"More than one more thing"

From the Phillipston OntheCommon.com blog: "More than one more thing"

OntheCommon.com - A place for everything

I thought that I did pretty well, dropping that dead gray birch about 18" from the boathouse....

Summer morning on the lake

From OnTheCommon.com

...
The water skiers and other powered folks were out. We had our time. They have theirs. Our parents tried to teach to share. The lesson about sharing is not just giving up part of the whole, but knowing that you'll get your fair portion as well.

OntheCommon.com - not even for ducks

OntheCommon.com: "Around six in the morning, you can hear the planes as start to follow Route 2 on their approach to Logan Airport. On Sunday morning, we couldn't see them, though. We couldn't even see Queen Lake's other shore, the fog was so thick."

We got a gadget

That sound that you hear is Huck scratching his head, wondering what his camp has come to.

The gadget is a MiFi™2200 Intelligent Mobile Hotspot, a personal wifi hotspot that connects to VerizonWireless's network, giving you, at best, speeds comparable to DSL.
So, no wires (phone line or cable), and Internet at decent speeds out here at the end of a dirt road, a road deep with puddles from last night's rain and yesterday's rain and rain that we haven't seen since the time of Noah.
But, we got the Intertubes.

The nuts don't fall far from the tree

You'd think that TV at the camp wasn't that important, that with deep woods behind us and a beautiful lake in front, we wouldn't need or want TV. That's what you think....

From OntheCommon.com - "The nuts don't fall far from the tree":

Queen Lake Association 2009 Annual Meeting

It's the Saturday after Independence Day and so it's the day for the annual meeting of the Queen Lake Association....

From OnTheCommon.com

Summertime sauna

So, we're back home after a trip to Finland. (I've been writing about our trip in my other blog. You can find links to the reports here.)
We went to sauna at various hotels and enjoyed the experience. The saunas had electric stoves and you cooled off with showers rather than a jump in the lake. Nevertheless, it was good.
Not as good, however, as being back at Queen Lake with a wood-fired sauna and a fresh lake.
The heavy rains and cool temperatures have kept the lake refreshing.
Here we could wait until sunset before going to sauna. In Finland, particularly in the north, that really isn't an option. During Midsummer in Finland, there isn't darkness.
And, after sauna, we get to sit on bench, watch and listen to the planes on their way back to Boston ("Someone's going home.), watch those cute brown birds swoop across the water, feasting on the plentiful mosquitoes,and be still, sometimes talking, sometimes. not.

Queen Lake Sunset

EEB sent us this photo:

The noises of coming to life

Across the lake, you can hear the small chainsaws with dull chains laboring mightily amid the continued cleanup from the ice storm. We've not yet toured the lake, but a neighbor reported that the west side was much harder hit. From another camp comes the sound of a circular saw, cutting lumber as a part of the season's repairs and improvements.
We're making good progress. Last week, Mike and Joe cut up and cleared the fallen trees that were blocking our driveway. We then spent a couple of hours clearing away the brush, leaves, and other winter debris.
This weekend, we turned on the water and cleaned up some more, inside and out. Sandra got a new power blower for Mother's Day, giving us one more tool tool to move stuff from this side of the yard to that.
It usually takes us until Memorial Day weekend to get the place ready, so we're right on schedule.

---

By the way, I'm writing a more-or-less weekly blog at the Telegram and Gazette's OnTheCommon.com site. The blog entries cover both Holden and Phillipston. My most recent post about Queen Lake is here.

There's work to be done

The camp survived the ice storm in good shape, but there are quite few trees down and some more that are nearly so. It'll be a busy spring.
Once the road dries out a bit, we'll need to bring in some professionals to do much of the cutting.

From Worcester T&G: Break-ins reported at Queen Lake

The Worcester Telegram and Gazette reports in their April 11, 2009 edition that police are investigating a series of break-ins at Queen Lake:

Thieves hit camps near Queen Lake
PHILLIPSTON — Police are investigating thefts that occurred last week at seasonal camps near Queen Lake in the area of Scout Rock and Lighthouse roads.

