Dec. 4-10, 2022

Weather | 12/4, 18°, 43° | 12/5, 23°, 53° | 12/6, 28, 43° | 12/7, 31°, 49° | 12/8, 34°, 43° | 12/9, 0.38" rain, 36°, 42° | 12/10, 35°, 41° |

• Sunday, 12/4: Firewood Cutting & Mallards Quacking
  
  • Mom texted that yesterday was Santa Day and the senior center folks (including Mom) set up Santa Shop in the CCM (Circle Country Market, or grocery store) building. She said it involved additional work hauling items to that building, but it worked out nicely. They also had a soup contest, a vendor show, and photos with Santa.
    
  • I sharpened one of the chains to the large chainsaw.
  • Mary and I cut firewood near the middle of the dry creek bed in the east woods. It was a mixture of dry and wet wood. We filled the trailer.
    
  • On the return home with the firewood load, we left the tractor/trailer behind and walked to the northeast corner of Rose Butt Field. There are several dead trees still there for future potential firewood cutting purposes. 
    
  • While standing there, we heard and then saw a large collection of mallard ducks paddling around in Wood Duck Pond. They didn't like our presence and were telling us about it with loud quacking.
    
  • We also heard one rifle shot way off to the east while standing in that area. It's the first shot we've heard during the current anterless deer season. A recent email from the Missouri Dept. of Conservation revealed that there will be an additional anterless deer hunting season next year for 3 days during the first week in October. The reason is statewide deer numbers are increasing, resulting in a need for the additional season.
    
  • After dark, I worked more on the wine diary and caught up to Nov. 1st.
    
    
• Monday, 12/5: A Tame Doe
  
  • While we were getting ready to walk the dogs in the morning, we saw a doe in north yard munching on grass. Eventually, it walked up to the McIntosh apple tree to start to munch on a branch. I stepped outside and onto the porch. She saw me and didn't move. I went back inside. She went back to take a nip off the apple tree, so I stepped back outside and clapped my hands. Her tail went up and the doe left, heading west. The deer on our property are rather tame.
    
  • Mary did some housecleaning, did 2 loads of laundry, and made venison General Tso for our main meal.
    
  • I dug up wood and bark bits from under the wood splitter and spread 5 wheelbarrow loads around the 2 new apple trees and the 2 Bartlett pear trees.
  • I moved a few of the firewood chunks from the trailer to near the wood splitter. I also stacked newly split green blackjack oak firewood at the inside north wall of the machine shed to dry, along with part of the wet cherry firewood.
  • While moving a big firewood log, I slammed a piece to the ground and hit my right big toe. I recently threw away my only pair of steel toe boots. They were old and falling apart. I was wearing a pair of leather boots at the time of my toe smash. As I walked off the pain, the top of the right boot was dented inward. It slowly went back into shape, but my big toe is currently red. Luckily, I didn't break anything. I decided that the next time I'm in Quincy I will buy a new pair of steel-toed boots. Meanwhile, more care is needed around big firewood logs.
    
  • I finished catching up on my wine diary.
    
    
• Tuesday, 12/6: Katie is in Hawaii
  
  • Mary moved the remaining firewood from the trailer to various locations in the machine shed and the woodshed. Most of this firewood is next to the splitter.
    
  • I re-sharpened the chainsaw chain, because I didn't sharpen it enough yesterday. It took 17 strokes of a file on each tooth to get it in better shape. As a test, I cut up some elm branches between the machine shed and the chicken coop that were about to drop on the electrical line to the coop. The saw tore right through the dry wood.
    
  • We drove the tractor/trailer to the northeast corner of Rose Butt Field and cut up a large honey locust tree that I girdled several years ago. It's been down on the ground for a number of years. When it fell, it smashed a barbed wire fence right to the ground. The wood is extremely hard and burns hot for a very long time. The problem is it grows thorns up to 6" long. If you kill the tree and let it be until it falls, all of the thorns rot away. The trunk of this tree is very wet, but split and left to dry, it ought to be good to burn by February. The bottom 4 chunks of the tree I cut in half, because they were too heavy to lift as full pieces. We drove the tractor back home and unloaded the wood.
    
  • As we sawed up the locust tree, mallards swimming in Wood Duck Pond were telling us we weren't welcome. Later, while at home, Mary and I saw flocks of mallard ducks flying overhead.
    
