My, how that 90-degree Monday brought in the leafing and blossoming of spring.

Overnight, my two large Japanese maples went from subtle buds to small, delicate red leaves, the burning bushes and bridal wreath suddenly became opaque, pink flowers popped out on the apple tree, a similar hue appeared on three Kwanzon cherries, and the stubborn forsythias are still hanging on, bright yellow for nearly a month now. Soon that sweet lilac smell will ride balmy breezes to my nostrils, alluring indeed. Between that, the crack of the bat, and human temptations, spring was my undoing of youth.

Turkey hunters have already lost their forest sight lines with the April 30 opening of the four-week season more than a week away. Which confirms that this precocious spring has remained consistent throughout, with sugar houses boiling three weeks early, rare indeed before Presidents Day, and the Holyoke fish ladder opening last Friday, shad running three weeks before last year’s more-typical May 5 start. Global warming? What global warming? A simple one-year anomaly, that’s all; nature’s way. We’ll be back to normal next year. Ask Sean Hannity. He knows. Gets all his information straight from impeccable sources, experts all, paid by the Koch brothers and ExxonMobil, two altruistic disseminators of truth, protectors of treasured freedom and justice.

I must say it’s been a splendid week thus far. Two books I have been eagerly awaiting arrived by mail on consecutive days. First, Monday, I read the jacket flaps and preface to “Democracy’s Prisoner,” a recent biography of early 20th-century political activist and dissident Eugene Debs, before finishing a biography of Revolutionary hero Nathan Hale, which I would not recommend. Although I read it through to learn the whole Hale tale, author M. William Phelps lost me early when he incorrectly identified Samuel and John Adams as brothers. Sorry, there’s absolutely no excuse for an egregious error like that. I Googled the author and found a smug, pompous ass in living color. As for Debs, I have bumped into him often in my reading and have for years wanted to know more about him. But first I blew through “Renegade: Henry Miller and the Making of Tropic of Cancer” in rapid fashion, couldn’t put it down after it arrived Tuesday. I immediately read the back cover and both flaps before getting drawn in, reading three chapters, wanting more. But I had a column to start and disciplined myself to sit at my desk.

I got back to the controversial American novelist Miller later that day, then rose at 6 a.m. Wednesday determined to finish the book before walking the dogs. So, now, here I sit. I don’t know what took me so long to “discover” Miller, a fascinating artist whose work I only knew from afar for years. You gotta love a guy whose books are banned in America and Great Britain. What better enticement to explore them? Of course, I have already been through this exercise once, actually not that long ago. It then all began with an interest in local legend Jimmy Cooney, Whately publisher of “The Phoenix” who led me to Miller and Anais Nin, infamous lovers and writers. Now I’m back at it, reading Frederick Turner’s take, brought to my attention by the New York Times book-review site that arrives by email every Thursday or Friday.

I’ve already read much written by and about Miller and Nin, even her diaries and erotica, which I found interesting indeed. Now I’ll probably be unable to resist revisiting at the very least “Tropic of Cancer.” And — who knows? — I may even read Miller’s first and last trilogies, the whole shebang. Provocative Miller broke U.S. censorial barriers before those eight-foot Woodstock chain-link fences were trampled into the muddy Bethel, N.Y., landscape. Today, he’s still going strong, has a cult following despite the sharp right turn Nixon put us on in 1968. Wait! Was it right or wrong? A matter of opinion, I guess. I report. You decide.

But enough of that, grandson Jordi was in town over the weekend and the trip to retrieve him cost me dearly: a $166 speeding ticket on my way to a Bethel, Vt., rendezvous Friday afternoon. My wife has often cautioned me to be careful driving through Putney so, of course, she didn’t hesitate to remind me of her previous warnings as we sat in the car speculating whether a ticket or warning was coming our way. She leaned toward the latter. Not me. I knew better from the cop’s stern, arrogant countenance, a strong dose of self-importance. Oh well, if I had to contribute money to a state of my choosing, it would surely be The People’s Republic of Vermont, so I guess I can live with that little “donation.” That said, I still believe I was in complete control, a danger to absolutely no one with my Tacoma speedometer reading 83. My first ticket in decades, I guess I’ve been lucky.

