Oct. 10-16, 2021

Weather | 10/10, 67°, 81° | 10/11, 0.96" rain, 58°, 69° | 10/12, 47°, 72° | 10/13, 0.27" rain, 56°, 73° | 10/14, 55°, 70° | 10/15, 0.05" rain, 45°, 55° | 10/16, 39°, 59° |

• Sunday, 10/10: Hot Pepper Harvest & Last of Weeping Willow Branch Removal
  • Wind gust were at 25 mph in the morning, which is the limit for using the lift, so I didn't use it until the wind gusts dropped at noon to 18 mph.
    
  • Mary harvested what was left of the hot peppers from the far garden and hung them up to dry in the upstairs south bedroom.
    
  • Mary broke up kindling into usable sizes from a pile we made from dried branches coming off the weeping willow tree. She stacked the kindling in the machine shed.
    
  • I finished cutting tree limbs off the weeping willow tree. Today, I took down the very top branches (see photos, below), then worked down the tree, leaving just an 8-foot high trunk. I can take the trunk out later, without the need of a lift. Big carpenter ants came out of some branches that were also hollowed out by the ants...potential breakage points during a strong winter wind. The lift was extremely useful in dropping branches straight down in order to take the tree out without smashing something around the tree. Potential items it would have smashed include our house to the south, electric lines to the east, the woodshed to the north, and our largest cherry tree to the west. It was really tight quarters for a large tree. Using a lift was the only way to take this tree down without damaging something.
  • Pear wine specific gravity was 1.050 in the morning and 1.030 at night.

In the lift, sawing the top branches.

A falling branch.

Cutting the top weeping willow limb.

Another falling tree limb.

Cutting large limb with the big chainsaw.

Down goes a big limb section.

• Monday, 10/11: Pear Wine Transfer
  
  • We got almost an inch of rain from a day of thunderstorms.
    
  • The specific gravity of the pear wine was 1.010 in the morning, so I moved the wine from the brew bucket into a 6.5-gallon carboy and a gallon jug. I gained an extra gallon of juice after squeezing the nylon mesh bag for a total of 6.5 gallons. Once in the carboy, foam expanded upward, threatening to overflow, so I removed some must with the wine thief and put an overflow blow-off hose on the carboy. A little over a half gallon went into the gallon jug, giving it adequate room for foam. The CO2 gas was really blasting off (see video, below). We tasted the leftovers. It's really great! Leaving the skins on has improved the taste immensely.
    
  • Mary husked several hazelnuts.
  • Mary made flour tortillas, then venison fajitas for our main meal.
  • We are enjoying 2 pears each, for several nights in a row. They are delicious and very juicy.
    
  • While walking the dogs on their final nightly walk, we heard snow geese flying overhead in the dark.
  Escaping CO2 gas from pear wine.
  

• Tuesday, 10/12: More Tree Removal and Coop Cleaning
  
  • The last tall branch of the weeping willow tree was left in pieces in a heap around the tree trunk, so I cut up all of the branch pieces and hauled them off to our various piles near the south end of the chicken yard.
  • The juncos arrived for the winter.
  • Mary made 2 quiche egg pies and we ate one.
  • Mary cleaned hay and manure from the floor of the chicken coop and replaced it with fresh hay. She said it was the worst she's ever seen it, after weeks and months of several birds inside the coop. Leo, our rooster, clucked appreciatively upon entering the coop.
    
  • Continual rain forecasts are preventing even the start of work on our roof. It's fine, because essential tree removal is still in the works.
    
  • I took the lift to the south side of the machine shed and NE of the woodshed, where an elm tree is dying. It grew leaning to the NE and over the electric line to the machine shed, because a neighboring maple forced it outward to seek sunlight. If the tree is cut at the base, it will fall over the electric line and the machine shed and take electric line out. With the lift, I tied a half-inch poly line around branches a few feet back from the tips, cut with a chainsaw so when the branch piece is free, it dangles from the lift, but doesn't hit the electric line. Then I can move the branch tip, untie the clove hitch knot, and let it drop safely to the ground. I got a main lower branch cut down, but still have an upper branch and the trunk to remove.
  • CO2 gas escaping the pear wine slowed way down. The stuff that looks like orange cottage cheese floating on top is sinking, too. I'll be racking the wine, soon, to remove fines.
  • I'm officially a geezer, because I got a notification in today's mail that Medicare starts for me on Feb. 1, 2022.
    
  • A deer snorted at us when we walked dogs on their last walk of the night. It ran off to the west from Bluegill Pond.
    
