By Mick Holien
When you share a bit of Paradise with a horde, meant as a compliment here, of your probably distant friends, and your leisure recreation is heavily affected by the weather sometimes annual rites of passage come earlier some years than others.
Unfortunately that was the case this summer and with quite a bit of levity I’m just not that happy about it. I was thinking as my buddy Mark was delicately backing the boat into the car port Sunday night I’m just thankful for the few lake days I had this summer, no matter how fleeting they were.
All I have to do is recall days of anguish in Houston and Florida or even worse in places like Puerto Rico where they’ve not yet even reached everyone in peril and where electricity could remain at a premium for as long as six months.
Such thoughts become certainly mundane when one is given to thoughts of the bothersome smoke that curtailed part of the tourist season and probably either prompted an out-of-the area trip or just further curtailed local activities.
Considering drawing a parallel between area maladies always is a stretch but there just couldn’t be a more stark comparison and that’s just in this country.
What about the continued earthquakes in other corners of the globe that eliminates lives, even entire, families.
Now I admit having been in the news gathering business the bulk of my life, I spend countless hours learning what’s going on in the world and I sometimes lament the lack of attention such things draw from the general population.
But back at Holien acres, which is anything but, temperatures of less than 60 not only have prompted me to get the boat out of the water a couple of weeks earlier than customary but repositioning the lawn mower in favor of the snow blower also is in order.
I’m not every good about the hoses but batteries find a home in the garage close to the battery chargers and scooters that seem to be low on battery even more than cell phones.
The barbecue is looking to get covered but I’m resisting that a bit and the flags are ready to find a home I can remember in the spring.
And then the most expensive item – try as I might rotating batteries. You know camper, boat, lawn mower you name it.
And the beat goes on…just sayin’
