The Jayhawks host #8 Texas Tech.

20/22/19 Ball State (24/25/25) The Cardinals are back in action at home against Eastern Michigan.

21/21/21 Georgia Tech (NR/NR/NR) Yes, GT will be hosting Virginia.

22/19/20 Tulsa (NR/NR/24) Tulsa will host UCF on Sunday.

23/NR/23 Boston College (NR/NR/NR) BC travels to North Carolina.

24/23/NR Florida State (NR/NR/NR) The Seminoles host the Virginia Tech Hokies.

25/25/24 Minnesota (NR/NR/NR) The Gophers will be at Purdue.

NR/24/25 Northwestern (NR/NR/NR) Northwestern will play at Indiana.

The First BCS Standings of 2008

This time of the season is when the BCS rankings begin to appear. Because the BCS is based upon the Harris Poll and the Coaches Poll but not the AP Writers’ Poll, they agree with the major polls but occasionally there is a discrepancy or two. This week, however, there is no question of the first four teams.

I tend to ignore the BCS rankings until the final weeks because the computer formulation (which is difficult to grasp) plays such a big part. It can be blamed for some of the lopsided scores that you see such as the SC/ Washington State 69-0 blowout this week.

1 Texas
2 Alabama
3 Penn State
4 Oklahoma
5 Southern California
6 Oklahoma State
7 Georgia
8 Texas Tech
9 Ohio State
10 Florida
11 Utah
12 Boise State
13 LSU
14 TCU
15 Missouri
16 South Florida
17 Pittsburgh
18 Georgia Tech
19 Tulsa
20 Ball State
21 Brigham Young
22 Northwestern
23 Kansas
24 Minnesota
25 Florida State

Week 8 Results

Time to get back to college football for a bit.

The reshuffled polls are out and there are several teams that made huge jumps up and a few that have been dropped off the polls.

(Poll numbers are those of the teams entering Week 8. Rankings are from the AP Writers’ Poll/the Coaches Poll/CBSSports.com in that order. NR= Not Ranked)

1/1/1 Texas The Longhorns embarrassed the #11 Missouri team Saturday night by a score of 56-31. It was 35-3 at halftime only because the Tigers converted for a FG as time ran out.

2/2/2 Alabama The Crimson Tide struggled against Ole Miss but came out with a 24-20 victory..

3/3/3 Penn State The Nittany Lions started slowly against Michigan but then stepped on the gas for a 46-17 win.

4/6/4 Oklahoma The Sooners prevailed over #16 Kansas 45-31.

5/7/8 Florida The Gators had the week off.

6/4/6 Southern California The Trojans demolished the hapless Washington State team 69-0.

7/5/5 Texas Tech The Red Raiders were victorious over Texas A&M 43-25.

8/10/10 Oklahoma State The Cowboys beat Baylor 34-6.

9/8/7 Brigham Young The Cougars played at TCU on Thursday night, a bad night for the ranked team. TCU’s Horned Frogs and their #1 defense (7 sacks in this game), took the Cougars apart by a score of 32-7.

10/9/9 Georgia The Bulldogs played well enough to overcome #22 Vanderbilt 24-14.

11/12/12 Missouri The Tigers lost to #1 Texas 56-31.

12/11/11 Ohio State The Buckeyes had no trouble with #20 Michigan State 45-7.

13/14/14 LSU The Tigers of LSU managed to pull out the win over South Carolina 24-17.

14/13/13 Utah The Utes proved to be too much Colorado State 49-16.

15/16/15 Boise State The Broncos defeated Hawaii 27-7.

16/15/16 Kansas The Jayhawks were overmatched by #4 Oklahoma 45-31.

17/18/17 Virginia Tech The Hokies were upset by Boston College 28-23.

18/21/19 North Carolina The Tar Heels dropped a 16-13 decision in overtime to Virginia.

19/20/18 South Florida The Bulls romped over the Syracuse Orange 45-13.

20/17/22 Michigan State The Spartans were overwhelmed by #12 Ohio State 45-7.

21/19/20 Wake Forest The Demon Deacons were shutout by Maryland 26-0.

22/23/NR Vanderbilt The Commodores lost to #10 Georgia 24-14.

23/NR/21 Pittsburgh The Panthers doubled up over Navy 42-21.

24/25/25 Ball State The Cardinals had the week off.

25/22/NR California The Golden Bears lost to Arizona 42-27.

NR/24/ NR TCU TCU handily defeated #9 BYU on Thursday night 32-7.

NR/NR/24 Tulsa Tulsa’s offense piled up 791 total yards on their way to defeating Texas-El Paso 77-35. It was actually tied 28-28 at the end of the first quarter.

Observations at the Bolt Hole

It's cold! At 8:30 AM the folks at weather.com say it's 26 degrees, the nearest weatherunderground station says 22 degrees, and the Bolt Hole thermometer says it's 17 degrees. By anyone's reckoning it's cold.

Everything is covered with a thick layer of frost and I'm sure that as the sun begins to warm the tree tops that a lot more leaves will be falling off the beeches and red maples in the forest. I noticed this morning the big sugar maple outside my door has dropped the last of its leaves. I had raked what was on the ground last week but it looks like I hadn't touched it so that will be one of my jobs later this day.

I'll have to make a run down to Wal-Mart later this morning for some supplies. Three kitties can really make a dent in the kitty litter even when one of them (Shadow) has turned her nose up at every moist food choice I put down for them. Chester and Julie have had no such compunction and are taking up the slack in the food department. Shadow does get her share of the dry food in the ever-filling bowl. And I need to get some groceries for myself, too.

The damn mouse in the wall is far more predictable than the deer. Three AM is the start of its work day. That's when it starts gnawing on whatever it is gnawing on and wakes me up. If only I could predict when and where the deer would be during the day. (I have a good idea of where they are at 2 AM but that's not exactly legal shooting time!)

I slept in this morning as much as Chester would allow me. He started howling at the bedroom door around 6 AM and kept at it for nearly an hour. He woke me but I refused to give in and dozed off and on until he gave up only to have my bladder take up the argument. It won.

Another task for the day will be to get the rest of the split wood into the barn and/or wood shed attached to the house. The forecast is for some showers on Tuesday and that wood will have to be under cover by then. Some of the split birch will be heading to PA when I leave next weekend. It's dry, seasoned and split perfectly for the fireplaces down there.

Walking in the woods today would be futile. The leaves are so crisp that every step sounds like a cannon filled with grape shot has been fired into the forest. Talk of snap, crackle and pop!

With no predictable trails (they are everywhere!) for the deer to follow and with the deer just starting to show some signs of going into the rut when the males get a little stupid in their pursuit of a doe in heat, it's tough to figure where to sit in ambush. In a day or two (when the bucks get really excited) setting out a few scent bombs may make them come to you, but I've tried a couple of times with Tinks Trophy Buck scent and they weren't buying it. Mark and I have the week to try and figure them out before he returns to work and I head back to the Aerie. With any luck....

Oh, well, Time to do some house cleaning and then off to Wally World. Later.

The Better Half makes good.

I wan to take a moment away from my hunting reports to mention that Terry is down in Atlanta this week attending the national convention of the Smocking Arts Guild of America (SAGA). If everything has been going according to plan at she will have been installed as the President of that organization at the closing banquet this evening.

She has warned me that if I ever call her "Madame President" I can expect to get kicked in the shins. So I won't.

Hunting Report from the Bolt Hole: Rifle

I woke up to the coldest morning of the fall to date. At 5:30 AM it was a mere 20 degrees but, as is usual, the temperature continued to fall right through sunrise. It was down to around 17 or 18 degrees. If freshly fallen leaves sound like walking on cornflakes, what does walking on frozen leaves sound like?

I made my way to a ridge to the south making enough noise to wake the dead despite my best efforts. I did this in the dark under the bright waning gibbous moon. I also managed to avoid most of the puddles in the skid way that were filed by the rains earlier in the week. Most, but not all. Some of the damn things lurked in the shadows and were carpeted with floating leaves so my feet got a little wet. Setting up in the dark (or near dark) was easy enough and then I just waited. Mark was going to a spot about 300 yards west of where I was and there were other hunters at the camps whom we hoped would be out and about.

