[A continuing serial! See your local bookseller for back issues! Or just scroll down!]

Bit of a controversy this morning; seems Mom forgot to buy groceries when she bought groceries. She bought no bacon and only one dozen eggs. Most of the rest she was a bit okay on, but generally her quantities were too low.

First I went out fishing with Dad at Darkwater. I caught a pike and Dad caught two during about three hours of fishing, and then a storm blew in. You can see storms from a long way off here, and you can see weather that doesn’t pertain to you. This storm skirted us for a long time, but finally started putting out rain and lightning, so we left. I like storm watching. It’s kind of giddying to see a really big cloud just scud right along. And it’s quiet here too, which I like. I can hear the thunder even from miles off. Five, probably. There wasn’t all that much rain, unfortunately.

After a brief interlude, I went back out to Darkwater with Erin and Maria, but we didn’t catch anything and it started getting weather on us again.

There are squirrels all over the place here, and chipmunks too. They’re a bit audacious, but I haven’t actually gotten close enough to touch one yet. My goal is to count coup on one before the week is up. Sierra and Jazmin are having fun here, with the squirrels and the abundance of older people to watch them and have fun with them. After a makeshift lunch of chips and salsa, Dad and Micah and I went out again, to no avail I believe. I think Dad got a walleye [recall, you can’t keep walleye at Crowduck]. No good. And then I stuck around a little while longer and decided I’d take Micah out to this one cove I found last year. After checking out with Mom, the two of us left.

Micah wouldn’t quit complaining. “No, stop trolling! Just leave the engine off! I told you we were too close in!” Shut up! Micah just keeps complaining; it’s all he does. He doesn’ stop to think that he’s got it really really good sitting on a secluded lake in the northwoods of Canada for free. Just complains. I caught one hammerhandle (small pike), but it got away before I could get it in the boat. Another sorm came up and I took us back, joined by Grandma & Grandpa, who I later found out had been sent to get us but were surprised to find us with sense enough to turn back.

Dinner was deep-fried fish and waffle fries, and I ate with Erin and Dan and Jazmin and Sierra. This year with them I’m “worm boy”, because I keep saying I’m eating worms. Ah, kids. After dinner (delicious, by the way), I took the little girls out swimming. Brisk! But I got used to it, even if it took a while, and up until my arms went numb I was feeling great in that water. It’s terrific swimming in a lake instead of a pool – no chlorine, way more space, possibly even cleaner. I swam for probably an hour. The waves are great on a lake – just today I noticed for the first time how interesting wave patterns can look. They’re interesting, something to stare at for hours.

When I was dry there was poker. I bought two dollars and lost that. Then I bought another dollar and slowly regained. Maria proved a strong player, as well as Dave, but not Grandpa[, who had had some refreshing beverages]. Micah sat and steadily lost almost every single hand. I think he won one, maybe two or three. I played fairly tight. On one, it was just my luck to get pocket Queens on the hand where Grandpa decided to go all-in without looking at his cards (“Looking at them doesn’t seem to do much good”). A bunch of other people stuck around on his $1.40 all-in, and two aces came up on the board, and then – another Queen. I tell you, I raked it in with that full house, and I sold $3 back to the bank. I stuck around in the pot with a 10-3 off-suit, and three Jacks popped up, two on the flop, along with a three (on the flop). The river was a 6. I won with the full house again. That was about the last hand of the night, I believe. I paid back my debts and ended up in the black $4.55, though Dan’s accounting probably leaves a little to be desired (for example, Mom came into the porch tonight and glanced at the ledgers and dais she wasn’t down $1.50 but up $0.15, and Dan just said, “Okay,” and put her up $0.15, figuring on balancing later, I guess.) Micah sulked a lot, and then left us to play Hearts – Dan, Grandpa, Aunt Ellen, and me. I won that too. I’m hot tonight! Later Dan and tracy and I checked out the stars, but the moon was too bright (though under the horizon) to let us see anything. Ah well. The night was impeccable otherwise. A light breeze, not a cloud in the sky, temperature pleasantly cool. I could live in this night – until I missed snow. It’s the perfect night, in my opinion. I hope Mom hasn’t already stolen the porch bed, but I think she has. I hear some loons out on the lake right now. A loon call is something I want to live with all the time. I want to be able to walk out the door every day in the summer and hear that ghost whistle, possibly fall asleep to it. This lake is, I think, where I live. I’m on a mandatory vacation 51 weeks a year. Looking at a Manitoba map early yesterday, I saw so many untenanted lakes, no roads for hundreds of miles around. Could I have a cabin on one of those? Just for a summer home. Please? My goal in life is to be the sole inhabitant – sole homeowner – on one lake. In Minnesota, in Manitoba or Ontario, I don’t care. I’ll go through the paperwork for a dual citizenship, I suppose, if I have to. Or whatever. It’s my goal.