It'll be a week or two before anyone has a lakeside picnic at this table

January 3, 2014 – Friday

-28 degrees/partly cloudy/breezy

Pentoga Road

I was up around 4 AM putting more wood in the stove. The coals from last night were still glowing hot so I filled the stove, shut the damper, did my usual safety check, and went back to bed. I was happy this morning to find the downstairs temperature at 68 degrees. I had brought in extra hard wood last night, maple, just for that purpose; to get the stove fired up early so we might wake up to a warm house. It worked.

I usually burn softwood during the day requiring the stove be filled about twice as often as normal. I’m here anyway, popple wood is plentiful, and heat is heat. During normal cold weather, it all works well. When we get a frigid spell, such as the one we’re experiencing, the type of wood one burns makes a huge difference. I’ll figure out the right combination one of these days.

Thursday was an inside day for the most part. I spent quite a bit of time working on various features of this computer. I have a new voice that reads to me, Karen, who has an Australian accent. I tired of Fred’s computerized voice. He sounded like the robot featured in Lost In Space... 

"DANGER WILL ROBINSON, DANGER!" 

For the most part, Karen sounds like a human, is a bit breathy, tells me knock knock jokes when I get frustrated, reads what’s on the page, performs various commands when verbally asked, and with some more “training,” I believe she’ll even fill out forms and do some fairly difficult navigation.

My goal is to be able to pick up the computer, place it on my lap and with vocal commands, have it navigate, read out loud, take dictation, look up email addresses, and do most normal functions… all without having to look at the screen. For sure, I'm stretching the Macintosh's software. We’ll see. About the time I think I’m making progress, Karen becomes a difficult woman and as in real life, she lets me know who’s the boss.

Sargie and I took a wonderful drive Thursday afternoon. After a stop in town, we visited some area lakes only to find there was NO ONE ice fishing. At one or two, there was little sign that anyone had fished at all this season. Evidently, I’m not the only person who has been shut out. Between the fish not cooperating and the frigid weather, this is shaping up to be one season that won’t go down in the record books; unless it’s for the least amount of fish caught.

A road is plowed across the lake, but no one has used it.

We put away the rest of the Christmas decorations last night. Sargie packed and did the hard work. I carried and stacked. The basement is small and the boxes have to go in exactly the right order so all might fit. They’re nestled in for yet another year.

Sargie works early today. I’m going to follow her to Iron Mountain and meet Sargie’s sister, Nancy, at sister Holly’s house. Nancy has been having some difficulties with her laptop computer and so far, we’ve been able to solve most over the phone, but I told her we should meet and download a program or two, possibly eliminate a few problems, and provide a few answers to a list of questions she’s been compiling.

It’s time to get this uploaded and begin the day. After all, a man’s work is never done.

So are the tales from Pentoga Road…

While in the store on Thursday, I immediately noticed these three things have something in common. They must have been manufactured for/by politicians. All require a lot of hot air to function.