December 31, 2010

Christmas, etc.

December 19,2010

A week from now Christmas will be over. Between now and then there will be much Yuletide celebration on good ol' SA as we spin merrily at close to 1,000mph and hurtle through space at something like 65,000mph. The Wylies will get here Wednesday and that should really liven things up. It will be a five-kid Christmas. It would almost be Dickensian if we were a little poorer.

We've had quite a range of weather this week. Monday and Tuesday were very pleasant days, cool early but turning into warm, sunny afternoons with light winds. By Thursday, though, the weather changed and Friday morning we woke to a couple inches of snow. Saturday there was still snow on the ground but the the wind was blowing out of the south so it warmed enough to melt it off as the day went along.

Abigail and I visited Caprock Canyon State Park to try our luck catching some of the trout released into it earlier in the week. There was no snow there but the breeze was chilly when we arrived about noon. Fortunately we found a sunny spot on the south side of Lake Theo that was sheltered from the wind and were able to do our fishing in comfort. A couple of cars drove along the road but we saw no one else fishing. It was very quiet and peaceful and other than not even getting a nibble we enjoyed ourselves immensely. After getting Abigail set up, which didn't take much since she's pretty well able to handle her own equipment, I turned to trying to figure out the Shakespeare rod and reel I bought for

Abigail for her birthday last July. It is an open-faced reel and we weren't able to get it working in Red River. I wound up buying her a simple but perfectly adequate Zebco rod and reel and swapping her. Yesterday I was determined to figure out how to work the dang think. So while Abigail fished I struggled with the Shakespeare. The line used for trout fishing is fine and that doesn't help since it's hard to see and requires nimble fingers. Eventually, though, I got it set up and managed to make a pretty good cast with it. Clyde, Eric and Eric's boys Austin and Conner showed up soon after and Eric corrected a couple of things and confirmed a couple theories I'd formed so that I now really like the Shakespeare. It works very well, except that it can't make the fish bite. We weren't too disappointed, though. It was a pleasant afternoon, the scenery was really nice and it was fun to try our luck even though we didn't have any.

Good ol' Grandma let Rebecca help her do some baking while Abigail and I fished and her mom and dad went furniture shopping. Joyce said she even let Rebecca help her wash dishes. Joyce was able to find enough plastic things to limit the damage.

Chris and Kari ran into Wes Kirton who told them he'd recently had some medical attention. I don't know the exact details but I think he ran into problems related to some congenital heart anomaly and had to have a stent put in to correct it. He's OK now, I guess.

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December 12, 2010

Seedlings

Abigail said she asked her dad why it was called the naughty pine room. What had it done that was so naughty?

From my bedroom window I watched two mockingbirds going at it this morning. No doubt arguing some point of order, they squared off and hopped around trying to gain advantage until they levitated in a flurry of wings. I don't know how the matter was resolved, if it was. I lost interest and turned my attention to John Derbyshire's comments on much the same sort of activities over the tax bill before congress.

We had some pretty nice days late in the week but wouldn't you know it a cold front blew in Friday night and was still blowing when it was time to get to work Saturday. My order of seedlings from Arbor Day came in Friday so getting them planted was the first project. Abigail and later Rebecca joined me, neither of them suitably dressed for the biting wind so I had to loan them some of my cool weather garb. Abigail chose my hooded sweatshirt but it was more of a hooded sweatskirt on her. That left my heavy denim shirt for Rebecca when she showed up in sandals and one thin layer of clothes and complaining about the cold. The actual planting was being done on the south side of the shop, the sunny side out of the wind, so we were mostly comfortable. It was also comfortable inside the shop. Two of the seedlings, a paper birch and a white pine, were in little pots so we planted them right away. The douglasfir, bald cypress and Austrian pine plus the two freebie forsythias and one red maple were bare roots and had to be soaked for three hours before planting. We spent that time up in the loft playing with the train. It is

running pretty good now, good enough to play with anyway. I've taken apart about half the track and cleaned the connections. I need to do the rest. There are a couple of sections of track that are designed to uncouple cars. They aren't working and I need to try to see if I can get them going. In spite of the defects I hope to remedy over time, it's fun to play with. The train can be backed onto the siding and, if the mechanism was working, cars uncoupled so in theory one could put together trains and take trains apart. It will take some skill to do that so it will offer a bit of a challenge. Then there is the prospect of adding stuff and working on the landscape, so to speak. It's a pretty good activity for one or more adults and one or more children (old enough to focus on something) when it is nicer to be indoors than out.

My friend Clyde, head ranger at Caprock Canyon State Park, called yesterday evening to tell me they would be stocking Lake Theo in the park with trout this coming week. Back in October I read somewhere that the state would do that when the water temperature got low enough to suit a trout's taste so I called Clyde and asked him to let me know when they did that. That means we need to plan a fishing trip for next Saturday. Clyde said they wouldn't allow fishing until Friday, I guess to give the fish a chance to acclimate themselves to their new surroundings. I don't know what the public response will be. The program is designed mainly for children, sort of a teach a child to fish thing. At any rate the following Saturday is Christmas so maybe we should plan on next Saturday to get our share before the trout get fished out. It could be that doesn't happen very fast. Maybe they last almost until the water starts warming but it still might be best to get a jump on things.

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December 5, 2010

We're back in our routine after getting back from Garland Wednesday. Joyce has been a little under the weather but that didn't stop her from getting us all to the Parade of Lights Friday evening. Various Amarillo organizations put together floats ranging from vintage cars with Christmas lights on them to flatbed trailers with fairly elaborate displays. The cold front which was so unpleasant Saturday hadn't arrived and the evening was almost balmy. A little neighbor girl named Claire joined us. I think Kari was baby sitting her. She's about Rebecca's age, maybe younger, and they had fun running around even though that gave Grandma the fantods. At one point after the parade when we were standing around waiting for the Christmas tree lighting I noticed a family of Native Americans standing in front of us. The man must have been full blood judging from his appearance. There were three women with him, one holding a 2-3 year old. I'd guess one of the women was the wife and maybe the other two were daughters. The father of the child wasn't around and the child's kinky hair implied his father wasn't of the same race. It's not that often that I see NA's as opposed to hispanics. I would have been interested to know a little more about them. What tribe? Where are the from? There are plenty of NA's in eastern Oklahoma and there are tribes in New Mexico but those are the closest. Not that they would have had to come from a reservation. For all I know they've been in Amarillo for generations but as the little

one showed it's not long before the blood is diluted.

Yesterday I hauled another load of tree branches to the brush site. That makes five loads of branches on the ground from the snow storm a couple of weeks ago. I guess next weekend I'll start trimming those that need trimming. I'm debating whether to hire someone to handle the elm branches that extend over the fence into Quadrille on the north and the office park on the south. They tend to be a little higher and it would probably be better if we didn't expose ourselves to the risk of injury by climbing up into the trees to reach them.

Yesterday morning Abigail had a volley ball game. Her team seemed to suffer the effects of the Thanksgiving layoff but Abigail said the team they defeated 2-1 was previously undefeated so I guess they weren't the only ones.

It's Christmas shopping time. We all have so much it seems a little crazy to keep adding to our stockpile. Still, it's fun to exchange Christmas presents. I could probably go through the shop loft and find things for everyone on my list. Maybe that would be a good way to thin things out a bit. I wonder if anyone needs a blanket or maybe a comforter or two.

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November 28, 2010

Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving has come and gone. In spite of the crowded conditions I think everyone enjoyed the celebration. K,C,A&R (plus those dogs) hit the road for home late yesterday afternoon so things were a little quieter yesterday evening. I went with Dave and Kaylee to Lowes and Home Depot so Dave could scout some Christmas paraphernalia. When we got home we loaded up on pie left from Thanksgiving. Later I added to my hours of football watching until nearly comatose.

Kathryn and John took me in for one night and we had a pleasant time discussing a wide range of topics until late in the evening. Saturday morning after breakfast we went

for a walk around the area instead of playing golf. It was a beautiful morning once it warmed up a little and the walk was probably a better way to spend it than a round of golf would have been. John gets in plenty of golf and that course is too much for a high handicapper like me. I got back in to Garland in time to spend a little time with the Zbinden branch before they left.

The Wylie girls are prospering. Little Vivian is in the 97th percentile for weight, or height, or something, I'm not sure, I'm told. She's certainly grown in the two months since I first met her.

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November 21, 2010

It was a reasonably mild week weather-wise this week after the rain and snow of the previous week. The snow stuck around in the shady spots most of the week. In fact, there was a hand-sized lump on the north side of the shop, all that remained from what dropped off the roof when it started melting, Saturday morning. The ground is still damp but the bare spots aren't sticky. We were able to get down the lane with the pickup to haul off the limbs the snow brought down. I got an early start on the limbs in our backyard Saturday morning. There were several, including a very large one. I think we were very lucky that one didn't do some damage. It was big and heavy enough to have knocked a chunk out of the Quadrille's fence and/or snapped the slash pine in two. It was good I decided to leave the slash pine and plant the Austrian pine I planted a couple weeks ago between the juniper and the pecan. It was safely out of the path of that big limb. Anyway, I got all that cleaned up, loaded in the pickup and taken to the brush site before Chris put in an appearance. Together we cleaned the limbs off the strip along the street. He dumped that load and another while I went to Abigail's volleyball game, then had lunch. Then he, Abigail, Rebecca and I made a load going about halfway around the lane starting on the north side. After that we called it a day. There is probably another load of fallen limbs before we get into trimming.

After work yesterday evening we had weenie roast. It was a pleasant evening, a little breezy, but still pretty nice, especially next to the fire as it got dark. A full moon rose over the trees on the east and lit up the tawny grass so that anything out in the open was quite

visible. Chris told me one evening after dark when he was walking the dogs an owl hooted at him from the telephone just east of the tree line. He said he hooted back and the owl didn't fly off. He encountered two more as he turned the southeast corner of the lane. Wonder why they seem to be around more in winter?

One morning I noticed a jumping spider slowly making its way along the shop floor. It was cold so it wasn't moving very fast. I collected it, put it in a clear pitcher sitting around the shop and stuck it in the man-cave window. I didn't think it could climb out of the clear plastic pitcher but the next thing I new it was walking along the edge of the window sill. I go a glass jar, a relic of the candy shop, and put it in that. The window sill was much warmer and the spider got quite active. The jar was close to a gallon in size and though the spider could easily climb the sides it couldn't negotiate the portion between the side and the opening where it would have to cling upside down. It kept trying though and after a while it seemed like its many falls were taking a toll on it. I had in mind keep it for observation, catching the occasional fly for it. I figured its chances of survival this time of year were better in the jar than outside. But when it seemed to be feeling the effects of the falls, and it may simply have been that sun wasn't warming the window sill as much and the spider was feeling the effects of the reduced temperature, I decided I didn't want it on my conscience so I took it outside and put it on one of the garden fence posts. It was a balmy afternoon so it had plenty of time to seek shelter.

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November 14, 2010

Chinese pistache fall foliage

It started sprinkling Thursday evening when the Zbindens were having dinner with us at 1911. The forecast was for a 15% chance of rain, I believe, and there was a possibility of a little snow west of us on the Texas/New Mexico border. We didn't pay much attention to the rain figuring it would stop before it amounted to anything. When it kept on for a little bit I began to hope for an inch which we badly needed. Before bedtime it was pretty obvious we would get that. The Zbindens had to make a run for it during a lull when it slowed down to a gentle shower. Recently Kathryn emailed me they'd gotten four inches over a 24-hour period from a gentle but mostly continuous rain. When I read that I wished we could get a rain like that but figured there was no chance. After all, the meteorologists say there is a La Nina and we're in for a warm, dry winter. When it gets dry like it does it seems like it will never rain again. Thursday night, though, we must have been in the sweet spot of the storm that came through because while other areas of town reported an inch of rain and a couple inches of snow we got three inches of rain and about six inches of very wet snow.

There was a downside to the storm. That very wet snow broke off many a limb on SA. Our poor old Siberian elms, old and brittle as they are, took a beating. There were a few other trees that suffered, too. The pear in the front yard at 2005 lost a fairly substantial limb and the pecan in the enclosure was damaged fairly significantly. There wasn't any collateral damage from the larger limbs that fell and when it drys up enough I'll get the groundskeepers busy cleaning up.

H&E are here and we've been partying with the Zbindens the last three nights. Yesterday afternoon we watched the last WT football game with the Brokenbecks. The East Central Oklahoma Tigers were no match for the Buffs so there wasn't much excitement to the game but it was fun anyway. The refs did their best to keep the Tigers in the game by flagging the buffs 10 or 12 times to one or two penalties called on the Tigers. I saw one of the Tigers kick the WT running back while he was on the ground after being tackled but I guess the refs didn't see it. Anyway it was nice afternoon even though it was chilly and we had a good time.