There wasn't a breath of a breeze in the early morning and as the sun came out, the leaves that still clung to the trees gave up and began to fall. Like big, brown snowflakes they fell, only not as quietly as snowflakes. They rattled against their fellow leaves as the fell and made audible crunches when they landed. Some started little leaf avalanches on their way down. One would collide with another and then the two would collide with more until 20 or 30 leaves would be rattling to the ground in one fell swoop.

As this was happening you could also see the sunlight glinting off the frost that was scraped from the leaves. At first I thought it was just dust but then realized that my boots had a thin layer of frost on them as did the leaves on the saplings about me.

The whole forest was shedding leaves for two hours without a breeze to assist it. Then a light breeze stirred even more leaves into falling and the noise became almost deafening. Certainly the noise took away one of the senses a deer hunter depends upon. A herd of deer could have been traipsing through the forest but if you didn't actually happen to be looking at them you would not have known they were there.

After sitting until 11:30 AM without a sight of another hunter or a deer, I packed it in only to discover Mark had done so an hour earlier. He had the log splitter out of the garage and was working his way through our final stack of round logs. I stripped off my hunting clothes and joined him. As he split, I built another pallet in the barn on which to stack the split firewood. Then I used the wheel barrow to haul the split wood into the barn and started building the stack. We now have (or will have once the last bit is in the barn) a stack of wood 6' tall and 22' long--twice over.

A face cord is 8' long by 4' tall. We've approximately 10 face cords in the barn, two in my woodshed and four more in his. Plus there's a face cord of split birch that is earmarked for the Aerie. And, aside of cutting up storm damage, we didn't put in any time felling any trees this summer. We may not have to drop any trees to the ground next summer either. Mother Nature played quite the lumberjack in September 2007 and again this past summer. She thoughtfully brought down many large maples, birches and cherries and left the root ball intact enough that many of these trees not only held their leaves, some even leafed out again this spring. The only difficulty will be in cutting them to length and hauling them out of the woods. The latter will be a chore because even the old skidways are full of large rocks and holes that a log skidder, working in winter when the snow may be three or four feet deep, and with a very high clearance just does not find an obstacle but which will mean cutting trails around them for my little ATV.

At 3 PM we stopped work on the wood pile, donned our hunting clothes and headed north off my property into the state lands. I was to sit and Mark was going to make a circuit passing to the west of me, around to the north and then back to a point a few hundred yards to my east. (He calls these his "Rambo Mode Walks".) Two hours later, he was at the end point having seen nothing. I was still sitting and had seen nothing. The wind was kicking leaves off the limbs and the sun was heading home. There was still a half hour of hunting time when I radioed him I was heading in. He stayed and finally followed. My leaving hadn't stirred any deer up.

I was eating dinner when he arrived. (A Beef Stew MRE left over from when I worked at a Boy Scout Camp four years ago. Hey! It was hot. It was easy. It was filling. AND it was free!) WE talked of what we were going to do tomorrow. It's supposed to be even colder in the morning. We agreed we'd both sleep in and decide whether we wanted to go out late in the day or just take the day off. I think I'll vote for the "day off" option. I mean Jets and Giants both are playing, right?

Hunting Report from the Bolt Hole

Well, I blew my chance at a nice buck this morning. No, I didn't miss. I never even got the shot off.

I was walking up the jeep/snowmobile trail with the intent of stepping off to the north since that would put the wind in my face when I rounded a small curve just be fore the last hunter's camp and saw a big-assed deer bound away from the apple tree in the front of the cabin and head in to the woods.

I froze and the deer returned to see what the heck I was. At this point I reached up to adjust my glasses so I could use my x-ray vision better (HA!) and the deer spooked again. This time it took two or three leaps and then stopped to snort at me and then walked behind the cabin.

I moved forward to position myself behind a big maple tree on the corner of the property and the deer stepped out of the woods about 60-75 yards away taking two steps onto the grass where it stopped on the other side of the maple! I couldn't see it and it couldn't see me. I waited for it to take another step with the safety off on my muzzleloader. And I waited. Then I made a HUGE mistake. I inched my head to the left to peek around the tree trunk. That's when I noticed two things: 1) this deer had antlers! Six, seven or eight--I'm not sure how many points and 2) HE was looking right at me. Shit!

That's all she (or he, in this case) wrote. The buck took one look at my ugly mug and headed back into the woods with all due speed. Three or four leaps and he stopped, snorted in derision and then walked deeper into the woods.

I tried to figure out where he went but the leaves held their secret well. A walking deer will leave virtually no impression on the thick carpet of wet leaves littering the forest floor.

After kicking myself in the butt for forty-five minutes, I continued with my plan and walked the woods for three hours with not another sight of a tail let alone any more antlers.

*sigh*

There's always tomorrow. Which happens to be the start of the rifle season. And there are many, many more hunters in the camps for that. Perhaps they will kick something my way.

Let's just hope there are as many returning to their camps as there are going out tomorrow morning. That hasn't been the case the last two opening days. Each of the last two we've had a hunter perish due to a heart attack. Two yeas ago it took two days, a load of professionals and volunteers, and a helicopter to find the poor bastard. Last year he died on the jeep/snowmobile trail and was found by his buddies who were starting out about 15 minutes after he did.

I hates meeses to pieces!

With three cats in this relatively small cabin, you would think that a mouse wouldn't stand a chance. WRONG!

Especially since the damn rodent is between the floors and appears to be smart enough not to risk its little furry tail by venturing out into the open.

Three nights in a row the little bastard has been creating a racket by gnawing on a piece of wood or something between the floor of the bedroom and living room--at 3 AM. It sounds like he has a full compliment of drums like those played by the Japanese. Deep, vibrating and oh so penetrating. I can usually shut the creep up by stamping on the floor a bit but not this night. He was very persistent.

As a result I surrendered and came down stairs at 4 AM. Fed the cats, stoked the fire and checked the temperature: 30 degrees. Then I fed myself.

In an hour or so, I'll be heading out the door in another attempt to see a deer before it sees me. At the least, I'll find my self a nice sunny hillside and take a nap.

Weather and Sports

Rev. Paul says it's snowing in Alaska. Hey, it's mid-October. What did you expect?

Here in the Adirondacks, the night time temperatures will be slipping into the 20's this week and the daytime highs will reach around 50 degrees--barely.

It promises to be sunny for the next few days, however, and that means some great fall weather. Showers will move back into the region by mid-week. Whether that means some snow flurries are possible remains to be seen.

In sports:

As I've said before, if you're a Top Ten team, DO NOT play football on Thursday nights!

TCU's Horned Frogs' defense (#1 in the nation) gobbled up the BYU Cougars chance at a BCS bid by a score of 32-7 as they hopped all over QB Max Hall for seven (7!) sacks.

The loss ended BYU's 16 game unbeaten streak that was the longest in the country.

In other sports, the Boston Red Sox came from back from a 7-0 deficit with just seven outs to go to beat the Tampa Bay Rays 8-7. David Ortiz (Big Papi) had the big blow with a three run, two out home run.

The teams return to Tampa Bay with the Rays leading the ALCS series 3-2. The winners will face the Philadelphia Phillies in the World Series. If it's Boston and Philly, stock up on cocoa and parkas. Playing all night games may have been great for TV time but it makes little sense for the fans who actually attend or the players who have to contend with the cold nights.

Dial-up sucks!

I've mentioned before how I have to use dial-up service while at the Bolt Hole. (I'm not looking to get satellite for the one or two months I'm up here during the year and the phone line is not fiber-optic and so DSL is out.)

Using dial-up means curtailing my usual surfing activity. It takes soooo long to load a page that it can be frustrating. And forget YouTube or picture or ad heavy sites! I therefore apologize to those of you who's sitemeter readings have taken a stock market like nose dive.

I use AOL as my access point but, once signed on, can use Firefox as a browser and it's weird. If I try to access some pages using AOL's browser, it takes forever and a day for them to load. Yet, when I try using Firefox--which has to go through AOL as far as I know--the same page will load in a fraction of the time. It's still slow, but at least I can visit some of the sites I am accustomed to visiting.

PS I really, really hate dial-up!

