Yes, I know it's been a long time since I posted the last chapter of the Africa. Journals. I have most of the photos ready and am just waiting for an opportune time to complete them with one last post. That means a very rainy day when I am confined to the house.
This is a quickly assembled post and there might be typos and auto-correct blunders in it. I'll fix them later.
In the meantime, I've been busy cleaning up litter along the Seward Highway. So far, 5-1/2 miles. I've also found three golf balls and a shredded dollar bill.
I've also been giddy about the migratory birds returning to Alaska. Here are a few photos.
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| This is an American dipper, formerly called a water ouzel, which is a much cooler name. It has a billful of bugs and is flying to the nest. Hard to believe they have hatchlings already. It is my favorite Alaska bird., |
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| I took a photo of this Barrow's goldeneye for ID purposes. It was really a long way away but when I saw the reflections in the water of the nearby shoreline brush, I settled down and made a picture. |
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| The red-necked grebes have a nest that is close enough to the highway that I can see it while driving past. This day, I saw an egg in it that looked as large as a gold ball. These are small birds to lay such huge eggs. |
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| Here are the two grebes with two eggs. They are such good parents. Each grebe takes turns incubating the eggs and tending to the young. I love watching them. |
I have also had a prolonged episode of carpet shampooing. My old carpet machine was giving me fits. It works, but leaves the carpet with a brownish tinge. I bought bottled water, thinking is was my well water. That helped, but not much.
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| No, my carpet wasn't this dirty. The photo shows the tinge the old carpet machine left and the lighter spot is after cleaning it with a new machine. |
I discovered the brushes weren't turning, so I ordered a new belt and removed 18 screws to change the belt when it arrived after two weeks. After I re-assembled it, I only had one screw leftover. Not much improvement.
So, I made a quick 200 mile trip to the nearest Home Depot and bought a new machine.
BINGO!
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| Dining room furniture and the Dreadmill (aka treadmill) moved into the living room so I can clean the DR. The LR is done and dry. |
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| More furniture moved. |
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| CLeaning in process. See the brown "old cleaned spot?" |
I was so pleased with the results, I cleaned every ACRE of carpet in the whole house
Coming up, another activity to keep me busy. I have several cords of firewood to split, load, and stack.
I actually like doing this chore.
Keep checking in. I'll be back someday.