Cabin #14

 Our annual Thanksgiving retreat was much needed, and went off without a hitch!

We had cabin #14 for the first time, and really liked it.  The fireplace draws VERY well, and is wide open.  No little insert, here, and no weird metal plate in front of the grate, like in cabin #7.

We have now had most of the stone cabins in the park, with the exception of #8-10, and we have determined that #14 is our favorite.

The front steps are a bit difficult to navigate, but we managed.

It was raining as we drove out on Wednesday, but it let up in time for our arrival and unloading.  

We spent a little too much time lingering over lunch (thanks, Dave), so we didn't get to the park until after 4:30.  The office was closed, and we had to get our key out of a little locker.

We ordered up 5 bundles of firewood from the cabin-area manager (this is a separate entity from the state-run office, and they were still open), and had a lovely first night fire.

The heavy rain on the roof started after we had settled in with our fire, and it was a lovely thing to just listen to the rain while the fire crackled.  I made the cranberries, then, too, so the cabin smelled heavenly.

Thanksgiving dawned with deer roaming right in front of the cabin, and a light rain falling. There was a buck and three does.  The buck was missing his left antler.  We hoped that he had won that fight. 

It rained all day, so we mostly stayed in.  I got the fire going in the mid-afternoon, and kept it going well into the night.

We did get out for a short walk before that, though, when the rain had let up.  It was absolutely silent outside... no wind, no people (apparently, the rain kept them all inside). We went partway up behind the cabins, where there were little rivulets of rain water laughing between the rocks.

Our  feast was really good, with herb and lemon roasted Cornish hens, fireplace potatoes, my green bean casserole (no canned soup, and lots of flavor), and cranberry orange compote. Pecan praline crusted pumpkin pie for dessert (and we still have some for breakfast today)!

There was wine, and reading, and music, and we used an extra bundle of the wood.  It kept the damp away, and this made the main room of the cabin nice and cozy.

On Friday, the skies were clearer, so people were out, and about, and LOUD.  

There was this one teenaged boy who must have been bored out of his mind, and he managed to drive all of the deer deeper into the woods to escape him, first thing in the morning.

You know...right as they would have been coming to forage for acorns in front of our cabin.

Grumble.

After breakfast, Dave went into town for more wine, and to look for a kitchen gadget or two, which he didn't find.  

While he was gone, I went on a solitary ramble.  

I stayed on the road, because I still have some vertigo, and didn't want to risk going to my favorite place alone, as it is up on the ridge, and the trail (which isn't really a trail, but a wildlife track), is right next to a drop off.

Anyway, I walked well away from the cabins, and the noisy people, and there, I was met by no less than 10 deer: one here, two there, 5 over there...quietly making their way through the deeper woods.  I stayed to the road, but they did not mind me, and we walked together for a good hour or so.

Until that same annoying kid came stomping along, with his dog, and his loudness. Why did he need to be talking to his dog at full volume? Oh, that's right....teenage boys only have one volume.

(I have often said that teenage boys are made of noise and stink)

Grumble again.... sigh.

Dave had come back, but was not worried about me, as we know this park very well, and we know that I need this time alone in nature.  That's part of why this retreat needs to happen every year.

We got another bundle of firewood, and then we walked together, up onto the ridge.  Further this time, than when the rain had let up on Thursday.... All the way up to the point where the trail becomes too dangerous.

I would have gone on, were I younger, and still had that absolute confidence in my hiking abilities that I once had. 

Anyway, we lingered up there, in the quiet, with the birds and the breeze.  It was heavenly. 

There were no vultures roosting in the highest trees this year, so that was nice.  

After that, we came back down, and walked past the cabins, and the noise (there was that boy again, firing a toy gun that made a racket, and playing catch with his much older brother), along the road- where I had gone earlier.

We saw a doe with a pair of twins, and heard a buck snorting up on the highest part of the ridge. We never saw the buck, but we got his message, and moved on.

All day Friday, we eat left overs, so Friday is really my day to completely relax.  

Yes, walking 5000-plus steps, out in nature, IS relaxing to me!!

We did more reading, and had a good, long fireplace session.  I was able to do some focused spiritual work to round out the day.

