OK. Its' an hour later, and I haven't picked up a paintbrush yet. The rest of the family is busy, but I'm finding as many non-painting things to do as I can. Any minute now, my loved ones will tell me to get my butt in gear, I'm sure.

But actually, my butt just was in gear. I may not be able to run right now, but I can bike, so I just took my trusty $79 K-Mart steed out onto the dirt roads and got a little cardio in. A lot of cardio, actually. My K-Mart steed used to have 12 speeds, but they've collapsed themselves down into two. It's work.

I had a good ride, but I also had a rolling reminder of why May is a little tough up here in the woods. It's black fly season. (There's a black fly supper tonight at the town hall. We don't eat them, we just talk about them.) As I was riding, I became a human windshield. My legs and shorts and sweatshirt with the giant moose head on it were plastered with dead flies. I forgot my sunglasses, so two flew into my eyes, and I swallowed about a pound of them. (OK, so we do eat them.)

Still sound idyllic, guys? Still want to come up here to the New Hampshire woods? I guess if you want to enjoy the loons and herons, you gotta swallow a few flies.

The black flies can read the calendar. They appear on the first of May, and they disappear on the first of June. It's uncanny. We've been coming up here for 20 years, and it happens every season. Three days from now, there will be no black flies.

Time to paint. I'm feeling guilty watching all the sweat equity being invested around me.