The Land Baron

Well, it's already Wednesday so the past weekend is almost a distant memory at this point. No cross-country trips or major family events to report this time around, but still several things happened that are worth mentioning.

First off, Last Tuesday, the 6th, we officially purchased property at Whiskey Creek. Two lots totaling 1.7 acres in the middle of 6 square miles of Manistee National Forest. If that doesn't make me a land baron I don't know what would I got out of work right at 3:00pm and Wanda was there to pick me up and from there we headed up to Ludington, to West Shore Bank, the people crazy enough to loan us the money to make this little dream come true. We got there a little bit after 4:00pm and we were back in the car and heading out of town 20 minutes later. It was a slam bam paper signing whirlwind. The guy running the deal kept throwing them out across the desk and we signed 'em and tossed 'em back at him. All that's left now is the monthly payments until hell freezes over. After the flurry of paper signing, we made a stop at Taco Bell for a cheap meal and then headed back down 31 to home.

Thursday I went out on a limb and in the hopes of maybe steering the son onto a more productive course than the one he has been following lately......bought him a guitar. A Fender Strat no less, just like mine but about 35 years newer. He's also going to start taking lessons and as long as he can maintain his interest level and put in the practice time then I'll pay for them. Not sure where all this money is gonna come from, but I'd guess a fair amount of overtime is involved. Lucky for me there's plenty to be had currently so I'm gonna cash in on the opportunity and take all I can get my grubby little paws on. Even more crazy than buying him a guitar is the fact that I'm looking at buying myself a bass. Something I haven't had in, well in awhile. He (the guy at the RIT music store downtown) has a nice little red Ibanez lefty hanging on the wall that calls out my name everytime I'm in there......don't be surprised if it ends up here in the not too distant future..........not sure how many more rabbits are in that hat anyhow..........

I don't really recall anything else remotely earth shaking for the rest of the week.....can't even recall what I did Friday night, although I do remember that Wanda and Ri went out to play Bingo. Saturday morning I was up early, loaded up the pick-up with ground breaking tools, the lawnmower and the wheelbarrow and headed up North with Chris to our weekend home in the woods. We got up there around 10:00am or so and worked until 4:30pm. Pretty much got all the area I wanted to get mowed, done. Trimmed a bunch of limbs and did general clean up of the area. Rick Fett, Adam's dad stopped by for a visit and to tell me the latest bear news at Whiskey Creek. Seems they have a bear who likes to smash the crap out of bird feeders in the campground and he'd shown up again Friday night. Frankly, as far as I'm concerned, having a bear around the joint adds value to my property, although I might think otherwise if I happened to bump into him walking down the road after sunset.

Rick came back awhile later to take me over to meet Gene the wine maker. We sat around his campfire and had a glass of his homemade wine while we talked about his 5th wheel that he has for sale. He's 77 and has gotten to the point where the traveling from Florida to Michigan, back and forth every year is too much foolin' around so he's selling his site and his trailer there and gonna stay in Florida year 'round. The trailer brand new was $60,000, but because he wants to get out of there quick he's selling it for $20,000. It's certainly worth every penny of that, but I just can't pull that big of a rabbit out of my hat at the moment, as much as I'd like to. At the end of our visit we said goodbye and thanks for the wine. I took some pics of his trailer and the grounds and said I'd show 'em around to try and help him unload the whole ball of wax. If I was able to actually find a buyer for him there's incentive for me to do so in the form of a 1955 Jeep that he says he'd give to whoever brings him a buyer for his lot. That's all the incentive I need so I've made up some flyers to hand out along with the ones I made up for the sale of the wagon, which still is hiding out in the garage with no gas tank.

Byy 4:30 we'd gotten most of the area that I wanted to get cleared, cleared and we wanted to get home to see Jennette and Ryan who'd decided to come up for the weekend so we tossed the tools and the lawnmower in the back of the truck and headed for civilization. We were back home by 6 and after some playtime with the grandson we all piled into Jen's car and headed over to Vic's for dinner. By the time we left there it was after 9 so we headed for home. I wanted to get the hot rod out and take Jen for an ice cream run to Diary Treat, but she had to give Ryan his pre-bedtime bath (...parents) so me and Chris went instead. By the time we got back home from the around town cruise Ryan was asleep and everyone else was ready to head for dreamland so we spent the rest of our day down in the den listening to music and working on the websites.

Sunday morning I woke up fairly early and killed some time down in the den again until everyone else was up and ready for breakfast. After pancakes and sausage I pulled the hot rod out of the garage and started to work on removing the master cylinder to paint it to match the car. The plan in the morning was that Jen was going with Wanda to Bingo again for the evening and I was gonna babysit Ryan, but during the course of the first half of the day she got to feeling pretty bad and decided to head for home early instead of sticking around to play Bingo. So she took off for Indiana about 3pm and Wanda took off about 3:30 leaving me chris and the rest of the day to mess around with.

I'd gotten the master cylinder apart and painted and was ready to reinstall it and then head down to Jeannies again for the heck of it, but just like the automotive rookie that I am......when I got the brakes all put back together the pedal went right to the floor without a fight. Damnit, I'd gotten air in the lines and would have to bleed 'em out. Never having done that before made it a problem so I thought for a couple minutes and then remembered Ray Nelson, the older gentleman and car guru that I'd met last fall, who lived south of town. I still had his card so I dialed the number figuring he wouldn't even remember who the heck I was, but after a couple minutes on the phone with him he said he'd come over and see if he could help. Well, deep down that's what I was hoping he'd say so when he got there we commenced to bleeding the brake lines and within 15 minutes we had 'em back again and even better than they'd been in the first place. I thanked him for his help and time before he took off back home and then me and Chris jumped in the car and headed for Jeannie's for the evening.

....and that's pretty much it for the moment. I've got plans to go back up to the "cabin" :-) this coming Saturday and finish up what I started last weekend. The well and sewer is suppose to be getting done real soon and I want to keep an eye on what they're doing so I don't lose a bunch of trees to the bulldozer. For right now though it's the end of hump day and bedtime.

TC