Crickets are chirping away now that it is dark out.  It was hot but has gotten chilly.  Thunderheads are piled up on the horizon.

Woodcocks peent out in the field.  Snipes whoop over the grass in the darkness.  Rain from the afternoon lingers in the air. 

Wood frogs sing in the band of white pines on the edge of the field.  The darkness seems thick.

A flock of geese honks its way north overhead.  What are they flying now?  They have been flying overhead a lot lately.  What gives?

I still haven't run in several days.  I ran four miles then tweaked a muscle playing hide and seek with the kids.  Whatever.

All six of the incredibly healthy cucumber seedlings I plants a week ago are now kaput.  I guess I did not harden them off enough by introducing them gradually to the cooler and windier ways of the garden.  They were too shocked by the real world to make it.

I was away for a couple of days and came home to seeds sprouting in the garden.  Beans and pumpkins are busting through the soil.  More lettuce and carrots are queueing up in their green lines.  The onions and leeks are growing tall. 

The cucumbers are dead, as previously noted.  Unfortunately, the chanterais melons didn't make it, either, but the watermelon plants, although small, look healthy.

On Sunday we ate our first strawberry and several more are swelling toward ripeness.  Flowers are sprouting in the several beds we planted.  Things are just growing like crazy.

I have been slowly weeding the huge row of flower beds but daggone, it is a lot of work.  By the time I am done I will have to start over.  Sheesh.

We have a huge pot of zinnias that my daughter and I started.  Those plants are growing like gangbusters.  If we get flowers in there, it will be a bright blast of floral eye candy.

I have yet to plant the second batch of lettuce, carrots and cucumbers.  And I still need to plant corn. I need to get those in over the next couple days.  I won't be able to do it over the weekend.  Soon planting will be close to over, with the exception of a few more second crops.  Then the tending will begin in earnest.

My children were hanging with a bunch of kids of mixed ages this evening.  They ranged from age three to age ten.  This had the potential to be a great thing, with the older children leading by example and taking care of the younger children.  It did work out fairly well.  They all got along and played well together.  It was the fighting games that made me wince.

We encourage our children to be respectful and to know that hurting other people is just not what one should do.  They get it and they act accordingly.  Even playing at hurting others has its dilemmas, however.  It is only play and children need to act things out, whether they act out what they want or what they are forbidden.  It isn't real, but this whole crew of children was pretending to shoot each other and even kill each other.

My children were confused.  Why were they hurting each other, even in play?  The game didn't make sense to them.  We have tried to instill in them that they should respect all life, even bugs and crawling things, even hornets and snakes and other critters that so many people irrationally fear.  And they do.  They come running to me with a worm or a beetle, excited at their discovery, and then gently place it back where it will be safe.  I love that.

I wasn't sure what to do in the situation.  They are and will be exposed to children playing these games.  I am not a fan of them, even though I played them myself.  I had toy guns and played war and killing.  It does not necessarilly mean one turns out to be evil.  Playing games where one pretends to hurt others may be helpful in simply letting out aggresion in a healthy way.  I've heard more than one theory. 

I let it go for a little while.  I observed from the sidelines.  I don't think they even knew I was there.  Both my children stood watching, not participating, unsure what to do.  Then we called them away for a snack, and the sticks and plastic rakes that became guns were dropped. 

It is a shame that children are in a place to play these types of games, as they do all over the world, I am sure.  Call me a peacenik, but wouldn't it be a better world if the idea of shooting someone else wasn't even a game?  What if children respected all life, and helping was the game instead of hurting?  Like others before me, I can imagine it in the future.  It won't happen in my lifetime.

I can't help but think of the hundreds of people who died on this day back in 1944.  It seems they died for a cause, even though I find it difficult to reconcile war being right.  It contrasts highly with the war we are fighting now.  I can't find the cause there.

