Here, Fishie, Fishie, Fishie...

I was going through some stuff the other day, doing some Spring cleaning, and ran across my dad's fishing license holder, circa 1980, when the McEwan family still owned it--I went to school with their son, Craig, and Mountain Gate was THE fishing spot for my dad, he was there every day.

 It's just a little plastic holder, nothing remarkable in itself--what's special about it, is that Mountain Gate Lodge no longer exists--it got completely washed away by the West Walker river in the 1997 '100 Year' Flood that swept it, and a big chunk of highway 395, away on New Year's Day that year. The flood was especially nasty, striking just before dawn. Several people had to be rescued from the lodge, and it also washed away the home of Betty, one of my mom's friends. My mom, who lived about 10 miles downstream, had been in Reno with Betty for New Year's Eve and was unable to return for days, not knowing if either had homes that still stood. Luckily, our home survived, being uphill a bit from the river--Betty's did not.

Interesting video (with overblown narration) here, but towards the end the sound gets badly out of sync. Mountain Gate Lodge footage at 47:32: 1997 Flood video

Snow Day!

Life, medical dramas (more than one, yay!) and sad times derailed my good intentions for blogging, sorry it's been a while.

But we had a lovely little snowstorm last night! The good stuff, too. Fluffy. It piled up nicely out front...

And the Contorted Redbud tree out back was beautiful!

It stuck to everything.

The chickens had their very own Siberian Ice Fortress.

No amount of calling for the grapes I'd brought out would induce them to set chicken foot in snow.

Even when, smartass that I am, I tossed grapes like little yummy bombs and plonked them in the snow right in front of them. They refused to go spelunking for grapes and just gave me dirty looks. The fowl are on to me.

Eventually Chonk, Kentucky and Brick said 'Screw this' and turned to go back into the run. The others followed suit and refused to come out.

The Chicken Union sisterhood is iron-clad. I relented and tossed the rest of the grapes in the run, where lukewarm chicken joy was grudgingly exhibited.