2017 Life Logs, Day 10: Kitchen, Computer, and President’s Farewell
Date: Tuesday, January 10, 2017
Weather: Warm and Drippy; High 41, Low 40 degrees
Location: At Home in The Studio, Falmouth, MA

I spent my day in the kitchen and on my computer. Some things never change! I canned 14 pints of chicken mineral broth and ‘almost’ finished that PowerPoint presentation I will make on Thursday, ready or not.

I called Bruce Woodin late in the day to see if I could stop by his house to try out my computer with the projector that will be used for the presentation on Thursday. And that led to an invitation to dinner. Jane left for NYC today to spend a few days with a good friend and Bruce was taking advantage of Jane’s absence to fix a wild game roast given to him by a friend. Jane is not a lover of wild game, but I am, so it was a perfect match. Dinner was a success but the computer to projector match for the presentation was not. The little Asus that I use as a computer is more like a tablet and doesn’t have ports for sending video out. But I brought the projector home to check out connections with my Toshiba computer and that looks like a match. I will try things out in the morning, but the Toshiba seems to have the right the port, so all should be fine.

I just finished watching President Obama’s farewell remarks. It made me so proud to watch him. He is a brilliant man and has been a classy, caring, and effective President. I shed more than one tear as he spoke his words of farewell. But I think his message is clear. Our democracy is in our hands. We, each of us, no matter what our political preference, has to get or stay involved. I’m planning to attend a ‘Save Our Healthcare’ rally on Sunday at Faneuil Hall in Boston hosted by Massachusetts Senators Elizabeth Warren and Edward Markey. Like President Obama said tonight, if anyone has a better plan for Obama Care that keeps all the good parts of that plan, then he’ll support it and so will I. But until there is that plan, I’ll actively support keeping what we have.

2017 Life Logs, Day 9: Last Day of Deep Chill . . . for now
Date: Monday, January 9, 2017
Weather: Still Chilly, but Warming Overnight; High 17, Low 19 degrees F
Location: At Home in The Studio, Falmouth, MA

The temperature overnight is forecast to be warmer than the high temp today, so it looks like the chill is lifting. We should have four days with temps in the 40’s, maybe even the 50’s, before we dip back to the 30’s. We are supposed to have rain during this warm-up, so most of the snow will go. I love looking at the snow, but a couple of days is enough for me. But it will be back. It appears that we are going to have to get used to this up and down weather as it just keeps coming.

Not much to report today—went to an early morning class at the gym, worked on the presentation I will make on Thursday, repacked the kayak so it fits in a plastic box so I can stack other things on top, got all of the Christmas decorations put away, and had my Monday ‘game night’ with Ollie while the rest of the Goldstones attend Scout meetings. Tomorrow I will pressure can the latest batch of chicken mineral broth and put the final touches on that Thursday presentation. It has taken longer than I anticipated, but that is because I have so easily gotten side-tracked. I have really enjoyed the look-back and am using this opportunity to get started on writing about the Voyage of Windbird. And tomorrow is an early release day for Sam and Jonah. Not sure if Heather and Jed need childcare support, but I’ll be on stand-by just in case.

2017 Life Logs, Day 8: After the Storm
Date: Sunday, January 8, 2017
Weather: Snow Over Night, Sunny Day; High 21, Low 10 degrees F
Location: At Home in The Studio, Falmouth, MA

The snow did resume last night after a short break, but by daylight, the snow ended and it was a bright, beautiful, sunny—but cold–day. I laughed when I looked out and saw the wind had blown the snow off the deck, leaving only footprints. I’m not sure what the official accumulation reports say, but I would say that we had 3 inches of snow on Friday and another 8-10 inches yesterday and overnight. We had quite a bit of wind overnight, so snow was blown to bare spots in some places and drifts of 2-3 feet in other others. I think it would be fair to say that we had at least a foot of snow, but not the high end of 18 inches predicted. Whatever, it was plenty of white stuff and today was a great day for outside snow play. I went to Heather and Jed’s for the afternoon and helped Heather with some organization projects while Jed took the boys sledding on the hill by the library down the street.

Tomorrow is an up and early to the gym morning. I’ll then finish up that presentation I have been working on and head back to Heather and Jed’s for an “Ollie and Me” game night while the rest of the Goldstones go to Scouts and Jed to Health Board. Tonight is our coldest night of the winter to date, but after tomorrow, things start warming up a bit. The temp tonight is forecast to be 10 degrees and the temp on Wednesday will be almost 50 degrees. Hard to follow these ups and downs, but I sure like the ups more than the downs.

