Stumbling Across the Finish Line

For the last seven years, on November 30th, our lead blogger (NaBloPoMo was originally Wireless' idea) has often done a retrospective of her favorite posts from the month.  Judging just from the number of comments they received -- 6 each -- my blogging community liked two of my  November posts better than the others.  Lessons from a windy Sunday night from November 18th (TJ's birthday), and Wanna Buy a Table or Two?  Or Three? from November 11th.  There was some good internet chatter throughout the month, and it was good to be in touch with all of you.  All good things must end, or so I've been told, and thus it is with NaBloPoMo.  (Or BEDFAMM).  I've chosen to end November blogging with some photos that I took this fall that didn't make the first cut.   This first batch is from October, when I was considering doing a bicycle cycling landmark series.  Anyone who has ever biked out of the beach house has ridden by these.  Do they look familiar?

Here are a couple of photos taken while riding my bike in October that I saved for November blogging.

That last one was supposed to be part of a series on benches, but I suppose you know that.    The one below was taken on November 7th, on  what turned out to be my last bike ride of the month.  A blueberry field.

And here's another photo from Thanksgiving at OSLO's, with three of my favorite people on earth acting goofy.  Maybe it was the tryptophan in the turkey?

Having a theme for the month helped me quite a bit with the "creative" part of this blogging marathon.  I hope you enjoyed that piece of it.  Next to the last, for those of you who check the blogs regularly, an advance warning that I plan to take a break from blogging for a while, so it is unlikely that there will be any new material here for at least a couple of weeks. And finally, thanks to all of you for playing along. Those who wrote, those who read and particularly to those who commented.

Winding Down

With just two days left in November, and the end of the blogging marathon in sight, I actually have a few photos in my archives that I haven't used yet.  Today was a decent (enough) day to take a walk on the beach, though.  My plan is to use the reserves of unpublished photos tomorrow.

There were signs that the beach has been busy since my last trip down there.  Lots of deer tracks, some tracks from much smaller animals, dog tracks and human foot prints of all sizes.   Sleds have been pulled along the edge of the sand and someone (or two) has been riding a bike down there.   That last thing is kind of a recent trend.

My turn around point was Tunnel Park.  Our favorite summer destination looks very different under a layer of snow.

I came back up the stairs at the south access point.  My prediction that this fence would be buried in sand by the time the snow arrived turns out to have been wrong.  But not by all that much.  One more day.

Today's theme is Thanksgiving

I'm taking a break from my beach/lake theme today. It seems to me that Thanksgiving is a big enough theme all by itself. Here are a few photos from today. OSLO and her domestic partner hosted the dinner at their place, and pulled off an first class holiday meal. The grands made our traditional appetizers -- a tray of olives and cheese cubes on toothpicks, along side grapes and mini marshmallows. Here's a mother/daughter moment, featuring the next generation of mother/daughter.  OSLO was making her famous green bean casserole.  That's wild rice stuffing underneath the aluminum foil, wrapped in a towel to keep it warm on its trip from here to there.

And here's a father/daughter moment, as OSLO hands the Gravy Master a hot pad.  The gravy was excellent, the turkey was moist and the cranberry sauce was the family recipe.

I didn't find room on my plate for the sweet potato casserole or the corn, but I found room for some of everything else.  The leftovers -- and the mess -- stayed at their house.  They were headed over to visit the other side of the family for dessert.  Personally, I'm glad I was only slated to eat once today.

Finally, a brother/sister moment.  Besides the appetizer tray, they set the table, fetched and carried, helped clean up and kept the dog(s) out of the way.  They were the best minions anyone could hope for.  I hope that all of you out there following along had an equally awesome day.

Thanksgiving Eve

The streets iced up again overnight, so the suggestion to take the morning walk on the beach seemed like a good one. It was no colder down there than at the top of the bluff, and the footing was much better. And the views were cool.  I especially like the contrast of the sunshine on the beach sand and the black clouds of lake effect snow out over the lake in the second photo.

