February 9-15, 2020

Weather | 2/9, 0.14" rain, 29°, 38° | 2/10, 22°, 36° | 2/11, 27°, 39° | 2/12, 4" snow or 0.28" moisture, 27°, 32° | 2/13, -3°, 8° | 2/14, -9°, 15° | 2/15, 22°, 39° |

• Sunday, 2/9: I was a dark, rainy day. We went to Quincy, shopped, then took in a Quincy Symphony concert. Got some good deals at County Market. Picked up the power strip for the microwave at Home Depot and Mary found some Honey Rock melon seeds. We also shopped Aldi, Sam's Club, & Walmart. I returned the chainsaw sharpening wheel at Farm & Home, since it was the wrong size, and instead got a Stihl hand-sharpening kit. The concert was very good. Got home right when the sun was setting, did chores, and unloaded. Ate nachos and watched 2 episodes of the BBC version of Sherlock. Churchill had a urine accident onto his bed when we took him out for the last time. I had to clean him and my shirt sleeve up after I reached under him to help him stand. Mary cleaned his bed...the trials and tribulations of owning a geriatric dog.
• Monday, 2/10: The final blossom of my amaryllis is starting to open, today (see below). Mary did 2 loads of jeans. I installed a new power strip for the microwave. Then, I looked up chainsaw sharpening from Stihl, tossed an old chain due to wear on it, and put the latest chain I'm using in a container of gasoline, to help clean the resin off it. We watched 3 episodes of the BBC version os Sherlock.

• Tuesday, 2/11: Mary did 3 loads of laundry and dried most outside, with a few coming inside to finish drying. We saw thousands of snow geese flying east to west, at times filling the sky with Vs of geese. Mary cut up a pork loin that we bought on Sunday and fixed up fresh veggies, so they store longer. I made grapefruit wine out of 8 medium ruby red grapefruit (recipe calls for 6 large ones). Mary helped me on grating grapefruit rinds of 3 of them to get grapefruit zest. She also filleted white pith off the insides of grapefruit rinds. Recipe says not to use the pith, because it makes the wine bitter, but you are supposed to use the rind, plus the fruit. Recipe called for 1.75 pounds of sugar, but it took me about 3 pounds to get the specific gravity to the desired 1.095 reading. Bill called while I was in the middle of raising the specific gravity of my wine. He and Mary talked about finances, the bottling of his beer this upcoming weekend, ideas about pets, and the star called Betelgeuse. My amaryllis has a second shoot with flower buds starting to show.
• Wednesday, 2/12: When I took new morning water to the chickens, there was a female opossum in the NW corner, inside the coop, under the west roost. It must have been hiding behind the metal garbage can that we keep chicken food in last night when Mary put the chickens to bed. Mary put it in a plastic garbage can using a square shovel and we hauled it off to beyond Swim and Dove Ponds, and let it loose. With snow in the forecast, I left chickens inside, which helped to keep it from returning to inside the coop. Once done with morning chores, I put pectic enzyme into the grapefruit wine, an hour and a half late, but that's what happens when you have to go through the 'possum relocation program. We ate a late breakfast...waffles that I made, while the snow started falling. Mary baked 4 loaves of bread. She also figured 2019 weather stats. It was the wettest year, since keeping records in 2012...53.9" for the year. Our average is 30". 2019 was the 3rd coolest year since 2012. I finished reading Patrick O'Brian's 6th book, The Fortune of War. I sharpened 10 of Mary's knives on her uncle's 3-stone knife-sharpening gizmo that probably dates back to the 1940s and came out of the Lewistown Farmers Supply, a grocery store that he once owned and operated. It does an excellent job at sharpening knives, but takes time. Katie called. Her dog, DeSoto, has a broken upper canine tooth, so she's taking him into the vet. Classes are going good. She said it's easy when that's all you're concentrating on. Temps in Gulfport, MS, have been warm, in the 70s. Put yeast into my wine around 10:30 pm. The yeast starter liquid needs to be at 95° to 97° and on top of the wood stove was a perfect temperature for maintaining that warmth. There was about 4" of snow on the ground with the moon starting to appear through clouds when we walked the dogs for the last time.
• Thursday, 2/13: We awoke to subzero temps this morning. Mary vacuumed all of her cross stitched Christmas ornaments and got them all packed away, since they've been sitting in a box since the end of December. She also made another chocolate pie, which she says is her favorite. I secured a board to a 2x4 at the bottom of the east wall of the coop where chickens on the outside have pecked OSB enough to create a crack in the wall at the floor line. This board seals that crack. I also stuffed an old dog bed into the chicken entrance from the inside to seal up air infiltration. While working outside, I saw about 50 trumpeter swans fly just over the treetops from west to east. They have a very unique honking sound that is deeper than geese...like an ah-ooo-gah old Model T car horn. We looked at the grapefruit wine and saw that it's starting to bubble. Churchill didn't eat most of his food and didn't have the strength to get up from noon into the night. It looked like he would die by morning.
• Friday, 2/14: Really cold this morning, but I restarted the fire at 5:20 am, so not bad in the house. Mary woke with an extremely severe backache...so bad that she could barely walk. I messaged it for quite awhile. She spent the day on the living room couch with a heat pad. Churchill didn't go out in the morning, because he couldn't get up. Had to clean up some poop...was like mustard-colored baby shit. After doing all of the chores, making, and eating breakfast, I took Mocha to the vet in Hannibal to get her final rabies shot. She knew immediately what we were doing in trying to capture her to put her in a carrier and hid under an upstairs bed. Consequently, I was late at making the 1 pm vet appointment. She gained 1.25 pounds in 2 weeks. The vet's staff all wanted to pet her and were amazed at how fast Mocha is growing. They commented on how she's such a lovable cat. Talked to Dr. Carson, the vet, about Churchill. He said Churchill is of an age when most super-sized dogs pass away. Shopped for a couple items, plus chocolates for my Valentine, at Aldi in Hannibal. When I got back, Churchill pooped another mess, scooted forward, and drug his tail into mustard baby dung. I cleaned it up...what a smelly mess!!! We ate barbecued pork loin. Did evening chores. Watched the Sabrina movie. Checked the wine and it has better yeast bubbling than yesterday, which is starting to give the house a fruity, yeasty smell. Churchill ate well for his afternoon and evening meals, plus he successfully went outside and walked around. He's afraid of going up the stairs, so sometimes he just sits down on his rump, instead of walking up the stairs. I had to lift him and carry his royal ass up the stairs once today. He's too damn big for that nonsense. Mary went to sleep in a living room recliner, due to her back. A flower is opening on the 2nd amaryllis shoot.
• Saturday, 2/15: The lower back ache that Mary had turned into a knot in the upper front muscle of her left thigh, which is debilitating and makes her walk bent over and not very far. Online research said to take elevated amounts of calcium, magnesium, and potassium, so she did that. Advil and Tylenol don't touch the pain. I did all of the chores, since she is pretty much on the couch in the living room. We ate candied onions and eggs for our main meal. Churchill is doing better. Katie texted that she's attending an Alan Jackson concert in New Orleans with a friend. Bill is bottling a batch of beer at his friend's house. Looked up apple orchards nearby in MO, IL, and IA, since the apples at Edgewood Orchards in Quincy were extremely high last year. Found one in Canton, MO, but I don't know if they're still open. Found a popular orchard in Donnellson, Iowa, called Appleberry Orchard, which is 65 miles north of us. The Iowa State University Extension is having a hands-on fruit tree grafting workshop there on April 2, which I want to go to. A $35 fee includes grafting tools and 2 trees that you graft and take home to plant. The orchard offers a U-Pick ability. Sounds great.