4/8-10/03 I went up to the property for 3 days: Tuesday through Thursday.

I arrived at noon and Bert and Ernie were right there to greet me. I broke my apple core in half and gave part of it to each of them. Ernie spit his right out and Bert gobbled it up off the ground. Now I don't feel so bad that Bert never lets Ernie get any. He doesn't like them. I tried to take some pictures of them but they wouldn't hold still so I don't think I got both of them in the same picture. We'll see when the pictures get developed.

After moving in, I went up to work on the planks. I got one notched for the F3 post.

When I went to bed, I felt like I was developing a cold so I took a Coldeze pill.

On Wednesday morning I was feeling pretty sick. I went to work planing, cutting and fitting planks and got all the holes filled in. It looks real good. The next thing is to trim the ends that are sticking out, but I haven't quite decided what to do. I would like to cantilever the planks out quite a ways to make the deck bigger and to provide a better view around the building, but some of the planks I had in there weren't long enough. I could have an uneven edge so that some of it stuck out farther than the rest. Or, I could make it not square so the one end would stick out farther. Or, I could make it square and straight and not have it stick out at all. If I did that, it would cut off almost all the notching I did for the F3 post. I went in for the night without deciding what to do. Once you cut a plank, you can't change your mind and put it back together.

I took cold medicine and slept pretty well that night.

On Thursday morning I made the decision to cut the edge off straight and square. After the planks were trimmed, I went down and looked at it from various viewpoints and it looks good. I think I made the right decision. I took a few pictures of the deck before I left for home at 2:15.