2017 Life Logs, Day 7: Lots of White Stuff
Date: Saturday, January 7, 2017
Weather: Snow All Day; High 30, Low 17 degrees F
Location: At Home in The Studio, Falmouth, MA

The big news today is snow, and more snow. But actually, I don’t think we are going to get as much as predicted unless it starts snowing again overnight. It snowed steadily all day from 10 am on until just about an hour ago. Then it just stopped. Now we just have wind with no snow. Still I would guess we have 8-10 inches, maybe more. And that’s enough!

I started my day at the gym attending a zumba class. I think I am hopeless. I just can’t get the dance steps. But then I’ve only been to a couple of zumba classes. I have to give myself a little more time. When I got home, I spent the rest of my day cooking and working on the presentation I’ll be making on Thursday. Actually, when I work on the presentation, I constantly get side-tracked, going back and looking at photos and reliving some fabulous times. Then I do a little writing, add some photos, and get distracted again. But distraction is good. It has reminded me of some of the unbelievable adventures Mark and I had. And that reminds me that I need to keep writing. I’ve just got to squeeze a book out of all these adventures. When I was reading about Madagascar today, I reread the logs from our three-day guided tour of the Ankarana Special Reserve in the northern part of the country. Our guide, named Goulam, was fabulous. And what a great name for a guide! In my log, I wrote down three books that he shared with me that I wanted to buy when I got home. Forgot all about them until today and when I looked the books up on Amazon, the main one I would like to have costs almost $600. It is only available in French, but it was the photos and the Latin names for the plants that I was interested in. Goulam worked with the woman who wrote the book and she gave him a copy. The University of California Berkeley also has a copy. Hmmm. Not many of these around. I don’t think I am going to be able to get this one.

I took late afternoon pictures of the snow. Will be anxious to compare to what it looks like in the morning. Tomorrow will be cold, but the sun should shine all day. That will help. I hope to get up and work on the presentation and then drive over to Heather and Jed’s and play outside in the snow with the kids for a bit. Things will warm up by Tuesday and the snow will melt. Then we’ll have a couple of days of rain. At this time of year, I much prefer snow. It really is beautiful.

2017 Life Logs, Day 6: Snow with More on the Way
Date: Friday, January 6, 2017
Weather: Snow Early, Sunny Afternoon; High 34, Low 22 degrees F
Location: At Home in The Studio, Falmouth, MA

It snowed last night and this morning to the tune of about 3 inches here on the harbor. But sometime between 10 and 11 am, the snow stopped and the sun came out. The snow is supposed to resume tomorrow morning and continue into Sunday. They are predicting anywhere from 6 to 12 to 18 inches, so we shall wait and see. It already looks like a winter wonderland, so tomorrow’s snow will only add to that. But the wonderland will be short-lived. By Wednesday of next week the temps will be back in the 50’s, so all the snow will melt and we will wait for the next winter storm.

I got word last night that Heather was hit with a killer cold. Jed has it, too, and all three boys have some level of upper-respiratory yuck. So far, I’ve resisted, but I know my time is coming. But today I decided to fix dinner for the Goldstones while I’m healthy and they are not. I had started prepping the chickens to roast mid-afternoon when Heather showed up at my door. It was an unexpected visit, but so delightful. She is so busy that I rarely get to talk to her, so we talked fast to get in as much visiting as possible before she had to go pick up Sam and Jonah. I was the recipient of her rare visit because she had gone to work and left early because she felt so bad. She was delighted to hear that I was going to deliver dinner, and I was delighted to be able to do that.

I spent most of my day working on the presentation I will be making at the Newcomers meeting on Thursday and I spent most of my evening figuring out travel plans for the next few months. While Heather was here this afternoon I was able to find out the dates when it would be helpful for me to be here to help out. So using that information, this evening I have come up with a tentative plan. I want to return to Nashville to visit with my sister and brother-in-law and I want to go to Puerto Rico to visit with Justin and family. And before I know, it will be summer again. Time flies when you’re having a good time!

