| The Feast of All Saints |
"November always seemed to me the Norway of the year." -- Emily Dickinson (1864) Although Emily is one of my favorites there are times that I just don't understand her. This is one of those times. She penned those words in a letter to Dr & Mrs J G Holland (Emily wrote to them often, whoever they were), and even though I've read that phrase in the context of her letter, I still have no idea what she meant by it. Maybe it was an "inside" joke. |
| All Souls Day |
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| November 3rd |
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| Election Day |
7:30 AM: Is this a beautiful November morning or what? Click HERE. 10:30 AM: There, darn it!!!!! In spite of what the above pictures of the beautiful November morning show, the swimming raft is now on the shore (about a month later than the last few years). |
| November 5th | Congratulations to President-elect Barack Obama. As John McCain said in his concession speech last night: Let us "offer our next president our goodwill and an earnest effort to find ways to come together, to find the necessary compromises to bridge our differences and help restore our prosperity, to defend our security in a dangerous world, and to leave our children and grandchildren a stronger, better country than we inherited." |
| November 6th | Lots of rain! The lake went up nealy one and a half inches in the last 36 hours. No snow yet though........except for a few flurries. If the lake would go up another inch by the time it freezes, it would go into the winter slightly higher than it did last year, which would be amazing considering how low it got this past summer. Click HERE. |
| November 7th | Ron (along with Mike and Dave) arrived to use LBLR as a deer camp for the 17th consecutive year. |
| November 8th |
We awoke this morning to the first snow cover of the winter........but it was a very light snow cover. And finally the last few pre-snow chores have been done; LBLR is now ready, so let it snow some more! There's at least one pair of Blue Jays still here, so it looks like we wont be Jayless this winter. |
| November 9th | There are tons and tons of Snow Buntings around. I don't believe I've ever seen so many. |
| November_10th |
Take a good look at this snow cover which has been here for the last two days, because it'll be gone before this day is done. Click HERE.
Although the locals seem to be having a lot of deer hunting success this year, the LBLR hunters didn't fare so well. The three cabins worth of hunters bagged a total of one doe........not a really successful hunt. |
| Veterans' Day |
Click HERE. Mike Kielpinski (the son of my friend Brian) finishes his tour of duty in Iraq today. Welcome home Mike, and thank you! |
| November 12th |
Congratulations to Jenny and Jason who are spending their honeymoon at LBLR. There's a little ice on the edge of the south shore of Bass Lake, but I see none on Little Bass. |
| November 13th | There were a couple of Swans on the lake this morning. Thanks for pointing them out Jim. |
| November 14th | Do you realize that this time of the year, when the temperature gets down into the 20s and the snow starts to fall, snowmobiles get so excited that they start their own engines (even if they're sitting in the garage), and their owners have to keep going out and shutting them off. Imagine having to keep going out and shutting off your snowmobile. That's why I don't have a snowmobile anymore. How do you suppose they put gas in their tanks? |
| November 15th | If one can believe the weatherman, the temperature should not get above freezing for at least a week, with lows near zero on Monday night and Wednesday night. That should be make a little ice, shouldn't it? After all, the average date for the lake to be completely frozen over is November 26th.........only 11 days hence. |
| November 16th | Since I've been here, the earliest the lake has ever been completely frozen over was on this date 11 years ago (1997). There was a little ice in the weed beds on the leeward shores this morning, but that was all. |
| November 17th | Beautiful! We woke up this morning to "a freshly fallen, silent shroud of snow" as Paul Simon so eloquently put it back in 1965. It's not much, less than an inch, but at least it looks like winter now. |
| November 18th |
Here are a few signs that winter is near:
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| November 19th | Click HERE. |
| November 20th | According to the Farmer's Almanac, Indian Summer can occur anytime between St. Martin's Day (November 11th) and today. If the Almanac is right, we didn't have an Indian Summer this year. |
| November 21st | I'm in St. Paul today, but Mick said it was 6 degrees in Grand Rapids this morning and Larry W told me it was 9 degrees, so it was about the same as it is here in the Cities. Two days ago (when I last saw the lake) there was very little ice on it........just a little near some of the edges. This morning Larry said (and I quote), there is "quite a bit of ice on the lake, the middle is open but it is frozen out about 150 feet so its on the way I think". |
| November 22nd | Over the next month the sunrise time will get later by over half an hour, while the sunset time will get earlier by only five minutes. Some of these astronomical tidbits are rather difficult to fathom. |
| November 23rd | Oh no! We're losing ground. There is less ice on the lake this morning than there was last night, and the average freeze date is only 3 days away. |
| November 24th |
Geez, I can never figure out what the lake is going to do. We get cold temperatures and we lose ground (ice-wise), then we don't get so cold (low 20s last night only) and we wake up to a lot more ice than we went to bed with. Sheesh! If the wind stays light we might be totally iced over shortly........but who knows???? Click HERE.
PS: There were a bunch of people skating in the south bay of Bass Lake this afternoon. Bold!!! |
| November 25th |
7:30 AM: Is it all frozen or not? It's really difficult to tell. As the sun rose this morning there was no steam rising from anywhere on the lake, and since steam often rises from any open water on cold mornings like this (5 degrees), that could indicate that it is all solid. When the sun gets a tad higher I'll drive over to the public landing and Peterson Bay to see what it looks like from there. Noon Upate: Hear ye! Hear ye! I've looked at it from every angle (the top of the duplex being the best view), and as a result I hereby declare Little Bass Lake to be officially frozen, and I will so inform the DNR. Of course that's not to say that it will stay that way, but it is for now. That's 5 days earlier than last year and 1 day before the average. Click HERE. |
| November 26th | On December 1st (next Monday) the cresent moon, Venus, and Jupiter will be in close proximity low in the Southwest sky. Even as we speak the players are moving into position, which can be seen very shortly after sunset. Don't miss it! (I'll remind you again on Monday.) |
| Thanksgiving | Ah, a day of football and relaxation. And my Lions are now 0-12. |
| November 28th | My oldest Grandchild, Josh, is here this weekend helping me with the last few pre-winter chores. Among them was burning a lot of brush, most of which was from the last of the three trees that went down in the lake this past summer. And Sara.........thanks for the wine glasses, one of which is prominent in two of the photos. Click HERE. |
| November 29th | Geez, did we ever get a lot done the last two days...........thanks Josh. This place is REALLY ready for winter now. |
| November 30th |
Ice fishing houses are bursting out on many lakes, but not on Little Bass yet. However, there have been a few ice skaters on the edges of the lake already. Don't forget to wander the countryside in search of buried treasure tonight. If you've forgotten why, look at the Chronicles entry for this day in 2006. It's HERE. |
