A sleepy day and mountain lion clarification

I started my day with a wander in the woods with K by my side. Although the day dawned with a low cover of clouds, the ceiling began to retreat while we walked.

We headed up to Hug Hill, and the juxtaposition of blue skies, wind-shaped clouds, and snowy mountains reminded me how lucky I am to have this spot easily accessible from my home.
K's dark silhouette loomed dramatically against the sky.
From Hug Hill, we plummeted down a north-facing slope to a favorite trail. Actually, I very carefully found a safe route to avoid falling, mostly following a packed path left by our elk herd. I love following in their tracks.

We reached a beautiful viewpoint that we haven't visited in months due to deep snow. I gazed at the mountains.
And, K wriggled on her back. I believe that wriggling in the snow is K's way of expressing joy.
We turned around at that point, hurrying home so that K could go to the vet and have her staples removed from her belly incision. The surgeon declared that she needed one more week of leash-only walking before we gradually allow more activity. I don't mind - I've enjoyed having my chocolate friend right by my side while we both heal. However, I suspect that K is eagerly anticipating a rambunctious romp through the snow.
While K was gone, R decided that he needed to take on the 'guarding KB' role. Everywhere I went, R hovered nearby.
Finally, I decided that I was too sleepy to try to write a blog post (I really didn't expect the extent of fatigue that I've had since surgery), and R and I snoozed together. He's such a sweet soul. And, he has impeccable taste in human friends. He and K worship SMRP, as you can see in the photo taken during our hike yesterday.
Houndstooth asked a good question in a comment yesterday, asking why the lion expended so much energy to move his deer carcass, only to allow scavengers to steal the remains. One thing that wasn't clear from my presentation was that the lion moved his cache on Jan 6 (Day 4 - see the video here).

Then, because we didn't know about the sneaky lion's move, our cameras remained at the former cache site, recording no photos for days. It wasn't until Jan 10 (Day 8) that we checked the cameras and discovered that the cache had been moved. I suspect that the mountain lion ate the remainder of the deer meat during that interval. Interestingly, mountain lions don't eat or gnaw on bones because their teeth aren't specialized for that tough job. Consequently, mountain lions always leave the bones for the the coyotes, who do the hard work of extracting nutrients from the bones themselves.

I'm still working hard on the 'documentary' style video montage of the hundreds of photos and video clips we collected. It's slow work but here's one of my favorites so far from the day the mountain lion moved his cache.