Oct 31st - I Have Arrived

Other than traffic jams in Dallas, todays 250 mile drive to Messiah’s Ranch was relatively uneventful. I entered the Dallas metro area a little after 9. The first stop and go traffic jam was only a little over a mile long. A TransAm was stalled in the left lane. The driver couldn’t get off the road to the left because of a barrier for the HOV lane.  After traffic just got back up to speed we had to slow down again. This time it was slow (stop and go) for maybe 4 miles. The second slow down was caused by an accident that had been cleaned up by the time I arrived at the accident site. This was not the most impressive view of Dallas freeways, but it was a place I could take a quick photo.

 

This place is certainly out of the way. The approximately 5 miles of gravel road was some of the dustiest road I've every seen. The CR-V was totally covered with dust. I thought I had let it run long enough last night to charge the battery, after a day on the road. It wouldn't start when I got it unhooked from the motor home. I had to jump it to start it. John loaned me a charger so the battery should be back to normal by morning.

 

 

Below is a photo of the gate to enter Messiah's Ranch.

 This is the driveway leading to the gate. The driveway starts after you get off the dusty road. Actually the driveway is not very dusty.

This is the view from the front of the motor home.

This is from across the road looking back at the motor home.

 

I've got the motor home hooked up to water and 50 amp electric. We have install a tee in a sewer line before the sewer can be connected. They have the line exposed.

 

It was 84 degrees here when I arrived. I've got the AC running. Tonights low is supposed to be in the mid 50's. The highs Thursday, Friday & Saturday are supposed to be in the mid 80's. These temperatures are about 5 degrees higher than normal for this time of year.

 

I am able to get CBS and FOX on TV with just my antennae. I've also got pretty good cell phone reception. I'm using it for my internect connection right now. They have WiFi in the dining room, and I'm parked close to the dining room, but my laptop can't "see" it now. I will check tomorrow to see if I can remedy the problem.

 





 Both John (the guy who runs the place) and Fred (Fred and his wife Gail have been full time volunteers here for about 18 months), seem like they will be great to work with. Fred and Gail are leaving for Tucson, where they used to live, in a couple of weeks. They are going back to spend the holidays with their family. I think John said that won't be back until some time in January.

 

I guess maybe I didn't sleep all that well at the rest area last night, because I pretty tired again tonight. Hopefully I can stay awake until at least 9 or I will be up to early. I'm supposed to meet John and Fred some time between 8:30 and 9:00 tomorrow morning. I think Fred works until around 3:30.

If you want to see where I am on a map, Google Kelumac Tree Farm, it is just down the road. http://www.kelumac.com/ I am stunned that there is a bed and breakfast out here.

Good night to all. May God bless you and yours.

PS. I sure don't expect any Trick or Treat'ers tonight. <grin>

Oct 30th - On the Road

Todays drive went well. I managed to make it 470 miles, just into Texas.

The Lake of the Ozarks area was quite interesting. All the water was steaming. It looked like the Smokies. The white strip you see just above the top of the semi is actually a cloud/steam.

 More of it in the photo below.

 

In a few places it was pretty foggy.

 

Traffic was quite heavy in places. This was taken in rural Oklahoma.

 

I don’t associate lakes with Oklahoma, but Lake Eufaula is certainly something to see. These photos were taken one after the other; one out the driver side and the other out the passenger side. There were other sections of the highway where I could have taken similar photos. The lake is BIG!

I'm currently parked at the Welcome Center, just inside the Texas border. It was closed when I got here. I walked around it and chatted with a guard who must spend the night here, in his car. It appears to be quite a nice place.

I've had my supper (Kathy sent me macaroni soup. It was delightful.) and will soon be heading to bed. I am 250 miles from Messiah's Ranch. Other than driving through the Dallas/Ft Worth area, tomorrow it should be an easy driving day. I should hit Dallas at mid-morning, hopefully traffic won't be to bad.

Good night to all. May God bless you and yours.

Oct 29th - Ready to Leave

I didn't do much today. I finished packing the motor home and moved it down to the grocery store near the highway. The CR-V is all hooked up. I should be able to make a "fast getaway" in the morning.

Kathy did some target practice with the 22 Ruger semi-automatic. She wanted to be sure she remembered how to use it. She did fine.

I did a little work on the rock retaining wall, the one by the side of the shed. I only added four or five rocks, but they were good sized ones.

Kelsey brought Lydia over a little after noon. They had lunch with us and then Kelsey went to work and Lydia stayed with us. She is such a sweetheart. Andy came and picked her up after work.

