Is it Autumn Or Is it Summer?

There are admittedly signs of autumn around – like the few trees which have changed colours out here, but prevailing temperatures are not supporting the idea of an ending summer. Ever since we moved to this island, and ever since we have lived ANYWHERE else we have never been able to enjoy such a warm and nice October month. We are having lunch and supper out on the porch and around noon time it was so hot in the sun that Bea got our RV-shade out and hung it up on the porch roof, making it much more comfortable to sit outside. Even after supper we were able to sit outside, until the sun was hanging out west over the city of Eastport. The only time it is a bit cooler than say in August, are the mornings. That is when I am running our 50-Dollar heating system. This house is equipped with an electric forced air furnace which I hate by two reasons:  1. It is way too expensive to run. 2. It provides a steady swing in temperatures from too hot to too chilly and it has me running to adjust the d**n thermostat every now and then. So I decided  that it was time for a change, and I went with a 50-Dollar  system. Alright, it is not for everybody and I hadn’t really planned it that way. But co-incidents sometimes seem to help. It was well a month ago that a neighbour had put a wood burning stove out by the wayside and he was about to poke out the firebricks. I found that a rather foolish business and promised to pay 50 Bucks for the thing, provided the firebricks would stay in the oven. The deal was accepted and said neighbour helped me with his twin-wheel dolly to bring the heavy sucker the 50 yards or so to our house. We managed to slide it down the outside access stairwell and over the next few days I connected it to our brick chimney positioned right beside that electrical furnace.  I was lucky enough to find a 6” stove pipe in the woods, fully usable and after I had some firewood down the same stairwell I was in business. Right over top of that stove runs the forced air duct. The heat from my stove transfers into the air duct and meanders nicely up through the vents. More importantly, it warms up the chimney which passes right through the center of the house and on top of it all, it warms up our floors. Ever since I have installed that stove we have a constantly and evenly warmed up house. yet another bonus is the now dry-as-a-bone basement. All humidity has vanished. Sure, we need to feed that stove with firewood, but so far that has happened only a few times during the morning hours. Also we have no dirt in our living room or the kitchen, as all firewood is brought into the basement from the outside. Today I made myself an errand across the border to buy a bread at “Martha’s” but was met with a “CLOSED” at the door. Her store will stay closed until October 24 which will be a sad time for us as we will have to make do with the bread we can find at the local grocery store. I also stopped by the local car repair shop and finally got myself a new battery for the FORD LTD and hopefully will be quit all starting troubles with that. When crossing back across the bridge I saw the 3 U.S. border officers standing on the bridge looking across the Narrows and over to the Canadian side. What was going on out there? I could see a green fishing vessel being close to the shore at Mulholland Point, and there were several cars parked by the lighthouse. After passing the Canada Customs I had to investigate and swooped down to the lighthouse. Well, you will remember I talked about that car in the water yesterday?  Today they were about to pull it out. It was low tide, and they had brought a tractor down to the beach. From the green fishing vessel a small boat had been dispatched. The guys had tied a rope (not a cable) to the red minivan and were now pulling the car around. It was a hard go as the thing seemed to be stuck in the muddy ground. They had also tied a big yellow buoy to the car. The rope tightened so I’m sure one could have played it as a guitar and….finally snapped. Of course I didn’t have our camera with me so no pictures of it here, but I had seen enough and proceeded home. When I got home I saw Bea working behind a heap of branches on the lawn. That girl had started a radical pruning action on our front yard apple tree. I went about the task helping her and cut down a few more branches with the chainsaw. Pictures of that adventure can also be seen on her blog “Dinner for two”. There was a lot of wood in those branches which I cut up into handy small pieces and fed it down the stairwell into the basement where I’ll stack it until it is dry enough to burn. It filled an entire wheelbarrow. Thanks for stopping by again!