Puckaway Motor Club

Log (page 1 of 13)

The day-to-day Puckaway activities, recorded for posterity.

Log: May 13 – 15, 2022 (where we finally open up for the year!)

May 18, 2022 / / 0 Comments

Friday

Jake, the pooches, and I pulled in a little after 6 pm for the first overnight trip of 2022. Sure took us long enough. It’s been a pretty miserable spring with lots of overnight freezing temperatures into late April, so I didn’t want to de-winterize things prematurely.

It’s ridiculously hot today, however. Temperatures are hovering near 90° and the humidity is unpleasantly thick. Good thing I started the Keep’s AC remotely this morning; indoors it’s pleasantly dry and in the low 70s. Jake and I made quick work of unloading everything Keep-bound to limit how much time the door needed to be open. The screen door is sticking and misaligned worse than ever–I really need to see what’s going on with the door frame.

I plugged in the Keep’s fridge to get it ready, then backed the truck up to the pole barn and unloaded all of my tools. I should make an updated Tools of the Trade post to cover all my new DeWalt goodies. The stackable, waterproof toolboxes make it so much easier to mobilize my gear.

With the truck empty, I headed for the water pump and got it primed and running as distant, long, low thunder started getting closer. Last year’s new hose reel and 75′ Flexzilla hose make it much less of a chore to get the water tank filled up. Shame I can’t do anything about the slow flow rate. I’ve been down a few YouTube rabbit holes about driving your own well and it’s something I’d like to try in the near future, probably close to the pole barn.

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Log: April 7, 2022 (and a history of Puckaway lawn mowers)

April 8, 2022 / / 0 Comments

Pulled in with the dogs a little after 4:30 pm. So far, this year’s Spring has failed to impress; temps are in the high 40s with drizzly, intermittent rain. Today’s trip is a short, goal-oriented one: I’ve come to collect all of the disappointing riding mowers from the pole barn.

(sips beer) “Yup.”

Two weeks ago, I came up pulling dad’s trailer with a 2011 John Deere X320 as cargo. This, friends, is quite the mower. Hank Hill himself would weep at its beauty. Whomever owned it and traded it in at Riesterer and Schnell’s Chilton branch took exquisite care of it–the plastic parts look washed and wax and not a single piece of trim is damaged, missing, or out of place. Really, the only signs of its true age (apart from the 320 hours on the engine clock) are some minor paint flaking and rust spots on the 48″ deck. Hell, it’s even got a brush bar on the front so the hood will hold up to my inevitable piloting ignorance. Oh, and the mower came with a Power Flow bagger unit, which means it’s ready to tow around the NASCAR trailer from day one.

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Atypical

September 10, 2021 / / 0 Comments

Hi.

It’s been a while.

And, honestly, it’s been pretty hard to get back into the practice of posting. I suppose I could blame the obvious villain–after all, whose life hasn’t been irrevocably affected by the global pandemic? It damn near killed Puckaweekend 2020, after all. But the pandemic hasn’t stopped me from going to Puckaway and working on projects. I just haven’t wanted to write about it anymore.

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Log: October 11 – 14, 2019

October 16, 2019 / / 0 Comments

Friday

Kings of the keep.

The boys, the pooch, and I pulled in at 6:45 pm. I unloaded the truck and we headed into the keep to get out of the rain. I then did… nothing. It was great! I just relaxed the rest of the night in the keep with my two little buddies. We watched one of the Harry Potter movies and some episodes of Mythbusters and shared some microwave popcorn. The boys were both asleep by 10 and I headed back to the bedroom and read for a bit before dropping off.

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Log: October 2, 2019

October 7, 2019 / / 0 Comments

Flying trip! Pulled in with Mom and Hannah at 5:15 pm. Mom wanted to get some more stuff out of the shack’s back bedroom before Puckaweekend and I had a bunch of supplies to bring up. She headed to the shack and I pulled up to the pole barn.

For the first time since I dropped it off this summer, I powered on the new pole barn fridge. I then proceeded to fill it with $200 worth of assorted craft beer, along with a six-pack of “Shitty Lyte Beer” which I can’t wait for Red to try, and 24 cans of PartyAid courtesy of Sean. I think having a beer fridge out here will serve us well at Puckaweekend.

