Three Beautiful Things 08/18/16: The Awning is Up, Walk to the Alma Mater, Bacon and Scotch Ale Bliss

1.  After a night's rest and with a little distance from the task -- and in the cool of the morning -- Everett, Paul, and I went back to work on putting up Everett and Christy's new awning. With a little bit of trial and error and some adjustments here and there, we muscled it into its brackets and secured it in place.  (I shouldn't say "we" secured it or "we" made adjustments. All I did was provide some lift. Paul and Everett were the brains of the operation.) Christy and Everett can already feel its cooling effects, not only on their deck, but in the north side of their house.

2. Unlike when I was a student at Kellogg High School from 1969-72, now a trail runs along the east side of the high school building and winds through the Ponderosa pines and fir trees up to a little bridge that crosses Jacobs Creek and ends at the football practice field on the upper level behind the high school. Starting at Mom's, I walked the trail to the high school that has been there since the birth of Moses and continued on this "new" trail and then I inspected the two levels of property behind the high school and returned to the old trail and on back to Mom's.  I'm not quite back into a rhythm of exercise -- I'll get back to that in Maryland -- but it sure felt good to walk about a mile and a half or so before it got hot today.

3. After I changed my flight date back to Baltimore from Wednesday the 24th to Monday the 22nd, I went to work in the kitchen, at Christy's request, and made ground beef patties, enriched by eggs, saltine cracker crumbs, Worcestershire sauce, ketchup, and Mrs. Dash garlic and herb seasoning. I also cooked up a bacon and fried Yukon gold potato mixture (Everett's favorite) and Christy brought over garden fresh green beans she steamed. She baconed up her dish, too.  Lord, it was good. While I cooked up my part of this blissfully greasy and flavorful dinner, I enjoyed a pint of Cold Smoke Scotch Ale from KettleHouse Brewing in Missoula, a gift from Kirk "Goose" Hoskins (KHS, Class of '72), proprietor of Stang's Food Center and Liquor Store in St. Regis, MT. This is, without a doubt, among the best beers I've ever enjoyed.  I will miss it when I return to Maryland and will seize upon it immediately when I return again to Idaho.