2017 Life Logs, Day 5: Lunch at the Warren Tavern in Charlestown
Date: Thursday, January 5, 2017
Weather: Sunny; High 33, Low 28 degrees F
Location: At Home in The Studio, Falmouth, MA

It was a beautiful day and I enjoyed my drive to Boston to meet with Windbird’s new captain, Sam Weigel. Sam flew in to pick up the medical kit that Mark and I purchased before our departure to sail around the world. We should have directed friends to leave it on the boat, but we didn’t, so today we made the exchange. Sam flew to Boston from Charleston, SC, to pick up the medical kit, and we had agreed to have lunch together in Charlestown. I picked him up at the airport and we drove to the Warren Tavern. Mark and I visited the tavern a few times when we lived aboard Windbird in Charlestown, but it was great fun to return today. We were the first people to arrive for lunch and we were seated by the fireplace—a good place to be on this cold day. Sam loves history so I made sure I got photos of him standing by the bar where Paul Revere and George Washington had drinks in the 1780’s. Evidently George Washington had a Charlestown friend, Benjamin Frothingham, whom he visited and shared drinks with at the tavern. And there are many stories documenting that Paul Revere often visited his friend Joseph Warren, who played an integral role in the American Revolution, at the tavern. I last heard from Sam when he was on the plane in Atlanta waiting for take-off back to Charleston, SC. Hopefully he made it home tonight as tomorrow’s weather, both here and down south, looks a little wintry. We should get some snow overnight and Atlanta might get snow tomorrow. So the meeting in Boston today was perfect timing.

2017 Life Logs, Day 4: Headed to Boston Tomorrow
Date: Wednesday, January 4, 2017
Weather: Mostly Sunny; High 48, Low 27 degrees F
Location: At Home in The Studio, Falmouth, MA

Early tomorrow I head to Boston to meet Sam Weigel, Windbird’s new captain, at the airport. Windbird has just gone through a refit and is now in the water and ready to head south. I have some things that Sam and Dawn can use for their first cruise south to Florida and to the Bahamas, so tomorrow we will meet and transfer the “goods”. The main item is the medical kit Mark and I purchased before heading out around the world. Assuming flights are on time, I will meet Sam at Delta’s baggage claim area at 11:30 am. We’ll drive to Charlestown to have lunch at the historic Warren Tavern, established in 1780 making it the oldest tavern in Massachusetts. The Green Dragon Tavern across the harbor in Government Center was established in 1714, but the original building is no longer in existence. So, the Warren Tavern where George Washington’s funeral speech was read and the place Paul Revere called his favorite ‘watering hole’ holds the honor. After lunch, I’ll take Sam and the “goods” back to the airport. He’ll head back to Charleston, SC, to Windbird, and I’ll head home. Tomorrow is supposed to be very cold and it looks like a little snow is headed our way on Friday, so I’m glad the meeting is tomorrow and not Friday. The cold weather this weekend is going to extend down into South Carolina, so Sam is anxious to get home and head further south.

With the threat of the first snow and truly cold weather on the way, I forced myself to insulate one more patio door today. Last night’s experience didn’t seem to help, but I pulled out the heat gun that we used to use to shrink wrap Windibird’s winter cover, and that made the shrinking job MUCH easier than using the hairdryer. I’ll try to finish the other windows on Friday while the snow is falling, but before Sunday night’s low temp of 7 degrees!!! I went to a new class at the gym this morning called Body Sculpt. I have to adjust the exercises to my level, but I’m hanging in there. And then later in the afternoon, I went to pick Sam and Jonah up from school as Heather was in Boston today. It was sunny, which made it feel warmer that it was, so the boys wanted to play on the playground after school. Ironically, the only other kids on the playground were Mollie and Joey from next door. They played with such enthusiasm that you would think they hadn’t seen each other for days. But since Mollie is in Jonah’s class, he had been with her day! And once we got home and finished homework, they all got together again.

2017 Life Logs, Day 3: Not a Frost Queen
Date: Tuesday, January 3, 2017
Weather: Rain, Rain, Rain; High 44, Low 42 degrees F
Location: At Home in The Studio, Falmouth, MA

Today I went to Hyannis to Home Depot to get 3M Insulation Kits to insulate the patio doors and windows in this apartment. I wanted 3M, not Frost King, as 3M is supposed to be a clearer plastic. When I looked online, Home Depot should have had this. But there was no 3M, and since this was the second Home Depot with no 3M, I caved and bought Frost King. When I got home, I cleaned the trim around one of the patio doors, put on the double stick tape, and put up the plastic. Ugh. This is not an easy job for one person. I got the one patio door covered and used my hair dryer to shrink the wrap, but I am NOT looking forward to doing the other doors and windows. And I am not happy with the way it looks. The plastic is not as clear as I would like and the nothing about the whole process was easy. Maybe I’ll just pay the extra money for heating with leaky doors and windows. A Frost Queen I am not.