I saved the two, biggest pieces of wood for last, and just before bed, stood them up over the intensely hot bed of coals, leaning against each other, and the back of the dogs, like the letter A.

They burned well into the night, leaving nothing but ash, and the cabin was kept warm. I never turned on the noisy heater, which I had used the previous two nights.

It rained again on Saturday, which made packing up the car more of a challenge than unpacking was.  I woke up in pain, too, which also posed a challenge for cleaning the cabin, and packing everything up.

But we made it, and checked out with 6 minutes to spare.  I told the ladies in the office that we have been doing this Thanksgiving stay since 2010.  They asked if we always stay in #14, and I said that I didn't know we could request a specific cabin anymore....(since we can no longer book next year at check out time, and now have to wait a month, and do it on line).

They said that there is a "notes" space on the reservation page of the web site, and assured me that we could request a specific cabin for next year, and they would do everything they could to book it for us.

Yay!

The rainy drive home was harrowing, as there were times when visibility was practically nil, but, once home, it had gone to a drizzle. Unloading the car was a much less-wet process than loading had been!

Laundry is done, cabin dishes, and other bits, have gone through the dish washer, and a list has been made of a few items we'd like to add to the cabin kit.  We left our oven thermometer in the oven, by mistake, and need a new one of those, too.

This morning, Dave is going to Costco, and I am going to finish putting stuff away, and re-loading the cabin box.

Back to reality tomorrow, with my office day.  Sigh.

Have a good week!

Thanksgiving is coming....

 The news is that the kitty we were calling Cinnamon has settled nicely into her new home!

There was a crew at the neighboring house this past week to mow, another to clean, and another to clear junk out of the shed.  Finally, a workman of some kind was there on Friday, making all kinds of racket. Not sure what he was up to...

Then, on Friday afternoon, the house was listed for rent.  I hope our friend gets a MUCH better tenant this time.  For our sake, mostly.

Thanksgiving is this coming week.  

We are finished with our grocery shopping, and have started throwing things in boxes.  I always manage to forget something, and Dave has to go out to the store in the nearby town to buy it before they close.

It's always an adventure to figure out what it is in time....

We have been assigned cabin #14, which is one of the few we have never had before.  

It's the one where the two roads meet, which is why we never asked for it, back when we were allowed to ask for a specific cabin.  However, we have snooped inside of it (when other guests were leaving), and it has a REALLY cool fire place. It's full size, with big, iron doors.

The cabin is similar to #13, in that it is one of the biggest, with the enclosed front porch, overlooking the lake.  

It's also RIGHT where the deer pass by on their daily dawn and dusk movements.  Or, at least, it has been.  

If they've been doing any major disruptive work this year, the deer may have changed course.

In other news, I'd been having more and more issues with my right ear, my sinuses constantly draining down my throat, and ultimately developed laryngitis, and a sore throat, this past week.  

Did a Covid test, since, you know... we were at a concert on the 10th.  Thankfully, it came up negative.  (Dave has been fine, as well, so Covid was not likely,  but we had to be sure.) 

Called my nurse, and got a Z pack.  

The symptoms started to clear up right away, and I am feeling much better.  

The vertigo is still there (it's been less intense than at the beginning, but is still there), which is MOST annoying, and going on six weeks at this point. However, my ear no longer hurts, the throat pain was gone after the first day on the antibiotic, and every other symptom is better.

Unfortunately, Z pack is one of the only antibiotics I can tolerate, but apparently, it doesn't get along well with Verzenio.  I have had absolutely horrible diarrhea this past week.  Joy of joys!  

I've never had this much trouble with that particular issue in my entire life all put together.  

First, the Verzenio did it to me at the beginning, and now this.

Hopefully, things are back to the new Verzenio-induced normal, now. 

I will load up on pro-biotics, and continue to drink a lot of water.

The night time side effects of the Verzenio are also balancing out, so I am not having to get up 8 times a night with a full bladder.

All in all, I have lost seven pounds since starting the Verzenio.  It has caused my appetite to change, and heart burn to become a daily / nightly thing, as well as the diarrhea, and night time pee fest.  

All I can say is that it better be working!

We will do a scan next month.

Anyway, other than the exciting concerts, and Thanksgiving coming up, this has not been a pleasant autumn for me, with all of this going on.  

