by Last Saturday Joyce noticed that one of the guineas stayed in goonie tower when she opened it and let the others out. Later she heard it making a pitiful sound which she at first thought was a kitten. She noticed its head was a little bloody as though it had been pecked so we collected it and put in the crate in the shop away from the other guineas. Through the day it continued to sound pitiful, as though it had something stuck in its throat. Sometime during the night it “sagged, lagged and expired.”
In the junipers outside my window I see doves roosting. They are hunched down in their feathers like “old me lost in their overcoats.” It’s been that kind of weekend. It was raining slightly when we went to breakfast yesterday morning and the rain turned to snow before we were finished. It kept it up enough to cover the ground but it melted off before the day was out. The skies remained cloudy with the temperature barely above freezing all day. I had thought I would prune some fruit trees after lunch but the chill in the air drove me into the shop where I worked on removing the paint from Joyce’s swing. I’ve been working on that after work for weeks. The paint doesn’t come off easily except where it was exposed to the sun. Yesterday morning I brought down a decorative wood shelf Joyce got in Hot Springs, Arkansas and has stayed in our attic since the move. I thought I might see if there was a place for it in the man-cave or maybe the shop. I wound up mounting it on the wall next to the kitchenette cabinets and above Genna’s little cupboard. It makes a nice place to display my collection of coffee mugs and the towel rack is handy since I didn’t have one.
Abigail made her television debut recently. A local TV station did a story on the open leaning she’s involved in at Olsen Park. She was one of the kids they enterviewed. I don’t know why it is interesting to see someone you know on TV, but it is. This is Abigail’s last year at Olsen. She’ll start next fall in middle school. She’s supposed to go to Sam Houston but Kari has mounted a campaign to get her transferred to Crockett. Sam Houston has the same unsavory reputation today it did when I was a kid. Kathryn went there a couple of years and never quite got over it. Besides, nearly all of Abigail’s fiends will go to Crockett. It is apparently up to the principal at the school the student wants to transfer to. Kari has some allies in the system that have put in a good word for Abigail and advised her to write a letter to the Crockett principal. In the letter she remarked that Abigail’s grampa was in the first seventh grade class at Crockett when it opened. Then, seventh was the lowest junior high grade. I don’t know if that will help any but maybe it won’t hurt. My three-year career at Crockett was unremarkable but on the other hand I don’t think I did any lasting damage.
Last Thursday was a pretty nice day and since we knew what the weekend forecast was, Joyce got a load of granite Thursday afternoon and I spread it Thursday evening. That way we managed to keep up progress on the front yard. I’m trying to get the dirt covered as quick as I can because it blows onto the granite from the uncovered areas. I see we’re supposed to get another blow Tuesday. Right now the ground is damp from the snow and rain but if the sun comes out and drys it out by Tuesday that might be a problem. I may have to get Joyce out there to water it down.
The weeds are mounting their spring offensive. I see their massed troops all over the place. There is one variety that only showed up a couple of years ago and now already the most prolific, it threatens to overrun the place. There is another type that has been around but must have had a good year last year (not on SA) because I see it emerging all over the place. The drought-weakend grass allows more ground to be exposed to the sun and according to what I’ve read, that is the trigger for weeds. When the sun is shining, I use Roundup, it being the only thing that works as cool as it is. I’ve experimented applying it to weeds when the temperature was 32 and, though it took weeks, it did kill them. Trouble is, it has to be applied in direct sun. Many of the places the weeds get started are in shade much of the day. It’s tricky to find a few minutes in my work day when I can catch the weeds in the sun and apply some Roundup but I do the best I can.