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November 7, 2010

There were two mallard hens on the pond this morning when I went up to run water in it. Interesting that I say I went up when in fact I went laterally to Six Acres orientation but it was always up when I was growing up at 2005 and up it shall ever be as far as I'm concerned. To late in the game for me to reorient myself. Anyway, I thought at first it might be the same pair, a hen and a drake, that frequented our establishment in the spring. Then I saw it was two hens so at least one of them was a newbie. The didn't seem too concerned with my presence, though. I cater to a clientele free to choose so it is always gratifying when they honor us with their patronage. Their trade is always welcome.

We enjoyed an entertaining football game with Brokenbeks yesterday evening even though the Buffs came up short in the end. They enjoyed the lead from their opening drive into the fourth quarter when Abilene

Christian, ranked 3rd in the country according to our companions, tied it up. The Buffs pulled ahead again and again ACU tied it up, then in the waning minutes pulled ahead and WT didn't have time to pull back even. They were throwing at the end zone at the end though. Needless to say we didn't leave early.

Saturday was a lovely day. I got an early start tree trimming when it was still pretty chilly. Nothing like tree trimming to warm one up. There was a fox in the pasture when I rolled the chili wagon out. It regarded me with surprise for a little bit, then cantered off on whatever business it had.

H&E will arrive this evening. Unfortunately I won't be here. I'm catching a flight to Dallas at 2 o'clock where I will work a trade show. I'll return to hearth and home Tuesday evening.

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October 31, 2010

New Car

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October 24, 2010

My work gang took care of the sunflowers on the place yesterday. It took less than two hours for us to shred them all into some pretty good mulch. We took care of those to the west of the shop first. While I was at lunch Chris and Rebecca pulled them up, cut off the stumps and had them ready to shred when I got back. It took only 22 cranks to get the beast going and Chris and I divided those between us. It's not easy turning over an 8-horse engine with a pull rope or start an engine that has been sitting for months so I counted us lucky to get off so lightly.

When we finished there we relocated to the north side of the dirt piles. We had a pretty good southwest breeze which is helpful when shredding stuff because you can work upwind and not have to breath so much dust. Chris lopped off the sunflowers with the lopping shears and Abigail dragged them off the mounds to the shredder. I got them ready to shred by lopping branches off the larger ones and handing them to Chris to feed into the shredder. Rebecca was helping out, too, until Grandpa yelled at her and hurt her feelings. I turned around just in time to see her reaching for the sparkplug on the chipper engine. She got over my yelling at her a look quicker than she would have gotten over a burned hand.

We got nearly an inch of rain Thursday, which spoiled our golf game but we needed the moisture and it gave me a reprieve on watering. Saturday morning I planted three of the four Austrian pines I bought the previous week. When I was looking over the stock at the nursery where I bought them I noticed that some of the APs had short needles and some had long needles. I didn't examine the labels real close to see if they were different varieties. Of the three large APs (at least I think they are APs) on the place the one on the south side of 2005 and the one north of 2005 next to the drive have long needles while the one west of 2005 has short needles. I had been wondering about that since

otherwise the trees seem very similar. Now it appears there are different varieties of APs. The four I bought have long needles. I prefer the long needles because it is easier to harvest mulch from them. The long needles are easier to rake up.

Anyway, I planted three of them. The large one I put in our backyard at about 2 o'clock from the bird bath. I was going to replace the slash pine in the northeast corner with it but when I examined the slash pine I saw it had nice growth on it and I decided to leave it. As the AP grows it will screen out the roof of the house just across the fence, which will be nice. It will have to compete with the pecan and juniper on either side of it but that should simply encourage it toward more vertical growth. It will be interesting to see it in 20 years.

Saturday evening I went to the WT game with the Brocks. Marilyn made a sandwich for me, not trusting me to not show up without anything and have to go to the concession stand like the last game. It looked like the other team was going to make things difficult for the Buffs when they took the opening kickoff and moved right down the field. The Buffs made them settle for a field goal, though. The Mustangs forced a Buff 3-and-out, took over the ball and again moved easily down the field. This time the Buffs finally held and from there into the fourth quarter went on a five touchdown run. The Mustangs tried to mount a comeback in the fourth quarter and the final score was 42-29. Some odd clock management and other questionable strategies by the Buff coaches made it seem close at the end. Art was ready to go half way through the fourth but Marilyn didn't want to leave. They had gone to bed the previous weekend with the Buffs in the lead only to wake up and find they had lost and she felt it would be bad luck if we didn't stay until there was no possibility of a loss, which turned out to be with about 20 seconds left. Anyway, it was fun and entertaining.

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October 17, 2010

It's been two weeks since my wife left me and I'm hanging in there, barely. Ran the dishwasher this morning, a big step, and may do some laundry sometime today if I'm feeling up to it. I still have clean underwear if I don't. Kari is doing a good job of caring for her elderly father so my glide path to perdition is a gentle one.

We had a weener roast yesterday evening, first one in what seems like a long time. It was a good evening for it. Though the afternoon was warm, it got a little nippy when the sun went down, just what you want for huddling by the fire. When it got dark a nice moon came out to keep the spooks at bay. They needed keeping at bay, too. Rebecca had some Dracula teeth and she looked pretty spooky when she had them in her mouth.

Saturday morning I revamped the tree nursery. The day be for I went to the nursery and bought one 5-gallon and 3 1-gallon Austrian pines. I think I'm going to replace the slash pine in the northeast corner of 1911 with the bigger one and use the smaller ones, at least a couple of them, in the lane. Two of the elm stumps in the northeast lane rotted out enough that we could remove them so now there are two nice spots to plant little trees. I removed the grass mulch from the nursery, smoothed the dirt out but still kept the slope away from the building, put down a double layer of landscaping fabric and filled the strip in with sand. Some of the plants will quickly send roots through their container into the soil and I don't think it is especially good for them to be ripped out of the ground. I figure these roots will hit the fabric and go laterally in the sand which will make them much easier to move around. Earlier in the week I ordered five new bare root specimens from Arbor Day. I need to transplant some of the existing seedlings into larger containers, then I'll be

ready for the new ones when they arrive.

While at the nursery Friday I bought some winterizer fertilizer which is supposed to be good for grass and trees. I'm going to experiment with it on some of the junipers that are in such bad shape. The winterizer comes in 20lb. bags for $15 so I have neither the time nor the purse for feeding any but a handful of trees. Yesterday I trimmed on that poor old relic due west of 2005, then spread fertilizer. That will be a good test of the effects. I'll keep my fingers crossed that I'm not just throwing my money away.

Yesterday was Abigail's last volley ball game for that season or session. I'm told another session will start up immediately. We spent some time practicing a couple of evenings this past week. When the games started they stopped practicing as a team and it appeared that their play degenerated because of it. Yesterday's games were entertaining. Their opponent won the first two but Abigail's team took some solace in clobbering them pretty good in the third.

All in all it's pretty pleasant on SA right now. The mowing is done for the season. There isn't much to be done in the garden except some picking. The leaves are starting to turn and the weather is mild, though dry. I'm trying to water trees. Soon I'll loose my evenings to darkness when the time changes but I've got projects in the shop/man cave that I can start working on. I need to finish the counter tops and install a sink. I also want to put in a hand rail for the cave stairs. The trim around the shower in the bathroom needs to be painted and then there is lots to be done in the attic to organize and reduce the stuff up there. That should be interesting.

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October 10, 2010

Frogs

So Saturday morning I got out of bed at 5:30 so I could collect some frogs from the golf course under cover of darkness. When Gary and I played golf week before last I noticed a puddle near the 18th hole that had little frogs in it. It appeared there was something wrong with a sprinkler head that was perpetuating the puddle. I realized that it would be pretty easy to catch the little frogs since the puddle wasn't much bigger than a basketball hoop. I was contemplating a raid the following Saturday but then Vivian changed my plans. I figured the spot would have dried up and the frogs would have found their way to the big pond not far away so I was surprised when we played this Thursday evening that the puddle and the frogs were still there. It was dusk when we finished the last hole and it was comical to see all the little pairs of eyes poking up from the water and watching us as we walked by.

Yesterday morning I got a bait bucket and my headlamp and got to the golf course a little after 6 o'clock. It was still quite dark and there was no one around.

The gate to the entrance was closed but I was able to squeeze between it and a hedge without any problem. I figured it would only take me 15 minutes to catch five or six frogs. Besides giving me the cover of darkness, it's chilly that time of morning and that slows the frogs down some making them easier to catch. I quickly bagged my quota and skedaddled. No doubt the proprietor would have allowed me to collect the frogs if I had asked but he might not have and anyway I figured it would be easier to apologize than get permission.

Of the five frogs I caught, I thought one was a bull and the rest were leopards. Then I remembered that little leopard frogs look like adults so these are obviously not leopard frogs. They must be bull frogs. The warty looking spots on their backs looks like the warts on toads but, again, little toads look just like adult toads. Abigail and Rebecca helped me put them in the pond. Maybe some will survive the winter.

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October 3, 2010

Vivian Scarlett Wylie

Happy birthday, Rebecca! It's the big 04. I was going to buy a billboard that read "Lawdy,lawdy, look who's 04" but I'm just too cheap. Anyway, happy birthday, Little R.

Speaking of birthdays, Vivian celebrated her day of birth September 30th with family and a few close friends and advisors. Cake and ice cream were conspicuosly absent but she did get a funny hat. Her vital statistics are 7 lbs, 13 ozs, 20.25 inches. Why do people always give the weight and length of a newborn? Could it be that there isn't much else to say? Of course, Vivian is beautiful. All new borns are, even if they aren't. In Vivian's case though, she is. She reminds me of my Uncle Marshal without the grogblossom. Her mother was a little loopy when we saw her Friday but is feeling much better now. Joyce has spent her nights and much of her days at the hospital. I've gotten in a little quality time with Kaylee, Sophia and Dave. Kathryn and John stood in for us Thursday night, troopers that they are. We were scheduled for arrival today since Vivian was supposed to be born on Monday so we had to rework our schedule on the fly when Jill was told by her doc Thursday afternoon to check into the hospital immediately, do not pass go, do not collect your baby-having gear.

September 26, 2010

Switzerland

About all I can say for Swiss International is that they were punctual. Seating space: about like American Airlines, made us glad to fly Southwest when we got back to the states. Food: not good outbound but really good on the return trip. Entertainment: seat-back screens with choices of movies, old TV shows, games, etc. Movie selection was terrible and on the return trip the system in our section didn't work at all. Flight attendants: nice enough. Overall: OK but nothing special. Both going and coming my seat was next to the can. It seemed I had someone's butt in my face at least half the trip as they stood waiting to get into the toilet. Many of the rearends were as wide as the aisle and gave me a good brushing as they waddled by. One fellow I finally tapped on the shoulder and told him to move his butt somewhere where it wasn't half in my seating area. Oh, and there was the occasional stench wafting out of the crapper when the door was opened. Lovely.

Now the hospitality once we arrived in Switzerland was another matter. H&E were as cordial as ever and were there to meet us in Zurich. My little scheme of using Southwest Award tickets to get to Boston and then take SI directly from there to Zurich worked out well. Southwest was on time and there were no problems making connections in Boston. We purchased an 8-day Swiss Pass, good on all Swiss public transportation, so from the time we got to Switzerland we just followed Hans, an expert on Swiss pub tran.

The last trip I made to Switzerland I never was able to adjust to the seven hour time change. Fortunately this time I didn't have that problem. Joyce had a little trouble sleeping and since we've been home both of us are useless by late evening but raring to go by four or five in the morning.

There was some cloudy weather while we were there and even a sprinkling of rain, which seemed to concern our hosts more than it did us. Granted, sightseeing in Switzerland is better in clear weather because the spectacular mountain peaks are obscured by any clouds. The skies cleared toward the end of our stay and the last morning we were there was cloudless.

On the return trip we got back to Boston too late in the day to get a flight home so our itinerary called for us to spend the night at a Boston Hampton Inn. The next morning at 8 o'clock we were on a Southwest flight to Dallas and were on the ground in Amarillo about 2:30. Kari, Abigail and Rebecca were there to pick us up. When we left the place was dry and brown. Switzerland is green, very green, due to mild temperatures, little wind and frequent rain. I sort of dreaded coming back to dry country but it rained while we were gone and while not as green as Switzerland, the place was in the process of greening up. We got a little more rain Thursday to give us something like two inches over seven or eight days. Yesterday I took advantage of ideal conditions (no wind, recent moisture, warm temperature) to spray weeds. The rain had thrown them into high gear and I figured if I could knock them in the head now and minimize seeding, that would pay dividends next spring.

Yesterday morning we went to Abigail's volleyball game. It was her third but the first we attended. Kids, Inc. has a very nice facility designed for volleyball and 3-on-3 basketball. The volleyball crowd was more genteel than the soccer and basketball crowds we've encountered. It was a pleasure watching the game without some of the bellowing that accompanies those other sports. Abigail did quite a good job. She returned nearly every ball that came her way. She returned one serve and then returned it again when her opponents managed to hit it right back to her. That was too much for the opposition and they couldn't get it back over again. Most of the time if either team got their serve over the net it was a point because the opposition could seldom return it. Abigail's team was a little better at that and, again, any serves that came Abigail's way she handled.

