Category: SA Times

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Joyce and I were glad to get out Saturday morning to watch the Abster play basketball.  The wretched cold had kept us inside and thankful to be there since Wednesday.  Crockett and the other middle schools were playing a sort of mini tournament they called a shoot out.  They played two games facing a different team for each game.  Crockett drew Travis in the first game and Fannin in the second.  Wednesday we went to their regular game against Bonham, I think.  Prior to Saturday we’d watched two games and the opponents weren’t competitive.  Wednesday’s final score was 30-something to 4.  I asked Abigail why that was and she said it was because “they stink”, though I don’t think that’s really an explanation.  Travis made Abigail’s team work a little harder but they still beat them pretty good.  Before the Fannin game Kari and I speculated on whether the Crockett coach would substitute if necessary to win.  So far she’d played half the girls for two quarters and half for the other, alternating quarters, and that works out well because there are 10 girls.  Since the games have been blow outs we didn’t know what the coach would do if it got tight.  Crockett had Fannin pretty well in hand through three quarters but early in the fourth Fannin tightened it up.  They were out rebounding Crockett so the coach subbed three girls that quickly corrected the situation and Crockett won going away.  The Abster got some rebounds, put up a bucket, had a couple of steals and a very nice assist.  If memory serves she’d stolen the ball on the opponent’s end of the court but was tripped up on the transition.  Before she hit the floor she dished off to a teammate down the court who took it in for an easy layup.  Good stuff.  Fun to watch.  It seemed the last couple of years of Kids, Inc. basketball some of the girls were so much bigger and more aggressive than Abigail that I had mixed emotions about here continuing to play.  Now there are few girls that are significantly taller, although there are some that are definitely stouter, but the Abster holds here own so I’ve quit worrying. Continue reading “Extra nine” →

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When li’l r came in out of the blowing cold Friday evening, she allowed how she was “covered in coldness all over.”  The fire and some hot soup soon set her right.  The forecast Thursday morning indicated the weather might be unsuitable for outside work after lunch so I was scurrying around trying to get the rakings I’d accumulated during the week loaded in the pickup and hauled off to the chipper site.  It was a very nice temperature and the air was calm early so I made good progress.   I wanted to rake up twigs underneath the junipers in the southwest corner of the 2005 immediate yard and was in the process of doing that when the cold front hit.  First there were a few puffs of much cooler air, then a cloud bank loomed and then wham, the front barreled its way through blotting out the sun.  It got cold quickly and by the time I got the load to the chipper site it was definitely unpleasant.  Fortunately it didn’t take long for me to drop my load and that was the last of the outdoor activity until maybe sometime this coming week. Continue reading “Coldness” →

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Our neighbors had a weenie roast Friday evening.  It had been breezy during the day but fairly warm.  Still, the fire felt good as the sun went down and the moon rose.  Barbara and the Lopez gang joined us but not Janice, who was busy trying to get her house ready to sell, or Joyce, who had a cold.  Them chillun seemed to have a lively time whoopin’ and hollerin’ and the evening turned out to be just about right for a weenie roast.  Saturday it blew all to be damned and would not have been suitable for a weenie roast.  I was pooped anyway Saturday evening after spending all day chasing water.   My life consists of 30 minute intervals as I run from one end of the place to the other to move sprinklers.  This week I concentrated on the south end and watered the line of junipers on the east.  That was the first time they’ve ever been watered since maybe Dad irrigated last, which could easily have been 30 years ago.  I should have started watering all of the junipers on the perimeter much sooner than I did during this drought.  They’ve gotten in pretty bad shape but in my defense it is very time consuming to do that and I couldn’t do it and work at the same time.  Hopefully I can keep up the watering over the winter and maybe we’ll even get some moisture and will see the benefit next spring.  Winter moisture is much more effective since it doesn’t get blasted away by heat and wind. Continue reading “Hillbilly dental plan” →

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On Halloween Joyce and I dressed up as a couple of old fogies and waited to see if we got any trick-or-treaters.  There was only a pair of salty-looking pirates prowling around the neighborhood but that’s more than we usually get. Continue reading “Trick-or-treat” →

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We had some really nice fall days this week and Joyce and I took advantage of one to tear down the garden.  In past years we’ve shredded the tomato vines, okra stalks and so on but this year Joyce wanted to try loading it all up in the pickup and taking it to the dump, the theory being insect pests and such would be removed from the garden rather than allowed to possibly survive in the compost.  Time will tell whether that works out but it’s worth a try.  We filled the pickup to capacity with the garden detritus and also the pond grass and cattails I pulled a couple of weeks ago plus the sunflowers we grew here and there.  We trucked it off to the dump only to find that there was a line of trucks and trailers half way to Canyon waiting to to weigh in.  The dump has one set of scales and vehicles weigh when they come in and again when they come out so they get a net weight of the load to calculate the charge.  Our stuff would not have been charged for since it is the kind of thing the garbage trucks would pick up along the street but it appeared we would have to wait in line anyway both coming and going.  We decided to take it to one of the brush sites instead.  Though the load was pretty brushy, we figured it would be construed as yard waste, which is supposed to go to the dump.  That’s why we took it there in the first place, but, under the circumstances, we felt justified in bending the rules a little.  The first site we visited was closed because they were in the process of shredding the accumulation but the second site was available and we were able to handle our business without interference. Continue reading “Goodbye garden” →