Thanks to those who have given their lives for our nation.  We do have a good thing going, despite all our faults.  Who knows what might have happened had we remained isolationist in Europe's war all those decades ago?  What would the world be like if we had not gotten involved?  I suppose we got dragged into it, in a sense. 

We chose this war.  That just doesn't sit right.  History shall judge one way or the other.  I judge it wrong.  There is no D-Day there, especially after the latest report that the Bush administration misled us.  No surprise there, if you were paying attention, but a confirmation. 

Too bad.  Those live might have made some change in this world.  Are we ever going to impeach this guy?  I suppose we will just wait it out.  January cannot come too soon.

Back in the middle of winter, when the temperature was below zero and the wind blew wisps of snow across the frozen meadow, I said, "It will be just a few months and it will be so hot we won't be able to move."  Today was that hot.

We drove home from Connecticut and ran the air conditioner the whole way.  I try not to use the air conditioner in the car but today was a day to use it.  All of us were sweating.  The sun through the windows was toasty.  It was a damp ride.

I finally got around to planting corn today.  I hope it isn't too late.  The soil was certainly warm enough.  I planted sweet corn and will wait a few days to plant popcorn, to make sure they do not cross pollinate.  By the time I raked the bed, pulled some weeds, dropped the seeds, covered them, then watered the whole garden, I was dripping.  I wasn't dripping from the hose spray.

We had four ripe strawberries this evening.  We each got one.  There are a whole bundle of them in the wings.  Tonight's berry was the sweetest strawberry I have had in a long time.  Baby that puppy was tasty!  I am hoping things go well with them the rest of the summer.

When I put the children to bed I read them a winter story, one about losing a mitten on a warm winter day.  It rains in the story (revealing the mitten buried in a snowman) so it is one of those soggy warm days when it feels like spring just because the temperature rises above freezing.  Today was a warmer day, about sixty degrees above freezing.

Tomorrow will be another scorcher.  The corn will love it.  The spinach, however, will not.  I need to pick a bunch of that for dinner.  If we can get corn to grow I say bring on some warm days, even hot ones.  As long as they do not hang around all summer, I can take the heat.

THE LETTER 

I receive a letter telling me
I will receive a letter.
It wears a strange stamp,
a cryptic return address.

The next day I receive
a letter telling me
I will receive a letter.
This goes on for days.

I let them pile up, then
open them all at once.
They tell me nothing
new. The stamps, all different

shapes and sizes. I collect
a good number when
I begin dreaming: I am lost
in a temple, walls carved

with familiar handwriting.
I write to the address:
Stop sending letters
or send me the letter.

The carrier’s blue uniform
always around the corner.
Why do you keep sending letters?
When will you send me the letter?

I try sending cookies
in colored foil. I change
my address. I move
again and again,

living in places no more
than one day. Soon
I marker the address
on a crate, seal it from inside.

When I arrive I peer out,
recognize my old house.
A man sits at my table
writing, then looking up,

writing, then looking.

It has been hotter than Hades these past few days.  I think three days of hot weather qualifies as a heat wave.  My little boy was sweating this afternoon while sitting on the couch and eating a popsicle.  Hot.

Now it is raining and dark.  A series of storms blasted through and the heat has been replaced by cool wet air.  Some of the storms were pretty intense, knocking down trees and causing flooding and slamming the skies with thunder. 

I was mostly worried about my garden.  There was a tornado warning and the possibility of golf ball sized hail.  No tornadoes touched down but big old hail did fall in places.  We pretty much got spared.

I was afraid the spinach would get smashed.  We ate our first spinach from the garden last night.  It was tasty stuff and it would be a bummer to lose the rest. 

We have greens out the ying yang at the moment.  We had our first visit to pick up our CSA shares this afternoon and came away with two types of lettuce, bok choi and arugula.  We also got some radishes. 

We had salad for dinner.  Post dinner we had a good storm watching session.  My boy said, the lightning splintering the horizon, "It's like watching a lightning storm movie!"  Sort of.