Bolt Hole Report

After having several hours of dampening rain showers Tuesday night, I went for a walk yesterday morning. The leaves on the ground at sunrise were nice and soft and didn't crinkle with every step. I planned to do a circuit to the southeast of me; one that would allow me to walk with my face into the ever so slight breeze that was pushing northeast up the slope and east toward the sun.

Once I got off the jeep/snowmobile trail and through the first 200 feet of small conifers, things opened up in a beech cherry forest that, surprisingly had only a few blow downs. I could actually see out to almost 100 yards. It was state land so some of the trees were huge! One old sugar maple that was partially uprooted had to be nearly three feet across at chest height and easily 75 feet tall. It was caught at the top by a slightly smaller but equally impressive sister.

Walking slowly and stopping often to scan the horizon all around me, I made my way southward until I reached a downslope heading to a swampy area and a creek. I found an log on which to sit and stopped to rest for fifteen minutes while I ate an apple and searched the exposed areas for deer. Nada. I did get up close and personal with a red squirrel which hopped on the end of the log three feet from me and didn't realize I was there until I said. "Booo!" It scampered on to the tree against which I was leaning and peered around the bole to see what the hell I was and if I was dangerous. I guess I passed some sort of test because the squirrel sounded no alarm and went on it's unhurried way.

I headed down the slope. At the bottom of the slope, I turned to the west eventually crossing the state boundary and back onto private land. I knew exactly where I was by the gold paint on the trees marking the border, the remnants of logged cherry trees littering the forest floor, an easily discernible skidway and my GPS unit.

Movement became a bit more difficult with all the tops of logged trees scattered about and the few blowdowns across the skidway. I was just making my way through a thick patch where I had to negotiate two tree tops and had limited visibility because of many young beech trees that are still yellow-green with leaves, when the slope above me exploded in activity. Apparently the noise I made stepping on a branch and my odor wafting up the slope had spooked three or four deer I never saw.

I froze for several minutes listening to the sounds of the deer going up the hill away from me and cursed my luck. I waited, hoping one or more might get curious and do something stupid like the squirrel, but it didn't happen. I made my way over to the point from which the sounds seemed to originate to get a clue as to whether they were just passing through or had been bedded down on the slope waiting for the morning sun. This was very near where I had sat on Tuesday morning and an area Mark had walked through trying to stir up deer.

I couldn't even find any signs in the leaves that there had been deer in the area. I found no beds (matted down leaves of a roughly oval shape), droppings, or even stirred up leaves indicating the sudden hoof activity I had heard. After a brief search, I gave it up and continued along a skidway that lead right to where I had sat the day before. It was along this skidway that I did find fresh scat (that's deer shit for those that don't talk so polite).

So ended my three and a half hour walk in the woods. Distance was probably only a mile and a half. The experience was worth it--frustrating, but worth it.

I spent the afternoon moving some firewood into the barn for the winter. Rain was forecast for Wednesday night into Thursday (and they were right--for a change) and I wanted to get the split wood under cover before it got wet. I moved about a cord and a half using the wheelbarrow. There's still another two cords that need to me moved and about the same that needs splitting, but that will wait for another day.

Today will be spent stoking the fire and keeping dry inside.

Cats! (not the musical.)

Julie, the seven year-old, has been seeking attention--when she wants it. She also demands a portion of my dinner (except for last night's liver and onions).

Shadow can disappear for hours in the three rooms available for them to roam. On occasion, I have searched for her and have had to give up. Eventually she shows up again and I'm none the wiser as to where she was hiding.

I also think she may be part raccoon. When we moved into the Aerie, she had a stuffed mouse as a toy. She would do all the normal cat things about batting it about,chasing it, pouncing on it when we threw it for her, etc. But then she would pick it up and carry it to the water bowl and drop it in the water and walk away. Tonight she did the same thing with a cricket she found somewhere. She walked to the water bowl, dropped it in and then proceeded to bat at it as it floated in the water until it stopped moving. Then she walked away.

Chester has been sleeping most of the day. He'll curl up on the chair and won't move for hours and hours. After I fished the cricket out of the water bowl, and refilled it with fresh water, he ambled over and drank and drank and drank. Then he walked into the other room and proceeded to heave up all the water he had gulped down. In three different locations. At least he didn't do it on the rug which made it slightly easier to clean up.

Pre Week 8 College Football Report

The reshuffled polls are out and there are several teams that made huge jumps up and a few that have leapt off the polls.
(Poll numbers are those of the teams entering Week 8 after their wins/losses in Week 67. The Week 7 rankings are after the team’s name. Rankings are from the AP Writers’ Poll/the Coaches Poll/CBSSports.com in that order. NR= Not Ranked)

There are several key matchups between Top 25 teams this week: Missouri at Texas, Kansas at Oklahoma, Vanderbilt at Georgia, and Michigan State at Ohio State. Those games alone mean there will be further changes in the rankings come next Sunday. These polls are almost as volatile as those for the presidential race.

1/1/1 Texas (5/5/5) The Longhorns host the #11 Missouri team on Saturday.

2/2/2 Alabama (2/4/2) The Crimson Tide hosts Ole Miss.

3/3/3 Penn State (6/6/6) The Nittany Lions host Michigan.

4/6/4 Oklahoma (1/1/1) The Sooners host #16 Kansas.

5/7/8 Florida (11/12/12) The Gators have the week off.

6/4/6 Southern California (8/9/8) The Trojans are on the road against Washington State.

7/5/5 Texas Tech (7/7/9) The Red Raiders play at Texas A&M.

8/10/10 Oklahoma State (17/17/18) The Cowboys host Baylor.

9/8/7 Brigham Young (9/8/7) The Cougars play at TCU on Thursday night.

10/9/9 Georgia (10/10/11) The Bulldogs host #22 Vanderbilt.

11/12/12 Missouri (3/2/3) The Tigers play at #1 Texas.

12/11/11 Ohio State (12/11/10) The Buckeyes play at #20 Michigan State.

13/14/14 LSU (4/3/4) The Tigers are at South Carolina.

14/13/13 Utah (14/13/13) The Utes host Colorado State.

15/16/15 Boise State (15/16/16) The Broncos host the Rainbow Warriors of Hawaii.

16/15/16 Kansas (16/15/15) The Jayhawks play at #4 Oklahoma.

17/18/17 Virginia Tech (18/18/17) The Hokies are at Boston College.

18/21/19 North Carolina (22/NR/21) The Tar Heels are at Virginia.

19/20/18 South Florida (19/20/19) The Bulls host the Syracuse Orange.

20/17/22 Michigan State (23/19/24) The Spartans host #12 Ohio State.

21/19/20 Wake Forest (21/21/23) The Demon Deacons are at Maryland.

22/23/NR Vanderbilt (13/14/14) The Commodores are at #10 Georgia.

23/NR/21 Pittsburgh (24/NR/22) The Panthers are at Navy.

24/25/25 Ball State (25/NR/NR) The Cardinals have the week off.

25/22/NR California (NR/25/NR) The Golden Bears play at Arizona.

NR/24/ NR TCU TCU plays host to #9 BYU on Thur.

NR/NR/24 Tulsa Tulsa plays at Texas-El Paso.


Gone from the list this week: Auburn, Northwestern, and Wisconsin.

Hunting and Weather Report: saturday through Monday

It’s been extremely quiet here at the Bolt Hole—and warm. I expected the three-day weekend to bring lots of hunting pressure for the first few days of the northern zone muzzleloader season and it has done anything but.

Saturday dawned nice and chilly with the temperature hovering just around 30 degrees. Friday Mark and I did see quite a few cars and trucks at the camps further down the road and with that promise activity I sat all day in one spot hoping that there would be hunters out walking in the woods. The Plan was for them to stir up the deer (who have become nocturnal in the pre-rut weeks) into moving about and seeking what I thought would be a safe haven near where I was sitting. It didn’t happen. There were no hunters in the four powerless camps up the hill to my east and those that were present in the camps to the south and west stayed well south and west of where I was, although a few strolled behind Mark’s cabin just after 7 AM on Saturday. I didn’t even hear much in the way of shooting during the day. There were a few rifle reports well off to the southwest from where I was and Mark intercepted some radio chatter from groups a mile or so to our south but that was about it.