We'll be eating at OSLO's tomorrow, so my Thanksgiving dinner preparations are pretty minimal.  I'm bringing a couple of side dishes, and she and her crew will do the rest.  I'm looking forward to it.

I'm not a fan of winter.

An overnight warming trend resulted in the snow on the deck being gone this morning, but not all of the ice on the streets had melted.  Still, it was an easier walk today than yesterday, and we ventured off the dune for a bit.  

Yesterday's wind left a coating of sand on the snow on the beach, and I thought that the effect was interesting.

I took my truck back from JB in order to get a couple of things done this afternoon.  There's a tentative rumor that the closing on the sale of our former homestead will occur at the end of next week.   So today I met with Joe of  "If It's Gotta Go, Maybe Joe, LLC."  Some stuff went.

The world seems to be colored in black and white.

The second round of snow moved ashore this morning just as I was returning from a very slippery morning walk.  This photo is of the street furthest back in our neighborhood -- the one that goes by the tennis court.  Like all of our streets up here today, I don't think it has been plowed since the snow started on Saturday.  Footing was occasionally treacherous, but at least I got some fresh air and exercise today.

By the time I got home -- less than 5 minutes after this was taken -- the "system" snow had begun in earnest.  The only difference I can see between lake effect and system snow, is that everybody else gets snowed on too, if it is system snow.  I considered travel to be hazardous, as well as unnecessary, so I just hunkered down for the afternoon.  Hunkering down is boring.  I used the down time to make some lentil soup, and baked up some frozen rolls.  I'd prefer rye rolls, but these made the house smell good.  I've decided to not include a photo of that here -- brown food in a bowl is for the post of last resort.  (5 more weather reports and we're done.)

I nearly forgot my theme photo.  Deer tracks and dune grass swirls, taken on the beach last Friday.

A Quiet Sunday

Our snowplow guys arrived around 4 am to remove what was reported to be about 6 inches of snow.  It was a little funny because our driveway got plowed, but the county plows didn't show up to plow the streets, so when JB attempted to leave here this morning, he got out of the driveway, but couldn't get up the incline on the street.  There was a layer of ice under the snow.  He borrowed my truck, eventually.  4 wheel drive rocks.

 I did just enough shoveling of our walks to remember how much it hurts my back.  I did get a path cleared to the plowed driveway from our front door.

I didn't measure the snow on the deck, but it looks like it could have been the reported half a foot.  Again, the webcams at Grand Valley are still showing no snow on the ground.  This is all lake effect snow.

I took my camera to the beach, clearing off the 33 steps with my boots as I went.  When I got there I realized that the memory card was still in my computer.  User error.  There were some interesting ice crystal formations where the wet sand met the snow line, but you'll have to take my word for it.

White Thanksgiving likely

Winter arrived today in the lee of the lake. I took this photo on my way home from my walk this morning. There were a few slick spots on the roads and it was cold, at least for this time of year. 20 something, and breezy, but not much snow.

The lake effect snow bands soon set up along our shore line and by mid afternoon the deck was covered in a few inches of snow.

I checked the Grand Valley State University webcams a while ago, and they have no snow. Living next to this lake has its down side.

Big Red

No, not that Big Red. I'm introducing one of my walking partners, and as we usually prefer some level of anonymity here on the blogs, I'm going to refer to him as Big Red. Though he isn't all that big, nor overly red.  He's an unusually well mannered and sweet tempered animal.  He's also been desert trained, so will alert us if he hears a rattlesnake.  I've been a fairly serious biker for about 20 years now, and as a rule, dogs are not my friends.  I am willing to make an exception for this one, and I like Big Red.  His one blue eye is rather endearing.  We've speculated that perhaps he is half Norwegian.

Dogs need to be walked regularly.  In this season when biking is not much fun, a group walk that includes a canine is a nice way to get some regular exercise.  Usually there are three humans and one dog, but we were short one human today.  Today's route finished with a walk back up the beach from Tunnel Park.  The sand pile keeps growing at the end of the tunnel.  Big Red for scale.