I hope to be on the road and headed south no later than 8:30 tomorrow morning. I'm excited about going to Messiah's Ranch and providing a helping hand, but I'm also sad about leaving the folks here.

I sent John, at Messiah's Ranch, an email and told him my arrival would be delayed a day. He responded that it was no problem, my list of things to do would just be longer when I arrived. I'm looking forward to meeting him.

Good night to all. May God bless you and yours.

Oct 28th - Leaving Delayed

After we had problems starting the motor home a couple of days ago I checked out the chassis (starting) batteries today. The end was blown out of one of them. I have no idea why, or when it happened. It must have been recent because we have never had problems starting it until a few days ago. I spent over four hours today removing the two chassis batteries, finding a place I could get another set on Sunday, going past Columbia (60 miles one way) to get them and installing the new ones.

Even with the delay I am pretty close to being packed. Kathy has been a trooper hauling things to the motor home and packing them away. She has prepared me a bunch of meals that will only require defrosting and heating them up. I could still go tomorrow but I want to be as "untired" as possible when I leave.

The plan was to take the CR-V down to the grocery store on the corner and have Kathy drive me back home to get the motor home. I would then drive it to the grocery store parking lot, hook up the CR-V and leave. Kathy suggested that I consider asking them (the grocery store folks) if I could take the motor home and CR-V down there tomorrow and get everything hooked up and leave them there overnight. That would allow me to get an earlier start Tuesday morning. Doing this would also give me the opportunity to drive the motor home a few miles down the highway, as a further check to make sure everything is OK. That sounds good to me so I'm going down there tomorrow to check with them.

The weather was nice today. After an overnight low of 30 it warmed up to a sunny 50 degrees. The highs will be in the 80's by the time I get to Messiah's Ranch in Texas.

We went to the Lutheran church in California this morning. It is where the Ott's attend. Kelsey, Diane (Andy's sister-in-law) and Debbie and Crystal (Diane's daughters) sang today. There were good. The Pastor has had a good message almost every time we have attended, but all the "structure" keeps us from enjoying the service.

Good night to all. May God bless you and yours.

Oct 27th - PM - Auction & Lawn Mowing

Kathy got up early so that she could be at Kohl's in Jefferson City when it opened at 8 AM. They were having some type of super sale. She bought a few things.

After she got home we went over to Lohman, about 10 miles, to check out an auction. They had some old Craftsman tools (table saw, jig saw, planer, etc) that might have been of interest to me next year, but not now. Kathy bought a lamp and a couple of other minor items. We actually saw a couple of people we know while we were there.

We then went into Jefferson City to pick up a prescription refill for me, at Walmart. I had called it in early this morning but they couldn't get in ready in time for Kathy to pick it up. We had hamburgers at Freddie's. They were a little overdone, but the fries were great.

Once we got home we moved the motor home around so that it was level. When Kathy started it, it seemed as though the chassis batteries were almost discharged. It is the first time that has happened. There is an button that allow you to momentarily connect the "house batteries" to the "chassis batteries" when you are starting it. She tried that and it started OK. Perhaps the chassis batteries are shot. Hopefully they will get me to Texas and, if necessary, I can replace them while there. I finished draining the sanitizing water and filled the water tank with fresh water.  We turned on the refrigerator and she started filling it. I still have to check the tire pressures, load a few minor things and then I will be ready to go.

I mowed the lawn this afternoon. The leaves are a bother. There are so many of them that the mower acts like a snow plow. At one time there were so many wadded up around the engine that I stopped and removed some of them. I was concerned that the engine couldn't get enough air flow around it for cooling.

With these temperatures, high 49/low 30, our wood boiler/furnace went 17 hours (from 5 PM yesterday until 10 AM this morning) without adding wood. The wood that we filled it with yesterday was trashy oak and cedar. With decent wood I'm reasonably sure that it will only have to be filled once a day until the high/lows are quite a bit colder. I think Kathy turned the thermostat down to 71 overnight. It has been set at 73-75 while Lydia was here.

Have a good evening. May God bless you and yours.

Oct 27th - Getting Loaded

Yesterday Kathy and I put a few things in the motor home, for my upcoming trip. She has been stocking it with groceries over the past week or so. I drained most of the heavily chlorinated water out of the water tank but I'm going to have to get the motor home more level to dump the remainder. (A few blocks and a move of a few feet will get the job done.) If I don't get most of it out I will have some very smelly water for the first week. I recharged the water softener that I use for the motor home. It is now ready so that I can fill the tank with soft water, once I get the chlorine out.

