HALLOWEEN

BOO:   Well the kiddies that came around tonight got soaked, it has rained, wind, more rain and tonight we have a severe wind watch posted with 25 to 35 MPH winds and possible winds gusts of 50 MPH !!!
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We are in our Own House for Halloween this year !    We enjoyed the evening, the kids came and came, Deferiet has maybe 25 kids,  we had about 60+ Kids tonight !
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Tomorrow, November 1st in my "Honeys" Birthday !
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FACE BOOK WILL NOT ALLOW ME TO POST PICTURES !
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DON'T FORGET, REMEMBER OUR VETERANS !

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Projects getting done

Had to do some cement patching on this house before winter as in the spring I will do some major cement work, I like Cement Work !
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I patched under the cellar window where the Stucco came off and loosened up !

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I had to replace this end of the floor beam with a concrete patch till I can replace it next summer !

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This will stop the wind and SNOW from blowing into the garage under the door.

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As an "Old Chief" in the Navy told me, "Woods; You need to get your S#!+ Squared away",  I laugh while puttering in the Garage as I can still hear Chief Weary while enjoying this cup of Joe !!!

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The Starboard Bow is squared away and Shipshape !

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The Port Bow is Squared away !

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Squared away from Bow to Stern and ready for a "Shake Down Cruise"  !!!

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"Bravo-Zulu" as Old Betsy is now able to be berthed inside for the upcoming Foul Weather !!

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Moving onto the next Project was getting a cover for over the Bird Platform feeder !  I am only allowed on a ladder if My Honey is close by and she was !!

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The Topside of the Feeder is a piece of Clear Plastic to keep rain, hail and snow off some of the bird seed, some birds like to dig for the seeds,  on the Windward side I also have a piece of clear plastic !

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We took a nice walk and right over my Honey's left shoulder is our House and Garage !  This is the lawn behind all our houses which belonged to St. Regis Paper Mill which closed and left Deferiet ! This is mowed by the Village in the summer !

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Don't forget, Remember our Vets !

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Visiting

Tonight myself and a friend of mine who is a retired Music Teacher went and visited a Senior Citizen Housing complex, there are 24 apartments and mostly Seniors who live there !
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We have played together before and have a great time, he is a few years younger than I am,   as a joke I made up a poster and called us Howard and Andy !  

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We played for an hour or so and we had a lot of the residents joining in with us on singing and having a good time!!  They have never had a group or anyone come in and entertain them before and this was a first for them and they really enjoyed it !  They asked us to come back as often as we wanted to.

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It was nice entertaining here and also a lot of fun and seeing it was well attended !

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We met some Veterans tonight, we should never forget our Vets !

Puttering

This was a "Putter" day !   We got up early, Had Prayer, coffee and off early to Wally World, I needed a "Shop Vac"", I had one but when we sold the house next door I also sold the shop vac, didn't need it in Senior Citizen Housing!!  It was busy at Wally World and only 2 registers open and but a nice lady opened up and we breezed right thru !

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Due to weight restrictions and limitations on lifting I had to settle for a smaller shop vac,  I got a 3HP, 3 gallon and not the big heavy 6HP 5 gallon ! I had to put some items together and worked on it in the basement!

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We went for a walk this morning and went down the street and to the river !

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This is the entrance to our "Village",  My daughter used to live here and she donated her time to plant, mow and upkeep the Village sign when they lived on Riverside Drive !

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This is the path to the Black River which is just past the trees, I didn't walk down due to the hill and the steepness of having to come back up!

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My Honey on our walk !!!

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I am using this more but have to wait till I get a clearance from the Doctor to increase my Heart Rate, I work it up to 100 Beats Per Minute now and have some Angina so will need to have it checked !

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I have gotten the shelves sorted and am starting to stock up the winter larder in case we are stuck inside for a storm or 2,  the Generator now comes on once a week and runs smoothly so we will have electric in case of a power outage.

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Don't forget our Vets !

Sunday Feast

We have my mother in law fairly settled in after moving her up here from Florida and getting her into Senior Housing.  Nice apartment, quiet and country setting !    Today after church we went up to cook Lebanese food.  My Mother in law, Irene is Irish, her Husband, Libnan was Lebanese, spoke Lebanese and she had to learn to cook Lebanese!

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My job is to cut up the lamb into small pieces, I started with a 3 pound leg of lamb, I have to be    careful not get anything into the meat but I like my "(MALOOF) or *(MISHI) on the moist side.  So I sneak in some small pieces of it into it while   trimming up the bone, I am holding up the bone, all trimmed off but saved.

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My Mother in Law Irene and My Honey Anna Mae making *Maloof or *Mishi,  a large cabbage is boiled and the leaves are peeled off as it boiled and set aside to cool,  a bowl of dry uncooked rice, cinnamon, allspice, cumin, marjoram are mixed and added to the cut up lamb,  next the tomato paste, tomato sauce and diced tomatoes are added, this mixture is rolled up into the cooled cabbage leaf.   Sounds like "Pigs in a Blanket" but my mother in law adds some other spices to it !.

The rolled up leaves are placed in a large kettle which had the lamb bones on the bottom, when full of rolls a can of tomatoes and is added with some more allspice and cinnamon and set on to slowly boil and cook !  It takes about 3 hours to cut meat, boil cabbage and mix and roll,  We used cabbage but in the late spring we get Grape Leaves and use them to make Stuffed Grape Leaves which is the real * MALOOF !

