Sat. Oct 10th... A..Duh, Duh...a Duh...Which way did e go?? Which way did e go?????

It's time for a break! When you can't keep your mind straight...or your schedule straight... or your desired agenda in correct array, it's time to give it up and slow down. The problem is......that sometimes if I slow down any more.......I'll be going in reverse!
Today we had plans to get up early, run to GNH to return four bags of SAKRETE. (I can't keep the stuff. It always gets hard in the bag) They were extra bags, which we didn't use on the gift shop pillars. Next, we would run to the area saw mill to pick up our lumber for the gift shop, bring it home and unload it, take care of the animals and head to Rhinebeck, to the sheep and wool festival at the Dutchess County Fairgrounds, then race back home to be able to get to our friend, Stanley Maltzman's art show opening this evening in Rensselaerville, at the Guggenheim Pavilion. Vicki and I always try to make his openings so we can chat with him at the event. That is exactly what we did last evening at the Cornell Agro-forestry center, on the way to Vick's parents. We stopped there to view Stan's daughter, Susan Story's art show opening, which also goes to the end of the month, as does Stan's, I sure.
Anyway, as I am racing around this morning, trying to get ready to attack today's itinerary, I sat sipping at my coffee...dreading such a rush, rush rat race plan....wishing we were instead sticking to our original agenda of picking up the lumber and hosting a building party, which pooped out for this weekend. WAIT A MINUTE, I thought! BUILDING PARTY???? Then it struck me that the sheep and wool festival isn't today, it's next week. Whew......I thought as I breathed a breath of relief. I got on the intercom and buzzed Vick, telling her that if we continued and made it to the festival at Rhinebeck today, we would surely get a front row parking spot, because the festival isn't until next Saturday and Sunday.
Now, our schedule for today is quite manageable.....all we need to do is pick up the lumber materials and work on the decking at the hospice gift shop (if it doesn't rain) and go to Stan's opening this evening.
Just the same, and not for nothin'......now you understand, duh...which way did e go? Which way did e go?

Yesterday, I finished the pillar mounting and supports for the deck of the gift shop, and today, if we can get the main joists lagged to the concrete, we can throw the rest of the deck up in nothing flat! (My famous saying that never transpires) Or, at least, make a start at it..... We'll see.

Fri. Oct. 9th... Back in the House...Soaked...Happy and Also Amazed...or in Disbelief...

As I previously stated, I was hoping the rain would hold off until we got the pillars re-leveled and in place so the concrete would not set up too hard because of the rain. When doing any building up here, I found that you can dig your pillar supports to below the frost level and then simply pour SAKRETE into the hole and leave it go. It will harden just as good as if you mix it in a wheelbarrow and pour it in without all the back breaking mixing and so on. I've done pillars for yard light poles and they are as stable and solid as can be. Anyway, I did the preliminary work last evening, but just at dusk, found it to be slightly out of level from end to end, so I wanted to correct it this morning before it rained and set the concrete. WELL........ I just made it. I got out there early and started and on the fourth and final pillar, finished in a drizzle of rain...off and on, then when I was finished and feeding all the critters, it let loose. I was thankful that I made it, and now it can rain until it is ready to stop. We don't care.
Also following are pictures of the pre-dawn hours in which I like to write... pictures of the deck I was working on last night and this morning, the barn windows which Vicki finished framing out and then installed the vinyl and frame on last night, (Nice Job...HUH?) then finally, a picture that sparks feelings within me as I gaze across the pond to the two chairs and imagine both my Mom in one and my Dad in the other, fishing in such a paradise like setting... Oh how my Mother would have loved it here and how my Dad would love to come back. Unfortunately, he is now in a senior's assisted care facility in Pa, never to return to New York or our farm. He does however... return occasionally in my mind, as I gaze at those chairs and my Grandfather comes to mind when I see the upside down boat as I mentioned in a post a few days ago. Looks like I will be writing or working in the barn today, because it looks like an all day soaker out there. Perhaps we will go away somewhere. Who knows? Tomorrow we can pick up on the deck again and will lag the main frame to the concrete with heavy screw lags. The rest will fly together then. We can't wait to get it up and ready for the long roof rafters which are being cut for us.

My favorite time in the morning

Fish are feeding in the early hours...

So quiet and serene.....

Another fish feeds as the steam rises....

Vick's window job. GREAT!!

I usually envision my Mom on the far chair and Dad in the near one... Both fishing, as they loved to do...enjoying the fall smells and colors......

This one reminds me of my Grandfather when he flipped this boat while fishing...

Our little pievce of Paradise....