This afternoon I saw some Facebook messages on my phone and when I clicked on them, a conversation between Mike Stuart and someone commenting on a photo caught my attention. Mike was telling the guy that Linda’s bike had sustained damage as they rode down out of the Andes yesterday. I immediately went to their blog and saw that Linda had also been ‘damaged’ in the downhill trip. I immediately emailed Linda and a few minutes later I got a call from her. Thankfully the “damage” was only a gash on the side of her forehead—no concussion, nothing broken. She and Mike were descending to sea level when they ran into impenetrable fog. Mike was in front as they rode the white line. Mike stopped suddenly when he saw a group of people in the road in front of him. When Linda tried to stop, the bike skidded on the wet pavement, threw her over the handlebars, and sent her skidding on the road. They caught a bus to get to their sea level destination of Guayaquil, went to the hospital to get stitches, found a hotel, and will stay there until they leave for the Galapagos in about nine days. I was so relieved to get Linda’s call and to know that she is really okay—a little shaken, but okay. What Linda had thought would be an easy downhill ride after days of climbing into the Andes, just didn’t turn out that way. But she is okay and that is all that matters. Rest, Linda, and get ready for that cruise in the Galapagos.

2017 Life Logs, Day 2: The Present
Date: Monday, January 2, 2017
Weather: Sunny; High 41, Low 37 degrees F
Location: At Home in The Studio, Falmouth, MA

Last night was a Goldpebble overnight and we had a great time. The boys enjoyed the little Star Wars Lego sets I got them to add to their collection that we keep here. They quickly built the kits and got to play for a short time before bed. And they continued this morning.

Today was a holiday for Heather, Jed, and the boys, but both Heather and Jed had to go to work for while this morning. On her way home, Heather stopped by here to pick up the boys, but she left with only Sam and Jonah. She was going food shopping and Ollie had no interest in doing that, so he stayed here with me. Being the youngest of three, I think he enjoys just having time alone once in a while. We ate lunch and he played quietly with the Legos while I dismantled the Christmas tree. I finally heard him call from the bedroom, “Oma, I’m ready to go now.” So we left for home. When we arrived, Heather and Jed were in the backyard trying to figure out where to put a chicken coop and run. Heather really wants to add chickens to the Goldstone ‘farm’ and I suggested we use the conduit tubing Mark and I used to support the winter plastic shrink-wrap cover. We would use this to support a chicken wire cover for the chicken run. If you don’t cover the top of the run in these parts, hawks get the chickens in short order. And you even have to have a ‘floor’ of chicken wire to keep other varmints like rats out of the chicken house. Heather had the conduit framing out and was measuring when Ollie and I arrived. We didn’t get very far into the discussion before Heather had to leave for a PTO special projects meeting and Ollie, Jonah, and I took off for a biking adventure. We biked to the elementary school where Heather was having her meeting. We went there because I thought the boys would be able to ride around the track with no worries about traffic, but the ground was too damp and Ollie wasn’t strong enough to push his peddles in those conditions. But the parking lot made a great biking place since there was almost no traffic today. And the boys got the added surprise of getting to walk home with momma.

After the biking adventure, I returned home and finished taking the trimmings off the Christmas tree. Once completed, I carried out on the deck. I then spent a little time texting with Sam, Windbird’s new owner, and set this Thursday as the date when he will fly into Boston. I’ll pick him up and we’ll got out to lunch and make the transfer of things that I want to send back to Windbird. After lunch, I’ll take him and the ‘goodies’ back to the airport and then drive to meet up with my nieces who live just outside of Boston. On the other days of this week, I’ll spend time finishing up the presentation about the Voyage of Windbird that I will make next week.

I want to end this log with a reference to ‘the present.’ I have been in a back and forth email exchange with a person Mark and I met over 35 years ago when we lived in southern West Virginia. Bill moved into the southern West Virginia area about the same time that we did and he started selling Max-Flex electric fencing. It was an instant success and he is still selling the fencing today. I had contacted him about fencing for Justin’s goats. What I got back was information on the fencing and a little pep talk about staying positive as I mourn the loss of Mark. Bill lost his life partner to cancer a few years ago, so he has experience in this area. Last night he shared a quote from a late nineteenth century poet that I’d like to pass on:

“The clock is running. Make the most of today. Time waits for no man. Yesterday is history. Tomorrow is a mystery. Today is a gift. That’s why it is called the present.”
Alice Morse Earle 1851-1911

I love the vision of the ‘here and now’ being a present to each of us. I’ll keep this in mind each day of this new year and try my best to live each day to the fullest. Thanks, Bill.