A 48º January Monday Morning

7:13

It's just after 7:00, the darkness of early morning is taken over by threatening, dark gray clouds.  As the day progresses, the temperature will drop as it will during the week with snow predicted for Thursday.  Frailty, Thy Name Is Chautauqua (apologies to Hamlet). The lake remains frozen despite the warm weather and noone seems to be out fishing.

Long Point In The Fog

I was looking forward to Sunday because of the two big NFL playoff games, Evie less so.  The morning sky was overcast, with a light rain occasionally falling during the day and we took many photographs of the fog rising from the lake most of the day.  We decided early to get in a walk, regardless of the weather so we drove to the CI around 11:00.  Despite the unseasonably warm, even unhealthy weather, we enjoyed our walk.

Bell Tower At Chautauqua

It's a three and a quarter mile loop, takes us a little over an hour.  And each time we notice something different; this time, it was noticing things because of the barrenness of the plants and trees. And for once, we heard the rushing of water in the creek when we walked across Thunder Bridge.  After our walk, stopped in at the Lighthouse Grocery and picked up some ground chuck and sandwich buns because we were planning on cooking burgers out on the grill.

We were home by 1:00 and Evie quickly put together our second big breakfast this weekend, applewood bacon from Trader Joe's, eggs, and bagels and we watched CBS Sunday Morning after the opening of SNL.  The big game did not go on until 3:00, so Evie watched some TV while I read and fell asleep, not waking until 4:00.  I had the game saved, however, so I watched it fast forwarding through the commercials, the only way to watch a game as long as you don't find out the score ahead of time.  We had talked about getting tickets for the $12,000 Queen Of Hearts drawing at the Viking Club but did not know whether it made sense to drive over to the club just to buy tickets.  And we were cooking burgers outside.  We finally decided (I should say Evie) to go over around 6:00 for a beer, buy our tickets and then come home and make dinner.  Just as we walked outside to get in our car, the only two neighbors who live along Woodlawn/Victoria happened to walk by so we talked with them for 15 minutes, all of us bemoaning the absence of snow and cold weather.

Neighbors

When we got to the Viking Club, we sat at the bar, had a beer and I noticed that a couple of the guys were oohing and aahing over their steak with onions and mushrooms.  When I suggested maybe we should share a steak, Evie quickly agreed, no doubt having this in mind even before we left.  So we enjoyed another beer, the ribeye was as good as they get and we talked with lots of new people, some regulars like us but we had never really gotten to know them.  We sat next to John,  from Chautauqua Ironworks, so we ended up talking to him quite a bit, along with a couple who always arrive in their snowmobiles if there is snow, and a fireman from Jamestown, who was waiting for  his wife who is a waitress at the Rod and Gun.  In other words, we had a great meal, a good time.

Dusk

We got home in time to watch the second half of the New England defeat Pittsburgh. We were  fed up with watching football by 9:00, so we watched the next episode of Homeland on Showtime, a bit disappointing because we are tired of watching Quinn get his mojo back.  It's taking too long and we want some action.

New word, compliments of Kellyanne Conway: "Alternative facts."