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It’s the middle of April in the ‘Ville, which means telephone poles start growing yard sale signs and people get ready to deal. Finley and I woke early this morning, snuck out of the house like thieves, and hit Dunkin Donuts for breakfast. Then we made it to four mostly disappointing yard sales in under an hour. She sweet-talked a lady out of a flowered ring, and I found two beginning guitar books for $1, but other than that it was pretty barren.

Because the last sale had taken us most of the way down the hill, I parked the Scout in Ellicott City and we sat next to the river to eat our donuts. While we watched the water pass by, Finley noticed several pairs of ducks nearby and then a family of goslings further upstream, so we crossed the bridge and walked to the end of the parking lot to find a mother goose preening on the rocks while twelve goslings darted across the water in front of her. Finn and I stood and watched for about ten minutes, entranced.

After bringing some food home for Mama, we moved up to the attic to straighten out the mess and get everything in the atrium up there. Now that it’s (mostly) clean I can start to wrap my head around what has to happen next in there: buttoning up the electrical work. Then, we packed a hiking bag, loaded the Scout up with recyclable metal, and drove to Elkridge.

I gutted two aluminum G5 towers about two years ago and I’ve been slowly collecting different types of recyclable metals for longer than that. All of this junk was beginning to get in the way, so I thought we’d take care of that stuff and get a hike in on the way home. The metals only brought $5 (looks like aluminum and copper is WAY down from the last time I was there) but it’s great to have that stuff out of the basement and garage. That room, plus what we got back from having the tandem gone, makes the garage look positively cavernous.

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A hike was just what Finn and I both needed. The air was cool when we walked into the woods but by the time we’d reached the bottom of the trail it was perfect. The trail we followed is one I used to ride with my friend Rob 20+ years ago, one that starts at the top of Catonsville and follows a stream down a valley to meet up with a larger river in the heart of the park. I remember it as a blurry downhill with several water crossings and a few heart-stopping obstacles, but with Finn it was a quiet exploration of felled trees, burbling streambanks, and sun-dappled pathways. We stopped to look at small fish darting in the shallows of the water and greet the dogs that crossed our path, of which there were many. Finn took pleasure in finding the optimal way to cross over each water obstacle, preferring felled trees to rocks. With no heat or bugs, it was absolutely the perfect time to explore, and we both had a great time together.

We got to the bottom and broke out the snacks, and word came that our neighbors were going to the park across the street to play after some ice cream, and would Finn like to come? So we hustled our way back up the hill, picked up some lunch for Mama, then walked over to the park for some playtime. Finn’s friend stopped over for another hour’s worth of play in the yard, and by the time she left it was dinnertime.

Date posted: April 18, 2016 | Filed under finn, general, photo | Leave a Comment »

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