September 13. Overcast. Chilly. Feels like Fall is approaching. It was a short but hectic summer. All in all, I give it a 6.5 out of ten.

For me to give a higher rating requires more projects and chores to be ‘done’. And they weren’t. “I’m sorry, but production was down, folks. No bonuses this year!” Of course, the Catch 22 in all this is that, for the most part, I am the single largest variable in the project schedule so I am really just grading myself. And I am not completely happy. “I see a lot of wine being drunk. I see a lot of food being eaten. I don’t see much in the way of progress, Mr. Cox!”

I stopped grading Sal after forty straight years of 10’s out of ten. In fact, most years she scored in the low to mid twenties despite 10 being the scale. Production counts!

But I still called her in for her annual review.

“Well, Sally, I note from your record that you’ve been with us for quite a long time now. I am glad to see you are fitting in so well.”

“Good. That’s it then for another year. Keep up the good work.”

That conversation was confirmation that this year was not one of my most productive ones. I blame the back-stop! If that damn backstop hadn’t gotten in my way, I would have had an extra month to further procrastinate on some of the issues on my plate.

I confess that the lower funicular – tho not dead – has not progressed as much as I would have liked. The log sort is 3/4 done but I still have some fine tuning to do. And the woodshed, tho for all intents and purposes full, is not. We still have 3/4 of a row to chop and stack.

And I am really going to have to address my winch problem. Hey! A plethora of winches is still an inventory problem if nothing else.

A Woofer, however, is coming in a week. She will be here for as long as ten days. I am gonna work her like a rented mule!