Late Rising

7:30

8:00

I got up later than usual, after 7:00 and could hardly look at the lake because the sun was streaming through our front windows, making it hard to see outside.  We certainly don't need an alarm clock this time of the year when the sky is clear.  In fact, the lake is clear as well, not a boat or kayak, the yards quiet on a 63º morning.  Temperatures should continue in the 80's, like the past few days.  No rain forecast until tomorrow.

Yesterday was one of those days where you wonder where the day went.  We had our usual coffee, listening to NPR, and so on.  We were not sure whether to go for a cruise in our boat or kayak when our Joyce and Bill asked us over for a later breakfast of strawberry/rhubarb pie and ice cream.  How could we pass that up.  So we enjoyed the local made pie and ice cream sitting out in the Leonard's yard, enjoying the shade of their tree in the late morning.

And that was about it for the rest of the day.  We spent the afternoon out on the dock, swimming when it got too hot, coming in occasionally for some water, to get something to eat, and in my case, watch 10 or 15 minutes of the PGA before going back outside.  It was a busy day on the lake as it seemed everyone had their boat out for a ride except for us.  It was surprisingly cool on the dock because of the fickle breeze, at times quite strong, at others, weak.  And when the sun came out, the wind died, it was hot, so much so that we could only stand it for about 15 minutes before cooling off in the lake.  We were entertained by a solitary duck, a cormorant, a deep diver, who would pop up in front of our dock, his long neck and head showing, and then he would disappear for 30 seconds, popping up somewhere else.  They are amazing water fowl.

Cormorant Readying To Dive

We relaxed around 6:00 on our porch, with some cheese and crackers.  Compared to our house, where we keep the windows shut during the day, the porch was warm, blocked by our trees and privets from the breeze.  And that's why we have a nice fan on the porch, to keep us cool on afternoons like this.  My grill has been giving me trouble, so I checked it in the morning to make sure it was getting hot,  And of course, when I went outside around 7:30 to cook our T bone steak, it warmed up only to 300º.  It's very frustrating because I can never count on it to get as hot as I like. So, maybe it's time to start shopping for a new grill, either getting a cheap one, then replacing it in a couple of years, or spending more money on a good grill like a Weber, and assume it will last for ten years.  We ended up eating, ironically, an over done steak, with mushrooms, spinach, potatoes and salad.  And we watched the film BOYHOOD, for the second time, three hours long but well worth watching again.  I then went upstairs to read and finished Shaara's THE KILLER ANGELS, the retelling of the Battle of Gettysburg, as close as one might get to what Gettysburg was like.  It makes me want to go there and walk the battlefields.