    
• Wednesday, 10/13: An Indoor Day
  
  • Our day started with a downpour immediately after morning chores. A series of thunderstorms ran through our area, with occasional high winds, so we stayed indoors.
  • I investigated Medicare coverage online.
  • I had a text discussion with Mom about her Medicare coverage. She's currently quarantined after helping her Alaskan friends with grocery shopping and later finding out they are positive with COVID. Her contact with them was on Saturday. Hopefully, all works out well.
  • Mary picked up the first pecans of the year...about 8 nuts.
  • I got the checkbook caught up and balanced our bank account.
  • We watched the third Harry Potter movie while husking hazelnuts, the last hazelnuts of the year.
    
    
• Thursday, 10/14: Clean-up Inside & Outside
  
  • I cleaned a two-tier coffee table next to my couch in the living room. This might not sound like much, but it hasn't been cleaned for probably a couple years. Mary gave up trying to dust it, because it was so full of books, notes, laptop cords, and general crap. It's all clean and ship-shape, now.
    
  • Mary cleaned the house, including sweeping and mopping all floors.
  • I chainsawed up the elm tree limbs I dropped 2 days ago, then used the lift to get the rest of the tree. At one point, I was higher than when I cut the tops out of the weeping willow tree. It was touchy, since most all top branches were over the electrical line to the machine shed. I'm glad to be done using the lift on tree cutting. I still must cut up branches and the trunk of that elm tree.
  • Families of Canada geese fly every evening from Wood Duck Pond to the poop pond west of us at the dairy, and wing over our house just above the treetops. They're so close, you can hear the air whisking over their wings. Mary said she saw the sunset glistening off their eyes this evening.
  • While walking dogs this morning, we heard crows raising a fuss just north of the house. Then, a Cooper's hawk lifted off and flew overhead. One crow followed the hawk. When the hawk landed in a tree south of us, the crow called, as if to say, "It's here."
  • Clem Tillion, of Halibut Cove, AK, died yesterday, at age 96. He represented the Kenai Peninsula in Alaska's Legislature from 1962 to 1980. I always remember that while in the Homer boat harbor, you could always tell when the Danny J, a steep-bowed green wooden boat, arrived, by the loud, bellowing voice of Clem Tillion. Mom said on Facebook, today, that she first met Mr. Tillion when we lived in Ninilchik, AK in 1964. His daughters, Martha and Marion, were a year and three years ahead of me at Homer High School.
  • Mary picked more pecans, while hollering nasties at a marauding squirrel.
    
    
• Friday, 10/15: Lift Won't Work
  
  • We got a little rain overnight. I made waffles that we had with strawberries that Mary picked yesterday evening.
  • Karen messaged that she and Lynn close on the house they're buying in Cleveland, Georgia, on Monday.
    
  • I tried the lift at the SE corner of the roof and verified my suspicion that it cannot reach the peak of the roof, where I need to go to start and finish the roof project. It reaches way above the height of the roof, but doesn't have enough of a horizontal reach. A major problem is when I get close to the house, the ground is sloped enough to illicit a tilt hazard in the lift and disables the ability to go up. Back off enough to eliminate the tilt hazard and the lift is too far away from the house to reach far enough (see photos, below).
  • Mary picked more pecans and checked for hickory nuts in the woods. She didn't find hickory nuts. Squirrels were in the pecan trees while she picked nuts off the ground.
    
  • I cleaned all gas cans and drove to Quincy. My first stop was United Rentals. They have a 60-foot lift that has a 40-foot horizontal capability. That should work on the roof. They will deliver it and take back the 45-foot lift on Monday around 1:00-1:30 p.m. I bought a peck of Jonathan apples at Edgewood Orchards, Splenda brown sugar at Walmart, and 17 gallons of gas in my gas cans at Fastlane on the way back home. Gas is now $3.05 a gallon.
  • I got a newspaper clipping from Mom in the mail from a Looking Back column featuring me and Brad Quick starting at Mid-Rivers Telephone Cooperative 25 years ago. Thanks, Mom.
  • She texted that she has no COVID symptoms.
  • Mary and I watched the 4th Harry Potter movie. Afterwards, she made 3 baked apples for each of us.

Distance lift must be from house before it will go up.

I cannot reach roof peak or the chimney.

• Saturday, 10/16: Pecan Nut Collection
  
  • We spent most of the day picking pecans using the lift. Both Mary and I were in the lift. I'd move us to a new location and we picked any pecans that either had an opening husk, or when squeezed, revealed the start of an opening husk. Occasionally, we heard squirrels or blue jays in neighboring trees, frustrated that they weren't getting to the nuts. There are more that we want to get to, tomorrow. It would be nice to own one of these lifts for tree picking, but the nuts and fruit would be excessively expensive.
    
  • We watched the 5th Harry Potter movie.
  • Mom texted that she's still without COVID symptoms. She's busy canning several items.
  • Bill texted that he was getting to bed early, to get up early for his flight to SC that leaves at 7:40 a.m., tomorrow. He said he gets to his destination, Greer, SC, at 1 p.m.