Turkey season

Listened to gobbles and watched the sun rise this morning!

Sharin' cashews with my buddy...

after an evening of workin' outside. Life is good.

hand forged in sweden

A few pictures to share

So we're having the normal Ithaca spring weather.  Growing up in Northeastern Ohio prepared us for this, hardening our souls to the prospects of sun and predictability.  We started gardening a couple weeks ago in spite of cold temps, grey skies, and snowflakes.  I was not thrilled to begin with.  Dressed as Nanook of the North it was hard to get into the spirit.

But Sarah "dug right in" and her enthusiasm and smile warmed my heart, and soon the day itself began to warm, if ever so slightly.

In addition to our almost 200 garlic plants that are already coming up from last fall, we planted two rows of beans, a row of spinach, two rows of lettuce, some carrots, some onions, and some green onions.  For better or worse, our available space is full, so I grabbed one of my favorite tools, the mattock, and went to work pulling up sod on another 12x12' section of lawn.

Sarah mentioned, as I stretched my back and then collapsed onto the ground, that "this is why people have bigger plots and then use horses to plow".  That is my new goal in life.

Cold grey mornings make the coffee taste better.  I love standing in my backyard and looking out at the trees, and am looking forward to this scene with buds, and then leaves.

Saturday morning I got up early and went to cut some more trees.  These are the four pines that were in the middle of the lawn.  They shaded the whole lawn and one side of the house and were where Rob wants to put his garden.

I cut a couple trees in the morning, then Sarah picked me up and we took our first trip to the Farmers Market for this season.  It was surprisingly crowded with both people and produce.  In addition to veggie dumplings and breakfast burritos, we picked up some carrots and some fresh beef for a minestrone soup that Sarah mad for dinner.

Then it was back to work, and down they came.  I'm really proud of this one.  It's overall lean was toward the house, and had a really large branch coming off the trunk that pulled it awkwardly 90 degrees to the direction of lean, but still away from where I wanted it to fall.  With some careful planning, wedging, and a good cut, I dropped it 3' left of the marker I'd put down, 180 degrees of the lean.

The yard as it stands now.

This is another awesome scalloped potato dish that Sarah made.  It has eggs and broccoli and tomatoes and bacon on top.  It's a great take on the traditional eggs and hash browns breakfast.

We went for an incredible ride Sunday morning.  Sarah rode Rambo who hasn't been out in awhile and they did great!  Rambo was so happy and alert; he nearly ran half the ride and Sarah had to try to slow him down!  I rode Bodie in a new snaffle bit bridle.  I've wanted to get him out of the mechanical hackamore for awhile and this was the opportunity.  He did great and had no major freak outs.  We've been working on his gate more, too and trying to keep him in his gated walk for longer periods of time (partly his laziness and partly my lack of ability to communicate clearly).  He did much better on Sunday.  As you can see, the sun was out for a bit, too.

Just some of the ingredients that go into my trademark macaroni salad.  Maybe I'll make up a big batch for the wedding this summer.

On my quest to expand my wilderiness, I cut down a tree with my knife.

I was successful in both cutting down the tree and in learning to bring an axe whenever possible,

After school Tuesday I cut trees until 8pm...

Then I rocked out in the truck on the way home, which makes me happy, healthy, and free.

Keith Harrington: Lumberjack

So there are many things that I didn't realize I could grow up to do, until I had already grown up and amassed an incredible amount of student loan debt.  In my adult life, I have made two discoveries in a frustratingly nefarious order.  First, I realized that people still do grow up to be cowboys and lumberjacks.  This realization was followed almost immediately by the realization that in order to hope to earn any kind of a living at these "careers" one should start early, and skip college.  So here I sit, on the cusp of commencing the pursuit of a second masters AND owning a saw and a horse.  It's true, I'll never be a full time lumberjack or cowpoke, but it's also true that I wouldn't be able to live a very happy life without the security that teaching brings me.

So I'll just have to be happy to have a few odd jobs lined up for a few weeks where I can essentially get paid to get a work out and swing an axe.

I put an ad on craigslist a few weeks back just to see if I'd get any bites: Have Saw; Will Travel
Honestly, I thought maybe one or two people would call about having a fallen tree cut up.

 Three people have called so far... All three of them have pretty big jobs to start with and then want me to maintain the lots.  These are pictures from Rob's place.  He wants to expand his yard and set up a big garden, so the trees up front have to go.

But so do the trees behind and all the scrub and underbrush that surrounds them!

After an hour of cutting away half a dozen smaller trees and underbrush, I finally got to the first good sized tree.  I used a wedge mostly because I just bought it and wanted to try it out.  So I felled the tree opposite it's lean (the lean wasn't real dramatic, don't be too impressed) with a wedge and my first ever plunge cut.  I put a stake in the ground where I wanted it to land, but you can't see it here because it's under the tree!

Lots of aspens need to go.  There were a bunch of tops down and widow makers hanging due to all the wind we've had lately.

I started a pile of bucked logs, and a pile of tops... also a pile of hawthorns in a spot where I hope to never have to go.

 This was my main goal for the day.  The top looked like Thor had whacked it straight down with his hammer, limbs hanging akimbo. 

 So everything was lookin like this: trees down, exactly where I want them, hinges 1-2" wide and perfectly straight, cuts parellel to the ground.  Until...  "I'll just do one more"

 Axe head slides up, almost off.  Not my fault here, the handle is a piece of crap, but still, I definitely knew that little piece of info before this morning.

 Wind blows hard, tree blows back, no plunge cut, tree rocks back on bar, saw jams, then runs out of gas, can't get a wedge in because it's so tight!  So... use the broken axe to chop away the remaining hinge, wait for the next gust of wind, tree slips, grab saw, run for cover.

 Tree, post "fall".  Ian and I adhere strictly to the "No: one last ride" rule when mountain biking, as he reminded me on skype today.  From here on out, I have a "No: one last cut" rule.

 Gas back in saw.  Thank Thor I'm still alive....

 And finish the day's work.

So I'm alive still, and the property is looking better already, if I do say so myself.  One more property to start on this week.  TIIIIIIIIIIMBER!

Acadia, the park

As mentioned in the last post, we were the only campers in the whole park, so you will not see other people in this photo set.  Obviously, if given the choice between being cold or being around people, I will choose frostbite every time.  And it wasn't even that cold, especially during the day.  The park is a lot smaller than I pictured it.  Given a week, I think I could hike over most parts of the peninsula, and from our camp we could walk down to the ocean, and up to the mountain tops.

There are lots of boardwalks and bridges in the park as you approach the ocean.  I was surprised by the size and breadth of the rivers since the peninsula is so small and the ocean so neat.  It seems like the water would just run off the mountains all over and down into the ocean, but not so, it still coalesces and runs to the ocean en masse.

This photo just looks like a painting to me.  It was surprisingly lush and green for so early in the season.  I guess evergreens will give a park that look.

This boardwalk made me want to go mountain biking.

This is just a romantic shot of light streaming through the trees.

The last of the river, from the delta, as it streams toward the sea.

The river becomes the ocean.

Sarah listening to the crash of the waves and the rolling of the rocks.

After a cold night's sleep, we got up, made some coffee, some tea, and some breakfast (oaties), and headed for the mountains.

Frozen bubbles.

A shot of Sarah before she saw the camera.

Sarah is thinking of teaching a hiker's safety course at Cornell.  Lesson one, how not to wear your hat for maximum trail seeing.

Pitch pine.

Livin on the edge!

Livin way to close to the edge for comfort.  Wow, that's a long way down!

What did you say?  There's a Trader Joe's on the way home?  We MUST need something.