18APRIL2011 @Helena, MT - How heavy can an empty canoe be? Maybe it's simply the 1st canoe hoist this year ... maybe it's that I am older than last year ... maybe the canoe is holding some water in each end. Wheeooo, lifting it was a serious endeavour and about the last thing I did today. Nice to go in and watch Antiques Road Show - from Billings even - and enjoy the last night at home for several weeks.
Joel Nordby came over at the perfect time and helped me move the boat trailer. It has a flat tire and has over the past two years become established in a depression caused by Felomina depositing screened soil all around it. It took a pick to get most of the wooden chocks out and then, yes, it moved. It was slow going, but we succeeded in moving it 40 feet and turned 90 degrees. It looks good to have a changed view.
A few more trip items were located and added to the pile. Letters from Governor Schweitzer to the Governors in North Dakota, South Dakota and Missouri, stuff bags and my old wrinkled travel/map book. There is a new North Dakota Governor, but that is a detail. If Bryan wrote a personal letter to the former Governor, the current office staff will handle it.
It is strangely cold today, peaking at 41. As darkness gathers snow is falling heavily and everything is turning white ... a pleasant reminder that we are on the earth more than we are of the earth.