Erosion

The mudslop under the casement window got most of the attention, but the reality is that Loveless is an erosion nightmare these days.

After the earth got scooped up to dig the foundation last year, the frozen ground and snow cover meant it didn’t get tamped down after all the activity. When the snow melted and rain poured, the piles caved in like hot butter through sugar. We sank to our knees during one March visit.

I’m reading up on native plants and trees that will be happy in the shade and clay-rich soil without a whole lot of intervention.

A smattering of determined ferns have pushed through the mud here and there. Last week, I found two spindly Colombines and what I think is a False Solomon’s Seal up by the weeHouse. Something about their tenacity made me feel really hopeful.

False Solomon's Seal, or something else?

High-tech, low-tech

Chris saw the hand surgeon earlier this week and asked whether a golf club might be in his future this summer. Surgeon said he was hopeful for a snow shovel. Ouch.

The reality of a long, slow recovery is starting to set in. Chris expects to be in the splint another six weeks.

This high-tech contraption is nothing but fishing lines, rubber bands and safety pins. His daily therapy involves lifting his fingers a subtle quarter of an inch, 10 times every hour.

Cabin jitters

Chris and I made an impromptu trek up to Loveless Lake late Saturday afternoon to address my case of Cabin Jitters, a now-familiar condition that sets in whenever I've been away too long. Good thing, too. We arrived to discover a mudbath under the casement window.



Despite his one-arm, hobbled state, Chris takes up the shovel.



Fortunately, I had my wet vac.

Aside from being nervous about the recent rains, I also was curious to see whether Jesse “The Builder” had lived up to his promise to clean up the place -- even though he long ago took his tools and walked away with silly little items remaining on his To Do list.

He did not.

But, alas, I shall throw no Loveless mud his way (though clearly I've got some to spare).

I’ve reclaimed my space.

To seal it, I moved in my very first household item.



Yeah baby, it's Loveless Time.



Detour ahead

Yes, that is the biggest honkin’ hand thing ever conceived by modern medicine. Chris sliced through nerves and tendons on two digits during a kitchen demo last week (not at Loveless), and spent three hours in surgery yesterday.

After a rough patch in post-op, he’s back at home, popping pain pills and trying to heal up. They don’t fool around. He’s scheduled to start physical therapy tomorrow.

Loveless can wait.  

Harmonic convergence



Look Ma, we’re on the Internet!

Shout out to Sam at Alchemy Architects for his work marrying images of the weeHouse's arrival at Loveless Lake in December with an original tune from Chemistry Set, where I'm the bass playing member of a rock 'n' roll power trio.

Click here to read my Star Tribune story about the cabin project.

The story ran Christmas Day because, like a gift from Santa Claus, the weeHouse arrived at Christmastime.

Let's show a little 'aloha,' shall we?

Fresh off of my Hawaii 50/51 adventure with Chris, I've decided it's high time we bring a little "shaka" to Loveless Lake.

Hawaiians use the gesture to show a little "aloha" to each other. I saw a dude at a cross walk flash this sign when a driver stopped to let him cross the intersection with his young family. A quick turn to Wikipedia (the font of all internet knowledge - fact or fiction - no?) explains that the shaka is a sign of "friendship and understanding between various cultures that reside within Hawaii."

Something akin to architects and builders, perhaps?

While on the North Shore of Oahu last week, I took a 7 a.m. call from one of the warring parties (it being noon in the Midwest) and sent him off to make peace.

I'm feeling certain that the passing of the cabin keys is imminent.

Shaka (or is it Chaka Khan?) is ready to tell me something good.

Collision

I discovered something unexpected and distressing last weekend while putzing at Loveless. Two dead birds on the future back deck. They apparently flew smack into the weeHouse windows.

Seems one of the coolest things about the place – seeing right through it to the woods and lake – creates a deadly optical illusion for the birds.

The Audubon Society says such collisions are a major cause of avian mortality. Could it be true that 100 million birds die each year this way?

Now I’m digging into research on how to avoid such a fate in the future. Not much of a surprise that those cutout decals of hawks don’t work. But it sounds like there are window films and other products that claim to help birds avoid the glass. And maybe when we put curtains up, that’ll help.

Turns out that the Minneapolis Public Library – one of the coolest new buildings to go up downtown in decades– was designed as a bird-friendly building, with patterns on the glass and trees planted close to the building so the birds wouldn't get a running start.




Minneapolis Central Library / Rick Prescott