A cold front really blew in today and it is … COLD! The forecast says that there will be snow in the mountains. Oh joy. We’ve gone from summer to winter with no season in the middle. I’m definitely not ready.

I’ve spent some of the week working on an insert for the screen door to the deck. We have been leaving the screen partly open so Bradica (the dog) can go out to do her business. However, more often than not she does her business elsewhere. She doesn’t like going out as it’s now very hard for her to go up or down the steps. As it is, she has never really liked going out, ever. But, Thursday a bird flew in through the partially open screen door. Flying in was apparently easy, but flying back out again was not so very easy. After flying in circles for a couple of hours, the bird finally found the front screen door and tried to get out that way. The door was closed and locked, and as I tried to get there to open the door, the bird flew back into the family room. So, I unlocked the door in case the bird made her way back there again.

Sure enough, about a half-hour later, Nina called that the bird was hanging on the front screen door. I went out through the garage, slipped onto the front porch, opened the screen door, and the bird flew away! Success … except for cleaning up the leavings of a very frightened bird.

So, how to prevent that from happening again? There are hundreds of birds flocking around the back deck during the day feasting at the bird feeders all along the railing. It is probably a miracle we haven’t had more birds in the house entering through the partially-opened screen. I went to Lowes and bought some lumber and screen and have built a small insert to go into the screen door. It’ll leave a small opening at the bottom for Bradica (the dog) to go in and out but the rest will be covered with a screen. No more birds in the house (and far fewer flies and bees and wasps and such). I should have made this months ago. It’s not quite finished. I put the stain on this evening. I’ll attach the screen and put it in place when we get back.

Back? We just got back! We are leaving again and I’m quite excited to be going. We’re heading for Seattle on Monday. We’ll drive as far as Richland, Washington (southeast corner of the state … near Pasco and Kenewick) on Monday and spend the night in a RV campground. We’ll do a session at the Columbia River Temple at 7:00 a.m. on Tuesday, perhaps a little sightseeing, and then drive the rest of the way to Bellevue, Washington. We’ll stay there through Sunday and spend the time playing with Jared, Arlene, Kendra, Wendy, Aaron, and Aiden. We’ll kick it off with a whale-watching cruise on Wednesday. Then the following week we’ll wend our way down the Washington coast and get home on Friday, October 5th. I’m almost packed … I’m ready to be on the road again!