Back to Jordi, though, we attended Saturday’s Historic Deerfield Patriots Day festivities — a home run, with wagon rides, a galloping messenger sounding the call to arms, tri-corned colonial militia in the tavern-side street, cannon blasts, you name it, all there for an impressionable 6-year-old to soak up. I believe some of the historical events we’ve exposed him to will plant a fertile seed that will sprout, grow deep roots and produce succulent fruit. We’ll see. He volunteered for duty on the spot, was given a lieutenant’s commission and marched in formation to fifes and drums with other kids, all carrying pine long-rifles sold behind the silver museum. Next up, Fort Ticonderoga. I have many times promised the ferry ride there. It’s going to happen soon. Then back to The Fort at No. 4 in early June, maybe with 2-year-old Arie, Jordi’s younger brother, in tow. At least I’m leaning that way. Hey, we may even get to Saratoga this summer. Jordi’s seventh great-grandfather, Deacon Thomas Sanderson of Whately, was a lieutenant on the Hudson Valley Revolutionary campaign that turned the tide in the rebels’ favor. There has to be information in the battlefield library about local men who fought there. I know that won’t be for Jordi. Maybe I’ll just leave him in the capable hands of his grandmother to break free for a couple of hours, which in my case usually turns into days or weeks. I love research but hated school. Figure that out. I dare you.

Moving on, I received an interesting email this week from a Franklin County man who wanted to remain anonymous but is not happy with some fish and wildlife folks. Why? Well, it seems a dead bear was discovered in a yard up the hill from my home last week and he called to report it but|couldn’t get a game warden to respond. Instead, he had to settle for local police, who he thought just went through the motions. The lackluster response just didn’t sit right with the man. “Wouldn’t you think they would have sent a game warden to see if there were orphaned cubs, or maybe to salvage some meat?” he asked.

Then Saturday’s opening-day of Quabbin fishing season reignited his ire. Right there on center stage at one of the public gates, a bold and brazen fishing bandit proceeded to catch and keep eight rainbow trout, five more than the limit. When our law-abiding source reported the violation to a park ranger, he received a nod, half-smile and that’s about it. It was about as much as he could endure, prompting his “This state’s a joke!” quip. Just one man’s opinion, of course, one I’d rather ignore. Hey, if the guy wanted to take a shot at the Vermont State Police, well, I might just bite, given my recent speeding ticket. But why poke at that white-faced hornets’ nest under my picnic table? Like old Aunt Gladys used to say, “Better leave it be.”

Something else interesting arrived recently in my inbox: a letter from local Deerfield River outfitter Chris Jackson, who picked up a recent column on my blog and chimed in. He begged to differ with anglers who had complained that there were no trout left in the river following Irene’s devastating fall flood.

“I don’t want to sound cocky,” he wrote, “but the lower Deerfield is and has been loaded with holdover trout and wild fish through the winter. If you can’t catch them, book a trip and I’ll show whomever how to catch them. People measure the fishing by how many dumb stockies they take, and assume that there’s no fish in the river because of their lack of success. I love those people! They leave me to catch dozens in solitude. All of the tributaries, sans the Chickley River, were lights-out all winter, and I have live video to prove it.

“Yes there were instances of fish-kill throughout the river system (natural selection for genetically inferior hatchery fish, they can’t take much of anything), and the benthic macroinvertabrate number are greatly reduced, yet the wild fish are thriving and the bugs have high fecundity, so the river is going to be fine. What we need now is some rain!”

So how about that! Mr. Jackson can be contacted through his website at www.flyfishthedeerfield.com — photos, video, the whole nine yards. Check it out.

Speaking of trout, it’s a slow week for local stocking. The Deerfield will again be done in Florida, Charlemont and Buckland by the Western District, and the Valley District intends to hit Cranberry and Puffers ponds. That’s it locally.

Oh yeah, a quick note before I go, one little leftover that arrived just too late for last week’s column. Local sportsman Donald Graves was named the Massachusetts Sportsmen’s Council Sportsman of the Year at the organization’s annual meeting on April 7. An outspoken gadfly who over the years has gotten under the skin of many a MassWildlife official regarding hunting and trapping issues, Graves has been a consistent supportive voice for Bay State sportsmen, thus the award. “I was chosen by my peers, had no clue it was coming and was happy,” he wrote in last week’s email.

That’s it for this week. Off I go to start “Democracy’s Prisoner,” the biography of a socialist candidate in five United States presidential elections, the last in 1920 as a federal-penitentiary inmate in Georgia, convicted of sedition for his public opposition to World War I. Yes, times changed in America when we decided to join European capitalists’ wars and take over as the world’s military-industrial complex, “helping” others instead of our own.

Ooops, there I go again, flying off. Better be careful. Hannity, Dennis & Callahan and the rest of our airwaves Storm Troopers might think I’m off my rocker.

Horrors!