August 20 – August 23, 2010

Friday: 12:30 marked the time we finally got to O’Wich with only stopping for gas – I am ready for cliffhanger Friday episodes of OLTL and GH. I got in a short nap and then we headed out to shop. I went to Wal-Mart to pick up stuff for the outing tomorrow and a pocket size camera while Carlo went to the grocery store for beer, wine and roasted chickens. Divide and conquer! Within the hour, the heat and the humidity, we headed back to O’Wich with the only double purchase being ice cream! Not a bad choice for doubling up on! I cleaned the chicken and it rained…no it poured for an hour, with lots of thunder and weather warnings…again?! We watched TV and hit the sack. It’s so hard to concentrate when I’m tired!

Saturday: I believe we slept through the rest of the storms and glad to have missed them. We were up by 7:30. I had coffee and set up my new camera ~ did I mention it is blue with a matching case??!! Carlo went for ice and I enjoyed a burger from last week. Carlo had one yesterday but today he described it as; “like a meatball or a meatloaf. They're too thick.” Of course it reminded me of my parent’s grilled burgers and it is a known fact that the Listermann family is a bunch of carnivores! Best burger ever – secret ingredients: grated onion (Karen) and A-1 (me). We are taking Chicken Rollers to Debbie and John’s and if “the sun comes up and dries up all the rain,” they are going to take us on a pontoon ride on Jordan Lake along with Carol and Phil. I really hope the sun comes up – don’t care if it dries anything out – just comes up! Carlo fogged in hopes of keeping the heavily populated mosquitoes at bay since they are up 800 times from last year…no lie! We made our rollers and headed out by 12:45. We had a great visit and went on the boat tour. It was overcast but comfortable. After the cruise, we munched on appetizers, visited some more and had a tasty BBQ. We had a very nice afternoon and headed back around 7:00.When we hit O, we were blocked from our travels by a group of Guinea Hens that escaped from their coop. We offered to help the owners corral them but they were just about under control by then. Our evening was filled with peace and quiet and we were exhausted from all of the fresh air. Say goodnight Gracie…g’night, Gracie! Who's Gracie?

Sunday: At 6:00 it finally was down to 64 degrees outside. The tops of the trees were covered with fog – as was the river and it had an eerie look to it. Now add the noises that sound like “caw, caw, caw” – which were coming from somewhere along the river, and you’ve got yourself the setting of an Alfred Hitchcock flick!

We haven’t seen much wildlife this weekend other than a few hummingbirds. Even the bird feeders are in tact and not yet “wiped out.” We put some scraps by the trunk and the only things missing are the cherry tomatoes. We even put the treats in a handy traveling tray for the convenience of our patrons!

After napping the morning away, we went to find An Siope Eire – it’s an Irish shop in Portage…or so we thought. We followed the given directions and ended up in a residential area with only houses. Since that was a bust, we went to Do It Best for seed and then stopped for corn and tomatoes. When we got back we ate corn and tomato sandwiches…fantastic! We delivered a tray of rollers to Carla and Tony and saw the changes made to the ‘once was Rick’s place.’ After a short visit there, we headed to visit Betty and Paul. They gave us some garden goodies and then we went back to the cabin for some UN-people time and bottle of Arbor Mist. By 8:00, we were hungry and Carlo ran for a Bud’s special. Can’t believe it’s already time to pack up to head home in the morning. At least we’ll be back on Saturday and hopefully the heat, humidity and mosquitoes will be gone or down so we can get some outside work done!

Monday: We started the day off with a lazy morning watching a woodchuck hit the feed pile. Then we got busy fixing the windows, cleaning and getting things into the shed so we could head home. F-I-V-E more days!