Monday, April 6, 2009

farmdoc's blog post number 351

The hours of daylight continue to dwindle. The autumnal equinox has come and gone (so sunrise to sunset is shorter than sunset to sunrise). Daylight saving has ended (and I’ve turned back all my clocks). The days are cooler (but mostly it’s still t-shirt weather). The nights are too (but not yet enough for me to reach for my flannel pyjamas and the flannel bed sheet). The solar panels are tilted up (to catch the ever more precious sun now it’s lower in the northern sky). The backup generator is fuelled and its oil topped up ready for when the battery charge falls below 70%. The fire permit season has finished (so fire brigade training has reverted from twice to once each month). The sycamore leaves are goldening (and their first leaves are falling, to the goats’ ravenous delight). Passover and Easter are nigh (I always think Easter marks the local tourist season’s end, after which the tourists stop coming, leaving the wintering here to the locals – a responsibility I’m glad to accept). In their song ‘Goodbye Earl’, the Dixie Chicks sing ‘…and summer faded into fall’. I'm only too aware of that. My summer has faded. And winter approaches. Inexorably.

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