Ah, Warmth

 It may look chilly, but the sun's warmth was surely felt, and welcomed, this morning.

Visit #1297, Sunday 21 March 21, 6:45-10:00AM, 4.8 miles, 9.5 lbs. of litter.

Temps in the 30's, quickly rising to the low 60's, sunny.

Although not quite as early as last week, I got a pre-dawn start this morning so any spray paint I applied would be dry before being stepped on. It was chilly to start.

I was heading to the wooden walkbridge to apply a second coat of spray paint over graffiti I found recently. Just prior to reaching the walkbridge, I found this note:

This note is from a forlorn hiker, to all his former hiking companions in Hubbard Park. That's the background to this soap opera. And now a word from our sponsors...

At the walkbridge, I got to my early morning work.

Hopefully this will cover better and weather nicely. Otherwise, I have a Plan B.

Almost reaching the road near Castle Craig, I found this recently fallen branch, which I 'll remove in the near future.

Walking the road down toward the reservoir I found this graffiti whose color matches that found on the walkbridge over I-691 I found and covered recently. I may have to go on the hunt to see if I can find more. Fortunately I had the brown spray paint with me which was a good downpayment on covering this.

The walk down the road to the reservoir was quieter than quarantining alone, but more enjoyable.

Heading back toward the park, on the road around Merimere Reservoir, I found a painted rock perched in a nook. The author seems to think highly of themselves.

As I reached the south end of Merimere Reservoir, I found a remnant of winter.

Find of the Week, the murder weapon.

I then reached the location of my major project this weekend, the water tank. I reported this graffiti to the Meriden Water Department in December 2020. I received a terse reply from the department, so I didn't expect a timely response, if any at all. I'll cut them some slack, considering winter was setting in then. Nevertheless, it was time for it to go, and I wasn't going to wait for this to rise to the top of their To Do List.

My initial plan was to paint over it. Of course, that would require matching paint. I brought a selection to compare. Sherwin-Williams' "Bora Bora Shore" (SW9045) was the closest match in my eyes. Remember that dear reader, should you have need to paint over graffiti on the water tank.

But that was for the future. Today I was going to try something else.

I sprayed it on every instance on the water tank, reasoning by the time I squirted the last one (about 12 of them), the first one would be ready for scrubbing. Turns out this graffiti remover evaporates and gets sticky in about 10 minutes so when I returned to the first tag and started scrubbing, it needed another application to reactivate the liquid.

However, other than learning from my mistake, it worked surprisingly well. I needed more rags than I had with me.

One tag was quite resistant to the Goo Gone, yet appears to be applied with the same paint.

I shall return in the near future with lacquer thinner to further clean my work and eliminate this stubborn piece.

Lacquer thinner is so strong it's been approved by the Vatican to remove sins from the souls of Catholics. Other religions will have to rely on plain ol' forgiveness and hope the best.

I returned to the park and dropped off my snow saucer for the week.