Sunday and Monday’s temperatures were also unusually warm. The mornings started out with the low only around 40 degrees which was around 10 degrees above the normal low. Again, I sat in just one spot on Sunday morning and there was even less activity with no shots or even radio transmissions. I could hear chainsaws and other activity at some camps but driving down the road showed some of the Saturday crowd had already departed. When noon rolled around and the temperatures had climbed to the upper 60s, I decided to call it a day and went back to the cabin to watch some football. Monday Mark circled the private property behind his place and I sat with the hope that he might kick something up. Once again, it was a futile effort and by noon we decided to call it a day as the temperatures soared into the 70s.

Tomorrow doesn’t look much better. The southern Adirondacks will again see high temps around the 70 degree mark but then we’ll see a front come through and the rest of the week will be more seasonal with highs in the low 60’s on Wednesday and then the 50s through next weekend with the lows getting back down into the 30s. Hopefully, that will translate in more deer movement. Certainly, it will make my movement a little more likely.

The red maples have passed their prime fall colors and many are dropping leaves with every breeze. The taller beeches have followed suit, but the understory trees are still predominantly green. The number of those understory trees clearly indicate that deer do not find the beeches a preferred food source. In many areas these still green saplings severely limit your vision lines. If you can see beyond 50 yards, it’s a rarity.

Leaves that have fallen are very dry because of the lack of rain and the warm temperatures. Walking after 10 in the morning is like walking on dry cornflakes—very noisy. While this might help hear a deer walking through the woods if you are sitting, it does not make still hunting (when the hunter does the slow walk through the woods stopping frequently to scan the woods about him) as stealthy as it should be. If we get any showers Tuesday night (unlikely according to the weatherman on TV) or on Thursday night (more likely), they would soften the sound in the woods considerably. A gentle, soaking rain would be most welcome but the forecast for the next week or so holds no promise of such an event.

Back at the cabin, I spent some time servicing my chainsaw. When we had some blown down trees during the September storm, it refused to start. After pulling the air filter and cleaning it of sawdust, it started right up. Like most machines, it seems to have a mind of its own. When it wants to work, it works. When I want it to work, it might not.

If the weather remains too warm to do any serious hunting, I may just put it to use on some of the small pines growing right behind the house. The pines are really crapping ones that I would have to classify as scrub pines. The only critters that find them appealing are the red squirrels that love the many cones each tree produces. The pines are mixed in with the small apple trees were trying to expose to the sun. They (the pines) may protect the apples from icy winds but they also shade the apples forcing them into a spindly growth that produces few if any apples. We’ve already removed much of the undergrowth that was producing a very wet environment at the roots of the apple trees.

Week 7 Results

Several big upsets this week: Oklahoma fell, as did Missouri and LSU. That means the poll positions will be shuffled again.

(Poll numbers are those of the teams entering Week 7 after their wins/losses in Week 6. The pre-Week 6 rankings are after the team’s name. Rankings are from the AP Writers’ Poll/the Coaches Poll/CBSSports.com in that order. NR= Not Ranked)

1/1/1 Oklahoma A High Noon showdown/shootout with undefeated #5 Texas, indeed! I said, “With the way these two can score at will, defense will be the deciding factor.” The Longhorns managed to “hold” the Sooners to a mere 35 points and that was enough as Texas came away with a 45-35 victory.

2/4/2 Alabama was idle.

3/2/3 Missouri The 5-0 Tigers squared off against the 5-0 #17 Oklahoma State Cowboys Saturday night and the Cowboys came away with the upset win at 28-23. By far, the biggest upset of the weekend.

4/3/4 LSU The 4-0 Tigers got swamped by the #11 Florida Gators 51-21 to fall from the undefeated ranks.

5/5/5 Texas The Longhorns improved their record to 6-0 while dealing the Oklahoma Sooners their first defeat, 45-35.

6/6/6 Penn State The Nittany Lions are now 7-0 after skinning the Wisconsin Badgers 48-7.

7/7/9 Texas Tech The Red Raiders needed to go into overtime to defeat the Nebraska Cornhuskers 37-31. The Raiders are now 6-0.

8/9/8 Southern California USC pitched a shutout against the Arizona State Sun Devils 28-0.

9/8/7 Brigham Young The BYU Cougars beat New Mexico 21-3 and are now 6-0 for the season.

10/10/11 Georgia The Bulldogs beat the Tennessee Volunteers by a score of 26-14.

11/12/12 Florida The Gators drubbed the #4 LSU Tigers 51-21 in the Swamp on Saturday night.

12/11/10 Ohio State The Buckeyes defeated the Purdue Boilermakers 16-3 and are now 6-1.

13/14/14 Vanderbilt The Commodores carried their 5-0 record on the road to Mississippi State and came away with a 5-1 record as Mississippi State got the upset, 17-14.

14/13/13 Utah The Utah Utes are now 7-0 as they beat Wyoming like a drum, 40-7.

15/16/16 Boise State The Broncos improved to 5-0 by manhandling Southern Miss 24-7.

16/15/15 Kansas The Jayhawks beat Colorado 30-14 to improve to 5-1.

17/17/18 Oklahoma State I said, “The Cowboys are 5-0 but that and a buck-fifty will get you a cup of coffee in the Big 12. This week’s challenge will be #3 Missouri. GULP! Looks like the range will be fenced in by the Sooners. It’s tough to win them all.” OOPS! The Cowboys like the open range and are now 6-0 with a 28-23 victory over the Missouri Tigers.

18/18/17 Virginia Tech The 5-1 Hokies were idle this week.

19/20/19 South Florida The 5-1 Bulls were also idle this week.

20/23/20 Auburn Another one I got wrong as the Arkansas Razorbacks took it to the Auburn Tigers 25-22.

21/21/23 Wake Forest The Demon Deacons hosted the unranked Clemson Tigers on Thursday night and managed to avoid the Thursday Night jinx with a 12-7 victory.

22/NR/21 North Carolina The Tar Heels knocked off Notre Dame 29-24 when the defense came out to pressure Clausen in the second half.

23/19/24 Michigan State The Spartans have now won 6 in a row after dropping Northwestern from the realm of the undefeated, 37-20.

24/NR/22 Pittsburgh The Panthers had the week off to prepare for the rush attack of Navy.

25/NR/NR Ball State The Cardinals are now 7-0 after beating the Western Kentucky Hilltoppers 24-7.

NR/22/25 Northwestern The Wildcats got tamed by #23 Michigan State 37-20.

NR/24/NR Wisconsin After starting 3-0, the Badgers lost to Michigan and Ohio State. This week they hosted Penn State and got schooled, 48-7.

NR/25/NR California The 4-1 Golden Bears were idle this.

And so it starts. Plus a weight report

Opening day of muzzle loader in northern New York. It's 6:30 AM and in a half hour I'll be stepping out the door and heading for the woods. The current temperature is around 30 degrees outside but clear skies means it will get up to the 60s again. My plan is to park my butt on a slight rise to the west of the cabin and sit until sundown. I'll put out some scent bombs and hope there's a curious buck or two out there willing to come investigate or that other hunters from camps near by will stir the bucks from their daytime havens.

I stepped on the scale this morning and was disappointed to see I had gained some 2 pounds over last week to 219 pounds. That's also a gain from the start of this current regime. Not to surprising, I guess considering the lack of any real diet and exercise plan.

Yeah, sitting still all day won't elevate my exercise (except, perhaps as I shiver in the early morning hours), but it will cut back on the availability of snacking in front of the TV. There's no cable here in the Bolt Hole so my choice of football or baseball games would be limited anyway.

Bolt Hole Report

We (me and the three cats) survived the night. I left a light on in the living room so they wouldn't crash into anything should a mouse be foolish enough to run the gauntlet. Then closed the door to the upstairs bedroom so I could sleep in peace.

During the night there was some hubbub that woke me up but there were no bodies to be found this morning. A couple of little piles of puke, but no bodies. It's possible that one of the cats gorged upon dry nibbles and then drank some water and, as the dry food swelled in their tummy, purged themselves. They've done it before, the little gluttons. Or, maybe, someone ate a bug or spider that didn't agree with them.

