Last night Pete figured out how to drain the water out of Raudi’s Pond. The pipe coming out of the pit is still frozen, so the water is backed up. The horses, who didn’t have a lot of room before the pond formed, now they have even less room. I told Pete that it pained me to see them able to range limitedly, and so he did something about it.

Pete took a garden hose, put it in the pit, attached a second hose, and then put the hose in a downward direction. After creating a siphon, the water began flowing outward. There was so much water in the pond that this morning it didn’t look to me like much had drained. I checked the far end of the hose and, yes, a strong stream of water was exiting the hose. This evening, when I got home, the water had stopped flowing out of the hose.

Compost shed buttoned up for winter

Pete disconnected the two hoses, and the water resumed coming out of the first hose. And so tomorrow I expect to see far less water in the enclosure. Now if we hadn’t done this, the water would have become stagnant, scummy, and stinky.

A lot of people right now are talking about stocking up on provisions because they fear that the economy is going to tank. They are right. However, some are missing a puzzle piece. This is that you have to be resourceful. Pete was very resourceful in how he dealt with the water in Raudi’s Pond. Me, a little less so. I figured that we might go and purchase some carp and put them in the water – they’d eat the algae and other vegetation.

I suppose that vegetable gardening requires a certain degree of resourcefulness. As does being able to fix that which might break. So I am not overly worried about our surviving what’s to come.

What we might all learn is now dependent we are on one another. This message might really be driven home in the next year or so.

Now I am really hoping that Sastrugi has a single offspring, a girl, and that she’s a good producer. She is looking a bit heavier, and she is ravenous. The problem is, there is never a good time around here for an animal to give birth. It seems like these days that I regretfully always have something going on.

Today it was books, books, and more books. I just want to get back to working on my own book. Tonight I attended a Center for the Book Zoom meeting – the organization supports and promotes Alaskan writers. There isn’t much interest in supporting or promoting an excess or overabundance of books, or in supporting and promoting someone who is attempting to find appreciative readers for these books.

I know that deep down, I am a writer – maybe what I’m doing is just practicing writing avoidance. Yes, this has to be it. Enough. I am going to resume working on “Shelf Life” in the next few days. At least I did something good for humanity in the meantime.

Next: 93. 4/4/25: Making Up for Lost Time