November 3-5, 2006: A Nice Fall Weekend

One of many trip reports by Alan Silverstein.
Last update: March 6, 2008

From:  Alan Silverstein <ajs@frii.com>
Date:  6 Nov 2006 11:18:01 -0700
Subject:  a nice fall weekend!

Just for fun, because it was a fuller and better weekend "at home" than most, here's the short story... From my point of view, of course, not from Cathie's!

• Thursday night, decided to join friends Friday night at the Lincoln Center for the 6:30 pm show of the 57th annual Warren Miller ski film (now $15, but you get some Copper Mountain and Winter Park discounts), downtown at the Lincoln Center.

• Friday night, rushed over from work without time for dinner, and two hours short on my 40 for the week, oh well. (I had three evening events last week.) Nice movie, loud (earplugs). Pass by Sunflower Market on the way home at 9:02 pm, to discover that this week they started closing at 9 pm not 10. (groan)

• Saturday morning, sleep in. As usual it's impossible to spend all week working on this tedious software stuff without a certain amount of Saturday downtime to recover. I'm usually tired, apathetic, whatever. The new job is low-stress, but high-concentration.

• Lifestyle maintenance at home, can't even recall now what all it was. Oh yeah, helped Cathie with phone calls to fencing companies and renters regarding her house in Aurora; she decided to pay $$big to have the old fence replaced soon, there are at least five broken posts. I sorted some more rocks from summer hunting. I went up on Cathie's roof and cemented/nailed in two partial shingles found recently on the ground. Our roofs are 16 years old and starting to wear out, now into patch-up mode to defer replacement. Used up the rest of a quart of roofing cement.

• Helped Cathie unpack and bring in her new 7-in-1 gym. You get a lot of exercise moving and assembling exercise equipment. She cut up all the cardboard... 4 pm, load up the car. Head for Sutherlands to drop off a dull 20", 72-tooth chainsaw chain (from the cabin) for sharpening. What's this, even though I called yesterday and was told 8-5, they closed today at 4 pm? But someone inside was nice enough to take the chain anyway for processing.

• Major recycling offload at the city site.

• Continue northwest to the north Home Depot. Buy a 4x4x8' cedar post to replace one in my back yard discovered today broken at the base. (Inspecting fence motivated by Cathie's recent issues with the rental house.) Now $14 for the post! Yikes, I recall when they were $5. Oh well, at least it's relatively easy to stick it in the Subaru. Buy more roofing nails, also some cheap gutter guards to try out on one section. Oops, no small containers of roofing cement => continue to nearby Walmart supercenter for that.

• Dinner at Woody's Woodfired Pizza buffet (yum, but not a healthy or routine event!)

• Attend 7:45 pm movie at the $3 theater, enjoyable; then home for more chores and to bed.

• Sunday, an even prettier late fall day, cool and calm. I really want to get out to the prairie with Cathie's dog for exercise and rockhounding, but "shoulds" abound. After breakfast, blow out the sprinkler systems for winter, both of them... That takes 1:15... I look forward to when we only have one house to maintain. Back up on Cathie's roof, repair one more shingle, also do some caulking. Clean gutters on both houses. Install gutter guards on my driveway section, see how they do over the years. ($1.06/3', needed 9 sections.)

• About 1:30, load up the dog. Drive-through at McD and on to the prairie! It's 45 minutes each way to get there and back. Stop on a very quiet Weld County gravel road (WCR 102 between 45/47) on a hill with a great view southwest, cross the barbed wire fence, and meander half a mile south to a windmill (cattle water-tank pump) marked on the US Forest Service (!) Pawnee National Grasslands map.

  Gorgeous, cool, calm. Nice rocks here too, in spots -- agates, epidote, even one blob of magnetite and one bit of fossil wood. Gunshots in the far distance... Other people rockhounding nearby, first time I've ever seen that. Share a burger with the dog while sitting by the windmill.

  A huge wave of dark cloud appears across the sky west to north. Hmm, it's going to get windy soon I bet! Yup, within a few minutes a strong, cold breeze picks up and it gets cloudier and darker. Meander back to the car. The dog is doing well and really enjoying her freedom. No chasing antelope this time. Arrive back at the car with lots of rocks (maybe a gallon) about sunset (about 4:55 pm). Nice. Split the second hamburger, watch a few sunset colors, admire a gorgeous orange full moon briefly visible between horizon and clouds.

• Back home, help the aging dog limp out of the car and into the back yard. Cathie will give her another aspirin at bedtime. Drive over to Avago to work two more hours and make my 40 for the week. Lots to do, and it's quiet.

• Back home again at 9:15 pm, the tire tumbler needs dumping; also sort and admire the day's collecting, most of which are bound for the tumbler.

• Snack, read, to bed!

Funny how when the weekend is over, going to the prairie was a highlight and I wish I'd had more time -- no surprise. But it was hard to tear away, leaving chores unfinished when the weather was nice on the weekend... Replace that broken fence post, start painting the trim on my house. Fortunately it's too soon for a final leaf cleanup, and cutting back the raspberries can wait.