"BEER BAT" AND ICICLES

No, not that kind of “beer bat,” just a separate encounter with each last night.

It has been very cold here of late, but no snow, just temperatures in the teens, and wind chills in the single digits, and a long icicle hanging above Baylee’s water bowl. Burrrr…looks cold, don’t it!?

I pulled a soft round package of pork tenderloin from the refrigerator last night and prepared to cook it to go along with our still baking sweet potato. However, when I zipped my knife down the side and rolled the meat out on the cutting board, I noticed that there were some bones! Bones? There ain’t no bones in a port tenderloin!

That was the first time I read the package…PORK RIBLETS! Heck fire…it looked like a roll of tenderloin when I tossed it into the buggy!

What the heck…I cut it in to 6 inch long pieces and cooked it just the way I would have the tenderloin. I couldn’t take it back now, so I might as well cook it, and if we don’t like it, Baylee will!

I poured a cold Yuengling into the Molson glass I walked out the Fallsview Casino & Resort in Niagara with, and cooked the riblets in EVOO, minced garlic, and a new jalapeño cooking sauce I bought recently. After salting and peppering, it browned up beautifully and Judy and I thoroughly enjoyed it. Baylee got the little flat soft bones and we were all happy and good to go for the evening.

Katie Bug came and spent the second night with us this week, arriving just in time to watch “Friday Night Lights.”

I then settled in to visit some blogs and leave intelligent comments, when Judy came flying in the computer room, “There’s a bat in there!”

“What?”

“It’s another bat, and don’t tell Katie,” who was by then taking a shower.

This was the second time we have had a bat in the house. They live, by day, along the bottom of the vinyl siding, and somehow they work their way up into the fireplace…best I can figure, and fly out into the living room looking for a place to get out.

The first time, it was spooky…something fell in the living room after lights out! There I was walking through the living room to the kitchen in the dark, Bersa .380 stuffed full of Hydra-Shoks! I kept feeling something blow on my hair! I turned on a light, and there was the bat fluttering around, just missing my head with each circle.

I grabbed a broom and made a few “swings and misses” and then thought to open the French doors that lead to the deck. After bumping him/her a time or two, I succeeded in directing it out the opening.

Last night’s encounter took a little longer, but nothing was knocked off and broken like the last time. Judy ran and closed all the bedroom doors and I succeeded in hemming it in the living room and dinning room area. I swung and missed twice (sorry no photos), then remembered the deck door. After opening it, I took up a batter’s stance and swung one last time; tipping the bat into the side of the couch. The bat tumbled to the floor and with one hockey like swing; I scored a goal through the French door!

The bat lay there exhausted and I closed the door and turned off the porch light, and took several deep breaths myself.

After stuffing some small towels in between the fieldrock wall and the fire-screen, I took another look outside. The bat was gone, but did it fly away or did one of my owl buddies get him?

So, I decided to have that third Yuengling!

I answered a couple of emails from Lin and Jeff and went to bed. I figured I would dream about bats all night, like I do when I watch things about snakes, but I slept peacefully all night. Must have been the beer!

WHITE OAK SINKS HIKE

Saturday’s forecast was for snow, so we decided to hike along the School House Gap Trail in the Smoky Mountains and then veer left off onto the lesser traveled, and unmarked, White Oak Sinks Trail. We had been on this trail before, but because we had already done a six-mile run, we turned around and headed back without tackling the steep climb into and out of the “Sinks” valley. However, Saturday, a visit to the valley floor was our express goal.

School House Gap is a steady climb of between 20 and 30-degree grades in its self, but its nothing compared to what is to come. Once you leave the wide trail and start out along the footpath trail of White Oak Sinks, you soon come to where the path splits and both take you to the top of a mountain rim that rings a small valley below.

The left fork of the footpath takes you to steep decent of between 30 and 50-degree grades, and the path meanders for nearly a mile to the valley floor. The right fork takes you to the top of a mountain backdrop for the falls and ends at a steep drop off of between 60 and 70-degrees.

We decided the steep climb out near the falls would be brutalizing, but the quickest way out of the valley. As you ascend the dirt, rocks, and roots to the top, you are literally moving on your hands and feet – it is that steep! My chest heaved as I grasped for saplings, clinging while I recovered. I moved up the hill at a snails pace, but once I was on top, drank some water, and hacked my lungs free of mucus, I recovered and moved on, rewarding myself with the thought that I had avoided the mile longer agony of the other trail.

Years ago, several families lived in the valley and the story goes that the children walked up out of the valley each day to walk on to the school in Cades Cove. Once you have climbed out of the valley once, you have a great respect for these children.

The valley now is beautiful, with rocky outcrops at two ends, a cave where bats are protected by a steel grid guarding their home, boar traps can be seen in different locations, and a spectacular falls that disappear into the mouth of a cave. The icicles that decorate the falls this time of year make it worth the hike effort.

Check out how we recovered at Mushy's Cookings!

See you on the trail!