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pre-Powerful jihad
Sunday, May 10 2020
Gretchen was back working her Sunday shift at the bookstore today, though it's still possible she'll be collecting some unemployment for the shifts she missed during the height of the pandemic. Meanwhile, I had cleanup jihad duty to prepare the house for the arrival of Powerful, the 40 year-old gentleman who has been in prison since he was sixteen and will soon be living in the Gunther room in our basement. Since his bathroom will be the one I usually take my baths in, one that I usually let get pretty nasty, I made a special effort to clean it up. I also used some dilute bleach to further cleanse the walls and ceiling of the Gunther room, which had a bad mold problem last summer. It had already been cleaned by professional cleaners, but it needed another round. Also, since the weather forecast still had some cold days in it and our indoor firewood supply was almost depleted, I went out with the chainsaw and salvaged some fallen white ash only about 150 feet from the house on the north end of the Stick Trail. It added up to something like two backpack loads' worth of wood, though I only used the backpack for one of those loads; the wood was close enough to carry home in my arms one piece at a time.
In an effort to straighten-up the yard, I also disposed of the huge semi-ruined yagi television antenna that had been on a pole over the solar deck. I dragged it into the forest and hid it just below the edge of an escarpment so Gretchen can't see it. The UHF part of that antenna is still in good shape, so I might eventually want to salvage it. But in the meantime, I can't have it junking up the yard. (Squirrels and birds are less fussy about such things.)
[REDACTED]
Gretchen returned from her shift at the bookstore this evening with carry-out from the Garden Caf&eaute;. Their soup had been some sort of ugly squash thing, so she hadn't gotten that. But the eggplant rollatini was back, so she got me one of those.
Another important achievement today was getting my Disturbatron back to working order. I then began the process of sealing it up. This time I'm using silicone caulk; I'd used paintable non-silicone caulk originally, and, as I discovered yesterday, that wasn't quite sufficient to keep it sealed against the weather for an Ulster County winter.
Another fiddlehead, from northwest of where the Chamomile crosses the Stick Trail. Click to enlarge.
Another fiddlehead, from northeast of where the Chamomile crosses the Stick Trail. You can see the stone wall in the distance. Click to enlarge.
A jack-in-the-pulpit from northeast of where the Chamomile crosses the Stick Trail. Click to enlarge.
The stone wall, viewed from the south. It's spring! Click to enlarge.
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