I also did a little more clean up yesterday. I cut up some cedar that was in a trash pile in the back, enough to provide wood for the boiler/furnace for a day. I threw most of the remainder of the pile over on my latest burn pile.

Lydia came for a few hours yesterday. Kelsey brought her over a little after 2, on her way to work, and Andy picked her up a little before 6, on his way home from work.

Today will be another "loading day" for the motor home. I want to get almost everything loaded and ready for my Monday morning departure.

We had the coldest night of the fall last night. It got down into the high 20's. It is supposed to be slightly below freezing the next couple of nights.

The fish haven't made much progress in learning to come when the fish food starts hitting the water. Within 15-20 minutes there are quite a few, mostly catfish, that are up on the surface eating. We have only been feeding them for a couple of days. It is really to early to expect them to have learned to come yet, but if Kathy keeps up feeding them I expect them to learn quickly.

Have a great day. May God bless you and yours.

Oct 25th - Lydia Eating Squash

Last night Kelsey fed Lydia some squash for the first time. She had eaten oatmeal before but Kelsey said she wasn't thrilled with the oatmeal. She really went after the squash. She would just dive for the spoon when she saw it coming towards her. She is still learning to eat "solid" food, and I'm sure Kelsey won't let her have much of it for some time yet.

We had an enjoyable evening with David, Elaine, and K, L & A last night.

Tonight Kathy fed her some more squash during supper. She is such a cutie.

 I think the expression is because she is still trying to get used to the feel of solid food.

I went to California this morning to take the hardware store a "core" battery to replace the one I had purchased for my lawn mower last week. No paper work, when I bought the battery the lady at the checkout counter just told me to bring the core back when I could and she would give me the lower "exchange" price.

I also stopped at the "feed store" and purchased 50# of fish food. I'm "training" the fish in our pond to come eat. I don't think they have ever been fed before. A few days ago was the first time I've gotten them to come eat chunks of bread. Today, after some time, I had quite a few coming after the food. Tomorrow it will be interesting to see if they come for the food quicker, if I remember to feed them.

We got the same dramatic temperature drop today that everyone in the Midwest experienced. It dropped about 15 degrees in 15 minutes. We still had the air conditioning on last night, it was 75 in the house this morning, and we started up the wood boiler this afternoon. It is 47 now. The forecast for the overnight low is 32. 30 is forecast for tomorrows low.

We moved the motor home from its "parking area" and back into the driveway. It sprinkled a little today and it was a good thing we moved it before it got any wetter. Some of the surface dirt that I had disturbed while grading was more soft than I thought. Rock is close to the surface almost everywhere on our place so there wasn't any real danger of getting stuck, but it was a little slippery getting out. On top of that it is VERY TIGHT getting in and out of the parking area.

I fired up the chain saw and trimmed up some cedar "logs" for Doug to take back with him when he comes out for Thanksgiving. (He wants to try out using cedar pieces in some interior decorating.)  I also cut up a few "junk" limbs that had been in the tree that I cut down. They are worth burning in the furnace, but only barely.

I am in the process of disinfecting the water system in the motor home. Not a big deal, it requires adding a little bleach to the system, filling the system and running water out all the faucets until you smell chlorine. After leaving it set for at least 12 hours I need to drain the chlorinated water from the system and refill it with fresh water. I'm still on track to leave for Texas on Monday.

Good night to all. May God bless you and yours.

Oct 24th - Done With Wood

I've split all the wood I'm going to split this year.

I think I have well over 15 cords. About half of it is by the wood furnace/boiler and the other half is in a building out back.

I may still do some clean up work, with the chain saw, where I cut down the big oak tree, but maybe not. Just depends on how much time I have before I leave.

It only got to 82 here today, the forecast was 86. It didn't feel to all that hot. Rain is in the forecast for tomorrow and the high is only supposed to be 71, then the highs are only to be in the 50's for the next 4 days. Hopefully we will get another inch or so of rain.

Tomorrow, depending on the rain, I will move the motor home from its "parking place" and start checking it out. The only thing I know I need to do is add 80-90 gallons of water to the water tank. I shouldn't need anywhere near that much water, but I would rather have more than I need rather than not enough; especially if I decide to spend two nights on the road getting to Messiah's Ranch.

Time to get off. Andy parents are coming for supper, as are Kelsey, Andy & Lydia. His parents just pulled in.

Good night to all. May God bless you and yours.

Oct 23rd - Leaves

It started raining late last night and didn't quit until 9 this morning. We got 1.4", PTL. That was great, but we still need a LOT more.