Now for the DIS-BELIEF...... Obama won the Nobel Peace Prize??????? Get Freakin' REAL people..... Just exactly what did this guy do? All I've seen him do is talk, talk, talk and side step a ton of issues with his eloquent speech making ability. The man should have been a movie star and by the way, I'm extremely embarrassed that this twerp's star appeal overshadows real ambassadors of peace or the many human rights activates that are endlessly at it, trying to stop atrocious conditions around the world. This guy has done zip, nada, nothing that even measures up to likes of the lower nominees like the ninny Al Gore or Michael Jackson or even Pete Seeger or the many others nominated........
Jeeze-um what a way to take so much away from the past recipients of this award and open it up for the likes of Donald Duck or the Three Stooges....... I mean, REALLY........

Friday October 9th... Praying for the Rain to Pass in Favor of the Hospice Gift Shop......

I arose this morning at 6:23 to complete darkness as I let the dogs out. Within another ten minutes we transcended the darkness and evolved into that pre-dawn gray I enjoy so much... that time when you can see everything like it was a dream or a figment of your imagination. That is the time when writing comes best to me, when there is not a noise in the world, except perhaps a rooster or two signaling what is to be coming in a little while. It is this time I relish the most every day. I know Vick is asleep upstairs, safe and warm, surrounded by all five dogs and that gives me a feeling of contentedness. I can then sip coffee and retreat to within myself to conjure up events of the past or invent plans for the future, but either way, I am now within myself, looking through my eyes at something other than what I regularly see......for I am creating...memories, visiting long departed relatives and friends I am no longer close to or see. I can simply relive times and events long ago or those of recent occurrence. Writing has now become a possession to me which I can never lose, or have taken from me. I may physically become impaired to the point of not being able to put my writing into print, but I will always be capable of transcending into my minds eye and seeing my life vividly displayed on my own monitor within my self.

Today, we are praying that any rain by-pass us so we can finish the pillars and deck construction. The ground work is a part of the construction that I don't mind so much and really doesn't cause me a lot of discomfort. It's the ladder work that kills me. My knees just don't care for being on a ladder rung anymore for some reason... of course they need replaced for some reason too. I suppose that is a result of those thirty-seven years of crawling around on concrete, under machines and equipment, working on my knees for hours, for that wonderful company that appreciated me so very much. My pain is probably felt by them due to my loyalty over those years. Yuk,Yuk,Yuk!! What a freakin' JOKE that IS!!
Anyway, we want to lag to the concrete and build the framework for the deck and possibly start to install the joists today. If we can just get the level of the mainframe without rain I will be satisfied. That is where we will be today...hopefully...and not under an umbrella........

Thurs. October 8th... Time to dig some holes...close some holes...blanket a hole and...

Today looks like it's gonna be one of those perfect fall days with lots of chilly air, falling leaves and everything else that makes it Autumn. These things make it hard for an old man to stand out there, with the wind blowing through what hair he has remaining anyway, as he tries to dig holes and line them up, for his mind is spoiled with the memory inducing drugs of harvest time and years gone by. Just as you start to diligently work, you can feel your mind reeling into a stupor of thoughts, with memories of years past, when you were aloof in a pine swamp, watching approaching deer and turkeys as they meandered about directly in front of you, living their lives, unaware that you are there and watching, let alone that you are a scrupulous villain with a rifle, capable of ending their life and placing them on the dinner table. I have taken game to the dinner table.... lots of it in my younger years, as I performed the normal family ritual of hunting, but in my later years, I had plenty. Not so much a home life or lots of close family, but plenty of money, food and a warm place to lie down to sleep. I no longer needed the game meat for the table and chose to dine on food already killed and packaged. This was not a decision of convenience, laziness or guilt. I felt that if there was already food available and I could afford it, why kill more? I therefore walked into the field and woods, with license and gun to simply enjoy, the very ancestors of those unfortunate animals that had provided sustenance for my table in previous years. Now it was a visit, so to speak; a ceremony of appreciation to applaud the sacrifice of their predecessors of yesteryear for my well being and nourishment. Once you understand the meaning of life and have helped bring it into being or have taken its existence, the world takes on a new appearance and your place within it becomes more apparent. Now I ask you...how then can a man concentrate upon the task at hand when such reverent thoughts and feelings keep coursing through his veins and mind?
In retrospect of the above thoughts of appreciation, perhaps I can stay the course by remembering all the eggs and pleasure the other animals have given this past summer and that now it is our turn to return the favor with a warm barn and lots of feed this winter coming....
So......maybe I should get with the program and talk to you all later today.....