Chris spent Saturday afternoon rendering lard. He'd gotten a potful of fatback from God knows where and set about rendering it on his grill. The process seems to be to boil the stuff a while and then separate the cracklings and the lard for later consumption. He gave Joyce a jar but I don't know how she intends to use it and maybe it's better I don't. The rendering process doesn't smell very appetizing.

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September 12, 2010

Abigail and I attended a program on playa lakes at Wild Cat Bluff Saturday morning. It was pretty interesting. After the first hour of the two hour program we got in our cars and made a field trip to a playa at 34th and Helium Road, not far away. It was dry so we were able to walk out into it and look for the various plants the presenter talked about in the first hour. Abigail really seemed to get into it. She and I collected some seeds so we can experiment with them. The presenter showed a gallon glass jar in which he'd collected dirt from a dry playa and added water. All sorts of interesting plants and critters were growing in it.

It was foggy here this morning. The fog came up after sunrise. That's about as close to rain as we've gotten in a while. I've spent much of today running around moving water. Then I got to go chase a stray do that was on the place. Joyce helped and eventually got it hearded out the gate it came in but couldn't seem to find again. It's disgusting to get barked at by a stray dog on your own

place. One renews one's appreciation for how big this place is when trying to chase down an unauthorized mutt.

One day recently Joyce picked up some trash someone dumped along the street. It was fast food trash. We get a lot of that. However, she found a $5 dollar bill in it so they'd dumped their change out with the trash. Two words: ha, ha.

We're supposed to head down to 2005 for some dinner pretty soon. Chris has a turkey he's smoked, or at least that was the plan.

Other than trying to keep things watered we've been doing quite a bit of juniper trimming. I've been working my way south along the northeast line of junipers trimming low and dead limbs so I can clean the weeds out from under them. Saturday Chris hauled off my trimmings and helped me trim a couple of trees on the southwest line. Little by little.

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August 5, 2010.

Happy Labor Day tomorrow everyone. Like most of you I will spend most of the day reflecting on all the good done our nation by organized labor over the last few decades. Why, without them we probably wouldn't even have a holiday to enjoy. Wikipedia says "It became a federal holiday in 1894, when, following the deaths of a number of workers at the hands of the U.S. military and U.S. Marshals during the Pullman Strike, President Grover Cleveland put reconciliation with the labor movement as a top political priority. Fearing further conflict, legislation making Labor Day a national holiday was rushed through Congress unanimously and signed into law a mere six days after the end of the strike." I'll be forever grateful to those workers who sacrificed their lives that I may loaf on the first Monday in November.

We're having a little one day heat wave today. NOAA says it is 100 degrees here. My thermometer says it is 96 in our backyard. There's a breeze out of the southwest that feels like a blow dryer and, of course it is dry. Yesterday was pleasant enough. In fact we had dinner in the backyard at 2005 and were quite comfortable in the shade. It's supposed to cool off tomorrow. We can be thankful for it if it does.

Yesterday was a day of living dangerously on SA. Chris and I worked on trimming the tree line on the southwest and Abigail and Rebecca helped me clean out the well pond. I went over with Chris the objective for trimming

the west side of the junipers and turned him loose while I went to check on A&R to see how they were coming draining the pond with my little electric submersible pump. We had already removed the single goldfish that resides in that pond. Abigail did a good job of monitoring the pump to keep it submerged and unplugging it when it got too gummed up to draw water. They both enjoyed getting down into the pond and scooping up the much with their hands to throw it out of the pond while managing to get quite a bit on each other. Meanwhile Chris did a lot of good trimming. There was the chance I would come back to find the tree line clear cut. Chris can be sort of indiscriminate when he gets up a head of steam. Anyway it all turned out well and no one even got hurt, not even the fish.

Kent Crutcher stopped by one day last week. He rented 1911 for several years, lives down by Lubbock now, was in town on business and just wanted to see the place. A year or two ago the renter who rented 1911 for quite a long time after we moved to Garland, can't remember his name, stopped by. It's interesting they would go out of their way to see the place.

Barbara Howard is to join us for dinner this evening. This is the first weekend she's been alone and Joyce invited her to join us in whatever Chris grills and home-made ice cream. I doubt we'll be eating outside.

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August 29, 2010

I've just finished Tried By War by James McPherson. It deals with Lincoln and his duties as commander-in-chief during the Civil War. It's amazing how inept the Northern generals were. It's amazing to read how divided the country was at that time. And it's also amazing to read about the low-life left/Democrats. They were no different then than they are today. If it had been left up to them there would be two countries, at least in the nineteenth century. Who knows how that would have shaken out as both countries tried to expand across the continent. There were Democrats against the war that encouraged Northern soldiers to desert. Lincoln chased one out of the country and when his fellow travellers harangued Lincoln for trampling on the man's right of free speech he responded that he couldn't see the fairness in shooting some simple-minded soldier boy for desertion while leaving such as this man untouched. I recommend Tried by War.

Last night before the Cowboy game I watched Julie and Julia. It was recommended to me by my friend Betsy. I was skeptical because just from the title it sounded like a chick flick. It was but it was entertaining nonetheless. The story was good enough that I was able to ignore the chickiness. Of course I had to ignore the leftist pap that is a template for so many movies. Julie was from Texas and spoke with no drawl. Her mother whom she spoke to several times on the phone sounded like the stereotype Texas hick. I guess once you cross the

Brooklyn Bridge you are suddenly cleansed and become acceptable to the beautiful people. Then in another scene Julie's boss chews her out for calling in sick when she wasn't. They worked for some governmental agency. The boss in trying to convince her he wasn't a prick said "a Republican would have fired you." Finally there was Julia Child's husband, some sort of low level diplomat, whining about friends losing their jobs (in the state department) because of Joe McCarthy. The left never misses a chance to prevaricate. I wonder if they have any idea how tiresome they are to reasonable people.

Our weather this week was pleasant. Early in the week a cool front came through. We got a sprinkling of rain but nothing more. But it did cool down and stay that way. We had overnight lows in the low 50s. It has warmed up some be still isn't hot. The little bit of cloud cover today has kept it very pleasant up to now. We also have low humidity, 42% at the moment.

Previously I had asked Abigail if she would like to learn to play golf and she said she would. Thursday evening was pleasant in the shade so she, Rebecca and I hit a few golf balls. My wedge was still too long for Abigail but she managed. Rebecca tried but it was completely unwieldy for her. We'll see how Abigail likes it and go from there.

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August 22, 2010

Clouds

Foggy morning

We got a little more rain this week, about 3/4s of an inch. That combined with what we've gotten over the past few weeks made the grass grow enough so that it needed mowing. So mow I did. I started as soon as I could Saturday morning and finished up this afternoon. With the exception of the garden and the enclosure, which I will mow tomorrow evening, that's the whole place. I decided to do it that way, which meant putting in about six hours today mowing and trimming, instead of stringing it out all week and even into next weekend like I've done other times this summer. That will allow me to get back to my puttering sooner.

We've had more humidity than we are used to this summer but Friday a cool front came through and the air it brought was dry. In just the past two days it has gotten much dryer. This is more like what we are used

to. Today and yesterday got well into the 90s but it didn't seem uncomfortably warm to me. Any shade made the temperature pleasant.

Rebecca and Abigail hosted their cousins, Janice's grandkids, one day this week. I was oblivious to most of their activities down in my cave but I think they had a good time. They were still around in the evening when I was out puttering. One day before that A&R played under the junipers on the north side of the shop. They had the dogs under the trees with some. They seemed to have a high old time getting really grimy.

The pictures are from Friday evening. K,C,A&R had gone to Wonderland and we thought maybe the weather would interfere but all it did was look threatening, and beautiful

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August 15, 2010

There came a shower of rain Friday evening as Abigail, Rebecca and I were getting squared away (Rebecca finding her shoes) to go hit some golf balls. I'd asked Abigail if she wanted to try her hand at golf and she said she did so I brought down my little golf tee mat thingy, my bucket of shag balls and my wedge but just as Rebecca had finally located her shoes it started raining. The sun was shining so it was just a vagrant cloud that happened to let loose. By the time it stopped we were out of the mood and dinner was ready anyway. After dinner the three of us retired to the cave and watched Ice Age III. Sequels almost invariably disappoint but this one was entertaining.

Foxes have been around lately, or at least a fox. Yesterday morning there was one around the bird dripper in the back when I came around to set up a sprinkler. It wasn't very shy. Then this morning as we were about to have breakfast one (could be the same one) came trotting through the front yard with something in its mouth. We couldn't tell what.

Speaking of the front yard, looks pretty bad.

The Roundup I sprayed last Sunday did a number on it. It killed the grass dead but some of the weeds were still showing a little green so I did some spot spraying yesterday. Last Sunday I left a strip at the east end when I ran out of RU so I had to spray that and there were a couple of spots I missed. They were easy to spot because they were green. It's going to look like hell for a while but it was nice not to have to mow this morning. The grass in the back doesn't have to be mowed every week; maybe every other week if it rains or we water it.

Peaches and pears are ripening. They are suitable for grazing and there are those doing that. I tried a peach yesterday evening. It had a good flavor but I had to eat around the worm hole. Abigail said the pears are good. The beans are still producing and we've been eating okra, cucumbers and peppers for a while. Abigail , Rebecca, the birds and probably the foxes have been helping themselves to my grapes, which is fine because I don't plan to do anything with them. Maybe when I hang up my spurs I'll want to try my hand at wine making and if I do the vines will already be producing.

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August 8, 2010

Our good friend Grady Howard passed away this week. In June Joyce remarked that she hadn't seen he and Barbara out walking lately, something they did daily in reasonable weather. She visited them one evening and Grady told her he hadn't been feeling well. They didn't attend our 4th of July celebration for that reason. Joyce told me I ought to go see him and I intended to. I wanted to thank him for the bottle of wine he gave me. He brought it by when I wasn't around so I'm not sure what he gave it to me for but I think it was for the little juniper I gave him. I took him to see my tree nursery one day and he admired the small junipers, said he'd like to have one. A few weeks later on a Saturday he stopped by to call my attention to the locust tree in his yard that was full of blooms. I let him pick out the juniper of his choice. He wanted me to see the locust in bloom and I was really busy at the time. I did make it a point to go see it later and it was worth the trip. Besides thanking him for wine I wanted to tell him I saw the tree. I put that visit off too long, though. After dinner at Kari's Saturday evening we all six went over and visited with the Howard clan.

I saw a fox on Tekla Wednesday morning whilst galloping around the neighborhood, the second time I've seen one south of I-40. It stood in the middle of the road and watched me without comment as I thundered by.

Cormac McCarthys All The Pretty Horses given to me by Kari for my birthday has been occupying my evenings lately the darkening skies and birds skirting the tops of the trees as they search for night perches. Im enjoying it but McCarthys style is, well, different. I struggle with punctuation too but I think I can fit an apostrophe in a contraction while the wind swept plains renders its mournful tale pioneers sighing through the tumbleweeds

and barbed wire and then there are the run on sentences. Maybe he tries to emulate Faulkner. Ive read a couple other of his books The Crossing and No Country For Old Men, and liked them both at least the first time I read them. Recently I tried to reread The Crossing but had to put it down when the author launched into a particularly gaseous description of god knows what while the thunderheads built over the bluing high lands like herds of skyborn figments of some old farts imagination.

Hot enough for you? We got a brief shower Wednesday night and it was cool and pleasant the next morning. That comes on the heels of several days with the thermometer reaching around 100. Prior to that rain, just a wetting mind you, it had gotten so dry you could hear someone coming as their steps crunched in the dry grass. Thursday night we got another shower and between the two we collected about 3/4s of an inch. I took advantage of that moisture to nuke the front yard. The rain was enough to get the grass and weeds growing and the Roundup I sprayed on them should take care of business. I resorted to this extreme measure because I simply lost the battle with the weeds. That clump grass that puts up the long stem with a feathery seed head was just too thick. I'd thought all along if I kept after digging it out, and it has to be dug out, it can't be pulled, I would eventually get rid of it. It wasn't happening and I got tired of having to mow weeds every week. Over time I'll expand the xeriscape area I've started in the front yard to include whole area. It will be a lot of work and the yard will look like hell for quite a while but the alternative was to just keep mowing weeds. I fight the weeds enough over the rest of the place to have any desire to spend more time fighting them in our yard, especially when I'm losing the battle.

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August 1, 2010

First the weather: We've got a hot one going and the wind has picked up out of the southwest. That makes it difficult to keep things watered. Joyce is spending a lot of time moving sprinklers. Dry weather makes my job easier since I don't have to mow except around the houses, but it makes her's harder since she has to wander all over SA moving water around. Then there is the garden. And it isn't just THE garden anymore. We've expanded our operation to include beds on the west and south side of the shop plus the melons growing on the dirt mound in the pasture. All seem to be prospering but not without Joyce's constant attention.