Today was a lazy day for me.

I went to Jefferson City this morning to make arrangements to get my CPAP supplies through a local supplier. I had to meet with their nurse before they would switch my account from Indiana to Missouri. I also needed to change from a private insurer to Medicare. It was raining quite hard during my drive into town.

All I did around the house today was hang some knick knack shelves, a towel ring in the master bathroom and I finally put up the porch swing.

Recently you saw photos of the trees around the house. Below is a photo of where our driveways intersect.

You are looking up one of the driveways. Another one crosses this one just beyond the trash bin. The leaf cover is solid.

It got up to 84 here today. After the rain the humidity was high. I gave up and we turned on the air. We will probably let it run through Thursday afternoon since tomorrows high is supposed to be 86, and Thursday's high is supposed to be 76. By Friday we will probably be stoking the furnace again. Thursday nights low is forecast to be 43, with a high on Friday of 52. Current forecast for Saturday night is 30 degrees.

Good night to all. May God bless you and yours.

Oct 22nd - More Wood Work

We split and stacked wood today. Kathy used the tractor to haul the wood down from the splitter area to the shed by the wood furnace/boiler. This was the first time she had driven it. She even took it up to the mailbox to get the mail. She kept asking me how to make it go faster. I kept telling her she didn't need to go faster. Actually she only had the throttle about half open. Once I showed that to her she was satisfied, even without shifting into high range.

 This is one of the chunks of oak that we split. This one was probably 19" in diameter and 21" long. These babies are HEAVY for this old man to wrestle around. Some of the smaller chunks of hedge that we split were as heavy as the larger pieces of oak. The oak split easier. I've seen tables that claim that oak is heavier than hedge, but the hedge I'm cutting and splitting here is significantly heavier than oak.

 We finished the 4th row of wood, two in the shed and two out of it. This wood is in addition to the 4.25 cords I have in the building out back.

I think that when we finish splitting and stacking the wood I have cut we will have enough to add a 5th row. Today we split about two thirds of the wood that was in the photo in yesterday's blog post.

Early tomorrow morning I need to go into Jefferson City and pick up supplies for my CPAP machine. Hopefully after I get back I will have the time/energy to finish splitting and stacking the remaining wood that I have cut. Once that is done I'm done with wood cutting/splitting for the year.

It was warm here today, 82 with a heat index of 85. It is supposed to be even warmer tomorrow. I'm looking forward to the cooler weather coming later this week. The low for Saturday night is forecast to be 33. We thought we were going to get some rain this afternoon. We quit when it started sprinkling and then it never did rain. It made a good excuse, I was pooped.

I sent John, at Messiah's Ranch in Bryan, Texas; an email yesterday to see if we were still on track for me to show up either Oct 30th or 31st. He called me this morning and sounded excited about my coming to help. They are finishing a two story dormitory and I will probably be helping with flooring and trim work, along with other things as needed.

One downside of going to Texas is that it is still hot there. It was 88 there today. The extended forecast looks like it will also start cooling down there on Saturday. The "normal" temperatures are highs of 77 and lows of 56 for the end of October. By the end of November the average high/low has dropped to 66/45. The lowest average daily temperatures occur in late Dec and early Jan. Then they are 60/40.

Good night to all. May God bless you and yours.

Oct 21st - Ready for Splitter

Weather was a little warm today, but nice. It got up to 80. By Wednesday the high is supposed to be 85. YUCK!!!! Fortunately then it will cool back down. The high next Saturday is supposed to be 50.

Steve brought the wood splitter back this evening. Now I've got to really get to work for a couple of days. I used about 2.5 tanks of gas in the chainsaw today. I cut most of the wood shown in the photo below. Maybe half of it is from the oak tree I cut down earlier. The rest is hedge and walnut the I "scrounged" from all the wood still left laying around the property.

 

One thing that was interesting to me is how hard it is to cut the hedge and walnut. The oak cuts much easier. I don't plan on cutting any more. If I get this all split I will be more than happy. Almost all of it is to big for me to pick up and put on the splitter.

 

Kathy bought some more outdoor furniture from Lowe's. She went in and picked it up today. She varnished the porch swing so that it is now ready to hang up. She also oiled some other woodwork.

 

Good night to all. May God bless you and yours.

 



Oct 20th - At K, A & L's

This morning I went to California to pick up a chain saw chain that had been sharpened and to get some odds and ends at the hardware store. I ended up going to both hardware stores and still didn't find everything I needed. The service at both stores was great. After spending far more time there than I anticipated I headed for Russellville.

