Sargie and Brutus having a human to dog discussion on Sunday. 

November 4, 2013 – Monday

44 degrees/cloudy/very windy

Pentoga Road

I’m not in love with the changing of the clocks twice a year, especially moving to Standard Time where we gain an hour of darkness each evening for the next several months.

We smelled smoke after going to bed last night. I sprang down the stairs to check the wood stove. A lazy fire was burning within and there was no evidence of smoke. In fact, the living room had no odor at all. It was only in our bedroom.

Upon further examination, I found the wind was blowing from the east, something that is very unusual for this area. The flue, located on the roof of the addition, is the same height as our bedroom window and the wind was blowing smoke directly at the air conditioner, the one that I've been promising to take out for the past month. The odor was blowing into the vents from the outside and ending up in the bedroom.

I love doing regular household maintenance in a cold room after initially going to bed. Standing in my underwear and barefoot, I wrestled the unit to the ground and slammed the window shut. 

I didn't sleep well after the smoke/air conditioner episode. We have multiple smoke detectors in the house, but each time I closed my eyes, I imagined various scenarios, none of them good. Live and learn. After this, the air conditioners will be taken out at summer's end.

Sargie did several loads of laundry on Sunday while I worked on assignments and otherwise piddled around outside. I did get the remains of an old woodpile moved and returned that section of yard back to its natural state. We also took the time to clean out the flower beds and empty the flower pots.

Time was taken for a five-mile stroll along the lakes. Though windy and not very nice, I thoroughly enjoyed the walk and felt refreshed when I arrived back home.

Currently, I’m finding it’s not the knee that is troubling me, it’s the other muscles in both legs that have been ignored all summer. Their protests are mostly silenced by taking  the time to occasionally stretch.

Sargie and I took our customary Sunday afternoon ride. The scenery was less than spectacular and we both commented it looked more like Thanksgiving than early November.

I threw a couple of burgers on the grill last night. Those, along with a tossed salad, made for Sunday night’s supper.

The diet is going well and according the scale, I’ve already begun to shed a bit of weight. I’m doing the low carb, quasi Atkins, diet for now. I’ve done it before and it works well… for a while. The biggest trick is to not stuff one’s self with carbohydrates when finished and gain all the weight back. The last time I did the low carb diet, I lost about twenty pounds and managed to keep eighteen off permanently. My plan is to initially shed a few pounds, then switch over to my favorite way of losing and maintaining weight, counting calories. It’s sort of a poor man’s Weight Watcher’s method. We’ll see.

Sargie closes tonight so it will be a very long day for her. I’m going to grade papers, take a walk, and possibly work out in the shop. The wind is strong, but the temperature is fairly warm.

It’s time to get another cup of coffee and begin the day. After all, a man’s work is never done.

So are the tales from Pentoga Road… 

No need to drive out into the country to view deer. We spotted this herd in one of the local grave yards.