Little Blake Lake

It began with a great pre-dawn paddle around the lake (with no bird noises).

Then I spent a couple hours over coffee and bagel at Cafe Wren. On the way home, I stopped and met Sank, a blogger whose stories I admire, who has a place on Big Blake. It was a good conversation.

Then I came home for lunch, and headed for the library in Amery. I planned to finish the last of the current 5 chapters for the Instructors Manual and send them off to my editor. As luck would have it, Thursday is the day that the library closes at 2PM.

Oh, well, I worked on the things that required me to be online and brought the rest back to Sidetrack. I spent some time talking to neighbor Larry, and then I got to work. About 5:30, I finished chapter 15 (out of 19). There was only one litle detail I had to check online this morning. At 7:45AM, I submitted 11-15 and I'm still on schedule.

On one of my breaks from writing I tackled the new propane tank for the grill. I have to admit we don't do a lot of grilling. I think this is the first time I've had to change tanks since we got the new grill.

Last night, I intended to grill my chicken for dinner. Knowing the tank was empty, I removed it. I brought the full one down from the Shakespeare House and proceeded to wrestle it into position. No luck. I couldn't make the clamp that holds the tank it place fit. I decided the struggle wasn't worth the effort and nuked the chicken and poured barbeque sauce on it.

Today, I started fresh. And when I sat down and looked carefully, I realized that yesterday I'd inverted the bar on which the tank sits. I rotated it to the proper orientation, and the clamp worked like a charm. I tightened the connector, and the grill is ready for another cooking adventure.

On another break from writing, I went out and checked on the huge mushroom that survived mowing by Jeff's crew. It looks like it's melting.

While summer may be over in many ways, I did see some hummingbirds this afternoon. They were more interested in the last of the tiger lilies and the salvia than in the feeder. The feeder can come down soon.

After dinner, I decided to do the dishes. Entertainment was provided by a big blue heron. It was in the water just off the end of the dock when I first saw it. My hands were deep in the soapy water washing glasses.

The heron jumped up on the dock with a flopping fish in its beak. It moved its head up and down and around and pretty soon the fish was going down that long neck.


Then the big bird walked across the end of the dock and back down toward the shore. It walked cautiously (Do herons walk on tip toe?) across the grass and ended up standing under Skip's willow tree.

I looked away while I scrubbed at some chicken fat that had been nuked onto the surface of the Corningware, and when I looked up, old heron had been in water, caught a little fish, and was back on the grass working on his swallowing.

From there, my feathered diversion walked slowly into the water and crouched down in the tall grasses next to the shore. It is still there 45 minutes later.

I finally heard some bird noises besides the crows. This afternoon and early evening, a pileated woodpecker or two have been very vocal in the trees just north of Sidetrack. (Just heard one again.)

Oh, and today was cicada day. The first cicada noises are rumored to be 6-week early announcements of the first frost (that would be October 8). We'll just have to see, won't we.

The sun is going down, much less spectacularly than last night (and it's only 7:40PM). The lake is very calm except for some ripples of feeding fish. It's been another lovely day near Paradise. (Remember, Paradise is only a few miles from here. It was rebuilt after it burned down a few years ago.) (Ask, if that doesn't make sense to you.)

This morning it was raining steadily when I got up just before 6AM. No canoeing. I had to put the top up on the Miata to get here. It's cleared up now and I can put it down for the ride home.

I've got my work done, I get to enjoy leisure and work around Sidetrack this weekend.

Hope you have a good weekend too.

I finally got back to Sidetrack. It's been 2 weeks. I'm supposed to be retired and have lots of time for sitting on the deck at the lake. What's up?

When I got here yesterday afternoon, all looked good. It was so still that the algae bloom was visible. The water is like pea soup.



It was beautiful even though the water isn't.

I sat and talked with Larry after supper. As I left, the sky turned red. What a sunset!



This morning I was up and paddling around the lake before the sun. I discovered it's not summer anymore.

First of all, the sun didn't show up until after 6AM. And, the dawn was silent. No cacophony of birds waking up ol' Sol. No loon. No warblers. No robins. No pileated woodpecker. Not ever any crows (until after sunrise). Silence.

I did see an eagle fishing on the other end of the lake. A heron flew overhead. Silence.

From out on the lake, the sunrise was almost as good looking as the sunset last night.



It's good to be back even though I have work to do and will have to spend time in the library in Amery.

It's been nearly 3 weeks, but I arrived at Sidetrack about 1:30 yesterday. A pair of loons were floating in the lake a few meters beyond the dock. Everything looked ship shape.

Except for the salvia in the pots on the deck. The stems looked like sad sticks with a few red, sagging flowers at the top. No wonder the hummingbird feeder was nearly empty. Cleaning and refilling it was one of the first things I did.

A few of the salvia revived a bit after I watered them. There must have been rain here, but so light it didn't get through the pine branches to reach the salvia pots.

Here's why I know there's been some moisture: at least three different kinds of mushrooms growing in the yard. A couple of them are huge.

In the reference section of the Sidetrack library, we have identification books for birds, trees and shrubs, wildflowers, rocks, ferns, and pond life, but nothing for 'shrooms. If you know what any of these are, let me know. The largest ones are 6-8 inches across.



It's also time for the tiger lilies to bloom. I delight in those feathery blossoms because of my childhood memories of my great-grandfather's front garden. When I was about the same height as the tiger lilly stalks, there was a relatively huge patch of those red-orange plants on the southwest corner of his house.



The tiger lilies blooming at Sidetrack now are plants I liberated from a road ditch about half a mile from here. They were in the road crew's mowing zone, but one year I saw them blooming while on a walk. I went back in the fall (twice) and dug up pails-ful of the roots and brought them back here. Most of them survived. There are now about 20 stalks, but not all of them are mature enough to bloom yet.

And I get to revel in 60-year-old memories of the 90+-year-old guy who would pat my head and claim that his hair was once as red as mine and tell tall tales about his youthful adventures.


Here's great-grandpa Albert Rohl standing next to his hollyhocks. They grew in his back yard. I'd guess it was taken in the later '40s or early '50s and hand colored by my mother or one of her sisters.

---