One thing about it, this weather will discourage the mosquitoes. A couple of weeks ago they were pretty bad. The mosquito machine in the garden looked like it had a week's growth of beard with all the skeeters stuck to it.

The Zbindens pulled out yesterday afternoon about 3 o'clock headed for Colorado Springs for a little vacation. Chris was in Phoenix all week and didn't get home till mid-day Saturday. They'll be back Thursday, I believe.

We ran into a moisture problem we weren't expecting in the man-cave. I guess the combination of rain in late spring and the warm weather made conditions right for

mold to get started. Last week we got a dehumidifier for the man-cave and yesterday afternoon we cleaned up the problem. I think the humidity had already decreased to the point where mold wouldn't be a problem but we are taking no chances. We are running the dehumidifier. It wasn't fun to have to clean it up.

Under the category of strange things, while we were cleaning up the mold problem I moved the refrigerator out so I could see if there was anything behind I needed to clean up. Underneath where it had been there was a spider carcass and I got a tissue to pick it up so I could see what kind it was. As I examined it it began to reanimate with a series of jerks. At the first jerk or two I thought I was causing the movement but fairly quickly figured out it wasn't dead and decided I'd put it down. It was continuing to go from a flattened carcass to a normal spider spasmodically until I shmushed it. I was a brown recluse I believe. I interrupted it's nap, I suppose.

My stock rises and falls with granddaughters. Lately it's been up with Rebecca. She's given me lots of hugs and told me several times I'm her best friend. That's nice while it lasts but I know how quickly my stock can fall. Friday evening the three of us watched a movie, Partly Cloudy with a Chance if Meatballs, I think it was called. Abigail said it was pretty good. I had to take her word for it since I slept through much of it.

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July 25, 2010

Our week of breezy days, though pleasant enough, dried the place out considerably. Already the grass is losing its green and it's only been a couple of weeks since that two inch rain. I finished up the mowing through the week, though, so we're set for the next round of rain or no rain. Both have their advantages and disadvantages.

Rebecca and Abigail spent the night with their grandmother Friday night while their mother was wined and dined by friends wanting to celebrate her birthday. Their father was out of town. After pizza we watched a movie in the man-cave while Grandma made ice cream.

Kari stubbed her foot on a door threshold Wednesday and she and Joyce got to spend the evening in the emergency room. The incident occurred earlier in the day and Kari tried to shrug it off. By evening, though, pain and swelling made her think she might have broken the foot. Turns out it was just a sprain. She's getting around OK, though slowly.

Yesterday afternoon it threatened rain and did rain a little but not enough to make any difference. I got the lawn mowed. I usually do that on Sunday but wanted to have it out of the way so I could enjoy my birthday. We were to attend a picnic with the Broks but it got rained out so we got a bite to eat and went back to their house for ice cream and to cuss the government.

Friday during lunch I went to see the fellow that has fabricated a couple of things for me: the chili wagon and the basement window grill. There was a young man there instead who said he was his son and that his dad died in May. Tommy Harbor was his name and he was probably somewhere around my age. I was shocked but probably shouldn't have been. Joyce says her classmates are dropping like flies. One of her classmates keeps track and keeps everyone updated. The same thing is probably going on with my classmates but I just don't know about it.

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July 18, 2010

Kari's Red River Pics

When it rains it pours...bloodsuckers all over you. I need a burqa just to get from the house to the office with my vital body fluids. Oh, and the weeds are flourishing in case you were wondering. I've developed a new technique I think has promise. I spray the weeds too small and too numerous to pull and pull the rest. I'm hoping that method will allow me to keep the weeds from seeding. If I can control the domestic population then all I have to grapple with is the invaders. The I-40 right-of-way is rife with all kinds of weeds and either the city or the state, not sure who is responsible, seems intent on letting them go through their complete life-cycle. And

then there are my neighbors to the northeast. Their crop of weeds are reaching the top of my fence and pressing on it like a hoard of zombies. Ain't life grand!

We dined on garden produce this evening. We had beets, green beans, acorn squash and garden salad. Very good. And Joyce is making ice cream. Nice way to finish up a very busy weekend. I almost got the place mowed. All I lack is part of the pasture and the enclosure. It looks really nice. I should take a picture but I'm too tired.

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July 11, 2010

Red River

Although it is always good to get home, you can always tell it was a good trip when you feel at least a small pang of regret that it is over. We got back from Red River this afternoon about 4 o'clock to heat and humidity. Our weather in Red River was excellent for the most part. A little rain but none that really inconvenienced us. It was nice to have the afternoon clouds to block a very hot sun. The air was always cool and dry.

Things didn't look too good on the first day we were there. After breakfast we had to rig the fishing pole I gave Abigail for her birthday before we could go fishing. Despite my good intentions I made a poor choice. It had an open-face reel which I'd never used before and there seems to be some ins and outs one has to know to make that type work properly. It took us a long time to get it set up, then we couldn't get it to work when we got to the city pond. Between trying to keep up with Rebecca and get Abigail's reel to work I had just about all I could handle. Rebecca finally went home with her mom and grandma and Abigail fished with Rebecca's pole, which was the one I gave Abigail several years ago, without any success while I fiddled somemore with the new one. We finally packed it in, went home and had lunch and then went swimming. That part worked very well. Later in the afternoon I excused myself, changed into street cloths and headed to the fishing supply store. There I bought the fishing pole the man who helped me recommended for a child Abigail's age. I figured life was too short to stand on principle. Believe me, that was the best $18 I ever spent. The next day when we went back to the city pond, Abigail was casting like a pro. Unfortunately, without success. We tried several baits but didn't even get any nibbles to keep us interested. The Abster hung in there, though, and

didn't get discouraged. There are two city pools, one for everybody and one reserved for kids under 12 and the handicapped. We were fishing in that one mostly but also tried our luck on the other one briefly. A man even showed up in a truck and put more fish in the ponds but we still didn't get any bites. Later, after calling it a day and heading for the swimming pool, we decided we should get some salmon eggs. There were some people there that seemed to be catching some fish and they said they were using salmon eggs. We also determined that the next day we would not be fishermen. We would be catchermen. We got out there before breakfast before there was anyone else at the pond but still didn't have any luck. It was chilly and after a while we went in to warm up and have some breakfast. After breakfast we walked to the fishing store and got some salmon eggs. Armed with those we headed back to the pond and positioned ourselves in the same spot the people that were catching fish the day before had occupied. Right away Abigail started to get bites but she had to learn how to work them. She had to learn how to keep the slack out of her line so she could set the hook when she got a bite. Finally her persistence paid of and she hooked a very nice rainbow trout, one bigger than I have ever landed. As you might expect she got pretty excited but she managed to reel it in. We put it on a stringer and went right back to work. I had just rinsed my hands off in the pond when she hooked another one and away we went. In all she landed three very nice fish. Two very nice ones got away. I can't tell you how relieved I was. Rebecca didn't catch anything but that was OK. She was more interested in switching from one kind of bait to another and putting fake red worms in her pockets. Abigail carried her string of fish home and I gutted them for her. Grandma cooked them that evening and let me tell you they were excellent.

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July 5, 2010

5th of July

We had our 4th of July congregation on Saturday the 3rd since some of the group have commitments on Sunday. The storm in the gulf was influencing our weather I guess. The morning was cloudy and cool. Chris cleaned up the southwest quadrant and I mowed it. Then we set up the volleyball net. It started to sprinkle as we did so and was beginning to come down pretty good by the time we finished. A light rain continued until about the time people started to arrive so we set up the victuals in the man-cave and directed folks down there. Joyce had me back the vehicles out of the shop and set up the ping pong table up there. That worked well for the kids. Later the rain stopped. Chris dragged his grill down to the shop and grilled the dogs. As always there was lots of food and after eating our fill and getting ice creamed up we played some volleyball. The team of me, Kari, Abigail and Matt got hammered pretty good by Chris, Sherry, Bruce and Blake but we didn't care. Art and Marylin joined us but left before we played volleyball. They were going dancing that evening. It was a pleasant day but I'm glad I had two days to recover afterward.

This morning I got out before breakfast and did some

weeding around the shop. After breakfast I continued with that and when I'd done all I cared to I spent some time transplanting trees in the tree nursery to bigger containers. Now I've got some small containers to put some new specimens in. The Wylie and Zbinden girls gave the sandbox a good work out. About 8 o'clock or so the wind changed from the south to the northwest. With the cool breeze and the shade of the trees around the sandbox they were comfortable all morning.

We will spend Wednesday through Saturday night in Red River. Chris will stay here to take care of the animals. He's been off for several days because his company shuts down for the 4th of July but he'll have to return to work tomorrow. I will also work tomorrow but will take the rest of the week off. Jill is conserving her vacation time for when the little stranger arrives so she couldn't go with us. I gave Abigail a new fishing pole for her birthday, an upgrade to the one I got her several years ago, so we'll do some fishing. To the extent her attention span will allow it, Rebecca will no doubt want to fish, too, so I won't try to do any. I'll just try to help them and do my fishing when it's just me.

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June 27, 2010

Birthday Party for Kaylee

We got an inch of rain Wednesday night, accompanied by thunder and lightening. Very entertaining. I had fallen back asleep after the flash and boom woke me up when the weather radio came on to inform me of the danger of flash flooding. I was warned to be particularly careful of water covering the road because my vehicle might not be able to get through it. It had just started to repeat the same message for a third time when I smashed it with a hammer.

Monday morning I had a load of sand delivered and spent Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday evening moving it. I had the guy dump most of it on a tarp next to the new sandbox. Because of the trees he couldn't get close enough to actually dump it in the sandbox. Still, it was much easier to shovel it in than first shovel it in the trailer and then dump it as we did Saturday. The sand I'd gotten before was coarser than this load,which is masonry grade. It should be much nicer for little folks to play in, especially without the cats spicing it up. There was quite a bit of sand left from that dump, six trailers, in fact, and I spread that in various low or bare

spots. Sand seems to be to buffalo grass what catnip is to a cat. When they finished bricking the shop there was sand left over which I spread around the south side of the shop more or less evenly. The buffalo grass grew up through and over it so thick it's like a carpet. I'm hoping it will do the same in the places I spread this latest batch.

Joyce and I spent a pleasant weekend with the Wylie Five. Joyce is still there, will drive back with Jill and them gurls Friday to celebrate the 4th with us on the 3rd. Dave will undergo back surgery Monday and Joyce is there to help out with K&S while Jill nurses Dave back to health. It was kind of nice to have a day of semi-convalescence. We've both been working pretty hard for a stretch. It was of course nice to spend some time with the Wylie clan. Sophia was afraid of me and didn't quite get over that but warmed to me somewhat before I left Sunday morning. We celebrated Kaylee's birthday belatedly with cake and presents. They said they had ice cream but never produced it, much to my disappointment. The cake was, however, delicious.

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June 20, 2010

Dry, dry, dry. And hot.

I hope you all enjoyed your Juneteenth. I spent mine hauling sand. Joyce wanted me to build a sand pile that could be covered to keep the cats out. I couldn't figure out where to put it until I thought of putting it between two of the junipers south of the swing set where it will be in the shade. Saturday morning I collected my materials, four 2X12X8s and some decking hardware to hold them together. It didn't take Chris and I long to put it together. We used the tractor and trailer to haul six loads of sand from the current sand pile. It will take about 10 more but I'll have to get a fresh batch first. Maybe I can get that done this coming week. We'll be in Garland next weekend but if the sand is here the following weekend maybe we can get it ready for the 4th of July.

The garden is coming along pretty good. It keeps Joyce busy trying to keep it watered. The sunflowers on the west side of the shop seem to be taller each day. There are wild sunflowers growing on the caliche mounds. There have been some wild ones in that area the last several years. This is the first year they've grown on top of the mounds. I pulled up all those that were in the way

of the mower.

Speaking of mowing, there hasn't been much of that lately. I mowed our immediate yard this morning because we water it. I haven't mowed 2005 in over two weeks because Kari hasn't been watering it and the workmen installing the siding had their stuff strewn around. They've finished now so I may need to put that on the agenda soon. 2005 really looks nice now with the new siding. It matched the brown that has always been used on it but eliminates the painting. It may outlast me.

Our grapevines are doing well. There were even a few grapes on the wild vines in the enclosure. I'm trimming back the vines around the garden. Although I've read a little about how to trim vines I find it difficult to put into practice what the books suggest. I encourage the vines to follow the wire put up to support them which they do but they also send out vines in every direction searching for something else to latch on to. Most of the vines are pretty big now and they grow rapidly. In an effort to confine each to its stretch of the support I trim them back. The fruit seems to only grow on the first few joints of the new growth anyway. Needless to say I've got a lot to learn.