Biking rules apply to walking on the beach.  The wind was from the north, so we headed out into the wind, keeping to the inland streets.  There was thus a tailwind for the return trip on the beach, with no need to face the blowing sand.  The beach was wild and beautiful this morning.

The Daughter of Norway suggested more photos of Mother Nature's sculptures, but there wasn't much to choose from today.  This piece of driftwood needs a few more years of weathering, I think.

It looks like the weather is about to take a nasty turn here, with lake effect snow predicted this weekend.  It's never possible to predict just where those lake effect snow bands will set up -- it all depends on the exact direction of the wind.  One TV channel is predicting 1-3 inches here, another says 4-6.  Stay tuned.

If it's Thursday, it must be Shredded Wheat

As you can see, I'm scraping the bottom of the barrel here for a topic for today's post.  Last night I ate the last (half) banana, and thus had nothing to put on my cereal this morning except a little bit of skim milk.  I sometimes add some yogurt to my cereal (or some cereal to my yogurt), but I haven't bought any yogurt for a while.  This often happens around Thursday of every week, since that's a day I often grocery shop.  So breakfast was a little spartan this morning.

Today was likely the last bikeable day here until Spring, or at least for a very long time.  I've been doing a lot of moving (read "tow that barge, lift that bale"), and opted to take the morning walk with the usual suspects rather than ride.  I did finally move my winter bike out of the basement at the Bay house and into the bike room closet at this house today.  It went into my trusty truck, also known as The Beast.  I pumped the tires and rode it around the driveway before putting it away, so I guess I did ride today, just not very far.  I also bought groceries, so tomorrow I can have a banana with my breakfast.  And here's the theme photo for the day.

A selfie, with the big lake in the background.

A Cautionary Tale

From The Family Album of Favorite Poems.  "The Kilkenny Cats."  Anonymous.

There wanst was two cats of Kelkenny,
Each thought there was one cat too many.
So they quarreled and they fit,
They scratch'd and they bit,
Till, barrin' their nails,
And the tips of their tails,
Instead of two cats, there warnt any.

(Found the book while cleaning out bookcases.)  And here is the BEDFAMM theme photo.

If It's Tuesday, It Must Be Perch.

We've gotten into a habit of going to Ottawa Beach Inn for supper every Tuesday night. Their Monday/Tuesday special is a First Mate Perch dinner. We order an extra salad and split the dinner. It's just about the right amount of food for two old people.

Today was house cleaning day, and we have a couple who cleans this house, top to bottom, once a month. Even the garage gets cleaned out.

We got an email today from the realtor of the buyers of our other house. They wanted information about who plows the driveway in the winter, who mows the grass, and who we've had clean up the leaves. No closing date has been set as yet, but I take that as a hopeful sign.

Lessons from a windy Sunday night.

Thump.  It sounded like something heavy had dropped somewhere nearby.  It was about 7:30 pm.  Winds were howling and the rain was going sideways, and neither of us wanted to venture out into that weather to investigate.  What little we could see by peering out of our upstairs windows told us nothing.  About 8:00 another thump.  More peering.  This time debris was hitting the window I was trying to look out of, the wall I was leaning against was shaking from the force of the wind, and I had just learned that glass has an incredible ability to bend when pushed hard enough by the wind.  I also learned that this freaked me out, just a bit. I now know a few other things as well.  First, I can't sleep when the wind is howling, the glass is bending and the house is shaking.  I spent the evening in the downstairs TV room emailing my friends, SMSing with my granddaughter and commenting on blogs.  My friend Lynne spent that same time in her basement, my neighbor spent it sitting in her stairwell.  I eventually slept fitfully, holed up in TJ's bedroom, as far from the wind blown bending glass panes as I could get.  Morning light brought explanations for the two loud thumps.  The California People lost a white pine tree.  Also shingles, gutters, siding and some minor structural damage from where the tree hit the house.  The tree snapped in two, half way up the trunk.

