Brrrrrr

Mysterious creature at Big Tree

While the ranger was taking the measurements of our Eastern White pine, I was looking around at some interesting footprints in the snow. Unfortunately my camera battery died so I was not able to get a photo of the prints.

However, they were a mystery to me and the ranger, though he did speculate. He said they weren't big enough for a bear. That's good I thought, so I suggested it might be a bobcat. He didn't think so. He said, "Maybe a coyote."

After he finished with the tree statistics, we looked at the prints more closely. They were about 4 inches across and the steps were close together. I'm thinking a coyote would have longer strides. He concluded it wasn't making deep tracks, so it wouldn't weigh much.

The word wolverine did come up, but not knowing what a wolverine was, I didn't exactly get excited. The ranger only mentioned that it might be.

We didn't dwell on the tracks long and I was anxious to get home so he could add up his numbers for our tree. Later, I wished I had taken actual measurements of the prints, stride and looked at front and back foot differences. My hind sight has always been 100 percent.

I looked up wolverine on the internet and chose not to believe that's what we have living around our tree. He did have steps leading from the right and left sides of the tree. And, wolverines do like to wander about in the snow.

Tom assures me they don't attack people, but they are vicious and have many names such as devil of the woods, skunk bear and others.

While I was waiting on the ranger, I heard a strange knocking sound coming from the area of the tree. It was a bit spooky and I moved around to see if the wind was making some of the limbs knock together. I didn't see anything.

There is a pile of brush in the gully at the base of the tree. Is this where my creature lives? Was he warning me away from his home? I don't think I will be taking a moonlight walk anytime soon down to my tree alone or otherwise.

Big White PIne

Our big tree being measured for the register of big trees in Maine.

Forest Ranger Merrill Ring arrived at our house this morning in 9 degree temperatures to officially measure our "big tree".

It is a mile round trip, the snow was two feet deep and I followed him all the way to the tree. He had to officially measure what Molly and Beth had measured in December.

At the end of December, Molly and Beth came over and we hiked on snow shoes to measure our big white pine. I had seen an article in the paper where you could register your tree if you thought it could make the register of big trees in Maine, but it had to be done by December 30th.

Armed with a 20 foot tape measure and a 12 inch ruler, we set out to make history. Snow shoes are okay for walking, but try walking around this tree to measure the circumference when the back side is a gully, especially when the tree is 20 feet around. Molly was a good trooper and she and Beth measured it at 20 feet. The ranger got 19.5.

Then we had to measure the crown. How in the world can this be done.? Molly said, "Grandmom, you stand under where the limbs reach out on one side and I'll go on the other." This distance had to be measured. Again Beth and Molly mastered the gully. Would you believe in this crude manner we got a crown of 73 feet and the ranger got 68.6? Again, a plus for the ladies.

The ruler did not give us a fair way to measure the height of the tree as we couldn't get far enough away, so we missed it quite a bit. We over estimated!!!! Anyway the ranger got 112 feet. Using a formula of adding the inches in circumference, to the height of the tree and a quarter of the crown, we had 362 points. The Champion white pine in Maine has 379 points and the ranger actually thinks it died.

So where does that leave us? As soon as Augusta confirms the figures, we may have the largest white pine in Maine sitting right here on Postlude Farms in Sumner, Maine.

My Swap Shop

I've written a little about my dump Swap Shop, but feel I have to say more about the people involved with the shop and show you some pictures.

We had a shoe rack that we moved about daily and in the summer we put it outside leaning against the container. Today my carpenter angel came in and said, I have a solution for that shoe rack. This angel has already built all the shelves, an outside shed, installed the lights and everything else we needed. I followed him into the bookstore shop where he said, "I can put this on the back of the container door and it will be out of the way." I said, "Go for it."

He went to work and a few minutes later he had the rack securely fastened to the container door. Now no more leaning it against the books so people have to look through it to find their book choice.

I have three workers who want certain hours EVERY week. I have someone to open every Wednesday and another to open every Saturday. I have another helper who wants to close every Saturday.

Keep in mind that today's high was 22 degrees.

The town has recently added power so we have lights and heaters. In an open container the heaters are mainly for sitting down close to and getting your feet and hands warm. We have added a hot pot and have instant tea and coffee for the volunteers.