The rain falls steadily.  It isn't slapping the house in sheets as it did earlier.  The winds have calmed as well.  Thunder still rumbles occasionally over the drops slapping the deck and the tree frogs. 

Despite the rain, the lightning bugs are out tonight.  They can handle the heat, and the rain fails to keep them hidden.  We've got lightning with lightning bugs.

I have had way too many weeds in our garden this year.  Last year there were hardly any.  What gives is what I asked myself.

I figured out before too long that the weeds came in the load of compost that I was so excited to get is such short time (it came that afternoon!).  The weeds are sprouting all over the place like, well, like weeds.

This, of course, bites.  I have been yanking hundreds of these dinky little plants from the dirt for months now.  I am glad I mulched in some places, but where I did not I am regretting my lack of action.  Last year it was fine.  Why would I need to mulch this year?

I need to mulch this year because we got crappy compost.  Not only does it have weeds galore, but I have keep finding bits of plastic and rusted metal and old tarps.  These are relatively easy to fish out, but I don't want to fish, I want to garden.

I won't order that compost again.  Last year I ordered from some folks who are closer and who specialize in compost but who charge more.

You get what you pay for.  That isn't true enough, baby.

We have this big old yard.  That means some work to make things look good all the time.  I am not a huge fan of being picky, but it looks dang good with a little labor.  I took some time to slice the excess growth on the margins of things this morning.

We have a new lawn mower and it works fast on the open lawn.  On the borders, however, it is difficult to get close to the edge with the large mowing deck, so we end up having a wide swath of tall grass and other lawnish plants.  These are what I trimmed today.

We have an electric trimmer, which is quieter, less stinky, less polluting and lighter than a gas model, not to mention not as hot or flammable.  It took all of a half hour to get the job done, and that included retrieving the extension cord from the basement, where it was plugged into the seldom-used exercise machine.

I can't help but think of how things would be different if we had no electricity or cheap gas.  It would certainly take longer.  If I had to trim with manual power, how would I do it?  I could use lawn clippers and a scythe, I suppose.  My guess is I would find a way to make sure the garden plants shade the edge of the lawn so tall grass would not grow and the mower could get through. 

I use the manual reel mower for parts of the lawn.  I plan to get out there at some point today to do some of that.  It is rewarding work, in that progress is apparent pretty dang quickly.  I like having a lawn but we do need to reduce the volume we have.  I keep picturing some sort of English walking garden, with shaded bowers and the perfume of a hundred types of blossoms. 

Maybe I can get to that when I have more time, like when the kids are in school.  I know I could put it off forever, and really I need to simply make a more solidified garden plan.  In the meantime I need to trim some more weeds from the gardens we have.  They are growing like small children these days.

Tomorrow morning I will rise early to head up and participate again in the Mountain Birdwatch high elevation bird survey for the Vermont Center for Ecostudies (used to be for the Vermont Institute of Natural Science).  I need to get up at about 2:45 so I can get to the trailhead, hike up and start by about 4:30 AM. 

I used to get there earlier but the birds really don't sing until about 4:30.  That is early enough.  I will hike in the dark and hopefully hear Bicknell's Thrush, along with other birds.  I am eager to get out there again.

I will plan to stop for breakfast at On the Rise Bakery in Richmond.  I am eager for that as well. 

Ben Franklin coined that old rhymer:  "Early to bed and early to rise makes a man healthy, wealthy and wise."  I guess I will settle for any one of those come the wee hours when I rise in the dark.  

That was the headline that caught my attention.  The man in the restaurant was OK but it looks like a tricky extraction.  Check out the police officer and make up your own caption.  My guess is he is saying, "Crap, I was hoping to get home for lunch."

Credit to Brian Joyce, WCAX

I was pretty excited to grow some sweet corn this summer.  Ain't happenin' 'til I start over.  The Turkeys ate all the sprouting corn seeds.