Wednesday October 7th... Cold and Windy but we Got Er' Done.... Kinda...a Little...

Both Vick and I slept in until ten o'clock today! I got up around 6:10 and went to the bathroom and while there, looked out the window to see the threat of rain and a brisk wind blowing. When I went back into the bedroom, Vick looked so angelic, just lying there snoozing, with Casey Mae and Princess snuggled against her; Dutchess and Beary on the floor by her side. I said to myself, "Myself"...Cause that's what I always call myself...So I said, myself....SCREW THIS CRAP!" With that, I hoosied Princess off the bed and rolled Casey Mae to the center and jumped back into bed and went back to sleep. Around 7:15, I awoke again to the sound of strong winds and rain pelting the window.... I said nothing, but rolled over and snuggled down into the warm covers again and drifted off to sleep until 10:00. I finally stirred and got up to get dressed and greet the day (which was ½ over by now) and came down to let the dogs out and start coffee.
We left the animals out and then took off for the post office where I sent off two more of my books. Once done there, we went to GNH and Vick sent a stupid Oreck air purifier that didn't work, back to the place she bought it. GNH has a UPS pickup site there, so we used it to drop the package there for pickup. We use Ionic Breeze purifiers we get from eBay and the house always smells so fresh with the ozone air smell, just like it smells after a spring rain. Well anyway, she sent the crumby thing back.
We went just across the street and had lunch at Owen and Jacobs, a little luncheonette and then headed for Cairo to pick up Vicki's prescription at the CVS drugstore. It was a good trip, because Vick wanted to stop at Story's Nursery to arrange for a replacement tree for one we bought last year this time, which didn't make it. This past spring when the other three got leaves, this one started to, then they died and fell off. She also wanted to talk to them about the tamarack pine tree we bought too, because all the pine needles fell off of it.
We also got diesel fuel for the pickup truck and when we got home, I poured both five gallon cans into the truck and we were then off to the feed store. When we returned, Vick started to work on the barn windows and I dropped the hinged ventilation panels above the alpacas for winter. I am going to install the blanket to close off the lower section of the Dutch door with the heavy horse blanket we bought for there. I then started digging holes for the concrete pillars at the gift shop. Tomorrow will be digging holes and closing off openings where cold air enters the barn. I gotta get the pillars in so we can build this week end if Colleen and JD get a work party together. Shoot...I gotta get them in anyway and we'll do the building if they can't come... It's gotta get done. The program is dependent on it!!!!! Now it's off to bed for the night..... Later friends.

Tues. October 6th... Junk, Junk, Junk...Why in the World do we Keep it???

