Signs of Spring

Daylight until past 8PM
Spring peepers along the Little J.
T running away for some...you know
Robins galore.
Not wanting to do school work.
Rain, rain, and more rain.
Fishing...? Soon.

Weight

Alright, that's it. 213. That's what the bathroom scale read this morning. It's time to lose it. Don't know what my "ideal" body weight is, but I'm guessing it's less than 200. So, 195 will be my goal for now. The cold, wet, snowy, sleety, icy weather isn't helping. But, blame it on the rain? No, I've been ridiculous in my eating and non-exercise habits - time to stop. So, nothing drastic, but daily exercise (running when the temp is above 45) and less on the intake side. Going to try cutting out the wicked bad stuff: bacon, cheese, butter, icecream, pizza, mayo, beer (in large amounts), beer (as a regular beverage), and fried food. Other than that, just going to try eating after exercise and not getting seconds of everything. C'est la vie, and I'd like to enjoy it.

March Fishing

Hit Penn's today; caught four rainbows. CFS was 950 - a touch high, but fishable. Air temp 57, water temp 45. Sunny and lots of midges coming off although no surface action. Crazy erosion along penns creek road from all the flooding, but no worse for the wear. Some guy stopped by and said that the penn's creek road section isn't open until the first day of trout - going to have to check on that before next time...

Porcupine (Luckily, in a tree)

Went for a nice walk yesterday off Green's Valley Road. The air was cold, but the sun was warm and softened the snow on the south facing slope of every little rise and every hill. The road was mostly ice, so we took a detour onto an old jeep trail and followed it along the ridge. We had to leave around 5:15 to drive to Alexandria to meet Julia and Denny at Main Street so we were just about to turn around - we'd gotten to a wide clearing, probably used as a log landing some years ago. Instead of turning around, we decided to take a quick jaunt up a side trail to the top of the ridge and (hopefully) a view of the valley and Pleasant Gap below.
I could see the dogs getting more and more "interested" and even said, "They seem to like something up there..." They did: a porcupine. Luckily, the little guy found his way up a small maple sapling before the dogs could get to him. He kept climbing as they jumped and barked and whined and he made it up onto all but the highest and tiniest branches. We tried to keep the dogs quiet, admired the dark creature peering down from his perch, and quickly departed before we scared the poor thing too much (or he lost his grip and ruined our good luck!). Hopefully that will be the closest encounter we have with porcupines! I've heard dogs react one of two ways to porcupines: Either "That things hurt! GET IT!" or "That thing hurt! Better leave it alone!" I'm content having no idea which strategy my dogs would take :)

Flooding

Looks like most of the flooding is past - only a few basements flooded and such, but the streams are pretty blown out. Penn's Creek Road is completely flooded and shut down. Wonder where those fishes go to hide from the strong currents and muddy waters...

Rain on snow

Hope it stops raining soon...

Sleep

Something has changed; I can sleep. It's not that I couldn't sleep before, it's just that I'm falling asleep quicker, sleeping through the night (instead of waking up with anxious thoughts), and I can sleep past 7:30 (when applicable). It's supposed to be 55 today so I'm going to mix some exercise in with the sleep and see how that works out (no pun intended). Maybe these bags under my eyes will go away in a few weeks? The relief is still not complete - but I can feel my body relaxing after tensing up for the past two months; it feels good. (Party pictures here)