Julie and Chester came readily to the food bowls as I dished up breakfast but Shadow is still in a snit. She'll slink in on occasion to grab a nibble but not while the other two are there. And Julie doesn't like having to eat on the floor with Chester who usually has to try and stick his nose in all the bowls to be sure they are all the same.

This morning Julie allowed me to pet her while she lay upon the couch like a pasha's princess. But just a little. Shadow actually permitted me to stroke her as she walked by without shooting up the nearest curtain or under the chest of drawers.

Speaking of under the furniture.... There are spots getting dusted with cat tails that I haven't been able to reach with the dust mop or vacuum. Every now and then one or the other of the trio shows up with a cobweb wrapped about their tail.

Taking a quick look around, I can see three or four screens that need repair. The worst is the big one on the sliding door in the living room. It's a nylon screen that has quite a bit of age to it and, being exposed to direct sunlight, it's faded and weak. Apparently so weak that a bird crashed into it and ripped a good 8" hole i the damn thing. I know it was a bird because there were feathers inside between the screen and the glass door. They looked like robin breast feathers with their red tinged edges. No sign of the bird outside so nature's cleanup crew took care of that for me.

There are also several smaller window screens that have been damaged in winters past from snow and ice falling off the roof and piling up along the walls that I've been meaning to repair. With the cats here, I can't do it on the floor of the living area without a lot of curiosity getting in my way so these will likely have to wait until I am here alone. Lord knows, I will not try to confine the cats to a separate, small room together while I work to make the repairs. It would be like a cage match. Three cats enter, one cat emerges.

I got stung by a wasp last evening when I came back from shooting across the street at Mark's. I reached for the door knob to let myself into the cabin when the wasp dropped from the door onto my right hand and before I could shake it off it stung me right at the big knuckle of my ring finger. This time of year, wasps, ladybugs, and cluster flies are looking to find any warm nook or cranny they can for the winter. The door is in the afternoon sunlight and this winged terror chose yesterday afternoon to squeeze into the crack around the door. I disturbed it and had to pay the price.

Thankfully, I'm no longer allergic to the stings of bees and wasps since I underwent desensitization shots years ago so there's only a little pain and swelling of the joint. Still, it was a reminder to be alert.

It was a glorious night with temperatures in the low 40s and a clear sky lit up by the waxing gibbous moon. I had a fire in the wood stove to warm the house and left the upstairs door cracked open slightly to keep the bedroom cool. It did allow some of the cluster flies that were in the door jamb to infiltrate the house and they buzzed around the bedside lamp while I read for an hour. Once the light went out, however, they settled down. I heard no sounds from outside during the night. Just the cats downstairs running around occasionally. I set the alarm for 6:30 AM and was surprised that it woke me up and not Chester. He didn't start making any noise until after the first snooze session.

Today promises to be a gorgeous day with the thermometer rising into the upper 60s. I'll be making a quick trip down the road to Gander Mountain and to pick up some groceries I'll need. I'll also be able to get a feel for how many camps are occupied this weekend. Then this afternoon will be spent doing some chores around the yard. Tomorrow will be spent hunting. Probably just sitting in one corner of the property to see if the other hunters will be moving deer around to their "comfort zones" in my area. And if no movement, or shooting occurs, it will at least give me an idea of where both hunters and deer are.

At the Bolt Hole

Well, I survived the four hour trip to the cabin with the three cats each in their own carry case. Julie was pretty good, she only meowed a little on during the first hour and didn't soil her cage at all. Shadow and Chester were the messiest with Shadow barfing up and taking a dump. Chester was the loudest but even he was quiet for the middle two hours. So quiet were they that I was a little concerned about their health. I thought they might have gone into shock or something.

Julie may have been good int he car, but she is letting me know she didn't appreciate the ride. Growls and hisses abound as she stalks about the cabin and hide under or behind anything she can.

Shadow got her collar off somehow and won't let me get near her to put it back on.

Chester is acting like he doesn't know what all the fuss is about. Head butts and demands for scratching from him all the while he is purring.

All three, however are taking great interest in the sounds of a mouse in the walls. If the mouse is smart, he'll stay in the walls.

Of course, once I got here, I discovered I left a vital piece of equipment back at the Aerie. My muzzleloader supply box was left in the foyer on a shelf where it went unnoticed this morning. Luckily I have plenty of powder, bullets, percussion caps and everything else I need to go hunting here. In fact, I was able to fire a few rounds over behind Mark's where he had a target set up at about 60 yards. Freestanding, I was three inches high at 11 o'clock on my first shot, five inches out at 9 o'clock on my second and just one inch high at 12 o'clock on my third. I'm ready.

I still may go down to Gander Mountain tomorrow to see if I can get some more percussion caps just to play it safe.

Heading North

I've got all my gear packed and ready to load into the Tundra fora rip up to the Bolt Hole for two weeks of deer hunting in the southern Adirondacks. The North Zone Muzzleloader season begins on Saturday and the firearms season begins the week after.

Three days in the deer stand here at the Aerie yielded not one sighting of a deer although the game camera indicated there were a couple of bucks and does that wandered by just after legal shooting time ended on each of the days I was out. I swear, the critters can read the game laws!

My trip to the north should be a real doozie. I'm taking the three cats with me and they HATE to travel. Just taking them 10 miles to the vets last spring resulted in a level of caterwauling that could have been reproduced only by a herd of thirty or forty felines. All three had soiled their cage by the time we arrived. I'll have to be sure to keep the windows cracked open and my earplugs in place just so I don't barf.

Why am I taking the cats? Terry's heading south to Atlanta on Saturday for the Smocking Arts Guild of America (SAGA) national convention. She'll be installed as president of that organization during the week. Normally, I would attend to see that but then we would have to put the cats up at the vets again and they (cats or vets, your pick) wouldn't be real happy about that. When we picked the cats up last spring, Julie's little cage had a towel draped over it and a sign that read "Beware!" as if she were a crazed bobcat. She even hissed at us when we put her in the carry case to bring home! Not putting them through that confinement again--and the hunting seasons--are reason enough for me to haul them north while Terry heads south.

Terry will visit relatives over in Columbia and Sumter, SC on her way back from Atlanta. She'll get to see her aunt and several cousins and their families. I'd like that part of the trip, but to go to Atlanta...not so much.

The weather looks good between here and the Bolt Hole for traveling today and for the next week or so up at the Bolt Hole with seasonal temperatures and some showers forecast for Thursday on. It's also bear season so....

I've also got to winterize the cabin before I leave so there's something to do besides walk in the woods with a rifle. Not that walking the woods is bad.

Pre Week 7 College Football Report

Lots of Top 25 match-ups this week and undefeated seasons are on the line. The Oklahoma-Texas game should be a doozy as should the Missouri-Oklahoma State game. Then there’s LSU vs. Florida in the Swamp. There’s also a lot of movement and disagreement at the bottom of the Top 25 list as teams struggle to stay in/enter the field.

(Poll numbers are those of the teams entering Week 7 after their wins/losses in Week 6. The pre-Week 6 rankings are after the team’s name. Rankings are from the AP Writers’ Poll/the Coaches Poll/CBSSports.com in that order. NR= Not Ranked)

1/1/1 Oklahoma (1/1/1) The Sooners are now 5-0 as they head into what may be their biggest challenge of the season—a High Noon showdown/shootout with undefeated #5 Texas. With the way these two can score at will, defense will be the deciding factor. It will be at OSU.

2/4/2 Alabama (2/4/2) The 6-0 Crimson Tide hosts Mississippi this weekend and should easily be 7-0 Saturday night.

3/2/3 Missouri (4/3/4) The 5-0 Tigers square off against the 5-0 #17 Oklahoma State Cowboys Saturday night. What the heck is in the water down in Big 12 Country? Five teams are 5-0 going into this weekend and averaging something in the neighborhood of 52-53 points per game on offense. Four of them play one another on Saturday so two will come away 5-1 and at least two will be 6-0 on Sunday morn.

4/3/4 LSU (3/2/3)The 4-0 Tigers travel to Florida in to face off against the #11 Gators in The Swamp.

5/5/5 Texas (5/5/5) The Longhorns take their 5-0 record to Oklahoma to face the 5-0 #1 Sooners.