  • Katie texted in the morning that she's in Hawaii. I texted a couple questions and she called. She's there on military business. A building project that she will supervise involving updating a Girl Scout camp on the big island is holding a planning meeting. She sent photos of Nene Geese (see photos, below) that she snapped while running, today. Nenes are the rarest geese in the world, with a population of only 2500, and she saw two of them. Katie said she was running in warm temperatures while Anchorage had about a foot of snowfall, today. The reconstruction surgery of her burn wound that she was planning on having this month in Seattle might be postponed, again, because her friend who was going to accompany her had his father die of a heart attack while they were vacationing in Mexico. She has a couple military training trips early next year. One is to Florida and the other is to Gulfport, MS. She recently bought some cross-country skis and a pair of snowshoes. The recent big snow dump in south central Alaska provides better conditions for using them. She hopes to visit Mauna Loa's eruption before leaving Hawaii. Her flight back to Anchorage is over the upcoming weekend.

Two Nene Geese on Hawaii's Big Island.

A Hawaii Green Sea Turtle.

• Wednesday, 12/7: More Firewood Collecting
  
  • I made a quick trip into Lewistown and bought 2 gallons of 91 octane gas for chainsaws and 5 gallons of 87 octane gas for the tractor and the woodsplitter engine.
    
  • While I got gas, Mary gave the chickens more hay on the floor of the coop, emptied a bag of oil sunflowers into buckets in the coop, and raked some pecan leaves up and put them on the compost pile.
    
  • Mary and I went back to the northeast corner of Rose Butt Field and cut up firewood. This time it was mainly downed oak branches. We hauled another trailer load of firewood back home and put it away in appropriate locations.
    
  • We watched the 2012 movie, The Big Year.
  • I saw that between 1 and 2 feet of snow fell in Anchorage. Katie was happy she was in Hawaii and not trying to drive in Anchorage right now.
    
    
• Thursday, 12/8: Rest for Firewood Collectors
  
  • We kind of laid low today, after two days in a row of firewood collection. Our bodies needed rest.
  • Mary made venison gravy on biscuits for our midday meal.
  • She also created a monthly menu and a shopping list.
  • Mary finished a cross stitch Christmas ornament.
  • She saw 7 trumpeter swans flying over our property.
    
  • I took the tire off the red wheelbarrow to fix it. The inner tube's stem is cracked at the base and impossible to fix, plus the tire has deep cracks in it. I need a new tire and tube. A new wheelbarrow tire I bought years ago is too large for this wheelbarrow. I tried placing it on a green Radio Flyer wheelbarrow that we got at an auction in Circle, MT, but it's hub won't fit. So, I swapped entire wheels between the green one and the oldest cement encrusted wheelbarrow and it worked. When I inflated the tire on the green on, I discovered that stem is rotten and leaking. So, through all of this work, I started with one wheelbarrow and ended up with only one working wheelbarrow. I need tire parts to get the other two working.
    
    
• Friday, 12/9: Shopping in Quincy, IL
  
  • Mary and I left at 10:30 a.m. in the pickup to shop in Quincy. We visited 8 stores.
  • I got flu and pneumonia vaccines at Sam's Club, while Mary shopped at Walmart. Both vaccines are covered by Medicare and Humana's Plan D coverage. They tried to sell me on getting a shingles vaccine, but it costs $70 a shot for 2 shots, so I passed on the shingles shots. It took a lot of time getting the shots, resulting in Mary wandering around Walmart forever, wondering where I was. She texted, twice, but I didn't answer. Needless to say, she was breathing fire like a dragon when I found her stumbling around the Walmart aisles. I left my phone in the pickup and never bothered to look at it.
    
  • We got home about 4:15 p.m., with darkness starting to set in. Mary took care of chickens, spreading sunflower seeds on the floor and shining a flashlight while 8 younger chickens got off the roost to peck seeds. I walked dogs and unloaded the pickup.
  • With shots in both arms, I experienced aching shoulders through the evening.
  • We watched the 1994 movie, The Santa Clause.
  • For some reason, all pets really missed us being gone, today. This evening, Mary had 3 cats on her and Gandalf snuggled next to me. Both dogs were extra schmoozy, too.
    
    
• Saturday, 12/10: Inside Day
  
  • Vaccination shots seem to last quite some time in my arms. Sore shoulders were the highlight of my day, so I didn't go outside and handle chainsaws or heavy hunks of firewood, today.
    
  • Instead, I stayed inside and balanced the checkbook.
  • Mary cleaned the refrigerator.
  • While Mary was letting the dogs out around 1 p.m., she saw a young deer walking toward the house on the trail next to the near garden. As soon as she opened the door, it spun around and ran back east on the trail.
    
  • Mary enjoyed Christmas music, did some cross stitch, and finished a Christmas ornament, while I read newspapers.