Why We Spend Our Winters On Chautauqua Lake

8:12

Ice Fishing This Morning

Note: Our electricity went out early this morning and did not come back on until 11:15, thus the lateness of the Blog. 

It's 7:40, and I've been up since 6:00, sitting in the dark until recently when the gray sky appeared—no sun, no clouds, just overcast. Today is a bit warmer at 27º with highs in the low 30s, but by Tuesday, we're supposed to drop to single digits with snow. And today at 4:30, the Bills play Denver in an NFL playoff game. I just put our bird feeder back out our front window after a hiatus of a month because of a squirrels. Within a half hour, the sparrows and tufted titmice are feeding as well as an aggressive hairy woodpecker. 

Yesterday was another good day—in fact, a great day, especially in the morning. I was up at my computer when I received a message from my neighbor, wondering if I was interested in hiking Long Point State Park. Of course, I said yes, so after breakfast and the blog, I walked over to his house at 9:45, and we headed to the park accompanied by Ripley, his dog. The woods were spectacular, snow frosting every branch—a winter wonderland, and exactly why we love it here in the winter, if only for a couple of days. Ripley loved it too, running wild, darting left or right, sometimes disappearing but always returning. We were the only ones out hiking and had to blaze our own trail at times. What's interesting is I rarely hear or see any birds or animals when I hike—mostly silence or the wind blowing. We were out for forty-five minutes and home by 11:30.

Wow

Ripley

The Woods

Jim And Ripley

I then shoveled our parking areas, came in briefly, then decided to tackle a few errands and took off to Lakewood, then Jamestown. I stopped at Walmart to get a photo printed for Joyce at Ryder's Cup.  I then drove to Jamestown and picked up some sleep gummies for Evie. I was tempted to stop at Wegmans but got gas instead and was home by 1:15. Hungry, I heated up the leftover spaghetti and meatballs with naan and watched my show. I then went upstairs and finished my tear-jerker, Kristin Hannah's Night Road, and napped briefly.

The rest of the afternoon we wasted waiting for wine time and the news. I can hardly listen to Republican pundits applaud and justify Trump's daily lies and craziness. It's scary. Dinner was a Turkish favorite, Tas Kebab—basically stew meat braised with tomato paste and Turkish spices. It sounds simple, but I love the flavor, and with mashed potatoes, I was happy. We watched a couple more episodes of DOC, but Evie had enough of its soap opera storylines and went to bed. I watched some of the Cavs game, then switched to TASK on HBO, which is decent. I've been having trouble finding a book to read and have started a couple, but this morning I received an email from the library telling me I have two books on hold. I hope one of them grabs me.