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June 13, 2010

Out for my morning jog Wednesday morning I encountered a little cottontail about half way across the Avondale overpass over I-40. No doubt it had heard of this wonderful place called Six Acres and was on its way to make its home there. Too bad I had to come along then and scare it back the way it came.

Gary and I got our golf game rained out Thursday evening. We knew there were thunderstorms in the area but decided to meet at the golf course anyway because the line looked pretty thin and likely to pass by quickly. It was raining pretty hard when Gary got to the golf course. He called me and we decided to cancel. There was a lot of lightening. Not sure they would have even let us on the course. After all that we only got about an eighth of an inch at home. That was probably gone by noon with sun, heat and wind we had Friday.

Progress was made Saturday on the furniture collection occupying one of our garage bays. Chris helped me move several pieces to the shop, pieces I don't want to turn loose of. A bookshelf and the desk that was in the corner of the living room at 2005 went down in the man-cave and the cedar chest and chest of drawers from the green room went up in the loft. I can make use of those pieces and I feel someone in the family is going to want them at some point. That made a dent in the garage. Janice said she would like to have Genna's new

couch to replace her old one. Her son Jon said it was too big to fit through her door. Joyce measured and Janice's front door was several inches smaller than the 2005 front door. However, since she wanted it I wanted Janice to have it and about the only way we could be sure whether or not it would fit through the door was to try it so we took it over there and sure enough by tilting at an angle we were able to get it through the door. The dang thing was heavy and it was a tight squeeze but since the cushion back could compress we managed to get it through without too much strain. We took Janice's old couch with us and dropped it off at a thrift store on the way home. I'm glad to have found a good home for Genna's couch and to get it out of my garage. We're down to the green chair from the 2005 living room, the bed, dresser and night stand from the green room and the washer and dryer plus a few other odd pieces. Maybe I'll advertise them cheap on Craig's List or maybe I'll let the Salvation Army come pick them up. We'll see.

I have mixed emotions about how dry we're getting. If we don't get rain the mowing will slow down drastically, allowing more time for other things, and the weeds will be held at bay. On the other hand, there is more work keeping things watered and the place doesn't look as nice if the grass goes dormant. Right now it is a pretty light green but that won't last much longer with out some moisture.

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June 6, 2010

Memorial Day Flowers

It was a quiet week after a busy Memorial Day weekend. First thing Monday morning Joyce and I rounded up some flowers and paid a visit to the cemeteries. After a little breakfast we drove out to Riverland. Before actually visiting Riverland we drove down through McBride Canyon to the fork in the road at the end of it, took the fork to the right and followed the road until it began to lose its battle with the vegetation. We hadn't gone too far after turning around until we encountered a convoy of scumbags. I realize that is being judgmental. They could have been the finest people you would ever want to meet but they looked like scumbags. The lead car was stopped on the high point along that road that is solid rock. There were a couple of the males outside the vehicles. I stopped and rolled down my window to inquire. The fellow standing outside the lead vehicle asked if they were going the right direction to get to the lake. I told him, yes, the lake was that direction but he couldn't get to it by following the road we were on. We were in the Pathfinder but they were in regular cars. I explained that the road was too rough and suggested they backtrack to the fork they took to get to McBride Canyon and take the other fork which would at least get them to the boat landing built in a more optimistic time when it was thought the lake would be bigger than it is. The fellow told his buddy who walked up about then what I had told him. He didn't say squat to me; not thanks, not kiss my foot, not nothing, so we proceeded on our

way. We had to wait for the third car back, an older model Cadillac with oversized wheels as is the current fashion among these types of people, to adjust so we could get by. We at least got nods from the four or more occupants as we passed. Just not the type of folks you expect to meet out in the boonies. They and their vehicles looked more suited to cruising Amarillo Boulevard than communing with nature.

Nicole and her gang were in town for the Memorial Day weekend and K&C had them over M-day afternoon. Chris grilled beer can chicken, excellent, and Joyce made a couple of gallons of ice cream, chocolate an vanilla. Jon and his family were also there so there were lots of kids to entertain each other. It was a pleasant afternoon/evening but I was exhausted by the time it was over. I could have used another day just to rest.

Joyce has been busy the last few days mulching her plantings. She's finished with that chore now. The heat, sun and wind dry things out pretty fast now. We've already begun to water the tenderer plantings around the place. We have a 30% chance of rain today and it would not be unwelcome. Chris and I got the south end mowed and trimmed yesterday. If it doesn't rain, it may be at least a couple of weeks before it needs it again. If the mowing slows down we should be able to work on other things. There is plenty of tree trimming to be done.

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May 30, 2010

Mother nature rung out her sponge over good old Amarillo Monday night. All but the immortal took refuge in the man-cave when the civil defense sirens went off. It rained hard for the next several hours and we wound up spending the night there in spite of there being no remaining tornado threat. Sometime in the night Joyce and Kari went home leaving me and the girls to slumber away. It's not a bad place to spend the night. I worked Monday evening finishing mowing the south end. Since we got over three inches of rain I'll spend a lot of evenings mowing over the next few weeks.

Abigail spent Friday night with us and after breakfast she and I went to Wildcat Bluff for a geology hike. The gentleman conducting the tour is a geology professor at WTAMU. He showed us the top and bottom of the Ogalala formation, the Trujillo formation and one other I can't remember. The rocks forming Wildcat bluff itself are Trujillo sandstone and he pointed out that the rocks show that the river that deposited them ran northwest while West Amarillo Creek which cut the valley below the buff runs southeast. He told us that 10 million year old zircon from the Trujillo formation has been found as far west as Utah. We learned that the rounded, smooth rocks one encounters in some areas came from northeastern New Mexico around Mora. We saw rocks formed from volcanic ash and learned about the Amarillo mountains. We also learned that the Yellowstone volcano is building and that when it blows it will ruin our afternoon.

We also encountered a large bull snake, a really pretty fellow, crossing our path and a diamond back rattlesnake curled up in the shade of a boulder next to the trail. He was a pretty good-sized fellow as well and just looked lethal. We both enjoyed the hike, the information and the sightings.

Joyce discovered that we have tadpoles in the pond, quite a few of them in fact. No doubt they are toads. I can't imagine there would be any frogs around to lay eggs. That brings up a question: why would we get tadpoles in the pond but not in the well pond or the lily pool? Is there something about the earthen pond? Do toads favor puddles formed by rain, which the pond would resemble? The ducks have been around quite a bit this week.

The place is pretty well mowed up. I've got to mow around the playground, the garden and our yard today but that will finish it up. That won't last long. In fact the south end is already close to needing mowing after just a week. That much rain and the warm weather has really put the grass in gear. It makes it hard to get much else done. Chris pitches in which is a lot of help. Really, with his contribution I don't have any excuse for the place not being in good shape.

Joyce and I will visit the cemetery tomorrow morning, have breakfast and head for Riverland to see what's going on there. I don't remember the last time we were out there.

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May 23, 2010

Mid-May and Joyce just about has her planting done. It didn't help matters that she contracted the stomach bug that several of the clan have had recently. She spent several days last week feeling pretty lousy when she needed to be planting. She got help from her sister, her daughter and her daughter's friend, though, which helped. H&E were here this week and Chris took the week off so he and Hans had time to get the drip system whipped into shape. Elisabeth single-handedly moved the day lilies out of the circle next to the driveway at 2005 to the flower bed on the south side, then cleared off the mulch and moved the border blocks to the cellar rock garden. Kari didn't want to keep that bed and it will certainly be easier to mow without having to mow around it.

Speaking of mowing, I'm about half way into a second round. Chris helped with mow prep yesterday. That is, he cleaned up twigs, which took quite a while because of the blow we had week before last. I raked up the area south of the enclosure underneath the big elm. Elms are really bad about twigging. The mallards where hanging around the pond at that time. The drake was sitting on the south bank taking his ease and didn't seem to be troubled by my presence though the raking caused me to get pretty close to him. When I came through with the mower he did stir himself but that was to just waddle off the bank into the pond. It's nice that these ducks aren't troubled much by us. It gives us all a better chance to observe them.

Last year Joyce had a spot on the south side of the shop where she planted a watermelon. She had me put a tree ring that came from across the street around the spot. Unfortunately the melon got whacked by the weed eater and she didn't want to try again this year so I gave A&R the Christmas card Kathy and John sent us to plant there. The card was a recycled paper material with wild flower seeds embedded in it. A&R were delighted to have a little bed of their own. Here's hoping it prospers.

Yesterday morning I put a coat of aluminum paint on the four fence posts I planted last year at the east end of the orchard. Next I'll string wire between the posts to support the grape vines we've planted there. These are seedless table grapes and are supposed to be kept at

least 100 feet from seeded grapes such as those growing around the garden. We replaced one of the three vines we planted last year that didn't survive. Joyce and I also planted a cherry bush and a forsythia from the nursery in the west side tree line in front of 2005. I'd planted a couple of junipers there from my earlier attempt at a tree nursery but they didn't make it. That attempt involved digging up the small trees that were just rooted in the soil. I planted half a dozen like that and maybe one survived. My new practice is to harvest seedlings and pot them. Once they've demonstrated they will survive I transplant them from the pot. Less damage to their roots, you see. Recently I showed Grady my tree nursery and he admired my two-year-old junipers. I gave him his pick and last week he gave me a nice bottle of wine. The forsythia we planted was a bare root specimen I got from Arbor Day just last fall but the several forsythias were all prospering and those I've planted previously have shown that they are tough and resilient so I went ahead and planted one in spite of its not being in the nursery at least a year. I hope it gets enough sun. We probably don't need more junipers but we need understory and if the forsythia can tolerate the shade they would be very handy for that.

Hans took us all to the Big Texan yesterday evening for dinner. Touristy though it is, they like it. A&R got cheap straw cowboy hats, something they seem to hand out to children. They also got some tokens to play the slot machines. You don't win any money but you can win additional tokens, which Abigail did so she got to keep playing for a while. So did Rebecca when Abigail shared her winnings with her.

K&C had new garage doors installed this past week and they will have siding trim installed in the next few weeks. After toying with a light green and a sand color, they settled on the same shade of brown the house has always had. Kari has been cleaning up the flower beds and the place is beginning to round into shape. We've all been enjoying Genna's iris. She planted a number of varieties around and they bloom at different times so a new variety takes the place of one that is fading. It would please her to know how much we enjoy them. Her time on SA was brief but she left her mark.

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May 16, 2010

Kari was out late Tuesday night howling at the moon and didn't join me for our Wednesday jog so she didn't see the two foxes I saw on Charles Street. Charles is on the other side of I-40, actually several blocks south of it. I'm assuming these were not the same foxes we see around SA though they could be. Who knows, maybe the whole town is overrun with them.

A pair of mallards were visiting the pond regularly. They are not terribly shy. Usually wild ducks will take off at the first sign of a human but these don't seem overly concerned that I'm working around on the outside of the enclosure. They would probably take off if I went in the enclosure. The drake keeps a sharp eye out while the missus chows down. I'm not sure what they find to eat. Maybe we ought to toss some bread over the fence.

Rain Friday. Abigail puked Thursday night so she didn't go to school Friday. She and Rebecca stayed all day with their grandmother while Kari tended to business. Abigail felt I should stay home and play games all afternoon but, though I was not opposed to that, I didn't. We did, however, play Yahtzee, checkers and chinese checkers after pizza Friday evening.

Saturday evening we accompanied Art & Marilyn to the America Supports You Texas banquet at the Civic Center. It was an interesting, patriotic evening. We were joined at our table by a couple of active duty army guys,

a major and a sergeant. Art is a Vietnam vet. There was some speachifying and singing. The singer was Steve Amerson and his rendition of the National Anthem was one of the best I've heard. The program ran a little long for Joyce and me. Heck, it was nearly 10 o'clock before we got home. But we enjoyed it. We have to get out of our rut now and then.

We were making real progress on the place until the rain came. It had gotten dry enough so that the grass and weeds had stopped growing giving me a chance to mow and trim them into submission. We had a wind storm early in the week which replaced the twigs we'd cleaned up. It even took a sizeable limb off one of the American elms east of 2005. The rain will kick off a new round of growth so by next weekend it will be time to start the mowing cycle over again.

Hans and Elisabeth arrived Saturday, though they were scheduled to be here Friday evening. Weather in Amarillo caused their flight to be cancelled and they had to spend the night in Dallas.

The ducks haven't been around the last few days. Maybe they decamped to someplace more to their liking. With the rain in April and now this week's rain the playa lakes should provide plenty of nesting opportunities for water fowl. It was nice to have them here however briefly.

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May 9, 2010

Today is Mother's Day so Joyce fixed me waffles for breakfast. See, I get special treatment on Mother's Day and Father's Day. I am spoiled. Today is also our seventh anniversary of repatriating to SA. Seems like a lot has happened in those seven years. I'm satisfied with the state of things now but I wouldn't care to go back and go through it all again. Too much work.