I am looking forward to our escape to the cabin, and a few days to re-group.

Today, Dave says that will be doing all of his pre-trip chores.  He almost always manages to put major ones off until after the last possible minute, and we end up leaving late.  SO, we shall see what he manages to get done today.

I will be as encouraging as I can!  I hate to miss one minute of our time at the cabin!

Wishing my readers (there are 5 of you, apparently), a most enjoyable, safe, and healthy Thanksgiving holiday.  May your hearts overflow with gratitude for all of the blessings in your lives. 

Busyness

 In 2019, we bought tickets to see a concert up at Red Rocks in Colorado.  The artist was a group from Norway called Wardruna.

Unfortunately, my scans that October revealed a return of the cancer (which it seems to have done every 2 years or so, pretty reliably).  An MRI was needed, and was scheduled for the day of the concert in Colorado.

We tried to sell our tickets, but no one wanted them.  We lost that money.

Then, in February of 2020, they announced a return to the US, that would take place in Dallas, TX, in October.  

We went ahead and purchased another set of tickets, with a package deal that included a room at a hotel adjacent to the venue.

Then Covid happened.  The event was postponed indefinitely.  

We were told to keep our tickets, which we did, however, when we asked the hotel for our money back, they refused.  We lost that money.

Some time in 2021, they announced that the concert had been rescheduled for November 10th. We booked a hotel.

But... then, we looked again, and realized that it was rescheduled for November 10th of 2022! 

 Fortunately, that hotel allowed us to cancel.  We tried to get them to just change the reservation, but they could not do that a whole year in advance.

SO, finally, last week, we went to Dallas for the Wardruna show!  It cost us a lot of money to get there, HAHA!  

We took a vacation day for Thursday.  My office always closes for Veterans' Day, and Dave took an additional vacation day, so we scheduled ourselves a 4 day weekend.

About a month ago, we got a room about 6 blocks away from the concert venue, and, when the day came, it was warm and damp, but  the weather was good enough, so we walked.  

Stopped in a really good Italian restaurant for dinner, and enjoyed a night cap at a bar on the way back after the show.

It was really good, all the way around.  The show was wonderful.

On Friday morning, it was POURING rain, so we took our time getting downstairs for breakfast, and getting checked out.

Then, because there is an IKEA store nearby, which we had visited many years ago, we had planned to go there before coming home.

I found kitchen gadgets and a replacement cotton blanket for summer.  It was fun...and we headed to the highway.

Where we got stuck in traffic for almost 2 hours of stop and creep, stop and creep.  It was AWFUL, and we got home so much later than we had wanted to, and totally exhausted....especially Dave, who does all of the driving.

As we traveled north on Friday, we drove into a cold front, coming home to substantially colder weather.  It started to SNOW just a few minutes after we arrived, and got the plants put inside the shed in advance of the hard freeze on Friday night.

Thankfully, we missed that on the highway, as there were slick spots, once the snow started.

Yesterday, I had an eye check up (I'll be getting new glasses for the first time in a long time), and Dave did the grocery shopping, but it was a pretty low key day....we needed that to recover from the whirlwind trip to Dallas!

The half inch or so of snow melted by afternoon, but it stayed pretty cold, and was in the 20s again last night.

Now, we are done being busy for a while, and our Thanksgiving tradition is stress free, so that will be nice.  We've done it so many times, it's easy.

Tomorrow afternoon, I have my annual "well woman" appointment, and the forecast is calling for more "meaningful" snow.

It's been an abrupt change.... we needed the air conditioning last week, it was 75 and balmy in Dallas on Thursday, and now, we have full-on winter weather for at least a week.

The ass hole neighbors have moved out, and left one of their cats behind.  We have found a home for her.

If the weather doesn't interrupt our plans, kitty's new mom will be here Monday afternoon to collect her.  She's such a sweet kitty, and clearly not an outdoor cat.

Unfortunately, she's been on the street for a year (they moved in December of last year, and the only time I ever spoke to one of the tenants was because she was out looking for a kitty who "ran away."  She ended up leaving said kitty outside to fend for herself---meaning for US to take care of).

That being said, kitty will probably need to be indoor/outdoor at her new home....but they live up in Guthrie on an acreage, so that will be perfectly safe for her.  Much better than the city!

