Memorial Day: Sunny and Clear! Giarizzo's Cliff Caves In

Sitting By The Dock on the Bay, Finally

Lemon Square Kid

It's a beautiful morning, though I have been up since 5:00, a bit worried about our dock as we had a heavy downpour last night, just as were finishing dinner with Ron and Linda on our porch.  Just what we needed, more rain, about 7/10ths of an inch in a half hour.  Fortunately, that was it for the night, though I went out and filled a couple more buckets to put on our dock.  In fact, there was a garbage can floating next to our dock, obviously it had come off someone else's dock, so I picked it up, filled it with water and used it until I find out if it's a neighbors.  The water level looks about the same as yesterday though the run off will be continuing all day so we will have to wait and see.  It cooled off a bit last night, so it's about 62 this morning as I write.

A strange birding observation: the martins have been flying in to our front porch, hovering and fluttering, as if they are looking for something (insects?), then flying off, then returning, sometimes four or five at a time.  I have never seen this before and wonder what's going on, as they usually stay clear of any structure.  In fact, I just saw two more a few minutes ago.  We better keep our doors closed.  And they are flying all over our front and side yard at the moment, like something our of Hitchcock's THE BIRDS.  They are really active, either building nests, the boys chasing the girls, or they sense something that upsets them.  And Evie just saw two robins going after a squirrel, chasing him up the tree.

It was great to sit out on the dock last night, with Ron and Linda, have a couple of beers, some guacamole, even though it was overcast.  We seemed to be the only one's on our dock, with few boats on the lake because of the impending storm.  We must have sat out for an hour, then had dinner on our front porch, of butter burgers, slaw, macaroni salad, and green beans, with Evie's amazingly good strawberry pie, a  crust between a pie and shortcake, and a center of vanilla  custard.

We just got back from kayaking towards Giarizzos, the beautiful house up on the hill, and a good part of their hillside caved in last night, huge trees are down, their stairway which led down to the water destroyed.  I guess it was a combination of water eating away at the trees and hillside, the heavy rains, and wind, all combining to take down a good part of the hill.  It looks like a bulldozer went in and cut out a huge swath of earth.  It stopped eight feet from their porch.  Four or five guys were out in the water, trying to rescue some of the horses and dock pieces that were sitting on the shore.  I have never seen anything like it here; it's something you might see in California, a huge landslide, caused by the rains.  Mike Giarizzo seemed nonplussed by it all, at least today.  He said, 'What are you going to do.  Just start figuring out how to fix it."  A good attitude.  One of the neighbors, who I play ball with on Tuesdays, was helping and said this is what happens when you cut down the trees for a view, and think something like myrtle will hold the hill. It won't.

We went over to the Viking Club at 3:00 and asked the Leonards along as they had never been there.  I have never seen it so crowded, cars parked on the grassy hills, people picnicking everywhere, kids swimming, and lots of people inside at the bar.  The lure was a chicken barbecue, 8 bucks a person, with sides included.  We walked around a bit, sat in the bar and talked over a pitcher of beer, then got our dinners.  The chickens were excellent, nice and moist and plenty to eat though the macaroni salad was not as good as mine.  We then came back and had the rest of the strawberry pie at our house, finishing it off.  It's a warm night, supposedly 87 at Bemus but 79 here with a slight breeze.  We both sat out on the dock until dusk, reading and occasionally fishing...caught nothing as usual.  Back to my book, THE BIRTH OF VENUS by Sarah Dunant.