I had told Kelsey and Andy that I would be at their place by 10. I called and told them I would be late. By the time I had breakfast at the little place in Russellville (good food & good prices but it takes FOREVER) it was after 11 when I finally arrived.

We got the hose bib installed, made a cover for the entrance to the crawl space and installed the light fixture at the back door. The big thing is that their crawl space is now closed up.

After I got home I moved the five chunks of wood that I had previously cut, from the woods to the area near the wood storage building. I think the remaining log will cut in 4 to 5 more pieces.

I called Steve, the guy who borrowed my splitter (I told him I would call him when I wanted it back) and asked him to bring it back so that I could use it for a couple of days. It is quite a chore to raise the splitter to the upright position. Most of the pieces are so large that if I don't set the splitter upright, so that I don't have to lift the pieces, I will need to split them in half by hand. Even split in half it will be a chore to lift them onto the splitter. Out of curiosity I split three of the chunks by hand. I picked the "cleanest" ones to split.

If I didn't need to do a lot of chainsaw work the next few days I would split more of it by hand. I need to get the rest of the log out of the woods and cut up several other pieces that are laying around, so that I can split them.

My current plan is for me to leave for Messiah's Ranch, near Bryan, Texas; on Monday, October 29th. I still have a lot I would like to get accomplished before I leave.

Good night to all. May God bless you and yours.

Oct 19th - Photos

Like most places fall is here.

From the "back" deck, looking left.

 Looking straight back.

 Looking right.

 From the front porch, looking left.

 Looking straight back.

 Looking right.

 

For those who haven't been here our property is outlined below. It is about 400' by 500' and starts about 250' off the county road. Our house is the building in the middle of the property. The back of the house is towards our pond, and the road. Now that some leaves have fallen we can see the traffic on the county road.



Low last night was 48 and the high today is only supposed to be 54. By Sunday it is supposed to warm up to 80/64.

I'm still quite pleased with our outdoor wood furnace/boiler. I don't know if I would install a new one ($10-15,000?), the payback can't be that great even if you have your own wood supply. It takes a LOT of labor to cut the wood. I estimate that it will take 10-12 cords to heat our house during an average winter. You also have the bother of filling it once or twice a day, depending on how cold it is. We can burn our propane furnace if we want, the switch over is automatic. Don't put wood in the wood furnace/boiler and once the water temp drops below 100 degrees it quits sending hot water to the coil inside the house. At that point the propane furnace will kick in. The outdoor furnace guy told me that if you set the thermostat so that you are heating with propane the wood furnace will "idle" (keep the water in the boiler hot) for a week, thus minimizing the concerns about the water freezing and damaging the boiler and piping.

Oct 19th - AM - Time Just Flies

I'm not even sure what has happened since my last post, Tuesday(?). Some good news is that we got another 0.4" of rain. That is on top of the 1.5" that we got a week ago. We can see that the water level in the pond has risen, but not by much. the water level would have to rise almost 3' before water went over the spillway. For those who have been here, the edge of the water has come up the entry channel almost to the bridge (it is really a stretch to call the two old beams over the channel a bridge). I think we are still around 9" short of normal annual rainfall.

Yesterday we went over to Kelsey, Andy & Lydia's. Kathy put Lydia in a stroller have they took a walk. I installed the perimeter face/sill board along the bottom of the kitchen wall. The exterior wall area that was removed during when the kitchen was remodeled. Tomorrow I'm going back over and hopefully we will get the back ready for siding. (Relocate/install a hose bib in the new wall, install the trim for the siding around the microwave vent, the exterior light and the weatherproof duplex outlet. Finish the exterior insulation. Install house wrap. Put up some type of door at the crawl space entry.)

In the afternoon I cut up some more of the tree I felled earlier in the week.

Some of the branches at the top are hollow. Whatever is in the hollow area just wears out chainsaw chains. I had a couple of chains that I had sharpened at a local hardware store. It only took this much wood before one was dull enough that I quit cutting, to hard on the bar.

I love my tractor! There is no way I could have lifted most of these pieces into my truck, let alone carry them out to where my truck was parked. I drove right up to the log, rolled the pieces into the bucket, drove them out to my truck and dumped them in the back. The end of the log is now about 3" larger in diameter than the length of my chainsaw bar. The "butt" of the log is at least 6" larger in diameter. Cutting up the rest will take some time.

I sharpened the chain, as best I could, and went back and cut five more sections. By then the chain was dull enough that it was hard on the bar. I sharpened the chain again when I got back to the house.