They also ate our strawberries.  We would have had at least a pint, maybe even a quart, yesterday morning.  Fowl consumption took them out.

They were up on the hill late in the morning, pecking at the lawn.  I went out to have a talk with them.  As I neared, they took wing, flew over the trees.  A fence won't keep them out of the garden.

Last night I put up a scarecrow.  They stayed out.  I need to replant the corn.  But that the scarecrow worked is not conclusive.  Yet.

I did a Google search with "turkey out garden."  I got a bunch of links to stories about the E.U. and Turkey.  Not was I was looking for.  Those strategies won't work.

The turkeys have set back my plans by at least a week.  If they eat the corn again it may be too late to replant. 

Damn turkeys. 

Saturday morning I headed up again to volunteer for the Mountain Birdwatch survey of high elevation songbirds sponsored by the Vermont Center for Ecostudies (formerly by Vermont Institute of Natural Science).  I was once again successful and enjoyed it like a songbird in a forest of protected habitat.

I rose at 2:45 AM.  The alarm did the trick and I got right up to avoid falling back to sleep.  I had organized all I needed the night before.  I brushed my teeth, grabbed my headlamp and my backpack, dressed downstairs so I would not wake anyone, and hit the road.

I had to drive about 40 minutes to get up to Bolton Valley.  For the first seven years of the study I would simply walk out the door and start hiking.  Since we moved off the mountain, I need to drive first.  The drive was easy--no traffic at 3:00--and I started hiking in the dark.

I did not use a headlamp at first--the lights from the resort lit the ski trail I hiked up for a little while.  Even when the lights fell behind I hiked most of the way without a light, despite the moonless sky.  I had just enough light to see where I was going.  When I got to a weird dip in the trail, I turned on my light.  Only when I got to the less tracked trail near the end of my route did I leave the light on.

I heard birds singing beginning about 4:00.  The first I heard was a White Throated Sparrow, which is often the first bird I hear on these adventures.  By 4:30 the birds were singing like gangbusters.  Four of the target species (the ones I need to record) were singing by the second of five points.  These are White Throated Sparrow, Swainson's Thrush, Blackpol Warbler and Winter Wren. 

The key species is Bicknell's Thrush.  I heard this one at point three.  Just as I was pulling out my notebook and starting the ten minutes of observation, I heard one sing behind me.  Shortly after that I heard another one.  I have not often heard two singing at once and it was exciting. 

Hearing a little brown bird sing in the wee hours of the morning, with black flies beginning to buzz in one's ears in a soggy spot in the woods may not sound exciting to many, but for me it is one of the highlights of my year.  This bird is rare and only sings at certain hours in hard to reach places.  Hearing it sing gives me hope that we can keep the diversity of our world alive.  We haven't squashed it all yet.

I heard two more Bicknell's Thrush later on my route, so I heard four total.  Not bad for an early morning hike.  There were some additional protocols to observe this time around so I was up there for longer than I have been in the past.  That was OK by me.  I took my time hiking down, knowing I would stop for breakfast in Richmond before going home to say good morning to my family. 

By the time I did get home, about 9:00, I felt I had put in a full day.  And I still had most of it left.  That is the kind of day I like.  I even took a nap in the afternoon, so by the time evening came, I could call it good without being way too tired. 

That is, of course, pretty much what I'm talking about.  I already look forward to next year.

I have been thinking lately about politics.  OK, really I have been thinking about the "president."  If I were from somewhere else and were just learning about this guy, I would be asking, "Are you for real?  I mean, are you for real?"

Back in 2000 I thought that there was not possible way that this clown would get elected.  He was a doofus, presented himself poorly, was pompous, inarticulate and fumbling.  The US electorate could not be that stupid.  They just couldn't be.

So I was truly flabbergasted that he ended up in the White House.  Heck, I was shocked that so many people voted for him at all.  I would have been shocked if half as many people voted for him.  It made me feel a loss of hope, that we truly are a nation of idiots. 

