Beautiful but chilly day today. About -10 Fahrenheit this morning.… Not so cold for here… But the first real winter temperatures.… It was sunny and bright so we decided to go out anyway.… The air it warmed up to the low teens so why not. We headed up to catamount Trail. We ended up walking the first couple of miles because the snow was so packed and we didn’t need snow shoes. We had it off trail initially bound to see some old beaver ponds we like to visit and then realized That we didn’t have time to make what would’ve been about a 7 mile round-trip. Instead we decided To snowshoe back along the ridge along the east of Preston, Brooke.… We had our GPS but we decided to see if we could do it by dead reckoning.… We decided to keep our shadows to the right and see how well that went.… That can work as long as you’re not Moving long enough for the sun to move too much

Between that and our fancy GPS we had no trouble tracking that 2 1/2 miles back. It was lovely deep snow and really nice hiking except for some serious brambles where the land had been logged a few years back

Beautiful day…

Spent the rest of the day trying to catch up for The week ahead…

One other great mile stone today.… We finished another puzzle. It’s amazing how satisfying that is in these crazy times

Ok More tomorrow

Nite all, nite sam

-me

Great, call De here in Vermont. And have her just above zero for most of the day. It was right outside so we decided to go for a snowshoe. We did one of our favorite hikes which is to go up Honey Hollow road which is closed for the season and then just turn right and go up the hill side.… Doing it with the GPS makes it even more fun because we know how to get back

Get some steep climbs and then explored a high Valley that we had visited in a long time. We found some amazing ice cliffs

A funny thing happened before we left. We ran in two guys that had a really nice micro camper. We talk to them for a bit

It turns out that tonight one of them . Zac. and I figured out that we actually know each other pretty well we just didn’t recognize each other. Zach is my friend Hank who is a professor at MIT’s grandson

Super small world

OK time for bed… More tomorrow

Nite all, nite sam

-me

Diane and I are having an all hip hop weekend . We’re getting tired of our hippy chill folk favorites , so we reached out to gabe and he sent us some playlists . We’re listening to new female hip hop artists . Really liking it .. getting a good anatomy lesson in the bargain !

Well let you know how it goes this week

Nite all, nite sam

-me

I just had an interesting revelation… I was listening to some music tonight and put on one of my favorite songs… “Off he Goes” by Pearl Jam. It’s always been sort of an anthem to me… It’s about a guy who’s always too busy for his own good and stressing out about it .. the lyrics go:

One, two, one, two

Know a man his face seemed pulled and tense

Like he’s riding on a motorbike in the strongest winds

So I approach with tact

Suggest that he should relax

But he’s always movin’ much too fast

Said he’ll see me on the flip side

On this trip he’s taken for a ride

He’s been takin’ too much on

There he goes with his perfectly unkept clothes

There he goes

He’s yet to come back

But I’ve seen his picture

It doesn’t look the same up on the racks

We go way back

I wonder ’bout his insides

It’s like his thoughts are too big for his size

He’s been taken where, I don’t know?

Off he goes with his perfectly unkept hope

There he goes

And now I rub my eyes for he has returned

Seems my preconceptions are what should have been burned

For he still smiles and he’s still strong

Nothing’s changed, but the surrounding bullshit, that has grown

And now he’s home, and we’re laughing, like we always did

My same old, same old friend

Until a quarter-to-ten

I saw the strain creep in

He seems distracted and I know just what is gonna happen next

Before his first step, he is off again

You can hear it here

Strange thing was as I was listening to it and trying to pick it out on a guitar I realized I don’t identify with that song anymore I’m still trying to figure out what that means. Does it mean I’m not as stressed and overcommitted as I was? Is that Covid? Is it giving up? Is it reaching a point of deep satisfaction in my life..

Some of all of those ?

I’m voting for the satisfaction part… Stay tuned to find out

-jc