6/6/6 Penn State (6/6/7) The 6-0 Nittany Lions travel to Wisconsin to take on a reeling Badger team that has lost its last two outings. Joe Pa should rack up another victory and could probably do it from State College, PA, let alone the press box.

7/7/9 Texas Tech (7/8/9) The 5-0 Red Raiders will host Nebraska on Saturday as they hope to keep pace with the winner of Oklahoma-Texas. The Raiders should be 6-0 come Sunday.

8/9/8 Southern California (9/9/10) USC (3-1) plays host to the Arizona State Sun Devils who should be no more trouble than a bunch of little imps.

9/8/7 Brigham Young (8/7/6) The BYU Cougars put their 5-0 record as they host New Mexico. Can you say 6-0?

10/10/11 Georgia (11/10T/13) The Bulldogs look to get back on track after a bye week following their upset loss to Alabama. They should be able to master the guest Tennessee Volunteers Saturday.

11/12/12 Florida (12/13/14) The Gators look to upset the #4 LSU Tigers in the Swamp on Saturday night.

12/11/10 Ohio State (14/12/11) Beanie Wells seemed healthy enough last Saturday against Wisconsin and that’s bad news to the Purdue Boilermakers who have to try and stop him this week when they visit Columbus. OSU should be 6-1 when it’s over.

13/14/14 Vanderbilt (19/19/23) The Commodores, 5-0, take it on the road to Mississippi State from which they should emerge 6-0.

14/13/13 Utah (15/15/16) The Utah Utes are 6-0 as they head to Wyoming. They should be 7-0 come Sunday.

15/16/16 Boise State (17/18/17) The Broncos take their 4-0 record down to Southern Miss Saturday and should fare well enough on that southern cooking to remain undefeated.

16/15/15 Kansas (16/16/15) The 4-1 Jayhawks host Colorado. KSU should improve to 5-1.

17/17/18 Oklahoma State (21/22/NR) The Cowboys are 5-0 but that and a buck-fifty will get you a cup of coffee in the Big 12. This week’s challenge will be #3 Missouri. GULP! Looks like the range will be fenced in by the Sooners. It’s tough to win them all.

18/18/17 Virginia Tech (20/24/19) The 5-1 Hokies are idle this week.

19/20/19 South Florida (10/10T/12) The 5-1 Bulls are idle this week.

20/23/20 Auburn (13/14/8) The Tigers are 4-2 after dropping a close one to Vanderbilt. The host a 2-3 Arkansas team this week that is on its heels. Look for Auburn to improve its record to 5-2.

21/21/23 Wake Forest (25/25/25) The fans of Wake Forest, it is hope Navy left a wakeup call in defeating the Demon Deacons 24-17 two weeks ago. This week the Deacons host the Clemson Tigers on Thursday night. Oh-oh, Thursday. Bad news playing a lesser opponent on Thursday night.

22/NR/21 North Carolina (NR/NR/NR) The Tar Heels knocked off undefeated UConn last week to improve to 4-1. This week they host an improving 4-1 Notre Dame. If they can shut down, or at least limit, ND’s running game they have a chance. To do so they need to control the trenches and if they do that, ND QB Clausen will see lots of powder blue in his backfield.

23/19/24 Michigan State (NR/NR/24) After a tough loss at California (38-31) in Week 1, the Spartans have won 5 in a row. They have a chance to make it 6 as they play at Northwestern this weekend but it might not be very easy. The Wildcats are 5-0. Look for MSU to skin the ‘Cats.

24/NR/22 Pittsburgh (NR/NR/NR) The Panthers were ranked #25 in the preseason polls but lost in the opening week to Bowling Green. They have since won 4 in a row including last Thursday’s upset in Tampa of South Florida. Pittsburgh is idle this week as they prepare for the rush attack of Navy.

25/NR/NR Ball State (NR/NR/NR) The Cardinals are 6-0 as they head to Western Kentucky to play the Hilltoppers Saturday night. They should be 7-0 come Sunday morning.

NR/22/25 Northwestern (NR/NR/NR) The Wildcats’ much improved defense is credited with their 5-0 start. This week they’ll take on #23 Michigan State at home. It could be question of who gets to score at all.

NR/24/NR Wisconsin (18/17/18) After starting 3-0, the Badgers lost to Michigan and Ohio State. This week they get to host a 6-0 Penn State team that just may make it to the National Championship game. Ta-ta Badgers.

NR/25/NR California (NR/NR/NR) The 4-1 Golden Bears are idle this week before heading to Arizona and the remainder of their PAC 10 season.

Gone from last week’s charts: Fresno State (22/21/22), Oregon (23/20/20), and Connecticut (24/23/21).

Just off the screen and waiting for a chance is 5-0 Tulsa. (But with a strength of schedule o5 104 out of 120…heh?)

Another Quiet Day in the Woods.

I spent Monday sitting in the tree stand again and, if anything, it was quieter than on Saturday. No deer, natch, and even fewer avian visitors.

There were skeins of geese flying south in the morning and late afternoon. Pushed, no doubt, by the fairly strong winds from the north and the hard frosts of the northern climes. (It stayed below freezing all night at the Bolt Hole. Another reason I'm heading up this weekend. The water system is still on and I need to heat the cabin or drain it.)

I had a hen turkey walk up to within 15 yards of where I was sitting. She spooked when she saw me and flew into a tree just 30 yards from where I sat. After inspecting me carefully for 15 minutes, she flew down just a little further away than the spot from which she took off and continued to walk up the hill.

Blue Jays, Red-tailed Hawk, Raven, Crows, Nuthatches, Chickadees, Downy Woodpecker...the usual suspects.

I went to bed last night feeling a little out of sorts and decided to sleep in rather than go back to the tree. I still feel like there's a banked fire behind my eyes and my lower back aches from being confined to a 24"x18" platform 15' up for 12 hours. Besides not seeing any deer movements the last few days, the heavy frost warning meant we would see temps below 30 degrees and with muzzle loader and rifle seasons starting in the Adirondacks on this and next Saturday respectively, I don't need to get really sick. At least up there, I'm likely to be walking (still hunting) instead of sitting for prolonged periods of time.

Heh!

This comes from Doug Ross:



Ross also has a great little commercial for the RNC.

Who are those guys?

Arizona Cardinals are currently beating the Buffalo Bills 41-17 with 9 minutes left in the game.

Are these the same Cardinals the Jets beat the crap out of last week by a score of 56-35?

And what happened to parity in the NFL. For years it made high scores less likely. Defense seemed to rule. This year not so much. Forty or more points have not been unusual. The Giants are 4-0 with two blow outs--41-13 vs St. Louis and 44-6 vs Seattle. We had the Jets laugher against Arizona, 56-35. The Eagles beat St. Louis 38-3 in week 1. Green Bay kicked sand in the face of Detroit by a score of 48-25. And Da Bears also beat up on the Lions 34-7.

College Football: Week 6 results.

I spent much of Saturday sitting in a tree stand in the woods and so I missed some of the college football action. I did get back into the house in time to see the Auburn/Vanderbilt game and started to watch some of the late games but was soon overcome by all the fresh air and lopsided scores.

Here's what happened to the Top 25 during week 6 play:

Thursday night continues to be The Night for upsets. This week it was #10 Southern Florida—a team that was #2 last year when Rutgers knocked them off their perch on Thursday night. #15 Utah barely escaped.
(Poll numbers are those of the teams entering Week 6. The pre-Week 5 rankings are after the team’s name. Rankings are from the AP Writers’ Poll/the Coaches Poll/CBSSports.com in that order. NR= Not Ranked)
1/1/1 Oklahoma The Sooners faced the Baylor Bears on the road. The Sooners scored 28 in the first quarter and 7 more in each of the other three quarters to beat up the Bears 49-17.

2/4/2 Alabama The Crimson Tide hosted the 4-0 Kentucky Wildcats on Saturday. Alabama is now 6-0 after beating the Wildcats 17-14.

3/2/3 LSU Idle.

4/3/4 Missouri drubbed the Nebraska Cornhuskers 52-17. Missouri scored 52 points for the third time this season. They have also scored 69 points (against Nevada) and 42 points (against Buffalo). The Tigers’ offense is averaging 53+ points per game.