When he got "re-elected" I was shocked again.  How could it be possible that we would make the same mistake again?  The guy is so clearly an idiot.  He has made such obviously poor decisions (can you say unprovoked war that turned out to be proven to be based on false assumptions?) that we would demand change, right?

Thank whatever and any god that may or may not exist that he will be out of there in several (too many) months.  I still can't figure this all out.  If Bill Clinton got impeached for lying about having an affair (duh!) why isn't this dolt impeached for lying about a war that has cost thousands of lives?  Are we for real?

So this next presidential election gives me cause for hope.  John McKain has supported his man, so he will so not get my vote.  But who knows?  I have no faith that we will do the right thing as a nation, even if it is painfully obvious. 

But I do have a little hope left.

The turkeys got into our garden again this morning.  The scarecrow didn't do enough, clearly.  I went out and offered them some ideas but they were not interested.

They ravaged the strawberries.  Once again we had a crop nearly ready and they got to them first.  The only consolation I might take is that they are getting some high quality food, even if they don't appreciate the sweet and tasty berries as much as I do.  I cannot, however, take that consolation.  They pick the berries, peck at them, and scatter them around.  They do not actually eat them.

They got into the corn seeds that I planted yesterday morning as well.  I couldn't tell how many they got and how many they missed.  But I used the rest of the seeds when I replanted from the first time they go to them. 

Tonight at about 8:00 they were out there again, not quite at the garden but considering it.  I left my little boy in the middle of a story to make sure they took flight into the trees.  I am not happy with them.  They are cool critters and I like to watch them, but not it is personal.  I want them gone.

I have even considered eating meat again so I can justify knocking them off and adding them to my dinner plate.  Really I want them to just go away, but that isn't likely.  I need to find a way to convince them not to come back.  That won't be easy.  They may be turkeys, but they ain't dumb.

For now I will try to wake early enough to wave them off.  These next few days I don't have time to do more, but after that I will.  I am losing sleep worrying about the bastards.  All I want to do is grow some food to eat.  And I don't mean for them to eat.  Unless I eat them after they eat what I grow. 

I am not ready to go quite that far yet.

I have been part of working the summer program for my students and other around the state.  This means some longer days than usual.  I wanted to run today so I got up early.

I rose at 5:00, put on short and a T-shirt and running shoes, and headed out.  After scaring the turkeys away, I ran down Leavensworth Road.

It was foggy and chilly (49 degrees) and it felt good to be out early.  This was the third day in a row I have run.  I need to cross my fingers that this muscle pull is healed.  I have taken lots of time off to heal and I am ready to get cracking again.

I need to take it slowly of course.  That isn't easy to do.  If I want to run fifty miles, however, I need to make sure I do not injure myself again.  I cannot afford more time off.  So I will run shorties this week and next (4-6 miles) with maybe a couple of longer runs in there. 

I saw a man running on the bike path as I drove in this morning.  His hair was gray and disappearing.  He was plodding along, not painfully but slowly.  I thought, "Holy crap, that's me!"  Oy.  Take it slowly?  I'm already slow.

I had my last official day of work for the school year and have a break for the summer.  This has not yet sunk in really.  In part this is because I still have some paperwork to do to wrap things up.  In part this is because I have some work commitments over the summer.

I will be at work next Thursday already.  Some break.  I have a good project to work on, however, so I am actually excited to take time for it. 

We head up to Montreal for a day next week for our first summer vacation adventure.  We will be there for Saint Jean Baptiste Day.  This is a province wide celebration that includes parades and music and so on.  We will head up to the Biodome, then take the Metro into the city and hopefully catch the parade.  I look forward to the kids seeing the city.

I have a list of things to do with some of the time I will have.  I have many house projects and gardening plans.  I also want to run a lot, and spend time with my family. 

