Day Two

Day Two at Our Dam Cabin!

Musings:

Wildlife. We haven't seen any yet. Even Jessie the dog has been noticeably absent. Jessie belongs to the neighbors at the end of our road. She's a very friendly golden lab who, according to the previous owners, is always hanging around the house. Haven't seen her since we came up in September to look at the cabin one last time before making our offer. Haven't seen a squirrel, a rabbit, a deer. I have seen some birds, but not many. Maybe it's the wind. The wind was howling in from the South all day today.

We heard stories about the abundant wildlife in these here parts, but so far they've been unfounded. Right after we closed on the property we all went to lunch together, and as we were sitting there Al and Betty, the former owners, started talking about the wildlife. "Oh ya, there's always deer in the yard eating my hostas, and there's skunks and racoons around, and wolves." "Wolves!" Darlene's eyes got as big as saucers. "There's wolves around here?" I think that kind of amused the locals. "Oh sure," they all said, "But they're more afraid of you. You can watch 'em on the road and then they just wander back into the woods." "But," said Dar, "what do you do?" "Oh," they said superciliously, "you just don't go outside until they're gone." They probably thought we were a couple of real bafoons; a couple of real citified ignorami. They might be right! I didn't think wolves' territory was this far south. That would be a cool thing to see!

Docks. As the day of closing drew near, both Ty and I were worried about having to take the dock out. We were told it wasn't a big deal, and I'm sure it's not. The thing's on wheels, and the lake bottom is hard sand. But it was just going to be the two of us, and we were going to have to do it by hand. We don't have an ATV or a vehicle with a winch. I imagined we were going to have to go into the water to separate the two sections and pull them out by hand. And I knew the October air and water temperatures would be freezing. That did not sound like fun! When we drove up Thursday morning the first thing we saw was the dock sitting out on the lawn. I don't know about Ty, but I let out a small little sigh of relief. We won't have to worry about that until next spring. I figure we can round up a few extra helpers by then.

Boats. Tom-the-Realtor called us a few weeks ago and said that he had found us a pontoon boat for sale. He had looked it over and thought it was a good deal. We were supposed to call his friend 'Rocky' who owns a marina near here. I thought that maybe he was going to make us an offer we couldn't refuse! He sent us some pictures, and it looked okay for the price. It was an older model, but it looked in good shape. We talked it over and decided to go ahead and buy it. Rocky said he'd bring it up and put it in our pole barn for us. The next day Dar says, "A tree fell on the pontoon." "What?" I said. "Oh, I forgot to tell you. Rocky said that a tree fell on the pontoon, and it dented in one of the railings. That's why it's for sale." "Oh," I said, "that's good to know." Turns out it's not as bad as it sounds. You can't open one of the gates all the way, but it's structurally sound. Anyway, they brought it out on Thursday afternoon and put it in the barn. Only, it's not what I'd call a normal pontoon boat. This thing is like the Queen Elizabeth II or the Titanic (Oh I hope not!) It's huge! I told Dar and Ty that it would be a misnomer to call it a pontoon boat. So we now refer to it as the 'Party Barge!' That thing barely fits in the pole barn. It has like a 6 thousand horse power engine on it. I'm pretty sure if we welded on some fins, it would hydro-foil across the lake. It's humungous! I'm sure our neighbors are going to be whispering behind our backs next summer about the new people on the lake with the huge yacht -- making innuendos about size and compensation -- I told Ty we should paint it pink and put a Party Barge sign on it. It might be a good way for him to meet girls. If you come and visit us there's going to be plenty of room, that's for darn sure!

Wildlife redux. We went across the lake (by car, not by Party Barge) and ate at the Lake View restaurant on the other side of Dam Lake tonight. The first thing we noticed was the Happy Hour sign: M-F 3-6 pm, Saturday 10:30-12:00 am. Darn. We missed happy hour by seven hours! That must be a misprint I said. So Dar asked the bartendress. "Yup," she says, "people come in before they go out fishin' in the mornin' or after they get done fishin'." What exactly are we promoting here? Welcome to the great "It's Never Too Early For A Beer" North Woods! Then we went into the dining room. There was one other group in there. They were dressed like they might have been fishing, or hunting, or motorcycle touring. Motorcycle touring is not very accurate. They looked like they were part of Marlon Brando's motorcycle gang in 'The Wild One'! No, that's not quite right either. They looked like banjo players from 'Deliverance' would look if they could ride motorcycles. And they were loud, and they were staggering to and from the buffet table, and I turned to Ty and said, "Let's not go out on the road 'til long after they're gone." I'm not sure what was a scarier thought: that group in a boat throwing fish hooks around, that group walking around with guns looking for animals to kill, or that group riding bikes down a public highway.

Names. I've been thinking about the name of this blog: Our Dam Cabin. Maybe it should be something more, oh I don't know, Laura Engels Wilderish like, 'Little Cabin on the Dam Lake' or 'Little Dam Cabin on the Dam Lake.' I don't know. Work in progress I guess.

Neighbors. We have great neighbors. We haven't even met them yet, but I know they're great. Ty brought my laptop up here Thursday to work on a paper for school and discovered that we can pick up a wifi signal from somewhere. We can actually pick up three separate signals. One is locked, but two are available. The signal isn't strong, and it comes and goes, but it's there. We can't get a cell-phone signal, but we can get online and blog. Thanks neighbors!



Louis, ready for his first boat ride!