It is drizzling rain here this morning. If it dries out I will go out and get the five pieces of wood. I think the remaining log is around 15' long. There are also some decent size branches that need to be cut up for firewood. After that there is probably a trailer load of trash that I need to move to the latest burn pile.  I burned the trash from around the pond so the area is ready for another fire.

I probably need to call the guy who borrowed my splitter and tell him I need it back for a couple of days. I told him that he didn't have to bring it back right away, that I would call him when I needed it back.

Andy brought Lydia over around 8 this morning, Kelsey worked last night. Lydia was just a real sweetheart all morning. Kelsey stopped by after work, had some breakfast, visited for awhile and just with her, its 10:30.

Have a great day. May God bless you and yours.

Oct 15th - A Beautiful Day

Sunday we went to Crossroads church in Jeff and then I didn't do much in the afternoon.

Today was absolutely beautiful. The overnight low was 42 and the high was 74. It was mostly sunny.

First thing this morning I drove steel fence posts at the corners of our property. The corners were all staked with rods driven almost flush with the top of the ground. The rods had colored tape on them at one time, but most of it has disappeared. Doug had shown me the back corners a month or so ago. One of the front ones was easy to find, there was a stake driven in next to it, but it was just dumb luck that allowed me to find the other corner. I knew I was somewhere near where the corner had to be but was headed back toward a fence line. My shoe was untied and as I knelt down to tie my shoe I saw a piece of the old tape that had come off the rod in the corner. The rod was only about a foot from the piece of tape.

After locating the corners I ran 2+ tanks of gas through the weed eater. I never got more than 75 feet from the house. Basically I trimmed around the area that I mow. I did get rid of the bamboo that has already come back up in the area where Kathy cut it down in late June. It was already 18-24" tall. I may get around to mowing tomorrow.

One interesting thing was seeing the wild roses that are in bloom. They must not know that it is mid-Oct.

I hand split some chunks (5 or 6 pieces) of wood that I had stored next to the wood furnace shed. I don't know the species of wood, but I do know that it is TOUGH! I was not able to split one piece using just the splitting maul. I had to use a wedge on every piece. Not one of the pieces split until I drove the top of the wedge well below the top of the chunk of wood. These pieces are around 27" long. Our furnace will accept up to 30" long pieces.

 I added another row of wood in front of the furnace shed. It is mostly under the roof overhang. I don't think much of the recent rain even hit it. I want to add another row so that there will be more wood close to the furnace. I will cover it up with a tarp to make sure it doesn't get wet. Looking to the left of the shed gives a little idea of how beautiful it was today.

This is the 11th day that we have had the wood furnace running. It is just idling. Kathy said the heat came on once early this morning. While we haven't needed much heat the past few days it has been pre-heating our water before it goes into the water heater. The water heater that we are using is electric. Using the wood furnace to pre-heat our well water should help with our electric bill. When "idling", like it has been, the furnace takes very little wood.

 This afternoon I decided to cut down a "dead" tree. It turned out to be a far bigger task than I had anticipated. It looked to me like the tree would fall directly toward the utility pole that supports our transformer. It was 30 paces from the pole to the tree. When I finally got the tree down there were limbs on the far side of the pole. Fortunately the tree did not fall directly at the pole. The limbs missed the pole/transformer by at least 5 feet.

I had put a new chain on my saw just a couple of days ago. I thought it should cut through the tree like butter, well...maybe not like butter. Instead I almost burned up the bar on my saw before I got the tree down. I keep checking to make sure the chain oiler was working. It always was, but the chain sure seemed like it did not want to cut.

The stump measured 24" in diameter. I was a little leery about which way the tree would fall. After cutting out the notch, and cutting a good distance in from the back, I thought the tree should have fallen. I ended up driving two wedges into the saw cut. After driving the wedges well into the sawcut the tree still did not fall. I cut some more, drove the wedges in further, cut some more and drove the wedges in further. I ended up with both wedges driven full depth into the sawcut before the tree finally fell. You can see how little of the tree was uncut when it finally fell.

The felled tree is in the photo below. Note our driveway in the background. There were limbs on the far side of the driveway.

 

I took a much needed break after the tree finally fell. While resting I tried to "touch-up" the chain. I went back and tried to cut up some of the limbs. The chain just did not cut well. In the morning I'm going over to the hardware store in California. I will buy a new chain and drop off my the two dull ones to be sharpened.