This past week I spent several days in Orlando. I really had a pretty good time. The workload/time wasn't very heavy and left room for socializing and enjoying the pool area. I discovered the lazy river concept. I was not aware there was such a thing. A lazy river is an artificial channel of circulating water configured like a meandering stream. One can take a float thingy resembling a giant inner tube and simply float with the current. At intervals one is subjected to squirting water which may be pleasant enough when it is hot but not so much when it is overcast and there is a breeze. Just for fun I tried swimming against the current for exercise but found I could make no headway at all.

You'll recall last Saturday was taken up with garden prep. The weeds and grass just kept on growing but yesterday Chris and I tackled the south end in earnest. While I finished cultivating the raised beds south of the shop we didn't get to last Saturday and prepared four mounds on the west side of the shop for squash which

will be planted among the sunflowers Chris worked at picking up the twigs and other debris prior to my mowing. Then he trimmed the areas I mowed with the weedeater. By doing that we were able to mow the entire south end with the exception of the immediate 2005 yard. The first mowing is always the hardest and most time-consuming because there are more twigs to be collected than there will be on subsequent mowings. They've had all winter to accumulate. I guess we spent seven to eight man hours total. No way could I have covered that much ground in one day by myself. Even if I'd had the time I wouldn't have had the energy. Chris is quite a force multiplier. If his enthusiasm doesn't flag over time we may be able to whip this place into shape yet.

Joyce expressed an interest in using Turffalo plugs to speed the fill in of some of the bare spots around the shop, particularly around the doors, so I got her a tray of it for MD. Stuff is expensive. I hope to get it planted today. The native buffalo is filling in pretty well. On the south side where there was a sand pile used for brick laying and which I spread out over that area the buffalo grass came up through it nicely last year and this year is stronger than ever. It's about the nicest area of pure buffalo (my favorite) on the place. If our investment in Turfallo pays off we should have the area grassed in by the end of summer. Let's hope.

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May 2, 2010

Joyce and I are rurnt today. Yesterday we tackled the garden, spent all day getting it ready for planting. I guess it is at 99% now since there is some work left on a couple of planter boxes on the south side of the shop but Joyce will certainly be able to start sticking stuff in the ground anytime she pleases. We were very fortunate with the weather. The air was calm, it was cool and cloudy most of the day. Kari's friend and renter Beca and her daughter Claire came over and helped us during the morning. Beca just likes to garden, I guess. The Zbindens were occupied with Abigail's soccer game and team party afterward so they didn't make it out till late in the afternoon.

In my ongoing battle with illegal aliens I mowed a section of the pasture that is infested with wild onions. Weed-B-Gone says it kills them but it doesn't. The only

other suggestions for controlling them I've read say to dig them up by hand (not feasible) and/or keep them cut down. They propagate by seed and bulb. I guess keeping the above ground growth cut off starves the bulbs and diminishes the seeding. Unfortunately it also makes the mower and consequently the shop smell pretty bad. It even wafted down into the cave. It was almost a relief to go outside and smell the feed lots.

Tomorrow I will fly to Orlando for a couple of days to work a show. I'll get home late Wednesday evening. That will curtail my working evenings this week. Sometimes it seems like I'll never catch up.

Rush mentioned this article Friday on his broadcast. I recommend you read it if you haven't.

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April 25, 2010

It finally stopped raining but then it started blowing. We weren't getting a lot of rain at any one time but we were getting it every day or night so things were getting kind of soggy. Friday and Saturday the skies were clear but it blew all to be damned. Fortunately the temperature wasn't very high so, while there was some drying, we didn't get the blow dryer effect we sometimes do. Today looks like a very pleasant one. I guess I'll use part of it to work on the yard at 1911. I spent the evenings this week trimming back junipers, pulling weeds and raking twigs on the south end. Yesterday I mowed the area between 2005 and the fence on the south. The weeds are pretty bad on the east end of that area and there is a lot of blue grass along the tree line so that whole area was looking pretty hairy.

Tuesday we got to have a storm party. I was working outside despite it sprinkling when Joyce called and said there was a tornado warning. We all headed for the man-cave and watched the weather report from the

comfort and safety of that facility. Heaven forbid we ever get hit by a tornado but if we do those who are in the man-cave will be safe.

Abigail is learning to play the piano pretty well. She played the piece she will perform at a recital in a couple of weeks. She seems not to suffer from stage fright.

The moisture we've gotten recently and that that we got through the winter has really greened up SA. The average temperature is still low enough that the native grass isn't growing very fast but it has greened up. A few warm days and it will really take off. I need to mow not so much for the grass yet but for the weeds. Seems like every spring I notice a new variety of weed and this spring is no exception. What we have now are the cool season weeds. They will keep me busy till it warms up enough for the warm season weeds to take over. It's just one continuous round of pleasure.

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April 18, 2010

Looks like we might see a little sunshine today. There hasn't been much this past week. It seemed to rain constantly Thursday and Friday and yesterday was gloomy. We take the moisture when we can get it and we did need it. The weeds were looking droopy. This should perk them right up. Joyce and I took advantage of the unpleasant weather yesterday to put pulls on the man-cave cabinets and load the stuff salvaged from the 2005 kitchen in them. That cleaned up the stack of boxes containing 2005 kitchen stuff that had been junking up the man-cave since October. After we got everything squared away I turned the Roomba loose.

Janice, Joyce and I attended the Amarillo Tea Party Thursday evening. Thankfully it was held in the civic center because it was raining and uncomfortably cool outside. The guest speaker was Sheriff Richard Mack. He successfully sued the federal government over the Brady bill which forced unfunded mandates on the states. His message is that the road to restoring this nation to its constitutional roots is through local government (county sheriffs) and the state legislature. His was an interesting perspective and worth consideration. He's saying don't necessarily expect to fix Washington (I hate that that nest of seat-warmers and rent-seekers is named after one of our greatest citizens) directly. Work through local government and state legislatures to counter the federal government with state sovereignty. One of the founders, Madison maybe,

pointed out that the "several states" would serve as laboratories for what works and what doesn't. If Californians want to vote themselves a workers paradise and go broke that's up to them. If Texans want to cleave to the constitution, so be it. Anyway, it's easier to get our hands on local politicians. The crowd was older and white and they sure don't like Obamacare.

Here's a gem from my favorite cynic John Derbyshire. You don't read Derb? Oh, you should, you really should.

"In an egregious, disgusting act of political opportunism, John McCain has demanded that the federal government put National Guard troops on the border. Oh, I so want J. D. Hayworth to take McAmnesty’s seat away from him this November. Yes, I know the Hayworth negatives. I don’t care. I don’t care if he pays his wife a salary from campaign funds. Here’s a hundred bucks, J. D. — buy her a brooch. I don’t care if he was thick with Jack Abramoff. I wouldn’t care if I heard he’d been taking showers with Kim Jong Il. Just help John-John off to retirement, J. D., please. Arizona voters, please."

I came across this article by James Simpson that appeared in the American Thinker September 28, 2008. Most of it I've heard before but it was good to review it. In fact it would be good to reread it ever so often, just to remind ourselves what we're up against. This isn't just a difference of opinion. It's an existential struggle. By the way, I found the link when visiting idiots4obama.com

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April 11, 2010

We cut down the arborvitae in front of Kari's kitchen window yesterday and hauled it off. Kari remarked that the kitchen was much lighter. This was in the morning. I reminded her it would be light in the afternoon as well when the sun shone directly in the window. I haven't talked to her since she's had an opportunity to experience that.

We've had a string of nice days and I took advantage of them. I took off at noon Thursday and all day Friday in an effort to keep up with all that needs doing here on SA. Thursday afternoon I sprayed weeds, Friday we shredded last year's growth in the garden and I've already mentioned the tree we cut down on Saturday. There were a few other little odd jobs mixed in here and there but those were the main accomplishments. Today we're taking it easy. That is, we're not working outside. This morning I finished up and filed our tax return. That cleared the way to fill out the census, thus lowering the level of my inbox.

Abigail and Rebecca seem to enjoy their expanded universe. Rebecca kept us company Friday while we worked on the garden. She was playing on the tractor in the shop while I put my boots on and told me she could see my bottom. Oh the shame of plumber's butt!

It is said that nature abhors a vacuum. We've tested that theory and found it correct ever since we moved the pickup to the shop. The free bay in the garage is a

magnet for stuff. No sooner do we get it cleared out than if fills right back up again. Friday it filled up with 2005 furniture as K&C emptied out the storage pod. Kari had thought they would use some of the furniture but their own furniture didn't leave much room. I think she's got Dad's chair, the one in what used to be the TV room, the roll top desk and the china cabinet, but that may be about it. We've got the green room bedroom suit, the love seat, Genna's sofa, the desk from the living room, the cedar chest, the green chair from the living room, one of Genna's bookcases, Genna's washer and dryer and a few other odds and ends. I listed the washer and dryer on Craig's list but probably asked too much money. I haven't gotten any calls. Kari said she's heard Craig's list described as an on-line garage sale, which means the stuff has to be priced really cheap. It's all nice furniture but we've got to find a home for it some place somehow.

Do fish sneeze? Do they cough? I think not since they don't fill up lungs as air breathers do but extract oxygen from the water by passing it through their gills. Whereas air breathers take in a lung full of air, then after a time send it back out the same way, for fish it is in the mouth and out the gills in continuous a stream. Then again maybe an irritant on the gills would cause the same sudden expulsion of water from the gills that air breathers have when they sneeze, part of which is air and part of which is worth. Maybe fish sneeze water and air out their gills.

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April 4, 2010

Easter on SA

A lot of time was spent last weekend in moving the Zbindens from 8 Quadrille Park to 2005 Bellaire. That's why there wasn't a new entry in this space last Sunday. The tractor and trailer came in handy for shuttling small stuff to 2005. The big stuff had been moved the previous Friday by Chris, Josh and Alfred. Josh and Alfred work for the outfit that builds the SIPS used in the shop construction but they could be hired for the move because Tom Clarke is one of the principals in the SIPS company and also the construction manager for the remodel. Kari wisely had Zip Dog move the piano. Several friends of the people that are renting the town home showed up Sunday afternoon to dismantle the kitchen. It was mostly this stuff I trucked over to 2005. The move has since been completed, which is not to say everything has been stowed properly but Kari and Chris are working hard on that. Friday evening they were far enough along so that we were able to join them for a meal of carry-out. As the dust settles it looks more and more like they are going to be happy with and comfortable in their new digs.

It blew pretty good yesterday but was pleasant enough to get out and get some work done on the place. By the afternoon I was comfortable in shorts and long sleeve T. It seemed that with the winter weather, the move and the cabinet project it had been forever since I'd been able to devote anytime to SA maintenance and it felt good to get back to it. There is much to do, too, as there always is, particularly this time of year when there is so much just basic clean up from the long hard winter. Plus, the weeds are in a full sprint after a wet winter and must be harvested regularly. I spent some time filling in the ruts made by the jackass applying the spray foam to the garage. The ground is still wet and a couple of weeks ago it was wet enough that the truck or trailer or both he drove out on it caused some substantial ruts. It will take some time to repair that damage. Having strangers who don't have sense enough to pour piss out of a boot drive

on the place gives me the fantods.

Dave and the Wylie Women arrived in the wee hours Saturday morning to spend Easter with us. Sophia is loping around on her hind legs now and Kaylee is beginning to look like a little girl rather than a baby. Both are jus preshus! When they and their cousins are all in the house the place is lively to say the least. I'm told J&D are drawing to three of a kind.

Last Saturday the weather was unpleasant so Abigail and Rebecca spent much of the day in the man-cave with me so their parents and grandmother could work on the move. Having finished painting the cabinets I needed to clean up. The sanding caused more dust than I would have expected and I had to go over everything to clean it up. I used the ping pong table to put the doors on while I painted them and I took it back down so I could put Mom's kitchen table where it goes. Speaking of the Genna's ping pong table, I guess I'll sell or give it away. It was propped up against our garage wall from the time Genna moved in 2005 until the man-cave was finished without being used. Before we moved furniture from 2005 down there last fall it was set up and Abigail and I played a few times but now there isn't room for it. It is bulky, heavy and no fun to set up so it needs to be someplace where it can stay set up if it is ever going to be used and I don't see that happening. Anyway Rocky and Bullwinkle kept us entertained and we were comfortable out of the cold wind.

Almost all of my friends, family, professional colleagues and even just the people I run into are worried about the direction the politicians are taking our country. Think of a cartoon canoe hovering half over a waterfall with some of the people in it staring wide-eyed at the watery abyss and one or two others paddling for all they're worth. Here's my suggestion: don't vote for Democrats. Work to elect conservatives and WATCH THEM LIKE A HAWK!