It hasn't sunk in yet that I have a bunch of time off.  I look forward to getting rejuvenated, however.  When the fall kicks back in, I will have lots of energy to do a good job and to stay motivated for the year.  I am lucky to have this time.  I need to appreciate it and I need to take advantage of it. 

I think I'm up for it.

A bunch of years ago I got as a gift a Simpsons version of the classic Magic 8 Ball, you know, that large plastic 8 ball that offers answers to questions?  This one features Bart Simpson on it with classic Simpsons sayings for responses.

D'Oh!

Sure thing dude

And the like.

I was thinking I would sell it on eBay but I have been having a hard time figuring out how much it is worth.  The talking version of this toy is available but it is hard to find the standard version for sale.

Maybe it is rare and worth some serious cake.

Or maybe it isn't.

If you have some ideas for me, let me know.

That's what I was doing--watering the pepper plants I just transplanted when it started to rain.  I made sure they had enough since it seemed just a shower and then quit.

I planted a zucchini plant as well.  I figure one will be enough, at least to get started.  The corn hasn't come up yet and I fear how much the turkeys have eaten but it has only been five days, cool days at that.

I pruned tomato plants while I was out there, nipped the suckers as it were.  The ones I bought are growing like nuts while the ones I grew myself pretty much are dinky buggers.  I know this whole gardening thing is a learning experience but to have only a few of my tomato plants make it, and then to have them grow so slowly, well it bruises the old ego. 




The pumpkins and lettuce and carrots and spinach have all been doing well, as well as the pole beans, which have begun climbing the poles.  We will get some food from this garden thing.  I picked the rest of the spinach as it was beginning to bolt, and we will have lettuce with dinner tonight.  I picked a mini leek that was crowding another leek.  It tasted intensely good.

I still had dirt on it.  It doesn't get much fresher than that, especially in the fresh summer rain.

JUNE RAIN

The night is quiet
except for rain
sussurating
the meadow’s grass.

Rain taps
the bending blades,
loosing scents
of soil, of summer.

Through the window
I watch the gray
clouds, the dimness
soaking the landscape.

Through darkness
and rain fireflies
speak the silent
language of light.

Clouds and grass,
rain and light
compose themselves
into night

and it seems
I can hear each
drop landing.
I imagine them

meeting the earth,
each drop
bursting into
light. My eyes

listen to June
rain, to grass
waiting for day,
to insects seeking

other insects
who flash desire
to procreate
this summer night,

other insects
who flash desire
to co-create
this summer night. 

SNOW GUNS IN SUMMER

They tower over the trail,
silver pipes against the sky
like necks of geese
punctuating a field,
ready to dip their beaks
to rifle grass for seeds.

Late in fall they come alive,
hissing to or for the men
who buzz between them
to tend their pumps and hoses.
Their breath freezes in the cold,
drifting into piles of snow.

The snow is gone now,
shriveled by sun and flushed
from the mountain in emerald
streams. Blue flag and daisies
color the gaps between rocks
and raspberries. The snow guns

guard this still landscape,
sentries for bobcat, bear
and early morning moose.
At rare moments, a warbler rests
on one of their shoulders and sings
of southern lands where the sun

stays high all year. When noon
perches on the slopes’ eave,
the snow guns stand
silent, absorbing the songs
of birds and the odor of flowers,
storing them for darker days.

The season for this poem has passed, but it helps to remember the winter when the summer offers its warmth.

MARCH ASH

Ten below and two in the morning.
I stir the ashes in the woodstove.
Exposed coals wake and glow,
their light competing with the half moon.
The red embers clink and tick.

I place a log, wait for the whoosh
that says the fire’s drawing air.  I watch
the sky. How many times has the moon
waxed and waned? How many stars
shine only when the moon hides?

How many of us remember the stars
when the sun rouses the wind and tempts us
with scents of turned earth and lilacs?
Even the faintest stars send us
their light when the sun tops the mountains.

When the day warms and the sap rises,
when the owl has stopped its shadowed calling,
this fire will outshine stars. And now,
no longer waiting in its ashes, it sends
its small light into the night.