5/5/5 Texas The Longhorns beat Colorado 38-14 after stampeding to a 21-0 halftime lead. Texas is now 5-0.

6/6/7 Penn State Joe Pa is hurting, but his team is not. While Joe had to stay off the sidelines due to pain in his legs and hips, the Nittany Lions downed the Purdue Boilermakers 20-6.

7/8/9 Texas Tech The Red Raiders went on the road this week to face off against the Kansas State Wildcats. Undefeated Texas Tech (now 5-0) beat KSU 58-28.

8/7/6 Brigham Young BYU played on the road against the Utah State Aggies on Friday night. The Cougars came away undefeated (5-0) by drubbing Utah State 34-14. It was 34-0 going into the fourth.

9/9/10 Southern California The Trojans romped (once they got started) as they defeated the #23 Oregon Ducks 44-10.

10/10T/12 South Florida The Bulls hosted the Pitt Panthers in Tampa on Thursday night. You would think they would have learned after last year. FSU suffered another Thursday night upset as the Panthers beat the Bulls 26-21.

11/10T/13 Georgia (3/3/3) Idle

12/13/14 Florida This week’s opponents was Arkansas on the road. The Gators gobbled up the Razorbacks 38-7.

13/14/8 Auburn The Tigers were tested by #19 Vanderbilt on the road. The Commodores eked out an upset by a score of 14-13.

14/12/11 Ohio State The Buckeyes played at the home of the #18 Wisconsin Badgers. Ohio State road on Beanie Wells’ feet and shoulders in edging the Badgers 20-17.

15/15/16 Utah The Utes hosted Oregon State on Thursday night. Utah escaped the Thursday night jinx—barely. They needed 11 points in the last two-plus minutes to remain undefeated (6-0 now) and beat Oregon State 31-28.

16/16/15 Kansas After a week off, the Jayhawks played at Iowa State (The Cyclones). Kansas spotted Iowa State 20 first half points and then scored 21 of their own in the third quarter to take the lead. They then outscored the Cyclones 14-13 in the fourth quarter to win 35-33.

17/18/17 Boise State hosted Louisiana Tech on Wednesday night. The Broncos won 38-3. On the blue rug, no one can beat them.

18/17/18 Wisconsin Losers to unranked Michigan last week, the Badgers had the biggest drop of the week—9 slots. They will fall further this week after losing to #14 Ohio State 20-17.

19/19/23 Vanderbilt The Commodores remain undefeated with a 14-13 upset of #13 Auburn.


20/24/19 Virginia Tech The Hilltoppers of Western Kentucky travelled to Blacksburg Saturday. VT beat Western Kentucky 27-13.

21/22/NR Oklahoma State The Cowboys hosted the Aggies of Texas A&M. Oklahoma State roughed up the Aggies 56-28 and remain undefeated at 5-0.

22/21/22 Fresno State The Bulldogs faced the one team that may have more frequent flyer miles than they do: Hawaii. The Rainbow Warriors went home to the islands with a victory but they had to go to overtime to down the Bulldogs, 32-29.

23/20/20 Oregon Oregon was ahead at the end of the 1st quarter 7-3 and held a 10-3 lead early in the 2nd. Unfortunately, that’s when #9 USC woke up. Mark Sanchez threw for 332 yards (out of the Trojans’ 598-yard offensive total and three touchdowns as he lead USC to a 44-10 victory.

24/23/21 Connecticut UConn was on the road to North Carolina on Saturday. UConn was forced to start a new quarterback and it cost them. They struggled to move the ball all night and North Carolina took advantage of a porous line during the punting formations (3 blocked punts by the same player? Named Bruce Carter) to win convincingly 38-12.

25/25/25 Wake Forest Idle.

NR/NR/24 Michigan State hosted the Iowa Hawkeyes this week with a chance to move up in the polls. The Spartans eked out a victory over the Hawkeyes 16-13.

A day in the woods...

I may not have had the luck to have a deer walk by me yesterday, but that doesn't mean it was an uneventful day in the tree stand.

As to be expected there were chipmunks and squirrels to watch but there were also lots and lots of birds.

The mixed winter flocks of Black-capped Chickadees, Tufted Titmice, White-breasted and Red-breasted Nuthatches, Downy and Hairy Woodpeckers were going about the business of searching every nook and cranny for insects and spiders and their eggs. Several times during the day they swept through the trees around me and stopped to inspect me as well. One lonely Yellow-rumped Warbler accompanied one group and a solitary Dark-eyed Junco came by as well. The Juncos are usually a low brush or ground group, but this guy was up at eye level to see what I was up to.

The Blue Jays also came to investigate, but they kept their distance whereas the Chickadees lit upon the branches right next to me and at an arms length. Every time the Jays started calling they got my attention. Sometimes they will call at anything that moves in the woods. In the past this has meant a fox, raccoon, or deer is on the move. Yesterday, whatever got them excited had business elsewhere and I saw nothing.

Overhead there were American Robins, Morning Doves, Crows and Ravens. From a short distance away but still out of sight, came the hammering and call of a Pileated Woodpecker. near the end of the day, a Red-tailed Hawk swooped in to do its own hunting along the power line and seemed either pleased with its catch or upset with my presence as it screeched off after making a dive into the ferns.

During the day, I was able to listen to folks on the ridge to my west felling trees for lumber, and down the hill to the north they were cutting firewood. A little further to the north, there's a guy who has a motorcross trail cut through the woods and he was out riding his bike for several hours. I hoped that all that noise might drive a deer or two to the relative quiet of my hillside perch but it didn't happen yesterday.

As evening approached there was a crash of a dead tree about a hundred yards from my stand. There was no wind so I've no idea what made the tree fall. But I was there to hear it. And it raised my level of alertness. I thought to myself that perhaps a bear was searching for ants or honey.

So, while my purpose for being in the woods--to kill a deer--was thwarted, it was not a complete waste of a day. It seldom is when there's so much to observe going on around you.

Home canning.

Last weekend at this time, we were in the midst of canning 2+ bushels of plum tomatoes. The effort resulted in 28 quarts of tomato sauce as well as a batch of spaghetti sauce that we both used and froze for the future. All for the cost of the tomatoes (at $6 a bushel a real steal) and the time it took to process the jars and tomatoes.

The process is simple but time consuming. First is washing the tomatoes. A half bushel at a time, they went into the sink for a bath in cold water. Any bruised tomatoes had their bad spots removed and, along with dirt and stems, went into the bucket for the compost pile. Only a few were not salvageable.



Once cleaned, the tomatoes went into boiling water for a few minutes to be scalded until their skins cracked.



They were then scooped out of the hot water and run through the food mill. Ours is a simple affair with a screen on the bottom that allowed the pureed tomato goodness through while preventing the skins and seeds from passing into the sauce. The skins come out a separate shoot and are then run through the mill a second time to get all the good stuff out that we can.



Once the sauce has been collected, it's boiled down to reach the desired thickness and ladled into the quart jars. The jars were washed and then sterilized in a boiling water bath while the tomatoes were being processed.



When the jars are filled, they get lids held in place by rings and go back into the boiling water bath seven quarts at a time. Boiled for 15 minutes to sterilize the batch , they come out of the water to cool. As the jars cool they seal with a distinct "pop" and are ready to be stored for future use.

Essentially the same process is used for apples to make applesauce except that the apples are cored, sliced and cooked into a soft texture before being run through the mill. We put up over a dozen pints of excellent applesauce using this process earlier this fall from just half a bushel of Cortland apples.

Skins and cores all go into the compost pile where they make a fine, rich soil compost.

We've had the food mill for ages and spent only $25 for it back in the '70s. It has paid for itself many, many times over. Jars and rings can be used over and over again as long as hey aren't damaged so their cost depreciates with each season. Lids are good for one use only but cost only pennies apiece. Time and produce are the major investment. And the reward is having something without any additives and the satisfaction of being just a little more self reliant than the other guy.

The larder is now stocked with homemade tomato sauce, applesauce, and blueberry and blackberry jam. Plus there are zucchini breads stacked like cord wood in the freezer and several Tupperware containers of frozen shredded zucchini. And pumpkin bread and processed frozen pumpkin will soon be joining the zucchini.