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March 21, 2010

Spring blew in during the wee hours of Saturday morning. It looked a lot like winter when we got up. Our two consecutive Saturday's of nice weather didn't make it to three so I finished painting the last two doors of the cabinets then helped Joyce with the 2005 door knobs. She's cleaned the paint off them and we went through them to try to get as many working properly as we could. We came up with enough to put door knobs on three bedrooms, including the closets. We also hung the doors. They were taken down for the floor refinishing. Insulation was blown onto the garage walls and roof last week and I think the plan is to sheetrock the walls. I don't know about the ceiling.

I made an overnight trip to the Rio Grande valley. The Donna school district needed our services. The weather was pleasant and the trip uneventful.

Joyce sent me this joke: A Tourist walked into a Chinese curio shop in San Francisco . While looking around at the exotic merchandise, he noticed a very lifelike, life-sized, bronze statue of a rat. It had no price tag, but was so incredibly striking the tourist decided he must have it. He took it to the old shop owner and asked, "How much for the bronze rat?" "Ahhh, you have chosen wisely! It is $12 for the rat, $100 for the story," said the wise old Chinaman. The tourist quickly pulled

out twelve dollars. "I'll just take the rat, you can keep the story". As he walked down the street carrying his bronze rat, the tourist noticed that a few real rats had crawled out of the alleys and sewers and had begun following him down the street. This was a bit disconcerting so he began walking faster. A couple blocks later he looked behind him and saw to his horror the herd of rats behind him had grown to hundreds, and they began squealing. Sweating now, the tourist began to trot toward the Bay. Again, after a couple blocks, he looked around only to discover that the rats now numbered in the MILLIONS, and were squealing and coming toward him faster and faster. Terrified, he ran to the edge of the Bay and threw the bronze rat as far as he could into the Bay. Amazingly, the millions of rats all jumped into the Bay after the bronze rat, and were all drowned. The man walked back to the curio shop in Chinatown . "Ahhh," said the owner, "You have come back for story?" "No sir," said the man, "I came back to see if you have a bronze Democrat."

No doubt you are familiar with our congressman's (13th district) Web site. If you haven't, you might want to read over his No Excuses Agenda. There are some interesting ideas there that would make for some lively discussions among We the People.

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March 14, 2010

The counter tops from 2005 were installed in the man-cave this week. Sad to say they took a bit of a beating in the whole process and one piece of back splash is missing. Still, they look good and eventually I'll refinish them. I can vaguely remember Dad doing that many years ago, maybe as many as 55. I expect to finish the painting in the coming week. It won't be easy though because I'll lose two evenings due to some business travel. We'll have to pick out a sink and get the plumbers out to set up the plumbing.

Friday night we went with A&M to the Lady Buffs basketball game. They won the Lone Star conference and are hosting the tournament as the top seed. The LBs took care of business and we enjoyed the game. Before the game we had dinner at a place called Nachos, which Marilyn wanted to try. She says she likes to try new places. Joyce said her chicken enchiladas were maybe the best she ever had. My spinach enchiladas were OK but nowhere near good enough to overcome the unsavory smell of the place (tobacco smoke) or the live music. I don't care much for Tejano music even when it is played well.

Our luck held on the weather Saturday. It was at least as nice as last Saturday and we expended ourselves on the 2005 garage. Chris and I moved out the two large pieces of marble, relics of the candy shop, and put them on the south side of the shop. One was a monster and the other was really heavy. If anyone wants a nice piece of marble they can be had for the taking. We took a load of trash to the dump, empty boxes mostly. We emptied a crate of cookie sheet-type pans and put the pans in the old curiosity shop. If you need any pans you are welcome to them as well. There are three or four sizes. We also moved the crated machine down to the shop.

I don't know what it is but peeking in from the top it looks innersting. It should make a good addition to the candy shop museum. We managed to separate out a quantity of stuff that we'll donate to charity. We took that to our garage so Joyce can call Salvation Army and get them to pick it up. We put that big counter out by the curb. I haven't checked this morning to see if it is still there. Hopefully, it isn't. Chris is keeping a couple of the benches and there is a quantity of lumber left over from the remodel we'll have to figure out what to do with. There are some windows, a screen door and an old bed that will go to Habitat for Humanity. And that's pretty much it. All we lack is finishing and the garage will be ready for a new set of stuff to take up space for the next 60 years. Joyce and I will fund our retirement selling the stuff we've stored in the OCS on ebay and Craigslist.

If the federal government's spending level gives you a case of the fantods like it does me, you might want to read about a proposed amendment to limit federal spending to 20% of GDP. It is obvious to me that the politicians can't restrain themselves. This idea would be difficult to accomplish, but not impossible. I think there are a lot of us appalled at what is going on in our nation's capital. If we focus on ideas like this, we might just be able to save our wonderful country for our grandchildren.

A letter from the census bureau says we will get a questionaire soon and it is really important that we fill it out and return it promptly. You see, it will be "used to help each community get its fair share of government funds." Now I wonder, if the tax payers in our community didn't have to give up the money in the first place, would our community be just as well off?

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March 7, 2010

SA rid itself of the last of last month's snow about 4 o'clock last Thursday afternoon. Saturday was a calm 60-plus degrees, such a pleasant change from the cold of February and to think we should be so lucky to have that kind of weather on a Saturday. It was particularly fortunate because we needed to mount an assault on the 2005 garage to clear out the junk so K,C,A&R will have someplace to put their junk. Junk out, junk in. All the possessions we have to have, can't live without, can't part with because you never know. Oh yes, we perpetuated the practice by moving much of it to the shop loft because, well, you never know. Can a life without junk be worth living? We did separate out the out-and-out trash and the junk so lame we knew we could part with it. There is a whole crate of various

sized pans, part of the candy business paraphernalia, plus some crated-up machine that is as heavy as lead. Then there is Mom's stove, it too being a monster to move. I'm not sure what we will do with those but I guess we'll need to find a home for them pretty soon. Genna's washer and dryer have been moved to the front porch giving the place sort of a groveite flavor.

Last Sunday afternoon Joyce and I went to see Ethel Clark on the occasion of her 90th birthday. She seemed a wee bit weary from the partying she'd been doing with her chillun. As we were leaving another set of visitors was arriving. I hope she didn't suffer too much from all the attention.

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February 28, 2010

Abigail went with us to the Lady Buffs basketball game Saturday evening. They may call themselves ladies but I saw an unlady-like elbow thrown. The player got called for it but I don't blame her because the girl guarding her was being obnoxious and the elbow served notice that enough was enough. It was a good game. Unfortunately the LB's came out on the short end of the stick. Art or Marilyn, I forget which, asked her afterward what she thought of the game and she said she liked it except for the part about losing. We all felt that way, I think. We didn't stay for the men's game because, well, it was dinner-time you know. Us old fogies like to have dinner early to beat the crowds. Then we go home and go to bed, worn out from discussing our infirmities.

The race is on to see whether the last of the snow melts out of the shadows before that that is predicted replaces

it. The forecast predicts four to six inches in the next 36 hours. None of us is looking forward to it.

Progress continues on the various projects on SA. Eventually those will get done and we'll have to come up with new ones. One thing about it, there is never a lack of projects on this place. I don't know what normal people do for entertainment.

Yesterday Chris drove metal stakes at intervals along the driveway verge to encourage drivers to stay on it. Particularly when the ground was covered with snow people started getting creative. Last summer the driveway was on its way to disappearing under the grass due to lack of use. Well, that problem has been taken care of with all the workmen coming and going. They seem to be trying to enlarge it to two lanes.

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February 21, 2010

There are random snowflakes falling, very random. We got a little rain yesterday evening, just a wetting I think. The snow of three weeks ago has receded to the shady spots but more is predicted Wednesday. A pox on all groundhogs.

That infamous troublemaker Art Brokenbek wrote a letter to the Amarillo Symphony taking them to task over the seats they stuck us in for the January concert. The seats were too close to the stage and next to some sort of ventilator that blew cold air on us. Art's point was that they shouldn't even have seats that crappy and I don't disagree. The Symphony's response was to send him a couple of tickets in a better neighborhood, which he passed on to us since he didn't want to take another chance. So Friday night Joyce and I went to the symphony. The theme was Discover America, a celebration of American folk music with guest violinist Mark O'Connor. Mr. O'Connor started out by playing the Star Spangled Banner. His rendition was initially beautiful, just the single violin playing sweet single notes, but he must have had a cockroach in his britches that started running laps because he started sawing away on his fiddle in such a way I could hardly follow the tune. After that he and the orchestra launched into what was billed as one of the first ever performances of his new "American Symphony." To me the first four movements brought forth visions of gap-toothed hillbillies wearing bib overalls with only one strap buttoned and nothing else and lovesick bison. It did, however, compare favorably to the orchestra's pre-concert warm

up period. The fifth and sixth movement were more to my liking and the selection of tunes after the break were all good. The good folks of the Amarillo area are generous with their approbation. I believe they'd give a standing ovation to anyone dressed in a tux that merely stood on the stage and rattled the change in his pocket and demand an encore.

Before the concert we had dinner at Napoli's downtown. Even though the concert started at 8 o'clock we went to dinner early to avoid the crowd. We went back home and piddled until time to head for the concert hall. Just before leaving I realized I left my hat at the restaurant we hurried back to it. The place was packed. I had put the hat in the empty chair next to me and when I got back to the restaurant a young woman sitting where I had sat had thoughtfully put her purse on top of it so it wouldn't blow away. I was greatly relieved to retrieve it.

Work at 2005 is reaching a crescendo. The painting should be done early this week and the kitchen floor and cabinet tops will go in as soon as that is finished. I keep after the cabinets in the man-cave. Yesterday I got the first coat of paint on them and today I'll sand that a little. I might even get the second coat on them but I don't know that I feel that ambitious.

The fox that calls the enclosure home sat by a tree and watched me walk to the shop one morning last week. It seemed to study me as though it had never see anything so ridiculous.

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February 14, 2010

Question for all the female homo sapiens in the audience: Will you be my Valentine?

As the frozen tundra here on the Texas high plains thaws we are seeing more and more patches of grass. Seems like forever that the ground has been covered with a snowpack. I say snowpack because there have been multiple contributions to the snow covering. The melting may slow down today because it is cold again, but the sun is starting to shine so maybe the process will continue. We hope so.

Speaking of snow, I'm told the Dallas area got quite a bit of snow. It is my understanding that the Wylie girls took advantage to build a snowman. It's nice that they have an opportunity to retain that childhood memory, though it seems unlikely they will since they are so young. They could easily be in high school before they have a similar opportunity, if then.

With the exception of Friday I spent time painting cabinets each day. It's a slow, laborious process but it turns out the man-cave is a good place to work. The

temperature is cool but comfortable for doing something physical. It is also undisturbed, clean and pretty much dust free. I don't have to worry about anything or anyone getting into wet paint or stumbling over my work-in-progress scattered about. I wish I could say I will be finished by the end of the month but I'm not sure. It could take longer. I've finished painting the inside of the cabinets and drawers and it will be easier to paint the outside plus there may be less surface area. However, the finish will be much more demanding. I'll have to sand between coats so I expect it will actually take longer. I reckon painting the insides took 18 hours. At two hours here and three hours there, more on a Saturday, that means a lot of days will be required.

We spent Friday evening at the Zbinden's. Kari fixed a tasty enchilada casserole. Chris and I enjoyed some Dave brew. Kari thinks they will move into 2005 over spring break, mid-March sometime. That's exciting. It will be a lot of work, of course, but it will mark another milestone for SA. I think everyone is looking forward to it.

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February 7, 2010

Snow Storm

This week's theme is snow. We got another five inches Wednesday evening on top of what was left from last week's foot or so, which was a lot. It was snowing when I took Abigail to basketball practice. When practice was over and we went out to get in the car there were several inches piled up on it. When I got home I swept it off with a broom before putting it in the garage to cut down on the water in the garage from the melting snow. There was still plenty. We have to put down towels to try to contain it and not let it get to things that are better off not getting wet. They make garage floor coverings that are grooved to make the water run out of the garage instead all over the place. That might be a good investment even though they don't give the covering away. We're supposed to get a few more inches in the next 24 hours and there hasn't been much melting since Thursday. It's hard to say whether the snow is gaining, staying even or falling behind. The latter, I hope. Spring seems like a long way away.

Saturday afternoon we went to a Lady Buffs basketball game with A&M. WT has a very nice and fairly new arena that is an excellent place to watch a basketball game. I went to the men's room while the other three selected our seats. They put us in the visitors section, without realizing it I suppose. We moved at half time after a group of rowdy frat rats from Eastern New Mexico sat down in front of us, or rather stood up in front of us. The seats on the other side had backs to them but our tickets were for general seating. There were plenty of the nice seats and no one rousted us when we sat in them.

The game itself was very entertaining, even though WT blew the other team out. It didn't seem like WT was that much better but they just kept adding points at about a 2 to 1 clip until the end of the game when the final score was 80 something to 40 something. It was excellent basketball absent the tatoos and preening, which is to say the gals could really play the game and concentrated on doing so. There is one more weekend home game later this month and I'm hoping we can take the Abster with us to it.