 

In another vein. A couple of weeks ago I wrote that I had "locked up" my old Stihl saw, and that I had purchased a new one. When I went to Tennessee to pick up my tractor I took the old saw to my brother-in-law (the same one who gave me a couple of days of his life while fixing up the trailer I bought to haul the tractor). He likes to "tinker" with things and said that he would look at the saw some time, out of curiosity. The local Stihl dealer had told me that the saw was probably not worth repairing. He thought I had seized the engine because I had not shaken up the gas can to mix the oil and gas prior to filling the tank. Tom called me over the weekend so that I could hear the saw run. He had started taking it apart and before he removed the clutch he thought the engine had some how "broken loose". He wasn't sure what he had done, he just knew that whatever had locked up the engine had broken loose and that after putting it back together it seemed to run fine.

 

Lydia was over for awhile this afternoon. Kelsey didn't have to be to work until 7 PM and Andy was working late. Kelsey came over about 5:30 and spent a little time here. I think Andy finally got here around 8 PM. I'm not going to go off on a rant about this but I am going to mention how unfair it is that there are far to many people on the government dole who are being supported by taxes collected from responsible young couples like Kelsey and Andy. Why we, as a society, continue to accept the irresponsible behavior of people who shuck out kids (because they are to lazy/incompetent to use birth control) is beyond me. It should not be the governments job to punish couples like my granddaughter and her husband and then use those tax dollars to subsidize the irresponsible.

 

Good night to all. May God bless you and yours.

Oct 13th - RAIN!!!!

Andy, Kelsey & Lydia came for lunch. Andy helped me unload my trailer load of pond trash before we ate. I was sitting at the end of the table and couldn't get him in the photo.

 After lunch I went over to Andy & Kelsey's and helped install the exterior vent cover for their microwave vent fan. Lydia woke up and Kelsey brought her out to watch. She is so cute! If you are on Facebook make sure you look at the photo Kelsey posted.

 

It started sprinkling just as we finished the vent cover installation. We have had a nice rain since this afternoon and evening, 0.8 inches so far and it is still raining. That is close to the total of what we have had since we moved here in late June. I got the trash cleaned up around the pond just in time.

 

Good night to all. May God bless you and yours.



Oct 13th - Pond Cleaning

Yesterday we went to town in the morning. Kathy had a doctors appointment. I got a much needed haircut from Larry, I love going to his shop. I picked up my new glasses, they are a disappointment. I don't notice that much improvement in my vision. Had I know the change was going to be so slight I would have kept the nearly $600 the glasses cost me. Yes, nearly $600 for one pair of glasses. My uncorrected vision is so bad that glass lenses would be horrendously thick. The lenses I get are some super duper high index plastic that allows them to be much thinner (but still quite thick), and lighter, than glass lenses.

We got our annual flu shots while in town. After some grocery shopping we stopped for lunch at the Dragon Kitchen's buffet and then headed home.

In the afternoon Kathy cleaned up dust from Doug's construction work and I cleaned up around the pond. The water is LOW! The lowest is has been while we have been here, and it has never been that high. It is probably about 3' below the spillway. I did a "walk about" Thursday, after Mom and Doug left. I walked our south property line, down below the pond. I sure wonder why they put the dam where they did. Had the dam been located closer to the property line the pond could have been much larger. Probably 5 times larger, but still less than an acre. I guess they didn't do it because the dam would have been larger, more expensive. We did see lots of fish in the pond while looking at it with Doug one day. I can hardly believe that it is large enough to support all the fish we saw. I've never seen any dead fish on the shore.

Below is part of the wood I cleaned up. I dragged most of it, used my tractor on the larger pieces (LOVE THAT TRACTOR) up from the edge of the pond. I added a couple of more small trees (4 & 6" diameter by 12-20' tall) to the load after I moved to the other side of the pond.

I though about getting out my lawn tractor, just so I'd have every piece of equipment that I own involved in the clean up <grin>.

Still no rain. Rain forecast is 50% today and 30% tomorrow. Radar looks like we may get some in the evening.

This afternoon I'm going over to Kelsey and Andy's (and Lydia's) and we are going to install the exhaust for her microwave. Andy got an "emergency call" this morning and is in making repairs to a new car that was dinged this morning. It is supposed to be delivered this afternoon. Kelsey and Lydia picked up Kathy and they went to town.

I've decided it is to late to see Utah's canyon country this fall. I'll wait until it warms up next spring to see it. My current plans are to start volunteering at a camp near Bryan, TX about Nov 1st.

Have a great day. May God bless you and yours.

