Well, it’s early November and go figure…..we hit about 70F today with an expected 75F tomorrow. It almost feels like CA during the winter. We had a cold snap there for a while but things have temporarily warmed back up. The kids were outside for PE today playing basketball and riding my new mountain bike that they now call theirs. My oldest daughter even took it down by the front creek where I cut some new trails through the trees. Speaking of which, I took the bike out last night out back right at about dusk time. I was on the grass speeding down a small incline towards a trail through the trees so I wasn’t making much noise. But as soon as I hit the trail, the bike tires began crunching all the leaves on the ground. I came to a stop soon after to just admire the quiet like I usually do. However, I had startled all the wildlife down there. I heard about 4 or 5 deer scampering away, their white tails surrendering their retreating positions through the trees. A couple of squirrels darted up a tree and a raccoon hurdled the dry creek bed to safety. All I heard were crunching of leaves as the animals departed. I thought that was interesting in that I thought wild animals tended to be more alert than that.

…..Dan at aslowerpace dot net