I've begun painting the cabinets we had installed in the man-cave. It will be a lengthy process but with the weather like it is there isn't much else to do in the way of after-work work so I'll just keep at it and get it done as soon as I can. The cabinet folks will install the cabinet top from 2005 once they cabinets have been painted. I'll have to do a little refinishing on it once they do but that shouldn't be too big a job. Then we'll have a nice little kitchenette in case we need one.

Joyce and I had no more than placed our orders at the restaurant we frequent for breakfast most Saturday mornings than Kari called and said there were half a dozen cop cars out front and some cops on SA. Seems a couple of ne'er-do-wells stole a car and abandoned it on Goliad. Making a run for it they headed west through backyards, over our fence and onto SA. By the time Joyce and I got home, both had been apprehended. One was sitting in the back of a squad car when we passed and his face was pretty bloody. No doubt he slipped on a bar of soap.

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January 31, 2010

We wrapped up our annual meeting Wednesday night at a restaurant in Glastonbury called 2Hopewell. Funny name, right? Well, that is the address of the restaurant as well and I'm told that is a common practice in that part of the world. The food was good. I had the scallops. Delicious. Tuesday evening I had clam chowder at Max Fish which is across the street from the hotel. Dinner was more money than one would normally want to pay. Besides the chowder I had a salad and their house brew. With tip it was $26. But, the chowder was really good.

Between flights Thursday Joyce told me I got a call from someone in our congressman's office regarding an email I sent the congressman. A couple of weeks ago I emailed the congressman this suggestion: pass a bill that required each congress critter to eat a copy of the federal tax code each April 15th; that the copy would be printed single space, front and back on 8 1/2 X 11 copier paper; that they had one hour to do it and would be docked a day's pay for each additional hour required to finish consuming all the pages. Our congressman's Web site referred to several pieces of legislation he had introduced or co-signed that were designed to simplify the tax code. In the email I suggested my idea would encourage congress to get the tax code closer to the four pages the original tax code contained in 1916. Apparently Congressman Thornberry got enough of a chuckle out of that to have one of his folks call me. When I returned Jeff's call he asked if there was anything else I would like the congressman to know. I told him I'd be in touch.

Kathy sent me this one: While suturing up a cut on the hand of a 75 year old rancher, whose hand had been caught in the gate while working his cattle, the doctor struck up a conversation with the old man. Eventually

the topic got around to Obama, and his being our president. The old rancher said, "Well, ya know, Obama is just a Post Turtle." Now not being familiar with the term, the doctor asked, * *What's a "Post Turtle?" The old rancher said, "When you're driving down a country road and you come across a fence post with a turtle balanced on top, that's a post turtle." The old rancher saw the puzzled look on the doctor's face so he continued to explain. "You know he didn't get up there by himself, he doesn't belong up there, he doesn't know what to do while he's up there, he sure as heck ain't goin' anywhere, and you just wonder what kind of dumb ass put him up there in the first place."

Debra Medina has recently come to my attention. She's running for Texas governor as a Republican so she's duking it out with Perry and Hutch. As a senator I think Hutchinson has been unresponsive and while I don't have anything against Perry, he has been governor for a while, so I'm taking a good look at Medina. I am especially intrigued by her stance against property taxes and for replacing them with a broadened sales tax. Take a look and let me know what you think.

After leaving Hartford early Thursday morning I finally got home about 4 o'clock Saturday afternoon. The snow-covered country was very pretty. Skies were clear and we flew practically over Palo Duro Canyon as we made our approach from the south. Joyce thinks we got about 11 inches of snow on SA. It is melting rapidly but Abigail and Rebecca were still able to slide down the dirt mounds Saturday afternoon on a piece of cardboard Grandma gave them. While I enjoyed JDK&S' hospitality and spending time with them, it is nice to be home.

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January 24, 2010

We celebrated our 41st anniversary with dinner and a night at the symphony. Art and Marilyn accompanied us and a good time was had by all. The young guest artist stroking the marimba was quite dramatic in her expressions but I kept feeling like she should be accompanied by a couple of Rastafarians on kettle drums. After she got a standing O, got her flowers, exited the stage and came back for another bow, and played an encore, the orchestra took a half hour break. Then they got down to business playing the complete Scheherazade. I have that, or at least parts of it among my classical music collection so I have something to compare it to and I think their rendition was superb.

Didn't accomplish a whole lot on Saturday. As I mentioned last week, Joyce tasked me with removing some doorknobs from 2005 doors that had defeated her best efforts. They defeated my, too, last week and I mentioned Chris's efforts in that regard, but there were a couple that survived Mongo because Joyce was able to divert his attention before he got to them. So I took another crack at them and was successful the second time around. I wasn't feeling too ambitious yesterday and figured if I could get the knobs off I would be satisfied with the day. Having spent the morning in part at Abigail's basketball game I really only had the afternoon for honey-dos. The knobs yielded fairly quickly and I spent the rest of my time tamping down the pond and running some water in it, then wandering around the place collecting trash.

Speaking of Abigail's game, last week at practice (there was only one because of MLK) the coach had two men helping her and they really got some good teaching done in my view. Then at the games Friday and Saturday it was back to street ball. Over 90% of the shots taken by Abigail's team the Mustangs were taken by two girls

simply because they brought the ball down the court and wouldn't pass off. Most of the time they got the ball stolen before the could get a shot off. That makes for a pretty boring game for everyone else to my way of thinking. This is little girl basketball and it matters not, or shouldn't, which team scores the most points. It should matter most that the players have fun, learn a little about the game and improve their skills. In order to promote the team ethic, what would be wrong with making the objective of the game, at least for the Mustangs, that every girl makes a basket. Once a girl makes a basket, then she concentrates her efforts toward helping the girls who haven't made a basket get opportunities to do so. The better players, or at least those who think they are better, will probably score fairly quickly but since they are then required to help their teammates score they will be forced to use their skill to feed the ball to their teammates. They'll be better off because they'll learn to pass. The other players will have more opportunity to develop their skills and the team will be much better off because they'll be forced to learn to work as a team. Yes, it will be difficult to get every girl enough opportunities to make a basket. Some of them may require a lot of opportunities, but it's not like they are winning any games now. Maybe someone will suggest this to the coach, presenting it not as a criticism but as a helpful suggestion. On the other hand, maybe I don't what I'm talking about and should mind my own business.

Sunday evening I had dinner with Andrews. Bryant and I got into an argument over Israel, he contending Israel is in the wrong and I taking the opposite view. We knocked over some furniture and rolled around on the floor for a while before Betsy separated us and made us look at pictures from her recent trip to Egypt.

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January 17, 2009

It was a slow news week here on SA. At least the weather was more pleasant than the previous week. Chris was in San Francisco all week but I didn't have to haul water to the dogs because their trough was freezing over like it was the week before. In fact, the nice weather peaked Saturday with a calm 60-degree afternoon. Winter wouldn't be too bad if we had more days like that. Joyce was busy all week cleaning up 2005 doorknobs. Some of them had been painted over and she had to use stripper to get the paint off before applying brass polish. She's gotten them looking good. Trouble is some of them wouldn't come off. I tried my luck without success and Joyce made the mistake of mentioning that to Chris when he showed up Saturday morning. He got them off using a crowbar, I think. He must have been out of plastic explosive.

At least his brute strength came in handy when we hauled off the old windows. Whey they were taken out they were stacked on the front porch. We had hoped to sell them and offered to split the proceeds with Jon

Tversky if he would haul them. He had been collecting metal for that purpose, but he got busy with other things and never came to get them, so Chris and I loaded them up and took them to metal recycling drop off at the city dump. I was surprised at how heavy they were. It took two trips but it is nice have that taken care of. The front porch looks very much better.

Paint is actually being applied to the walls of 2005 these days. There is quite a bit more yet to do but what has been painted looks really nice. Nothing like fresh paint.

As the weather improves and lets us work in relative comfort we'll turn our attention to the stuff in the 2005 garage. There is still plenty of it. I don't know what all is there. We'll just have to go through the routine of sorting through it, getting rid of what we can and finding a new place to store what we can't bear to live without. Kari and Chris have their own stuff they need storage space for and I'm sure they will quickly fill the garage back up.

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January 10, 2010

We're hoping it will warm up to normal soon. We were in the deep freeze this past week, the lowest temp I saw on my thermometer was 6 degrees. Yesterday afternoon wasn't balmy but at least it was warm enough to get out and mess around some. Most of my messing around involved the shop. It hadn't been cleaned in a while and the crud was getting thick. Jill and Dave gave me a iRobot garage cleaner for Christmas which I have used to good effect in the man cave, but I'm not ready to use it in the shop because there is too much stuff on the floor right now that will be an impediment to it.

There has been some consternation over the finish of the new cabinets in 2005 but I think the problem has been resolved so there is progress. Joyce and I met with the gentleman who made the cabinets for 2005 and he's working on the design for the cabinets for the man cave. We will use the cabinet tops from 2005 and have new cabinets built to fit them. It won't be anything elaborate, just a little kitchenette you might say, a place to make coffee or heat something up in the micro wave.

Although there is still unmelted snow, ice really, left over from before Christmas, we are getting pretty dry, as often happens this time of year. Trouble is it has been too cold do much about it. At least one and maybe two

of the little spruces east of the house is in the process of giving up the ghost. Not for lack of water, I think. I don't know why they've survived as long as they have only to die. We have big spruces on the place that grew from small ones Mom and Dad transplanted so I don't know why these aren't prospering. It doesn't fill me with confidence that the third and last of the 15 I planted nearly three years ago will survive. We'll see.

I watched The World's Fastest Indian recently. Starring Anthony Hopkins, it is based on the true story of a superannuated New Zealander who rode his modified Indian Scout to a world land speed record at the Bonneville Salt Flats back in the 60's. It's a pretty cute story and I recommend it.

Haven't read any good books lately but I continue to plod through Plotinus, one of the Great Books reading assignments I've been working on for 10 years now. It takes me at least a year to get through what is recommended for one, so I'm only half way through the 10-year list of reading. Most of the stuff puts me to sleep in no time, making it very difficult to make headway. On top of that, it is very hard to follow. I'm in over my head, of course, but I'll press on even though I have my doubts about ever getting much out of it.

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January 3, 2010

Greetings and Happy New Year to my readers all over the world. May 2010 be filled with happiness and prosperity for all.

We are winding down a four-day holiday. ICS gave me off New Year's Eve as well as New Year's. Four days, that's almost like a vacation. Thursday morning was foggy and cold but Joyce and I ventured forth anyway to have breakfast at IHOP. We spent the rest of the morning on a little project in the man cave and the afternoon recuperating from the exertion. We celebrated New Year's eve with the Zbindens and fondue, both cheese and chocolate. Then the elderly members of the group trudged home and welcomed the new year in blessed repose.

New Years dawned bright and sunny and evolved into a pleasant afternoon which we occupied with dismantling the outside Christmas decorations and storing them away in the attic until next Christmas. Abigail came down and helped us. Afterward she and I played catch in the pasture. We dug out one of the baseball gloves from the toy box under the tree house for Abigail to use. We used a tennis ball so it wouldn't hurt if she missed the ball and it hit her in the face. After a while Abigail thought it would be a good idea if I got my glove. I did and we spent quite a bit of time just playing catch. Although the glove she was using is a small one I believe we bought for Kari and Jill sometime in the yesteryear, Abigail's hand is still too small to really work the glove. It won't be long before it is big enough, though, and if she starts now getting used to it she should be able to field a ball better and better the older/bigger she gets. She throws surprisingly well, it

seems to me, not like a girl at all. She gets lazy with throws and consequently erratic but when she tries she can fire it in there with some velocity and pretty accurately as well. While she may not develop into a major league pticher standing on the mound with a wad of tobacco in her cheek staring down a batter, it wouldn't surprise me if she could make the throw from shortstop to first in an amateur league if she spends a little time developing her arm. I picture lazy summer evenings tossing the horsehide around or playing flies and grounders.

Saturday we were back to cold and foggy again. The fog froze on the tree limbs and everything else making Amarillo sort of a winter wonderland. The moisture wasn't enough to cause any icing problems. Joyce and Phyllis attended the burial ceremony of the husband of one of their school chums. His vehicle got stuck in the snow the day after Christmas and in the process of another vehicle pulling it out he got run over. Gary drove them to the cemetery. I rode along and while they were attending the ceremony we went to Harbor Freight. Harbor freight specializes in man candy, that is, all kinds of tools and other manly stuff. It's really porno for middle-aged men with nothing better to do on a cold Saturday than wander up and down the aisles looking at stuff and trying to figure out how to justify buying things. We only made it down one aisle before Phillys called and said they were ready to go. The funeral had been held several days ago so the grave-side ceremony was probably going to be brief anyway, but the temperature no doubt also contributed to the brevity.

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