Another Day in January

It was cold all day today. And now that it is evening; it is even colder. I saw 0 degrees a few minutes ago and the evening is quite young. We could have close to -30 degrees tonight.

So we are having cheeseburger soup in bread bowls for supper tonight. Frances and I settled on that plan as we were leaving to go clean a house together this afternoon.

We had to go check on Neiman’s house on Windigo Lake on our way. We parked the car at the brink of the hill just as the road drops down to where the cabins are and then the lake below them. We walked down to the gate and stood there to decide that there were no tracks into the property and no broken windows and no trees down on the two roofs. The woods are full of snow, of course, since we have had snow fall almost every day for days. If you did not know better you would think nothing living moved or even existed in these woods. But closer inspection proves that there are critters here leaving tracks everywhere.

Which reminds me, (This is a rabbit trail. Is that a pun?) We noticed last Sunday that the field across the road from the church was full of coyote tracks. They had been mouse hunting. You could see that they had trotted here and there smelling or listening or however they know and then a space of clear snow and then a dug up area where they had pounced and found their prey. I thought this was fascinating. It was not hard to visualize them, with the moon shining over the field of snow, running, waiting, leaping, and digging here, then there.

Frances and I got back to the car at Neiman’s and headed over to our cleaning job. There have been carpenters working there all fall and winter on a new unattached garage with living space above. So the house had tracks from their coming and going and then the usual dirt and dust. We had it spotless and beautiful again before two hours was up.

Home to soup and bread creations.