I am off to make flapjacks for breakfast.  No set plans for today.... Dave needs to run another errand, and he wants to make two more winter shelters for the feral cats, and I need to do some work on the course I am taking.  It should be an easy-ish day.

Enjoy your week!

Crane spotting weekend

 We left Friday after work, and drove up to Jet, OK, in a very gloomy rain.

We were able to use the trailer house that belongs to the family of my friend Ty, so we got to have free lodging this year, again.  That happened in 2020, as well.

We'd hoped to get up there earlier, but Dave was slow to get ready, and we ended up leaving an hour later than *I* had planned for us to leave.  

As a result, we didn't get there until dark, and we never made it out to the wildlife refuge that evening.

So, Saturday, we got up and out an hour or so later than *I* had planned (haha), and when we got to the refuge, we found that the usual trail to the observation deck was "temporarily closed."  

There was no one at the visitor center when we went past the first time.... so we decided to go to the "auto tour" route, only to find it was closed as well.

We drove around to every other access point, and all were closed.  When we came back by the visitor center, there were people there, and there was a sign that said "HUNTER SIGN IN."

Hunters?? In a wildlife refuge....???

But we didn't stop because the ranger, and the other people who he was with, appeared to be leaving.

Disheartened, we went back to the trailer, and took a hike from there into the adjacent state park.  

We found that the lake across from the trailer was so low, due to our ongoing sever drought, that it was a desolate, horrible-smelling wasteland, littered with hundreds of dead fish.

In the mean time, I had posted on Facebook that the refuge was inexplicably closed.  

After arguing with a couple of friends who posted that they knew that the refuge always closes for the winter in October, and telling them that, no, it does not, because we go Crane Spotting every NOVEMBER, because that's when the cranes gather in their largest numbers.... another friend, who had more free time that we did yesterday, discovered that the refuge had closed on Friday to allow DEER HUNTING.

They're doing a deer cull, because the population within the refuge has gotten too large, and human encroachment and removal of apex predators, has created this.  

This was not on the refuge's Facebook page, or listed anywhere else that we could find, so we had no way of knowing in advance that we would not be able to access the waterfowl observation desk.

UGH!!!

Plus.... it's a deer cull.... and I am, well, a Deer Witch...(hard to explain--just take my word for it). 

The cull is being done in phases, and this weekend was the first phase.  

So... SHIT..... 

Heartbroken, we went back out to the refuge, briefly, so that I could do a blessing, and appeal to the God of the Hunt, and the antlered Goddess of the Deer, asking for the aim of the hunters to be true, and the deaths swift, ensuring as little suffering as possible for the murdered deer.

We went back to the trailer, and hiked the other direction at the state park, as dusk fell, and the cranes started coming back from their daily foraging sites.

As it turned out, hundreds of them flew RIGHT over our heads!  SO many flocks, one after another.

This is usually what we watch come in from a distance from the observation deck at the refuge!  It was SO COOL!

Dave got tired of it, and went in, but I stayed outside, in the cold and growing dark, by the light of the almost full Blood Moon.... feeling wave after wave of emotion wash over me with the cries of the cranes.

Crane was believed to be a messenger of the spirit world, and was also seen as a psychopomp, so I said some prayers to Crane spirit as well, asking that the spirits of the deer being culled be carried to peace and light, immediately and without fear.

So.  All in all, it was a good trip.  I got to do important spiritual work that I had NO idea I would need to be doing.  

I've also had a shift in my perspective about the annual Blood Moon, which is the 13th moon of the year.  This was the time when our ancestors would cull their flocks to prepare for winter.  It was a time of death to ensure life through the cold, harsh months. 

The fields were already harvested, and so, at this time, the meat was harvested....Thus the Blood Moon. 

(This is the original meaning of the phrase Blood Moon, before the internet decided that the red phase of an eclipse is called the blood moon.)

It's not like I was directly involved in the cull, but I knew it was happening all around me, and it was my duty to be there, to intervene, spiritually, on behalf of the deer.

ANYWAY...we are home now, and the laundry is going, and I am working on the menu and shopping list.  Office day tomorrow for me, and cold weather is coming later in the week.  

Have a good week!