Thieves forced open locks on outbuildings and tried to break into one of the camps. An all-terrain vehicle was recently taken from a camp on the Spa Road end of Burma Road. Meanwhile, police are investigating the theft of two chain saws that occurred sometime in the past two weeks at a Brooks Village house. Thieves got in through a workshop at the back of the house.

Police are asking anyone with information regarding any of the thefts to contact the Phillipston Police Department at (978) 249-3560 or police@Phillipston-ma.gov.

Winter storms

In all, we fared pretty well. There were a few trees and a lot of branches down around the camp, but no damage.

Through it all, we have to give Verizon a lot of credit. Even though electric service is still out on our side of the lake, the phone still works.

We did see a new Cove Monster fall down and try to rise up from the frozen waters:

Even after some really harsh and cold weather, the ice is only about 3-4" thick and many places are slushy beneath the recent snowfall.
So, the winter of 2008-9 has given us several good kicks. The National Weather Service is suggesting, in their long-range outlook, that we'll be colder than normal with above average precipitation. In a word, yikes.

Dirty hands, clean heart

So, I finally found the replacement adapter for the sauna stove pipe. It took just a few mnutes to connect the new piece to the old pipe. I lit a small fire to check for leaks and found none.
Any project with stove pipe is dirty work. The rust and soot get on everything. As I was washing up I remembered that I'd not seen an ad for Lava soap in a long time. I guess people dont get their hands dirty like they used to.
---
Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

Watching the steam rise from the water

The temperature is 38. I'm sure that we would have had a frost last night if it wasn't for the relatvely warm lake nearby. Our wood stove, made from an an old barrel, heats the room quickly. The sun will be up over the trees soon, bringing even more warmth. Nevertheless, we're at the end of summer and that means we're getting chilly.
---
Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

Justifying another barrel of scraps

The last couple of times we had sauna, we noticed that we could see the fire through holes in the stove pipe. The metal had rusted away and fell apart to the touch.
I went to a half dozen stores looking for the right replacement sections and couldn't find the one that I needed.
Fortunmately, in the corner of the boathouse there is an old barrel filled with odd pieces of stovepipe I picked some of the oddest and was able to get a working configuration. We'll give a try this evening.
---
Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

Red leaves and blue berries

Even as we take the turn into September, this year's bountiful crop of berries just won't quit. In a quick few minutes, we picked a quart, enough for breakfast, lunch, and snacks. The neighbors report more than 40 quarts for the season, not a record, but a mighty haul all the same.
The wind is strong from the northwest and the angle of the sun has dropped behind the trees in the afternoon. The sunlight is still warm, but the air and light and colors tell us that we're late in the season. It's been a good one, one of the best.
---
Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

Deer flies pose nuisance to berry- and mushroom pickers

The Helsingin Sanomat - International Edition reports what New England berry-pickers have also discovered: deer flies are tenacious little critters that bite hard and can make you take the Lord's name in vain.

Nearing the end of the blueberry season

If we were to get only the blueberries that I picked this morning (a pint in a half hour), in most years, we'd have called it a good crop. As it is, we're nearing the end of a bountiful season. Today, we're picking single blueberries, not the clusters that look like bunches of grapes. Sometimes, you can't even see the berries at first. You have to let your eyes relax, as though you're looking at a Where's Waldo? scene. Then, they appear, sweet and dark and fresh.
---
Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

A quiet day amid the thunder

The thunderstorms went to the north and south of us with only brief bursts of rain. It was just enough to keep us indoors, talking, reading newspapers.
Lily spent a couple of nights with us. On Thursday, we saw a fun show, High School Musical, at the Mount Wachusett theater. Yesterday, we brought carrots to the neighbors' pony and goats, swam with and without Marley, and dined on sweet corn and pie. We brought Lily to Northampton this morning, where we met her mom for breakfast.
There's a lot of bouhaha about this weekend's sales tax holiday. We came home, feeling a bit unpatriotic, having bought just a small can of paint and a couple of odds and ends. It's good to be in a place in our lives where we don't need much more stuff. If anything, we need less. I think that the government should give us a tax refund for the stuff we get rid of.
---
Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry