At last, a night at the cabin

Believe me, the cabin is no place for the faint-of-heart. A tree-frog was hanging on the door as I unlocked it.

The cabin has been deserted awhile, so I guess I shouldn't have been surprised at the bug casings and actual dead bugs I found. This is a sticky-trap; I put these out for mice, but I've only gotten one mouse with them. I do think, if you click on the picture to enlarge it, you can see the remains of a tiny skink, though. That's a shame, because I like skinks. Not in my bed, of course.

Nor should I have been shocked when a fat mouse jumped out of the mouse-bait box atop my books and ran straight up the wall.

I put a new box of mouse-poison out and started sweeping.

Then I cut my lawn which, as you can see, was overgrown.

These are my lawn-mowing tools at the cabin.

I've had "Pillars of the Earth" laying by my chair here at the house for a long time, but the size of it is so daunting I've barely made a dent in it. So I spent a couple of hours reading in my lounge chair behind the cabin.

Getting wood for my campfire, I found this interesting bug, over an inch long; I haven't decided whether those are actually his eyes, or some sort of camouflage to keep people from seeing his real eyes. He really didn't appreciate having his stick of wood thrown onto the fire.

Sadie normally won't go within ten feet of a fire; smoke makes her sneeze. But she spent a half-hour digging around a big rock at my campfire, so I finally lifted it up a little and some tiny creature the size of a mouse (maybe it was a mouse) took off with unbelievable speed. Sadie was in hot pursuit, but of course he got away.

I used to be able to get a good look at the sunset through these trees, but they've gotten so big you have to work at seeing it now. I also used to have a view of the river bottom, but the trees grew up and took that away. I don't mind, because I have a wonderful view of the sunset from my yard, these days.

I enjoyed my fire until 9:30 or so; then Sadie and I went to bed; we heard thunder approaching. I love being at the cabin when it's storming.

I used to go to the cabin to get away from the crowd up here; it seemed as though people were constantly in my face. I couldn't step outside my door without some kid making a comment about where I was going or what I was doing. I also went back for the peace and quiet: the old two-story house sits right on the gravel road. We have kids riding noisy four-wheelers back and forth constantly, stirring up dust; and neighbors who don't believe in having mufflers on their cars.

Since we moved back away from the road, all that is a thing of the past, and I no longer need the cabin. I've thought about having Cliff do away with it, but after last night, I've decided it's a nice thing to have, and it isn't hurting anything back there. If nothing else, it's a nice place for bugs and mice to get out of the weather.

Cliff has always told me, "The mice were there first; you chose to go sleep in their domain."

And of course, he's right. That doesn't keep me from putting out poison, though.