As I sat on the rear deck this morning, with steam rising both from my coffee cup and the Pupskill Bay Lake Pond, as witnessed across the side yard, I saw my old boat lying on the bank, beside the water and thought, "Man...I really need to get that junk outta there so it doesn't ruin the view of the picturesque view across the water like that." With that thought in mind, I wondered why I even kept the stupid aluminum dunking vessel, but as I wondered that a fond and humorous memory of my late Grandfather rushed into my mind. It was my Grandfather's boat, used on the Juniata River....not three miles from where he raised his five kids and spent his entire life. Late in life he and my Grandmother moved to Mechanicsburg, Pa where my Grandmother worked until retiring from the "Department of Vehicles", in the license department. They missed Granville, where they had lived all of their single and married life prior to living near Harrisburg, so they returned each Friday afternoon, during the summer, to stay at my parent's riverside camp site, on the Juniata River. The funny thing was that my Grandparents lived there their entire life and Pap only found the joy of fishing and camping at 76 years of age. He decided he just had to have a boat to fish the "mighty ol' River", but couldn't afford to get one. He was disabled and could no longer work, so while my Grandmother worked daily, he repaired small appliances for people and when not busy with that, made fishing lures. He made lures out of about anything you could imagine, including the rubber molded bugs of the late seventies that you molded yourself as a craft project. His tackle box was an old cardboard cigar box. Mostly, he borrowed my Uncle Bill's old ten foot green aluminum flat bottom boat, one of Dad's fishing rods. My Dad, knowing that Pap's home made lures were not going to catch much, always made Pap take some worms and his tackle box along...just in case he needed a new or different lure than he had.
Anyway... every Friday, Pap had everything packed, lined up and ready to load into their old Studebaker station wagon and as soon as my Grandmother got home from work, they would be on their way to the campsite.
Pap loved to sit in his old lawn chair along the bank and watch carp feeding upstream, leaving a muddy trail behind them as they dug through the stones, looking for crayfish, in the crystal clear water. One afternoon, Pap decided to grab his gear and catch one of those big carp. He got into the little boat, which was very unstable and rowed out into the river, dropped his anchor and started to sweet talk the carp with a hook full of sweet corn. After he had fished for a good forty-five minutes, his legs became cramped sitting in that little boat and he decided to turn to face the other direction. Placing a hand on each side of the boat, he stood, bent over with his legs straightened for a moment and then tried to turn around in that same bent over position. As he turned, he lost his balance in the narrow, unstable boat and we saw him and the boat flip upside down. Everyone was watching from the campsite, a good hundred yards away, and started to scream for me to go help Pap, but they were too late......I was already treading water... heading his way. I saw his head pop up on the upstream side of the capsized boat, as all the gear from his boat, floated downstream. His head kept bobbing under the surface and back up again, as everyone on the bank yelled "help him quick...he can't swim...he can't swim. All the while I was wading toward him, as fast as the current would allow, yelling "stand up Pap...Stand up". Unknown by the others...I knew he was in an area where the water was only four feet deep and Pap was an easy six foot six inches tall, so I figured he had a lot of room left above the water, if I could only get him to stand up. The problem was that at seventy-six year old and in his condition, the water's current was carrying his six foot frame down under the boat and he couldn't get his feet back under himself to stand, so he simply held on to the upside down, anchored boat now acting as a dunking machine. When I got there, I grabbed under his arms and pulled him upstream, away from the boat and allowed him to stand up. We both walked to shore, where he immediately sat in front of the fire on a lawn chair with a blanket around him. I then went to recover as much gear as I could, but we never found his shoe which came off somewhere along the line and a boat cushion that floated away. I remember everyone laughing about the incident for years afterward and I'll never forget my Pap as he sat there dripping wet, looking like an old Indian around a campfire with his blanket wrapped around himself, as he disgustedly mumbled, "I wouldn't stop a damned and sell everything I have and quite fishing!" I remember everyone immediately bursting into uncontrollable laughter as my Dad said, "Well that's nice Dad... you lost my rod, my tackle box, Bill's boat, the oars and other junk, plus your one shoe. Now, just what do you think you'll get for the one shoe you have left, because that's all you have?
Even Pap had to bust out laughing over that statement, which ended the episode.
Pap fished again and everyone bought him rods, gear, lures and a tackle box for his birthday and Christmas and so on. He even bought the little dunking machine off of his youngest son, Bill. After Pap gave that all up after he had his stroke which put him out of commission all together, I bought the boat from him just to have it. I kept a copy of the bill of sale, his last fishing license, some of his old homemade lures and that old boat, which now is the eyesore I spoke of at the beginning of this blog entry.
Must I explain further why we keep all this old junk that most consider to be an eyesore? I guess the boat can stay right where it is....for it is a ticket to my past pleasures... as are many things I have horded over time...as the old saying implies, "One man's junk is another man's treasures." If you were too young to understand the meaning of this...now you know!

Monday, Oct. 5th... A Reviewed Book Almost Immediately Is Outrageously Cool...

Following is a press release from The Long Island Free Press that was placed on Sunday. http://press.longisland.com/press.php?ID=10704 . We were amazed that my book was placed in such a prestigious newspaper so close to the "Big Apple", being only two days after it came out, but we are very appreciative to whoever saw fit to enter it there so quickly. The book is available on the left side of our blog to anyone interested in having a copy. Simply click on the "Buy Now" button and purchase your copy through Pay-Pal.com. It is a quick, easy and secure way to pay for almost anything now days, with their service going way beyond eBay. Now you can pay individuals and use it like "Bill Pay".... paying anyone with an email address. I have sold about fifteen books since receiving them Friday evening.

Joe is coming again today to finish the barn cleaning and then help me with a little bit of the work on the hospice gift shop. We'll try to dig the pillar holes and install the concrete for the porch deck today and get the treated material list together, so we can have all that here for next weekend, when help might arrive for a building party. (Dependent on weather conditions...) If it doesn't happen this coming weekend though, it's off for next weekend, because the 17th is scheduled for the Sheep and Wool Festival at Rhinebeck and we won't miss that one.

Vicki is proudly marketing her artwork on our publishing house web site at http://www.skipwattbooks.com/skipwattbooks_011.com near the bottom of the page. There, she is offering a watercolor note card sets for $11.88 (tax inc) each.There are five different sets, with eight different cards and envelopes in each set. She has ingeniously included a cover card showing which cards are in each of the five sets. Soon, I will have her individual 5 x 7 original watercolor art on glass and mirror selections available at unbelievable prices. Keep watching her site above.




Set #1










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Set #5