THE PLACE WHERE LOVE LIVES

In this place there is a small wind.
It rearranges dry leaves and covers

and uncovers objects resting in sand.
The sun is hot but there is shade.

In the shade it is cool and there is water
to drink. Flowers bloom in spring,

painting hidden corners. Some drop
petals after sweetening the air

under stars. Some become fruit,
stirred by bees to offer themselves.

This is not a lush garden. It is a spare
place where every beauty is

unveiled. In summer
there are storms, water

hammering the earth, moving stones.
In winter, wind gathers strength,

sculpting snow into new landscapes.
Sometimes you go there.

You remove your shoes and dip your hands
into puddles left after rain. You want

to stay but you are afraid.
You stare into your palms until you

remember you are not alone. You
stand, lock fingers and begin

walking the soft path
in the place where love lives.

The scarecrow seems to have worked on the turkeys.  They have not ravaged the garden since I put it up.  Of course, I go out and chase them into flight to the trees whenever I see them on the lawn.  But the crows took over.

Once the turkeys ate all the corn, I replanted.  It came up.  The turkeys stayed away.  I was hopeful.  But then the crows started eating the seedlings.  Not all at once, but after a couple of days, it has been whittled down to just a few plants.

The popcorn I planted a few days ago has not come up yet.  I put up a series of flags and reflectors to blow and move about so maybe the crows will stay away this time.  I have pretty much given up on the sweet corn.  There isn't even really enough left for good pollination.  Maybe next year.

The crows seem to want only the corn so far, but I can see them having an interest in the blueberries once those are ripe.  And they may find a taste for tomatoes.  So keeping them away will be key.  I am thinking of creating a huge scarecrow-ish art installation with waving and shining things all over it.  It would look cool and be functional.

I am not sure if I will get to that.  It depends on how desperate I get.  Last year we had no pests--no bugs, no critters, no fungus, not disease.  All grew well.  This year we also have cucumber beetles.  They are chowing the pumpkins and cucumbers.  I have crushed more than a few.

I blame the compost at this point.  It brought weeds galore and I think the beetles came with it as well.  And it wasn't even all that rich.  Last year's batch cost more but it was way worth the extra bucks.  You get what you pay for, as I have said before.

At least other things grow well.  That is power of diversity.  The watermelons may be a flop but the leeks and onions are cranking.  I see this as a lifetime experiment.  Every year I will learn more and put my learning to use for the following year.  As long as I get some good produce every summer, I will be happy.  I am in no rush.

I woke early this morning and decided to go for eleven miles.  Screw the sprained ankle and hope the muscle sprain doesn't come back, and go for it, that's what I said.  So I did.  It was relatively cool, with emphasis on the relatively.  Although the temperature was only about 70, a lot of sweat dripped off my head, what with the humidity at like 90%.

The deer flies found me early and then got thick about halfway through the run.  At first there were just a few.  I swatted at them and even squished a couple.  Once they got swarming, however, I had a hard time crunching them into silence.

They bite, that's the problem.  If they just flew around my head and buzzed, well, that wouldn't be too bad, but they manage to land on my shoulder occasionally and take a chomp.  That just gets me riled.  I waved my arms a lot.  In fact, I spent way too much energy waving my arms.  It was hot and it was early.  Why was I wasting my calories on bugs?

Once, while backpacking in the Adirondacks, I got really good at grabbing deer flies out of the air.  One would start sipping around my head and within a few minutes I would have it in hand, shake it around a bit, then toss it to the trail.  I had no such luck or skill today.

With three miles left a stiff wind came up and hit me just right and I lost the cluster of flies that had been annoying me.  I picked up a few when I entered the woods again, but it didn't last.  I ended the run bug free.  I also ended it pain free.  Now I am tired, but I had a good week.  As long as I can keep from injuring myself again, I have many more good weeks to come, flies or no.