Jan. 17-23, 2021

Weather | 1/17, 24°, 33° | 1/18, 20°, 37° | 1/19, 17°, 47° | 1/20, 13°, 47° | 1/21, 26°, 51° | 1/22, 15°, 27° | 1/23, 9°, 37° |

• Sunday, 1/17: Firewood Cutting
  
  • Mary and I got a wagon load of firewood from a downed red oak tree in the woods just north of the machine shed. It's actually a tree that grew 3 trunks and all 3 fell over. I completely sawed up 1 of the 3 until I saw a poison ivy vine on the lower part of the tree trunk, then stopped. I started on the 2nd trunk, but stopped after I thought I had a wagon load, and helped Mary load the firewood.
  • We did some online grape research. The Norton grape is a variety brought by German settlers to Missouri in the 1800s from Virginia that flourished for over a century in this state. It's the Missouri state grape. Most grape plants sell for $12-$16. Mary found that Missouri State, at their Mountain Grove, MO campus, has what they call the Clean Grapevine Program, where you can buy dormant cuttings of Norton and other grape varieties for $4, each. It might be an inexpensive way to get a grapevine started. Mary found several books we own that have recommendations on how to effectively grow grapes.
  • Mary helped Katie remove several pieces of stitches that are emerging and irritating skin around them. Katie ran 3 miles up and down our quarter-mile lane.
    
  • We watched another Downton Abbey episode, which concludes the second season.
    
    
• Monday, 1/18: Stars Appear
  
  • We finally saw stars in the sky after dark. After several cloudy days and nights, a clear sky is welcome.
  • Mary made another batch of flour tortillas. She made a turkey/rice dish for our main meal.
    
  • I split about 2/3 of the logs we brought in yesterday, but they were all small, so I'll get more split firewood from the trunk sections that are left to split.
  • We watched the 2007 movie, Stardust, requested by Katie.
  • I didn't see the airlock of the fullest gallon jug of pumpkin wine burping, so I tried fixing it. Pressure kept pushing the rubber stopper out of the jug's opening. I solved the problem by using a smaller stopper kept in place with a vitamin pill container's lid that I drilled a hole in, which the airlock's stem goes through. That should keep oxygen out, which is needed for fermentation completion.
    
    
• Tuesday, 1/19: Firewood Day
  
  • Mary and I split the rest of the firewood in the machine shed. It was all big and knotty. Then, we moved it to correct locations. Dry wood went to the woodshed. Wet wood was stacked in a crisscross fashion on the north side of the machine shed.
  • We cooked up a batch of smoked scrambled eggs over an outdoor fire after dark. The wind was blowing hard out of the NW, so I had to drop the cast iron frying pan to almost on top of the little fire.
    
    
• Wednesday, 1/20: More Firewood
  
  • I chainsawed up the rest of the 3 trunks that fell in the woods north of the machine shed. I left behind some trunk parts that had poison ivy growing on them. Then, I packed the firewood logs up the hill to the north edge of the woods, where we'll pick them up in a couple of days.
  • Mary made kindling from old dry branches in the machine shed, then gathered more branches that have fallen off trees in the yard for future kindling. She put the new branches in the machine shed to dry.
  • In the morning, we listened to the inauguration of Biden and Harris. 
    
  • I installed the new cigarette lighter plug I got yesterday in the mail on the portable air pump that I carry in the Cadillac. This one is built very well. It's manufactured in Everette, WA, for marine purposes. The pump works great.
    
    
• Thursday, 1/21: To St. Louis
  • Katie and I drove to the Mercy Burn Center in St. Louis. We left home at 7:30 a.m. It is her last visit. After several photographs were taken, Katie was given a clean bill of health. The doctor gave her approval to go to any military duty, immediately. He recommended that she can start work mid-February on light duty, and said that she should be at 100% for work by March 1st. He gave her a pamphlet for a daily patch and nightly ointment that she should administer for a year to completely remove all traces of scaring. He also gave her a prescription for 2 custom-built compression shirts. They cost over $900. She called Kandace, her case worker nurse, to get approval for the compression shirts and to give her details of this doctor's visit. Katie also called her UIC project manager. Katie wants to go to Mississippi to sell off a bunch of her belongings in preparation of moving to Alaska.
  • Katie and I shopped for a few things in St. Louis. The place we were to go for Katie's compression shirts was a waste of time. They wouldn't do anything until Workman's Comp approved of it, then an appointment would be made, then the shirts made, in what would be several weeks back and forth to St. Louis. Katie will be long gone before any of this can happen. She's going to check with the people at the Harborview Burn Center in Seattle to see if compression shirts are really necessary.
  • We met up with Bill at a Japanese restaurant near where he works. Katie and I split the dinner ticket for taking him to dinner. We all had a good visit. Katie and I got back home around 9:30 p.m.
    
  • Back home, Mary did house cleaning, and a load of towels.
    
    
• Friday, 1/22: Katie is Moving On
  
  • Katie lined up plane tickets to Mississippi. She flies out of Quincy on Sunday at 1:17 p.m., then flies out of St. Louis at 7 a.m. on Monday to Gulfport, MS. It gives her time to catch up on Air Force National Guard drills and get belongings in order for moving at a future date. She does her telemedicine follow-up appointment with Seattle's Harborview Burn Center remotely from Mississippi on the morning of Feb. 9th. Katie checked paperwork from Seattle and in it she found that they recommend wearing compression shirts once burn wounds heal. She's going to look into getting some in Mississippi.
  • After waffles for breakfast, I spotted a big red-tailed hawk flying toward the chicken coop. Mary and I ran outside. All chickens were inside the coop, so Mary closed the chicken door to the coop, so they could stay safe inside. She let them out, later. It was a big female hawk.
    
  • Mary and I picked up the firewood I cut on Wednesday and moved it to the machine shed. We drove the tractor and trailer to further north in the north woods and chainsawed up another wagon load of firewood, then unloaded that into the machine shed.
  • After chores and baths, we ate nachos and watched 3 episodes and a special feature of Downton Abbey's third year.
  • Below are photos taken of Katie during her visit yesterday to the Mercy Burn Center in St. Louis...a vast improvement from photos right after the accident, when she was at the Harborview Burn Center in Seattle.

Katie's face from front, Mercy photo.

Katie's face from side, Mercy photo.

Katie's neck, Mercy photo.

Katie's hands, Mercy photo.

Katie's underarm, Mercy photo.

Katie's thigh, Mercy photo.

• Saturday, 1/23: Firewood Splitting/Stacking
  
  • Mary and I split and stacked all of the firewood that we brought in yesterday. Splitting took us 1.5 hours. It boosted our supply by quite a lot.
    
  • Mary moved hay onto the coop's floor for the chickens.
  • Some seeds we ordered from Fedco arrived in the mail, minus 2 packets of seed that Fedco didn't have in stock. I looked up those varieties (a type of carrot that grows well here and a summer squash) and ordered them from Victory Seeds, in Molalla, Oregon.
  • It was Game Night Saturday, so we played Michigan Rummy, which was Katie's choice. She won. I was second and Mary took third. We shared 2 bottles of pear wine. We laughed so hard at times our stomachs hurt.