Threatening Skies But Delicious

7:04

7:26

7:43

It's 7:15 and I have been up watching the heavy clouds attempt to block out the rising sun, creating a panoply of delight.  I kept walking outside to take another striking photograph, so different from the beauty of yesterday's sunrise.  It's a balmy 60º but the temperatures will start dropping tomorrow and Wednesday.

7:45

8:45

Yesterday started out sunny but then became hazy and finally cloudy but unseasonably warm, at least for Chautauqua Lake.  I got in a great paddle early, when it was still sunny, over to Long Point and back to Sandy Bottom and home.

Kayak Sundasy Morning

Paddling Along Long Point

Interestingly, when I was paddling along Long Point, a muskrat chose to follow me, chugging along on the top of the water like a mini-submarine and at times was only 10 feet away.  Usually, they see me and dive and I never see them again.

My Muskrat

When I returned, Evie suggested going for a walk at the Chautauqua Institution, a walk we like to take on Sundays.  We left around 11:30 and walked around the narrow streets for about a half hour, just right for Evie.  We even did some clothes browsing at one of the stores.  Evie loved being outside after being housebound for almost ten days.

We were home by 12:30 and Evie quickly started frying up the bacon, so we could have our traditional big breakfast and watch CBS Sunday morning.  Nothing like fried eggs, bacon and a bagel to make my day.  After breakfast, I ended up taking a cat nap, just what I needed after being up early.  I finished up my book the third of Don Winslow's POWER OF THE DOG TRILOGY, a stunning drug war trilogy.  Around 3:00 I went outside to get some gardening done and Evie soon joined me.  She wanted to move a couple of our limelight hydrangeas from along the brick walkway because they blocked the view of our garden.  So I dug a couple of unattractive hydrangeas from next to our porch and planted them on either side of our garage door.  We are not sure how well they will do there and thought it was worth a try.  I then dragged each limelight over on a tarp and dropped in the hole left by the other hydrangeas.  They should do well next to the porch.  By the time I was done, I had worked up quite a sweat even though I was only wearing a tee shirt, so I went in the house, changed and decided I had enough for the day.  Evie, however, stayed out for another 45 minutes, happy to be working in the beds, specifically trying to trim and prop up a Daphne that gets beaten down in the winter.

Before going outside, Evie had prepped the dinner, making the maple/soy marinade for the salmon and getting the asparagus ready to roast.  We had a brief wine time before Evie put both the salmon and asparagus in the oven, cooked the rice and made a salad.  I was a big help, doing up the dishes as she finished with them.  Our dinner of salmon, rice, asparagus, and salad was particularly good or we might have been really hungry.  And though we are still not crazy about the Amazon Prime series, Hanna, we watched three episodes before saying enough and went up to bed.