Heavy Fog Obscures the Morning (Hiking Ellery)

7:00

7:00

Up at 7:00 and too my surprise, the fog had blanketed the dock and lake, reminding me of the opening of T. S. Eliot's poem "The Lovesong of J. Alfred Prufrock."

The yellow fog that rubs its back upon the window-panes,	15
The yellow smoke that rubs its muzzle on the window-panes
Licked its tongue into the corners of the evening,
Lingered upon the pools that stand in drains,
Let fall upon its back the soot that falls from chimneys,
Slipped by the terrace, made a sudden leap,	20
And seeing that it was a soft October night,
Curled once about the house, and fell asleep.

It's 41º outside, though there were frost warnings last night.  It looks like a sunny day, high around 68º, a perfect day to hike somewhere, haven't figured out where yet.  Perhaps a road trip or just something around here, depending on our mojo.  Sunny tomorrow as well and warmer, in the 70's, two great days in a row.

Yesterday it was overcast most of the day, with light rain on and off.  We decided to take a new walk so we drove to Bemus, to the Ellery Road and parked in the Methodist Church parking lot.  We started up the road but decided to take a detour up Mahanna Road, next to Brown Road cutoff as well.  It was a less traveled walk, and we had never been on it before.  We were surprised at how beautiful the houses were along the route, most with lots of acreage and woods, some set back in the woods so they were hidden.  We came across two Bed and Breakfasts we had never heard of, one about a quarter of mile off the road called The Inn at Pheasant's Run, with 200 acres, hiking trails and a swimming pool though it did not look as if anyone was there.  We also came across Morning Glory Country Inn, much larger, with a driving range.  Strange.  We have been in this area for over thirty years and we have never heard nor seen either one of these places.  It was a pleasant walk up to the top of a ridge, about 1.5 miles and back, taking us over an hour.  It's always fun and interesting to walk somewhere new.

The Inn

Horse Farm on Mahanna Road

When we got home, I took off to Jamestown, as I wanted help getting Evie's Ipad set up to download books from the library and was having trouble doing it.  The problem, her card had expired so the librarian at Prendergast Library renewed it, changed her password, and showed me how to download ebooks from the library to read on her Ipad.  Before the library, I stopped in the Labyrinth Coffee shop for lunch, a tasty Southwestern wrap, had a coffee and surfed the Internet.  I then shopped at Wegman's because we had a hankering for Chinese food, so I loaded up on vegetables to make a stir fry.

I did not get home till about 3:00 and just read some and relaxed, as did Evie until it was time to begin prepping for dinner.  Both of us did the prepping, cutting the vegetables, making the marinade for the chicken and sauces before relaxing with a glass of wine till about 6:30.  I am usually the wok master so Evie was my sous chef, as we stir fried the ingredients in stages, mushrooms, then bean sprouts and cabbage, then chicken and sauce, adding scallions and tomatoes, then everything together before the final sauce.  We were out of hot bean sauce so I added a combination of Hoisin and Siracha sauces to give it flavor and heat.  We loved it, over rice,  just as good as a local restaurant and fun to make.  We watched a terrible movie from the 1980's called Black Widow with Debra Winger.  It's amazing what we watched back in the day.  We went to bed at 11:00, as usual, to read.