This is also my theme photo for the day, since the lake is in the background.  Taken about 8:00 this morning. The other thump was likely the blue spruce that went down in Bob and Marty's yard, falling across the street that goes back to Lynne's and blocking it completely.

By 9:00 am Joe and Bob were out inspecting the situation.  It was a big blue spruce and would require men with power tools to remove it.

It took less than an hour for the majority of the tree to be cut up into pieces and stacked in piles along the street.  I think that is the definition of four man-hours.  Four men, one hour each?

I heard later last night from OSLO, who had lost power during the first round of storms during the afternoon.  Her reaction to that situation was interesting.  She took a nap.  By the time she got up, the power was back on.

Birthday Dinner Rescheduled

Strong winds and heavy rains rolled through this part of the state mid afternoon.  We didn't get hit hard here in our neighborhood, but there was property damage and flooding north and south and east of here and a lot of power outages in Grand Rapids.  It was well telegraphed on the local news, as well as the weather channel, well ahead of time, and we decided to reschedule Totally Jammin's birthday dinner for later this week.  The COTU had spent the night here last night, so we gave him his birthday gifts and sent them home this morning, before the storm front arrived.

I checked the lake shortly before the rain went through, and some kite surfers were taking advantage of the wind and waves. The winds are picking up again, and it looks like it is going to be a blustery night.  We just had a 53 mph wind gust and flying objects are hitting our windows.  Tree limbs, most likely.  I hope it all holds together!

Saturday with the Grands

The Grandaughter has been in her new efficiency dorm apartment for two weeks now, and she's very pleased to be there. The only glitch has been her TV set. Besides the lack of a remote control for much of that time (it's there now), she was also dealing with TV reception that was pretty awful. Her Grandfather researched TV signal boosters, ordered one from Best Buy, picked it up this week and we made the trip to campus to install it this afternoon. Although the guy at Best Buy was skeptical, saying that dorm rooms are notorious for their bad TV reception, the TV had a nice sharp picture on it when we tried it out.  We did a before and after comparison, and the booster seemed to work quite well.

The two young people then joined us for dinner at El Rancho, their favorite local Mexican restaurant.  The girl is currently using our kitchen counter to work on a project requiring an X acto knife and a hot glue gun.

We've called off our evening walk because of the rain and wind .  It looks like a quiet evening here, except for the weather.

I took this photo late this morning so I didn't have to dig into my archives.  This is the spot where I normally leave my shoes in the summer on my way to walk on the beach.  There were no issues with hot sand today.

Half Way Point

It's a good thing I chose a theme for this month, since most days I come up blank on ideas for what to post on the blog.

By midafternoon I'd done about all of the productive things that I was likely to do for the day, and I headed down to the beach with my camera.  The sun was only slightly obscured by a thin deck of clouds, and there was enough wind off the water to make it a little chilly.  Sweatshirt weather.

I wandered down the beach to take a photo of a sculpture, newly done by Mother Nature.

I believe I've mentioned before the futility of putting fences on the beach.  This one will be fully covered before the snow flies, and by spring you probably won't be able to find it.

Except for the wind it's good yard clean up weather, and the sound of leaf blowers is everywhere.  Our weeping beech tree is one of the few that hasn't yet dropped all of its leaves, but it's getting close.  The weekend looks busy.  The grands will be here for a while, and Sunday we will celebrate Totally Jammin's 15th birthday with dinner at a local restaurant.  The actual birth date anniversary is Monday, and his Mom has another celebration (and cake) planned for then.

Mornings

Here's what my first view of the lake looks like in the morning, or at least what it looked like this morning.

I've been walking in the morning fairly often now that it is generally too cold or too windy or both to bike. There are three of us most mornings, four if you count an extremely well behaved and mellow dog named Charlie.  LH and her friend GG are the other two.  (GG is Charlie's owner.)

It was good to get some fresh air after yesterday's marathon house cleaning.  It's been a while since we sold a house, but things seem to be moving along.  The appraisers are coming either tomorrow or Saturday, and today we had to make a trip to our lawyer's office to sign some papers that the title company said that they needed.