The journey continues...

Brian Bilbrey July 15, 2026

15 June 2026

Busy Week So far this week, I've been fishing, gone to the dentist, and had my fuel oil topped up for the following year. Mostly everything went okay. The fishing was fun. I caught a couple of bass each at a couple of spots where I'd expect them to be at this warm time of year. But it was a windy day, and got windier as the day progressed. As little white caps started appearing, I decided it was time to stop fighting for my balance on the front of the boat. The dentist visit was okay, except they found…

Brian Bilbrey July 9, 2026

10 July 2026

Best By Date Rule number ... I've lost count. But always look for the best by date on the packaged food. I didn't even think about it, but it turns out that eating Uncle Ben's Original Recipe more than five years after the best by date is contraindicated. I'll omit the details, but think colonoscopy prep. Not recommended. We're having a hot summer this year, several days in the (low) 90's already. That doesn't mean that the outdoor work stops. Yesterday, after walking the dog 3.5 miles, I spent five hours doing yard maintenance, including moving the boat trailer back…

Brian Bilbrey June 26, 2026

26 June 2026

Chores and Electrical Excitement After a couple of days of fishing this week, I thought it was time to get on with more of the deferred maintenance around this joint. One of the things I've been putting of is re-stocking the firewood in the basement from the sub-garage. I started by coating the pertinent basement wall with a moisture barrier paint, something that's been on the list for four years. I used up a gallon of the paint, then measured the square footage of the completed painting, and how much wall remains to be painted. Now I know that I'll…

Brian Bilbrey June 23, 2026

23 June 2026

Fishing Days While it's been a fairly rainy month, leading to some progress with indoor chores (mixed in with calculated procrastination), I have made it out fishing a few times. To be honest, it's been mostly fishing, and precious little catching. And those have mostly been what professional anglers refer to as "just like a bass, but smaller". Sigh. Last Wednesday was the first "good" fish, two and one half pounds of large mouth bass. Yesterday I made it out again and my second landed fish in a different part of the lake was about the same size. But the…

Brian Bilbrey June 15, 2026

15 June 2026

Owl Encounter Great horned owl fledgling Pictured above, the Great horned owl fledgling was standing in the middle of the walking trail as we were heading back towards home, shortly after noon today. Georgia spotted the owl and wanted to go visit... this I did not allow. The owl's first reaction was to hop and flutter about five yards further along the trail away from us. It then stopped and turned. I figured we could continue on our way and it would just fly off. But no, there it stopped, spread its wings up and forward to become big (more…