Oct 12th - Workers Have Gone Home

Doug and my Mom left after lunch yesterday. By the time both had gotten home they had a nearly 600 mile, butt-numbing, trip. They sure helped a LOT while they were here. My Mom nearly wore me out trying to keep up with her as she helped me cut and split wood <grin>.

Doug did some wiring (we now have a light in the stairway down to the lower level!), trim work and installed some braces on the back deck. He tried to install some lags in the ledger that attaches the back deck to the house but couldn't find anything solid enough to hold a lag. That is probably bad news.

Kelsey and Lydia came over for a "goodbye lunch". Below is a photo of my Mom rocking Lydia. Lydia must be getting some teeth because she sure is chewing her fingers, or a pacifier, a lot.

In the afternoon I cleaned up my tools we had out for the work at the house and cut a little more wood. Mom and I had started cutting up a tree that had fallen out in the woods while she was here, I finished cutting it up. I could only get the tractor to within about 40' of it because of logs I have not yet cleaned up. The three yellow pieces on top were from a small log that was in the way. They are hackberry and are supposed to have great heat value.

Time to head off to town for errands. Have a great day. May God bless you and yours.

Oct 10th - Grocery Shopping

Yesterday Mom and I split wood for awhile in the morning. The wood pile keeps growing, but slowly.

We then went to Russellville, picked up Kelsey & Lydia and went to the Amish grocery store near Versailles, MO. The grocery is in the middle of nowhere, about 25 miles from our house. Every time that we have been there it has been busy. Give generations of family in the photos below. My Mom &  Lydia, Kathy, Doug & Kelsey.

 Five generations outside the grocery. I took Lydia out to the "barn" , where the workers keep there horses and buggies. There were two horses in the barn. Lydia was not impressed. I don't think she cared for the smell of horse manure.

 We had lunch at a restaurant just outside Versailles. I had an open face roast beef sandwich that would have rated a 10 had it been 5-10 degrees warmer. There had to be two cups of mashed potatoes on the plate, with gravy, and over a pound of roast beef on a slice of homemade bread. It was as good a "hot beef" sandwich as I have ever had at a restaurant.

On the way back we had to stop at another place to check out the lawn furniture. Doug and Lydia took some time to go swinging. The sun was bright enough that I'm not sure Lydia had the opportunity to get the feel of swinging. She was more concerned about the bright sun.

In the evening we went to Moose Brothers, in Russellville, for supper. It was good but it seems to me that they just raised the price of their tenderloin sandwiches and that the sandwich was smaller. Not the great deal it used to be, but still not bad.

I'm not sure what today will bring. Doug is still trying to figure out wiring. I think he will need some help with it. I still have several pieces of wood near the splitter that need to be split and stacked, and more to cut. (Doug needs a tool, got to go.)

Have a great day. May God bless you and yours.

Oct 9th - More Cleaning & Burning

Just more cleaning and burning the past few days. Doug, our son, came out with my Mom (Beverly) last Saturday. It has been good to see them.

Doug has been working on our mystery wiring. We have lots of switches that don't seem to turn anything on or off. Mom & I have been cleaning and burning trash wood. We have also added some to our wood stores.

The wood burning boiler/furnace seems to work fine. In this mild weather (highs mid 50's, lows mid 30's) I only have to fill it once a day. We have been keeping the house FAR warmer than we have in the past. We used to set the thermostat no higher than 70. We have had it up to 75 while Mom has been here. Doug had to strip down to his tee shirt. We do have the registers in our bedroom closed. We have the windows partially open at night, even the night that it got down to freezing. We sleep way better when it is cool. One nice thing is that our master bath has its own register and we can keep it warm while having the bedroom cool. At our house in Lebanon our bathroom and bedroom were on the same hot water heating zone so if one was cool/cold, so was the other.

I like my tractor. Getting chunks of wood the size of the one in the photos below onto the fire would be a problem without it. This piece of wood was partially rotted, but it was still heavy.

I took the photo below at 6:30 last night, the last time I checked the fire. I started this fire Saturday morning and it has burned continuously since then. In the morning it will have burned down to mostly coals but it will still be hot enough to set whatever I throw on it afire. I stirred up the fire at least three minutes before taking the photo. I was surprised at that it was still throwing off sparks.

Today the plan it to go to Moose Brothers, in Russellville, for lunch. They have the best tenderloins, onion rings and breaded mushrooms.  I can already feel my arteries clogged up from all the grease <grin>.

After lunch we are heading over to the Amish grocery store to check it out. It is about 10 miles on the other side of Russellville. Going to a grocery store that has a place to tie your horse, and a place for the employees to corral their horses, is always interesting.