These people have faithfully weighed each item going out on our scales and for the year 2008, we kept 40,000 pounds of usuable items out of the waste stream in the Transfer Station.

Here is a shot inside the forty foot container.

That's enough for today, but I will blog again to tell you some heartwarming dump stories from the "Dump Diva".

Christmas 2008

Christmas 2008

Christmas day was very special as I got to cook Christmas dinner for part of the family for the first time in ages. What a blessing to have Beth and all of her family that was around for the day. Sara is of course doing her duty in the Peace Corps in Macedonia and Ethan and Ann were with her parents in Kentucky. That left Molly and Archie to hold down the fort.

We expected to be picking up Charles and his family at the airport tonight, but at the last minute as they were about to board the plane, it was discovered that Luz Maria and Ignacio's visas were not in order. What a disappointment for all of us. But with some last minute planning it was decided that all, including Peter, who was supposed to come from Indiana would meet here during Peter's spring break in March. It looks like the tree and house decorations will need dusting a few times before March, but they will stay put. I managed to freeze most of the food for their visit. Tom and I will just eat the rest.

Beth, Molly and Archie came over yesterday to clean the house so it would be nice for our Chilean family. Now I have a clean house to look at.

We did have a white Christmas and we actually made it to our church Christmas Eve Program. It was getting home that was scary. The roads were covered in black ice and Tom drove about 5 miles an hour. When we finally did get home, the usual 15 minute trip took nearly an hour. We had two calls from Pastor asking us to call as soon as we got in as they were so worried about the roads. Praise God everyone got home. The Congo church canceled their program, but God was with us.

We have had very cold weather, but Beth, Molly and I walked all the way to our large pine tree beyond the cabin. We have submitted it's statistics to the State of Maine so maybe it will get in the register of large trees.

Ice Storm December 2008

I"m sure you've heard the news about the ice storm to hit New England last Friday night. Actually, our town was spared the worst. We lost power around 3 in the morning Friday night . Our outside generator clicked on and we were happy, momentarily. Then I realized that though the generator was running, I still didn't see my clock, night nights, etc. I nudged Tom and said, we aren't getting any power.

He dutifully got up, found a flashlight (which should have been by our bed, but wasn't) and made his way to the basement to look at the breaker box. Everything looked okay at that end. He knew there was also a breaker on the generator, but in order to get to it, he had to go outside in the freezing rain and that meant getting dressed.

I watched him from the front until he was around the corner, then went to the guest bedroom where I could look out the window. He was still standing. He clicked the switch and didn't think anything happened. I'm relaying info through the winter sealed window, but he doesn't have on his ears. Finally I got the message through that we had power.

He climbed back in bed and we slept snugly knowing the house would stay warm. (That is if you consider my 60 degree setting warm.) We got power around 9 the next morning. We were the lucky ones.

South of Portland had the worst storm they could remember. Over 200,000 people were without power. Tom was called on Saturday to go and relieve Emergency workers who had been working shelters and phones since Friday night. He was picked up at 4 pm by two other emergency workers and they drove to York County. They worked all night answering emergency calls and he got home around 9 Sunday morning. This gave him just enough time to get a nap before our two Cantata performances Sunday afternoon and evening.

Here is a photo of our birch tree by the driveway. He had to cut one tree out of the driveway, but all of these limbs straightened right up the next day.

Cold weather has come

Yes, cold weather has arrived in Maine and I believe this is the coldest we have seen in a December since we have been living here which is now 10 years. We had wind chill of 20 below this morning with a reading of 4 on the thermometer. I just looked out and noticed that it was already 4 degrees. This prompted me to bring a few orchids into the house from the sun porch. I believe tomorrow will be devoted to bringing in most of the warmer loving orchids.

I have finally recovered from my interesting Sunday. After reading over that blog I realized I never identified my new 93 year old friend's instrument. It was a stand up bass, and that was why I was worried about him getting tired. I hope he has as fond a memory of last night as I do.
I don't know where he played in his younger days, but that would be an interesting story to find out. I don't think he can communicate that to me, but I'm sure a relative can.

Pete is in an assisted living apartment in a nursing home. I plan to arrange to go over one day and play with him at the home. According to his sitter, he has stacks of music. I know he doesn't read music, but maybe he did when he was younger. Anyway, we shall see if we can liven up that place one day!!!