Now if I could only find a deer or two for the freezer....

The tide must be in this morning.

Actually it's just the early morning fog down in the valley.

Here's a veiw from the "lawn" of the Aerie to the west.



And here's another looking northwest to the gap through which Route 15 (soon--perhaps--to be Interstate 99) passes as it heads out of Mansfield and toward Corning, NY.



Heavy fog is common in the spring and fall as the cool air sinks into the valley and any moisture from the several rivers, streams and impoundments condenses. One of the advantages of living at an elevation of 2100 feet is that the coldest air moves down the hill to the valleys. We get fogs only when the cloud ceiling is really, really low. At those times, the valley is getting rain while we can look at the rain drops forming. That doesn't happen too often, however.

One of the disadvantages of living at 2100 feet is the air is constantly moving. It's either going down hill as it cools or uphill as it warms. There's only an hour or so when the tide shifts that things are very, very still. That's why, I suppose, there's a wind farm being constructed atop Armenia Mountain. We will have some 75+ wind turbines along the ridge above and to the east of the Aerie turning that air movement into electricity. At community meetings last year, they were said to be ready to erect the wind turbines this summer--didn't happen. There are delays due to added restrictions and requirements requested by folks concerned about the birds, the view and the forest. So much for demands for alternative electrical production.

Connections and Words Matter

Dead Cops, Dead Marines...and Their Killers Food for thought.

Vote accordingly.

Weigh in Saturday (4)

Before I went out this morning to sit in my tree stand for 12 hours waiting for a deer that never showed up, I stepped on the scale and it said the same thing as the last two weeks. Three weeks in a row now my weight has been stuck on 217. Zero loss but also zero gain. I blame the ice cream jones I'm carrying.

PA Bow Hunting Season Begins

I went out this afternoon when the wind and sun finally had an hour or two to dry out the brush and hung my tree stand up in a pine in the back of the Aerie's woods. It took me awhile to wrestle it into the tree, but I got 'er done.

There's a crossroads of sorts about 15 yards away and both trails leading to that intersection are within easy reach of my bow. During the summer I had a game camera stationed here and had several legal bucks (at least three one-inch points on one side) and several does trip the camera. Their movement has not been confined to the middle of the night either. While much of the activity has been between 10 PM and 3 AM, there have been visits between 7 AM and 7 PM as well. All I ask is for one of them to come wandering by between 6:38 AM and 7:15 PM. (Those are the legal hours tomorrow, if I'm reading the table correctly.) Doesn't matter to me if it's a buck or doe since I've got an antlerless tag to fill.

Fresh venison liver or tenderloin would be good for dinner tomorrow or Sunday.

What the F?

Any one who has sat with me during a freakin' Mets' game or a Rutgers' failure lately might be surprised by this:


Created by OnePlusYou - Free Online Dating

Obviously, 32 years of teaching high school and middle school have caused me to be careful in what words I use. I must look for ways in which to expand my vocabulary.

Words of caution...

...via email from my younger sister comes this cautionary tale:

John's Egg Business

John was in the fertilized egg business.

He had several hundred young layers (hens), called 'pullets,' and ten roosters to fertilize the eggs.

He kept records, and any rooster not performing went into the soup pot and was replaced.

This took a lot of time, so he bought some tiny bells and attached them to his roosters.

Each bell had a different tone, so he could tell from a distance, which rooster was performing.

Now, he could sit on the porch and fill out an efficiency report by just listening to the bells.

John's favorite rooster, old Butch, was a very fine specimen, but this morning he noticed old Butch's bell hadn't rung at all!

When he went to investigate, he saw the other roosters were busy chasing pullets, bells-a-ringing, but the pullets, hearing the roosters coming, could run for cover.

To John's amazement, old Butch had his bell in his beak, so it couldn't ring.

He'd sneak up on a pullet, do his job and walk on to the next one.

John was so proud of old Butch, he entered him in the Renfrew County Fair and he became an overnight sensation among the judges.

The result was the judges not only awarded old Butch the No Bell Piece Prize but they also awarded him the Pulletsurprise as well.

Clearly old Butch was a politician in the making.

Who else but a politician could figure out how to win two of the most highly coveted awards on our planet by being the best at sneaking up on the populace and screwing them when they weren't paying attention.

Vote carefully this year, the bells are not always audible.

What was the cause of the credit crash?

Sub-prime mortgages to people who shouldn't have had them. (This was also a huge mover in the housing bubble--both it's inflation of home prices and their current crash.)
Why were they offered mortgages?
Who wanted to reign in the program? And who didn't.

If you read the current papers and listen to the current Democratic leadership...you are hearing the wrong answers repeated over and over again.

Snopes.com, however has reported on two emails going around that expose the truth.


Read the whole thing to get the facts.

The Community Reinvestment Act (passed by a Democrat controlled House and Senate and signed by President Carter and later expanded by a Democrat controlled House and Senate and signed by President Clinton) paved the way for risky loans to those who might not be able to repay them. Even punishing lending institutions if they did not comply.

It was Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac in 1999 that wanted more lending. (The head's of those agencies cooked the books to award themselves huge bonuses. And are currently advising the Obama campaign on financial matters.)

It was the Bush administration that wanted to install more regulation of the two because of the shaken ground upon which they were built. It was Democrats in the House and Senate that swore that things were fine and no added regulation was needed in 2003. These same Democrats (specifically Rep. Barney Frank and Sen. Chris Dodd) had pocketed tens of thousands in campaign contributions from the two agencies and were given sweetheart mortgage deals from affiliated lenders. It was Sen. Barack Obama who pocketed more money than any other Senator or Representative when calculated as dollars per years in office.

Pass this along.

UPDATE: The newest GOP ad: "What Just Happened?"

What the hey?

What the heck is that big glowing ball up in the sky? The sun?!

You don't say!

We haven't seen that very much during the past week or so. It's still breezy and quite chilly, however.

PA's bow season for deer starts tomorrow. The overnight low is supposed to be into the 30s and the daytime high in the upper 50s. I'll have to bundle up and be prepared for that low temperature that seems to hit just as the sun is rising. (At least it's supposed to rise tomorrow.) No rain in the forecast either, which is a plus.

Just askin'...

Do you think ESPN will be able to lure many top ranked teams to play on Thursday nights next year?

We had all those #2s upset last fall and then this year #1 USC fell to Oregon State last week and last night #10 Southern Florida lost to Pittsburgh (USF was #2 when Rutgers knocked them off last year--on Thursday night) and #15 Utah needed a last second field goal topping an 11 point comeback with just over two minutes to play in order to emerge with a 31-28 win over Oregon State. (OS might move all it's games to Thursday night.)

Raw fall days at the Aerie

Yesterday's high temperature here at the Aerie was a mere 51 degrees and it was overcast, breezy and drizzly much of the day. This morning has started out with more of the same.

I turned the heat on yesterday for the first time this season and we've kept all the windows closed. Inside it's been right around the 65 degree mark which is where we like to keep things during the winter. It's actually quite comfortable at that temperature as long as we shift to the long sleeve shirts. The radiant floor heat seems very comfortable at the low setting. It's the damp that makes things a bit raw. If things don't warm up and dry out between now and 2 PM, I'll be seriously considering lighting a fire to farm the house.

The propane company came by the beginning of September but after checking the level in our tank made no delivery. The gauge read almost 70% full at the time. The last delivery was in April and since then we've only been using our gas for hot water (and on-demand system) and cooking. Using the grill outside and its 20 lb. tank (had to refill that just once this summer) for many of our meals has even reduced our use of the house supply further. I'm not looking forward to the first fill-up and the bill.

And now for something a little different

Who needs a drummer?



(From over at Theo's.)


And here's another:

Stormy weather...

October is starting out just like September. It rained overnight--again--and the weather forecast is for 60% rain today and 50% chance both tonight and tomorrow. The breeze is light but some of the leaves that have changed are being beaten to the ground by the rain. Temperatures have been a bit below the averages. It never rose above 62 degrees yesterday and that was only during the brief--as in one hour--that the sun snuck out from behind the clouds. Overnight it dropped to 48 degrees.