The newest addition to the pond, a floating, solar, fountain.

July 20, 2017 - Thursday

53 degrees/clear skies/calm winds

Pentoga Road

We're excited here on Pentoga Road. Our friend, Joanne, is stopping by to visit by way of Atlanta to Rochester, Minnesota. She's due to arrive Friday afternoon or evening.

Joanne has been a family friend for many many years, since I lived in Maine and the boys were growing up. She was a loving part of our home and family on many holidays and kept our boys in pocket money by having them mow her lawn and doing odd jobs.

Joanne's a retired therapist, or as I always called her, a shrink lady. She left northern Maine for a position at Mayo Clinic. In the medical field, that's the equivalent of playing in the major leagues. Joanne retired to the relatively moderate climes of the Atlanta area several years ago where she enjoys her granddaughter and daughters.

Wednesday was a busy one. I rode back with Sargie to Iron Mountain and later stopped by Home Depot to purchase the needed lumber for the next two sections of privacy fence.

Initially, I was hoping to finish the fencing project yesterday, but it took much longer to prepare the area than anticipated. In every load of wood I haul from Yooper Brother Mark's plant, there's always some that can't be used. Often, there's a piece or two that are too big or unmanageable and over the years, I've simply pushed those to the back, the old out of sight/out of mind trick. 

Old wood had to be moved, much of it too big to ever cut and split. That being the case, I loaded the mega pieces onto the loader of the tractor and took them to the burn pile.

More manageable ones were split and stacked in one of the wood sheds.

It took the majority of the day to clean the area.

Lake Pentoga is officially dry and what a mess. After six weeks of being under water, what used to be green, lush, grass, is now a mixture of dried mud, bare ground, grass, and weeds.

Hard to believe my sons were kayaking to the back of the property a few short weeks ago.

Finally, I could drive to the burn pile with the tractor and not leave ruts. I'm going to try mowing the meadow tomorrow and at least make it look a bit nicer.

Planting a post was another challenge in this privacy fencing project.

Between the trees roots and rocks, gaining even an inch in depth meant some mighty hard work. Add in the mosquitoes and sweat that insisted on dripping into my eyes and Tommy P wasn't an overly joyful person.

I wanted to mix the cement to pour into the post hole, but remembered at the last minute that there's a hole in the bottom of the wheel barrow. A five-gallon bucket saved the day.

I used the two-wheeled cart to save my back and transfer the very wet cement to where it was needed.

It was late afternoon before the post was set and the area made ready for the new section of fence. At least I'll get to build fence today and not have to root around moving old, wet, rotten, pieces of very heavy wood.

The UPS man arrived with the floating, solar powered, mini fountain. 

One problem, if it floats too closely to the side it throws water onto the ground.

There was nothing to do but scrounge around in Dad's old tackle box and find a sinker. 

Looks like the sinker is floating in mid air, eh? Maybe I should be a magician when I grow up!

Tied to a piece of monofilament fishing line, the fountain is now firmly tethered in place.

Cesar's Palace has nothing on us. We have our own fountains.
Hmm, Pentoga Palace?

Sargie was home early last night and we had a quiet evening. 

With Sargie back to work early this morning, I'm going for my usual walk then start building the privacy fence. With any luck at all, it should be finished by day's end. If there's any time and/or daylight left, I may begin to mow the lawn. It needs it again. Yooper Brother Mark also mentioned there is a huge pile of wood at the plant waiting for me to come load the trailer.

If only you had my life.

Time to fix breakfast, pack Sargie's lunch, and get this day started.

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

So are the tales from Pentoga Road...

The spaghetti squash are in bloom