Cedar-Lined Campsite

I'm quite certain that 75% of my readers (that would mean, um three readers) know that I was back in Monona in the first part of the week to spruce up our home now that the (lousy) tenants are gone. Monday night I shared a hotel room with my parents, they went home Tuesday afternoon so I camped out on our sublime three season porch that night.

campsite - leave no trace!

Sleeping on the porch was one of those things I always wanted to do during our ~5 year tenure - but due to lame excuses I never quite got around to doing it. Since it was a cool night with temps dipping into the lower 50s, my trusty 40 degree Kelty bag was perfect. While the iPhone pinged with numerous emails from Taiwan, I was able to tune those out and listen to the wind blow through my old neighbor's majestic maple trees - the same trees I cursed every spring as they littered the yard with helicopters that needed to be pulled from the garden beds.

One quirk of the upper Midwest that I had forgotten about was the birds. Every morning at first light all of the songbirds - cardinals, wrens, robins, jays, sparrows, etc. - join in a cacophonous chorus. While I was awakened at 5:something, I was able to drift back to sleep for another hour.

I'll post some pix and such from the trip in the coming week. Tired now, off to climb into a real bed and enjoy the cool sea breeze blow past the palms. Glad I was finally able to spend a night on the porch.