2009 August | The Road Home

Morning shadows and other stuff

About 7:45 on this morning’s walk. It was cool and quiet, though we are forecast to hit 90 today and tomorrow – probably the last very hot days of the summer.

I’m fairly sure this week’s sun and heat is due to the fact that my birthday Wellies arrived on Monday:

I ordered them last week when it was wet and rainy. It will be wet and rainy again. In the meantime they are brightening up my entry way!

The house painting is done. I have rollers and pans and water seal stuff all ready to apply to the front porch – hopefully during today’s lunch break. Finish photos on the weekend!

Today is my birthday and I’m thrilled that I got to have another one! And I’m grateful that I am living in my little house in the woods by the mountains and especially grateful that Karl and Bob are in good health and with me as I begin my 55th year on Earth.

Some years I have birthday week, some years birthday month. Neither my waistline, nor my budget could stand more than birthday weekend this year. Yesterday started with a ham and cheese croissant and cappuccino (they claim made the authentically Italian way!) at Colter Coffee in Kalispell. It is my favorite coffee house in an old Kalispell building with brick walls, tall wooden tables, massive front windows looking out to the street as well as excellent coffee and pastries. Yesterday morning it was pretty quiet at 7:45 a.m. – just a few other morning people and the two baristas – perfect!

Afterwards, the supply gathering was completed and one of my finds was a cherry pitter – YEA! The plan for birthday dinner is pan seared scallops with cherry sauce. I was getting tired of pitting cherries with a knife. The pitting tool is wonderful, so wonderful that I will run into Bigfork mid-morning and see if I can get more cherries.

I’ve had a bit of the birthday cookie with my morning coffee… It is a giant molasses cookie from Colter’s that I doctored with fresh whipped cream laced with hazlenut syrup, cinnamon and cloves… not sure that the birthday cookie is going to last the day..

My birthday present arrives tomorrow – a new pair of Wellies for tromping around wet woods. They are a bit untraditional – photos to follow.

Birthday weekend has been wonderful so far and I expect it to continue that way. Hope all who visit here are having a wonderful weekend as well.

Views from the dump

I like to do my supply gathering and errand running mid-week, even if it means working a bit evenings or on the weekend to make up for it. But the San Francisco trip resulted in a large project with tight deadlines and it has been head down and work, work, work during the week. And then the weed control, septic fixing, house painting…yikes! It has been somewhat busier than House de Summers is used to!

We never, never, never skip walks or stomach rubs…but the supply gathering and errand running and hair appointments have slipped to the week end (say that as the Brits do – emphasis on “end”…).

The drama continues this week and I find that yet again, I am doing the aforementioned supply gathering, etc. on a Saturday.

But, mitigating the “pain” of being in the weekend “crowds” was today’s scenery. Along the route, this morning on the Somers cutoff (Rt. 82), were these views from that dump site*:

The green box dump site on the Somers cutoff affords a view across the fields of Flathead Lake from the northern tip to the southern, where sits Polson, MT.