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Log: September 27 – 29, 2019

September 30, 2019 / / 0 Comments

Friday

Arrived at 4:45 with Hannah to some light rain. We spooked some deer by the woodpile on our way in. Before I even got out of the truck, I drove around the yard targeting mole tunnels. Man, do I hate these things. I’d leave poison out but I don’t want my dog to get into it, and the mid-tunnel traps don’t do much good unless you’re up here regularly enough to keep checking them.

I unloaded the truck and headed into the keep. Watched some TV while I put clothes away in the bedroom and ended up dozing off for a bit. I woke up around 7:00, hungry. I ordered a pizza from Christianos then went out to the pole barn to work on a project so as not to feel completely lazy.

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Log: September 24, 2019

September 25, 2019 / / 0 Comments

Preamble

I left work at 2:00 pm today and drove over to my folks’ house. From there, Mom and I drove down to Forest Mall in Fond du Lac, where we parked her car, met up with Dad, and got in his truck. Our destination? Cleveland.

Let’s back up a bit. A few weeks ago, I was talking with my mom about Puckaway projects. Specifically, I was describing the condition of the shack. Windows are broken from uneven settling, it’s mustier than ever, signs of critter infestation are everywhere, the doors are in rough shape, and the roof–that is, the wooden roof built over the actual mobile home roof–is rotting apart. My recent cleaning efforts and furniture rearrangement have made it more habitable than it’s been in years, but it’s an unwinnable war.

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Log: September 20 and 21, 2019

September 23, 2019 / / 0 Comments

Friday

Pulled in at 7:00 with Jake and Hannah. After Josh’s solo overnight last weekend, Jake was ready for his own. We surprised four deer eating acorns in the south yard as we drove in. One bolted right away, one left after I parked the truck, another took off after I revved the engine, but the final deer was enjoying her snack too much to be bothered to move. It wasn’t until I pulled up to the pole barn that she decided it was time to join her friends. Jake, of course, got a big kick out of this.

I set my boy up with one of the Pirates of the Caribbean movies and he had his A&W dinner at the keep’s kitchen table. I joined him after unloading the truck by the pole barn. Since we arrived kind of late, I don’t have much to tackle projectwise tonight and we can just relax.

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Log: September 13 and 14, 2019

September 16, 2019 / / 0 Comments

Saturday

Pulled in at 4:00 pm with Hannah and Josh. This is his first solo overnight up here without his big brother and he’s excited. We unloaded the truck and Josh headed to the swing. I opened up the shack and turned on the ceiling fans to help freshen it up. I think I’ll start doing that every trip up to keep mildew at bay.

My next stop was the outhouse. This year, we’ve had several hatches of little black flies in there. I’m surprised it hasn’t happened before, honestly. Between them, the spiders, moths, and crickets, it’s getting a little too crowded in there for my tastes. I brought up a four-pack of bug bomb with me today, so I grabbed one can, tied it to some twine, and lowered it down to just above the, uh, “waterline” in the pit below before tying the line off. I placed another can on the bench next to the seat, raised first can, and activated them both before dropping it back down below. I held my breath and shut the door. I’ll give this a few hours to sort itself out.

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Log: September 7 and 8, 2019

September 12, 2019 / / 0 Comments

Saturday

Hannah, the boys, and I pulled in at 5:30 towing the ATV trailer full of furniture. I’ve already had a busy weekend shuffling couches and chairs around. My folks got new living room furniture a few weeks ago, so yesterday afternoon, Dad and I headed up to Presque Isle with the old couch, loveseat, chair and recliner from their house. We stayed the night up there and swapped out all four pieces earlier this morning. Back in Oshkosh, we swapped the recliner for the one in Dad’s basement, then headed to my house to swap the couch and loveseat for the ones we had on the front porch. This is the final leg of the journey. The chair from Presque Isle will end up in the keep. The couch and chairs from my porch, along with the recliner from my folks’ basement, are destined for the shack. Finally, the furniture currently in the shack has a date with the burnpit.

For now, that’s all got to wait; we narrowly avoided the rain on our way in, so I backed the ATV trailer into the pole barn to keep everything nice and dry. There wasn’t much to the front and the rain let up within 20 minutes. The boys kept busy with their fort, Power Wheels, and the swing while I headed over to the shack.

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