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The finished product,  a side of seasoned green beans and a chunk of *(MAROOK) flat bread the meal is complete!.

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For desert we had Baklava with fresh Honey.   A great meal !!!!   Great Day !

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Don't forget, Veterans Day s fast approachng!   Remember our Vets, Past and Present !

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Sunshine and cool

Sunshine and outside we went, things need doing and out we went.

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My Honey trimmed up the "Dead Heads" off the Mums, picked off and cleaned out her St. Francis Garden !

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I cut down and pulled the Morning Glory Vines, Frost got them pretty hard several times so there done !  Put away chairs and odds and ends into the Garden Shed !.

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Weeds, dead flowers and Morning glory vines all being composted at the Village compost pile !

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One of then ice things about being back to owning a home is "Decorating", We are getting ready for Halloween, My Honey is the one on the far right !

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The leaves are at or past peak,  lawn mowed, cleaned up for winter !

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Another nice day in Deferiet !

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Don't forget, Remember our Vets !

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Wet and Dreary

And the rains keep coming, we are getting hammered with more rain than wind, it is slowly tapering off at 6PM.
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last night before dark we had 2 1/2 inches of rain and it rained all night,  we now have almost 4 inches of rain, it is damp and cold ! 

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The "Swamps" are filling up,  There is an Old saying My Honey says, my Dad said and Grampa says "Snow comes after the Swamps get full" and right now the swamps are full of water and mud, and tonight they forecast Snow in the upper Adirondacks about 3 hours from here !

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There is still lots of leaves on the trees and not a lot of leaves have fallen off,  It is almost Deer Season here and hopefully there will be some winds to knock the leaves off  ! 

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With all the rain I have been down in the basement checking the walls, so far so good, no water coming in as I need to put up rain gutters to divert the water away from the house ! Above we currently have it shallow ditched to divert it away and as you can see there is lots of running water coming down off the roof !

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Looking out the front window there is a lot of running water going down the street, one nice thing is we are elevated on the street !

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Time for another Patrol of the Garage, Garden Shed, Basement to check things out, I need to move and get the circulation going, got my trusty flash light to see by, My Honey is using the exercise room we are setting set up now !

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Remember our Veterans !

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Stormy

It is Storming, we are getting some Rain, wind and it is going to get worse tomorrow!!

We went for a ride this morning, it was sunny and clear, we came upon this huge flock of Canadian Geese resting this morning up in New Breman.

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As far upstream as you could see they were geese, they were not afraid as we drove down to the beach area and they were Mallard Ducks there also lots of color on the trees !

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The geese must of been feeding as we could see more geese coming in to land and we were lucky to be so close !

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These were right over our head and very noisey,  They are pretty but they are messy !

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Coming home before the rain, this was the mirror like view of the Black River, the panoramic setting on this phone is crappy !

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From sunshine to clouds coming in from the south west, they moved quickly,.

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The front window pane, weatherman said maybe a couple inches of rain between tonight and tomorrow !

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Off the back deck it was really pouring for a while but let up !

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This wind and rain will really knock down the leaves ! 

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Stay warm and Dry, Don't forget our Vets !

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Returning to normal

Well, things are returning to normal, we had a couple medical issues to take care of and we did, trip to the Emergency Room for My Honey, Blood Pressure went whacky and some breathing issues, Cardioligist changed her meds and we will see, so far so good,   I had some Issues also,  overdid it !  We have both just been laying low and doing nothing major !
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We went back to watching the Birds at the feeders!    I was busy and made a new platform feeder and did some overhead lighting changes in the basement going from floresecent 4 foot lights to the new 4 foot LED, WOW, what a difference, I went from 3 of the 4 foot lights to just 1!
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The rear deck had the flooring tightened down with some 3 inch screws and the spindles tightened up and I put up the platform feeder My Honey wanted !

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I attached the Platform feeder to the top railing of the deck and you can see the yellow feeder and suet feeder behind, feeder has thistle, cracked corn and sunflower, saffron and some millet seeds.

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This is our Fall view of the woods behind the house looking north from our deck !

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3 Blue Jays come in and scare other feeders away from the feeder, we have watched a blue jay attack and kill a smaller sparrow once and could not believe how viscious they were !

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We finally have seen a "Nuthatch"  at the feeder, we have not seen one here at the new house till yesterday morning !

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There is a pair of "Flickers" here that come in under the feeder looking for bugs and worms, they are a member of the "Woodpecker" family !

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We have about 2 dozen Sparrows that visit, the one shown in the front is "Tiny Tim" !  We call him this as he has a broken eg, either from a crash or bad landing, he is calmer than the other birds,  he gets in the feeder and just lays down and eats!

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There are about 2 dozen "Sparrows" here and they are hungry eaters !

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I caught "Tiny Tim" flying away from the feeder, here you can see his left leg as it hangs and the right leg is tucked up !!!!

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AND, any feeder would not be complete without a Chipmunk or Squirrel, well, here is "Charlie Chipmunk" stuffed cheeks in all !

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Getting things done for "Fall" as we are now "Home Owners" and we love it, just have to earn to slow down !

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Don't forget our Vets !