Emerson enjoying an apple on a sunny spring day

March 29, 2016 - Tuesday

26 degrees/clear/calm winds

Pentoga Road

Matt sent along a couple of pictures of the munchkins yesterday. He says both are doing well and everyone survived the arrival of the Easter Bunny on Sunday.

Bennet

I may have overdone it a bit on Monday. Certainly, my back was screaming in protest when I awakened a bit ago. 

Sargie has some back pain also, enough that she went to the doctor's yesterday. He seems to believe that she might have some infection in her kidneys and prescribed antibiotics. As of 1:30 this morning, the medication hadn't begun to work and Sargie couldn't get comfortable. I finally got the heating pad for her to lay on and came downstairs. Between my back and her kidneys, sleep was difficult to come by. It's now 2:45 AM and I'm hoping that by the time I'm finished writing, I'll be ready to go back to bed.

Monday was a beautiful and very busy day. Perhaps I overdid it just a bit, but it seemed entirely too warm and sunny to waste any time not doing something. 

The day began with the usual five mile hike. The chilly temperatures made walking most enjoyable and I arrived home a full ten minutes earlier than usual.

A logging operation alongside my walking route

Enjoying a rest, I put pencil to paper and came to the conclusion that my planned garden expansion will cost over $400 in treated lumber to make the raised beds plus two or three hundred more for top soil. Needless to say, the grand expansion has been put on hold. Maybe half will be done this year, half next. Perhaps I'll keep it the size it is and simply enjoy what's already there. 

The trailer was still half filled with wood. After emptying and sweeping it clean, I loaded the trash and drove to the dump.

I miss the old landfill days... back when a trip to the dump meant finding treasures that others had discarded.

I hated to waste a trip. The trailer was towed on into town and left at Yooper Brother Mark's to once again be filled with firewood. 

Back on Pentoga Road, I spent an hour visiting with Neighbor Mike. He was attempting to hang two homemade screen doors, both of them, literally, works of art. I'll take a picture the next time I'm up to his camp.

Three fairly large spruce trees have been growing along what used to be the edge of our back yard. Of course, the yard has since been quadrupled in size and the trees not only blocked the view to the rear, but were crowding each other out.

One was infested with spruce bud worm, a fatal critter that has decimated a huge segment of the UP's spruce population. The middle tree was root bound making mowing most difficult as large roots were growing on top of the ground.

The third tree, the largest, had the best shape and seemed to be the healthiest.

After much contemplation, I cut down the first two trees and figured while I was making a mess, I might as well cut down another that was growing elsewhere and needed to go away.

It wasn't a horrible job. I cut what I could off the trunks and took the stumps down as low to the ground as possible. The backhoe will be used to remove them as soon as the ground is dry enough.

Next came the little Ford tractor with the front end loader. Once the trees were cut into workable pieces, I simply transported each to the burn pile where they'll be incinerated in the next couple of weeks. 

By late afternoon's end, the trees were gone and any mess had disappeared. Needless to say, this woodcutter was all done in. Maybe next time I feel so ambitious, I'll spread the work out over two or three days rather than attempting to do it all at once.

Sargie was home fairly early and we enjoyed brat patties done on the grill. The rest of the evening was spent watching Dancing With the Stars. Bedtime for both of us came shortly after 9 PM.

Sargie closes tonight, so it will be a long day for her. I sure hope she gets to feeling better. I'm going to walk my usual miles then work in the garden. There are three or four raised beds that need repair. Other than that? Hey, the sky's the limit, including taking an afternoon nap. 

After all, a man's work is never done.

So are the tales from Pentoga Road...

The Easter Bunny visited Isabella's house!