'Summertime and the Living is Easy'

September welcomes Autumn with temperatures flipping from 90 degree days in August to 60 degree days. This is my first free/retired Summer since the early 90's. We decide each morning what activities we will partake-in during the daylight hours that follow. We are daytime operators...evenings find us safe in our house either playing Scrabble or watching Netflix, often both. Nori, our Labrador gets the first exercise option after we finish our early morning coffee. This means either a dog walk on the trails behind our house or a bicycle-assisted trot to Last Chance Creek (a six mile run that includes twenty minutes of swimming and stick chasing down-current toward Lake Almanor). Afternoons find us in our bicycle saddles, usually headed uphill toward Lassen Volcanic National Park. Six, eight or thirteen mile climbs that are often traffic-free and wind-assisted. Since the Dixie Fire consumed all of the shade offered foliage we are exposed to the lava bones that hold up the Lassen uplift.