All Better

I have a faint recollection as a young child of my mother spraying Bactine on a skinned knee, saying, "All better now." Well, I don't know if my recent illness was coronavirus or not. I tend to think not.  But I'm all better now.

Life has settled into a routine, and it's not too exciting.  Five mile walk in the morning. Firewood processing in the afternoon.  I'm just trying to spend as much time outside as I can.  When I'm cooped up in the house too long with the revised family unit (4), I can go a little stir-crazy.

In the beginning of this shelter-in-place event, I was spending lots of time reading as much as I could about the virus and steps to combat the virus.  That was helpful in the beginning.  I like to educate myself  as much as possible about something like this.  Beyond a few important known facts, there is still a lot that nobody knows, especially for a virus that has changed everything for the entire world.

Now, I scan the news for new developments, but most days there really isn't anything new to learn.  This thing is going to take time.  Back when the kids were young and challenging, I used to make a lot of firewood to reduce stress.  I have a feeling that my piles of firewood are going to get a lot bigger this year. 

I go into Lodi about once per week to do our family grocery shopping.  Our grocery store doesn't offer delivery or curbside pickup.  The produce isn't always the freshest, and the inventory can be limited, but I can find enough for us to eat and the basic essentials for living.  I'm very grateful that the store exists.

 When we first moved to this area, there was a period of time when Lodi didn't have a grocery store.  The nearest store was more than fifteen miles away.

There's also something about shopping local in a small town.  On one of my recent trips to 'The Pig," I  put all of my week's groceries on to the conveyor belt and then reached into my pocket for a wallet that had been forgotten at home. When I told the cashier that I was going to have to run home to get my wallet,  the store manager rushed over and told the cashier that it was no problem because I was a long-time customer.  She told me to take my groceries home and then call in my credit card for payment.

The store manager knew my face, but didn't know my name or address or anything about me, except that I'm a regular shopper.  She didn't ask for my identification.  She trusted me to go home and then pay for my order over the phone.  When I called in with my credit card, I thanked her for her trust.  "Anything we can do to help," she responded.

That's the kind of place that Lodi can be. 

Sick

Yeah, I got sick around Easter.  In different times, it would be no big deal. I don't get sick very often, but it happens. Fever, chills, aches and pains, headache, sore throat, upset stomach and runny nose.  Blech.

Unfortunately, many of these symptoms are associated with the conrona virus.  I was mildly concerned, but I never thought that I had corona virus.  This felt too much like other bugs that I've caught.  If testing was widely available, I could run down to the doctor's office and find out.  However, there's still a shortage of tests.  Public health guidelines are to stay home and self-isolate unless your situation is really bad (difficulty breathing).

The good news is that I haven't had any breathing issues, and my fever went away after a couple of days.  I stayed on Tylenol for most of the week, so I wasn't positive if the fever went away on its own or if it was the Tylenol.  Now I need 3 days of no fever (without Tylenol) , seven days since onset of symptoms, and a decline in symptoms.  If the fever doesn't return, I should be good to go on Sunday.

To protect Justin and the rest of the family, I moved up to the Scamp.  My little electric heater has kept it mostly comfortable during some cold temperatures.  Callie the crazy dog has been good company and has kept her eye on me day and night to make sure that I stay isolated.

During my staycation, I read "Call of the Wild," binged on downloaded episodes of Bosch and the Wire, and slept a lot.  Those tv shows are really good, but "Call of the Wild" is timeless.  It's available for free at the internet archive. It's especially recommended for anyone with a dog like Callie.

I returned to my long walks on country roads on Wednesday.  I rarely see anybody.  This is a stream in the marsh near my house. When I first looked at it, I saw two decent-sized trout. My friend Jon (now deceased) told me there were trout in this stream, but I never saw proof until this week.

I'll probably start splitting wood again this weekend.  On a hill like we have, leaning trees sometimes pull up by their roots and fall.  That happened this week to an oak.

The domino effect changed five other trees.  The tangle is probably too dangerous to mess with at this point, but gravity will eventually bring them all down to create more potential firewood.  My chainsaw can be very patient.  There are less dangerous downed trees in my woods to process.

Nature has many lessons for us. When a tree falls in the forest, it doesn’t really matter if anyone hears it.  But there is often collateral damage.

Closed

Sunrise from our Hill

My favorite local places to hike are:  Gibraltar Rock (less than ten miles away) and Devil's Lake (less than thirty miles away by way of the Merrimac Ferry).

Yesterday, Governor Evers closed those two locations, along with dozens of other state parks and state natural areas in southern Wisconsin.  This was not unexpected.  State public lands have been flooded with people seeking outdoor opportunities but who were not practicing social distancing.  In fact, the record crowds of people, together with closed bathrooms, limited garbage service and no added staffing, resulted in increased vandalism and litter.

I've been staying away because it was all too predictable, given human nature.  The Lodi Marsh remains open, as far as I know.  We've been hiking there about once per week early on weekday mornings to avoid crowds.

Lodi Marsh

Unfortunately, Callie has had a couple of hostile encounters with other dogs there.  One was an off-leash pit bull that the owner had no control over, even after we walked fifty feet off the trail to avoid it.  Another was an on-leash bigger dog that its owner wasn't able to control.  The dog literally dragged her owner 30 yards to get into Callie's face.  Callie's behavior has improved dramatically since she joined our family, but she doesn't tolerate other dogs in her face.

Australian cattle dogs are part Australian dingo, and she seems to have received more than her fair share of that part.  Sometimes, I think Callie must be swearing at the other dogs in dog language.  She definitely brings out the worst in other dogs.  The only dog that she tolerates is Elvis the service dog.  Callie seems to think that Elvis is a docile cow tied to Justin's power wheelchair. 


The best place to walk has turned out to be on the country roads east of my house.   The old dairy farm roads are almost always empty of traffic and people. 

After a five mile walk in the morning, we work on the firewood project in the afternoon.  This involves cutting down dead trees, bucking the downed trees into rounds, and rolling the rounds down the hill (we call it firewood bowling).

Then we pile the rounds into the splitting pile, split the rounds into firewood, and stack the firewood  on pallets.  Each year, we move seasoned firewood (1-3 years old, dependent on species) from the outside storage area into the pole shed for the coming winter.

There's still plenty of work to do outside while social distancing. With temperatures in the 20's and 30's for the next 7 days, we will still be burning last winter's firewood to keep the house toasty.

The Driveway

The plan was to be about 500 miles from home and on my way to New Mexico by today. Instead, Callie and I are camping next to our pole shed on the hill.  I really can’t complain. I have nearly every convenience of a rustic campground: twenty amp electricity, a water spigot down the hill, and  a bathroom inside the house. The Scamp has a bathroom, but there are no open dump stations to unload so we will let that go unused for awhile.

There is also a fire ring, although the state of Wisconsin suspended burning permits and strongly discourages campfires so as not to place any strain on emergency services responding to grass fires.

Numbers for “the virus” have been climbing in Columbia County, but no deaths so far. Dane County, where Madison is located, is a bit of a hotspot. Milwaukee is the big hotspot here with deaths starting to climb, and hospitals putting up triage tents in parking lots.

Our family is staying relatively healthy. Julia’s dad Gene is out of the hospital. We have scaled back our hiking trips. Mostly, we hike from our front door. There are country roads to our west and trails to our east.

This is actually a pretty good place to ride out the storm. Camping in your driveway is better than not camping at all.