Saturday Slightly Dank

I always liked that word"dank." Its sound seems to hit the nail on the head when describing a gloomy, cold, colorless and uninspiring atmosphere. Well, we're in the dank tank today. I commented to Bill this morning that the ring of visible grass around the Scotch pine in the front yard has maybe stretched about a foot in the past three weeks.

Bill said, "Yeah, yesterday we finally caught up to where we were a week ago before the latest series of snowstorms. Well, today we've seen just a few flurries, but it sure ain't purty outside.

Nonetheless, it's the weekend, and we've still got Final Four games this afternoon to keep us inspired inside this house. I'm still inspired by my greenhouse because I can go out there and plant more pots. Yesterday I added significantly to my potential cucumber crop.

If things work out in the Lovestead cuke category, maybe I can make those delicious bread and butter pickles from a couple of years ago when our garden produced so many cucumbers I was hauling them down to the hospital for Mark Perlinger to use for his fall canning.

He used his for dills, but I canned about a dozen quarts of the bread-and-butter variety. Friends and family who received a jar of those precious pickles said they never lasted past the first opening cuz everyone ate them like candy.

I also picked up some parsley seed along with my annual box of wildflower perennial mixture, guaranteed to cover 2,000 square feet. Well, they never quite live up to the claim on the box front, but it's always fun to see what does come up. Seems like you can always count on the Bachelor Buttons. I'll probably sprinkle some more from the box on Rambo's, Casey's and Charlie's graves down in the God Tree pasture.

The clerk at Wal-Mart who rang up my stuff told me I could probably just plant those wildflower seeds in the snow and the flowers would come up. I told her she was probably right because we're encountering a new paradigm shift in the weather, and we'll just have to accept it and work with it. So, today I may just go a scattering for the fun of it.

Bill and I had fun last night out at Hope. I needed to snap some photos of JT Cheslic and his pontoon boat for the Sandpoint Magazine article, so we headed to Kramer's Marina. J.T. was home from work and visiting with his neighbor Jeremey Lizotte, who owns the Grok-n-Roll, a quaint and lovely pontoon boat just down the dock.

Seems Jeremey and JT are 1995 Clark Fork High grads, and Jeremey, who just returned from a tour of New Zealand, remembers my son Willie from soccer back when they were all little guys, except for Willie, that is.

"He was the big kid who played soccer," Jeremey recalled. But these days, Jeremey's caught up to Willie, so they're both the big guys now. Bill and I really enjoyed the visit and then moved on to the Icehouse Pizza where Bear, who also just returned from New Zealand, is open for the season. He told me to spread the word, so I am.

Bear's Icehouse Pizza at Hope offers good stuff to eat and funky, fun atmosphere. When you step inside, you feel like you've entered a new realm with lots of art, murals and even live music when the season gets rolling.

Last night, while waiting for our large meat lovers' pizza, we listened to a nice mix of Sirrius radio music and a hard-to-ignore phone conversation at the next table where the young couple worked out the details on a trip to Glacier with his mom and dad.

Seems Mom and Dad, at the other end of the conversation, want to do a bus tour in the park, but daughter-in-law, sitting at the table next to us, isn't in to that, so they'll go hiking while the old folks ride the bus. They never quite worked out whether they wanted rooms with views of the mountain or the lake, but they were pretty thorough in discussing all options. Finally their meal came, and the remaining trip plans were put on hold.

Annie introduced us to Icehouse Pizza a couple of years ago, and we've introduced it to a few other relatives. It's one of those places you just have to experience to understand its draw. In my case last night, I sat at a table in the back room with a slightly obstructed view down the main channel of the lake. The Green Monarchs on the east side are snow-covered and spectacular this time of the year, so once more, I felt awestruck with the allure of that lake---after 60-plus years of seeing it time and again.

I truly believe that Lake Pend Oreille has a unique quality of perpetually offering its spectators a new script with every view. No reruns on this lake; its beauty is fluid and nicely so.

On that note, I'd better get out there and let that little Lefty out of his stall and into the barnyard slop. My two horses will be here for just another week before we take them to the Spokane Equestrian Center for school and maybe even some dry footing. They may not want to come home after that experience.

Happy Saturday to all.