October 15, 2011 -- At Leech Lake

At 9:30 a.m. this morning the sky was mostly clear, with some big white billowy clouds hovering above, the wind was again strong at 18-22 mph out of the west, the lake was very choppy with some occasional white caps and the temperature was brisk 35degrees.

Unlike yesterday when no boats were on the water, I saw four boats out on Sucker Bay today. Three are clumped closely together in front of the Newman's and the fourth was in front of our house. With the wind blowing from the west, that means it's coming directly across the bay and straight onto shore. The boats appeared to be drifting from the middle of the bay toward shore, and then when they would get into 8 feet of water or less, they would motor back out into the bay for another drift. It's the same style of fishing I prefer -- drifting with a jig and minnow.

The fishermen out today are most likely staying at the resort, or came up specifically this weekend for some Fall walleye fishing on Leech Lake. With the weather conditions the way they are today, I would bet that not many of the residents of Leech Lake are out on the water. But I suppose if you made a long drive up here to fish, you are probably willing to brave the cold and rough conditions to spend some time fishing. For me, the conditions will have to improve significantly throughout the day if I'm to take my boat out fishing.

At 11:15 a.m. I walked out to the end of the dock at our house to get a better feel for the wind and a closer look at the boats out fishing. During my entire time outdoors yesterday I wore nothing heavier than a pair of jeans and a flannel shirt. Today that was not enough. It is pretty cold and the wind quickly striped the heat from me. I'll need to wear a sweatshirt when I work on cleaning out the gutters on the house. While standing at the end of the dock surveying the situation on the lake, two of the four boats left the area and headed back toward the resort.

By 11:30 a.m., the wind had picked up even more and was coming out of the WNW at 20-25 mph with gusts again over 30 mph. The sky was still partly sunny and the temperature had warmed a bit to 42 degrees.

After eating a sandwich for lunch I went outside with every intention of cleaning out the gutters on the house. But then I noticed several logs -- about 2 feet long and 8-10 inches in diameter -- stacked up along the outbuilding where I store the ATV and log splitter. The logs were left there by my neighbor John Newman who had cut up a tree a couple of days ago after it came down during some high winds. John had stacked about 20 logs with the request that if I had some time could I split them up with my log splitter into kindling for him. Figuring I should probably get to the splitting sooner than later, I put the gutter cleaning on hold and pulled out my Swisher, 26-tons of power, log splitter.

It took more than three dozen pulls of the cord to finally fire up the splitter which had sat inactively in storage for probably a year or more. But eventually I got it going and I started in on splitting wood. I spent more than an hour splitting about 10 logs into a pile of kindling wood. I figure John can take a good portion of it, but I'll keep some of it for my use as well.

With the wood split and stacked, I put away the log splitter and moved onto my next chore; no, not cleaning the gutters, but pruning the red- and yellow-stem dogwood plants that ring my harbor and provide erosion control. Left alone, the red- and yellow-stem dogwoods will grow to be 12-15 feet tall and very bushy. I keep them pruned to where they never get more than 3-5 feet tall.

I began my pruning on the south side of the harbor where the larger of the two groups of dogwood grow and trimmed them back significantly. I then move to the north side of the harbor and began pruning the smaller plot of dogwood. While reaching out to trim a branch, the clippers slipped out of my hand and dropped into the water of the harbor. With the wind blowing so strongly today the harbor is filled with white foam and locating the clippers visually was impossible, so I was done pruning for this year, or until I get a new set of clippers.

When I came inside I checked the computer for the score of the Michigan State vs. Michigan football game and discovered that for the fourth year in a row the Spartans had defeated the Wolverines, this time by a score of 28-14. Go Green!

After putting off cleaning the gutters all afternoon, I finally got out the 8-foot step ladder set it up on the back porch of the house and climbed up onto the roof at 3:45 p.m. I started on the north end of the house facing the lake and worked my way south toward the sliding door to the kitchen. Just as was the case at the cabin, the gutters here at the house were full of leaves, twigs, maple seed pods and gunk.

I cleaned out the gutter all the way to the point where the roof gets taller above the living room (the great room facing the lake) and called it quits. My hands were wet from the water and sludge in the gutter and the wind was howling so hard that my hands were numb. I suppose I could wear gloves, but when I've tried that in the past I had a hard time getting all of the small pieces of debris removed; so I tackle this chore with my bare hands. But now my hands were too cold to continue so I climbed onto the ladder, made my way onto the back porch, folded up the ladder, and stowed it for use tomorrow. Maybe it won't be so cold.

At 5:00 p.m. I tuned into A Prairie Home Companion on the Bose radio. I have a new Cambridge Audio Azur 650T tuner, but have yet to install a powerful FM antenna, so although I have a great new tuner, it doesn't pull in any signals. Thus the Bose provided more than adequate backup.

It was a particularly good "News from Lake Wobegon" tonight; Garrison Keilior was at the top of his game. By the time A Prairie Home Companion ended, at 7:00 p.m. CDT, it was dark outside. I remember listening to the program this summer and still having 3 hours of sunlight to enjoy after the show ended. Not now.

It was still very windy outside and the temperature was just under 40 degrees, so just as I did last night, I built a fire in the fireplace. For the remainder of the evening I listened to music and watched the fire. Periodically I would check the score of the Sharks game (they would lose to the St. Louis Blues) and the Tigers (who would be eliminated by the Texas Rangers. The Rangers return to the World Series). Eventually I shut everything down and went to bed.

A cold, but productive day at Leech Lake.