Symphony

  • Photo by Rebecca

It’s National Prostate Month in the good ol’ USA. If you have a prostate you are allowed, no, legally bound, to celebrate in the manner of your choosing.

So far it has been an uneventful month here on our little patch of Earth. We’re still basking in the damp from last weekends rain. SA has greened up nicely and the blue gramma is already putting up seed heads. I got over two thirds of the place sprayed during this week and hope to finish the rest this coming week. I will also be busy putting down preemergent. We resolved in the spring to try to do something to reduce the sock weeds and other types of cool weather weeds. Sock weed isn’t the proper name but its prickly seeds infest one’s socks when walking through the grass in early summer so that’s what we call it. A search on sock weed just brings up pictures of socks with marijuana leaves on them. By this time of year, the sock weeds have disappeared so we have to go by memory to apply the preemergent. We won’t prevent it all or even most of it from sprouting next spring but maybe we’ll make a dent. If we keep applying preemergent in September every year, then maybe we can get the problem under control.

Ten years ago about this time we were in Switzerland. Just Joyce and I visited Hans and Elisabeth and we toured the country using our Swiss Pass to ride trains and buses. Here are pictures from that trip if you are interested. That same month Abigail and I visited a playa with a group. Interesting that we visited another playa early this summer. Maybe we will visit another playa in 2030.

Another spell of wet weather this week, wet and cold, well, chilly. We managed to get some preemergent weed killer down on Monday and the dams in the lanes repaired. Some had been breeched when we got the relatively heavy rain a couple of weeks ago. Those needed to be repaired in case it rained heavily again. It didn’t, but we did accumulate over an inch which was just right to refresh the grass and trees and to water in the preemergent. It was cool and wet enough to keep me in the shop Wednesday and Thursday. After a long, hot and dry summer I was glad to lounge around the cave.

We aren’t having any luck getting some work done around the house. I’ve called three painters, one handyman and a person recommended by the place we got our front door. It needs to be refinished. Of the three painters I called, two showed up to look at what I wanted done but one decided he already had too many jobs and the second didn’t get back to me with an estimate. The third returned my call eventually and said he would come take look at the job, but never did. The handyman said he would call me back to schedule a time to meet with me but never did. The door refinishing specialist said he would call and come by Saturday but I didn’t hear from him. Business in the trades must be pretty good right now.

Meanwhile, I’m letting the grass seed out again this fall and, with the moisture we’ve gotten, the place is beginning to look pretty hairy. There was a fox in the meadow yesterday. It and the cats will like the long grass where they can play hide-and-seek.

Joyce and I passed a pleasant Saturday evening enjoying an outdoor Amarillo Symphony concert in Amarillo’s new Hodgetown baseball park. We had what we considered to be the best seats in the house; behind home plate and elevated. The orchestra was on a platform positioned over the pitchers mound. Seating was assigned so as to maintain proper distancing. Why the powers that be chose us for the best seats we don’t know but we’ll take it. The theme was Americana and I particularly enjoyed the theme song of the Magnificent Seven, Stars and Strips forever, the William Tell Overture (think the Lone Ranger), the Sound of Music and probably several others I’m forgetting. The orchestra kicked off a fireworks show with the 1812 Overture and the fireworks alone were worth the price of admission. It lasted through several songs and the effect was memorable. We have been experiencing cool mornings, warm afternoons and light winds for the last week and that made Saturday pleasant for sitting in a baseball stadium and listening to good music.

As September slips away we have gotten dry again. I’ve begun doing some of the touch up on the house that I tried to hire someone to do so the weather has been good for that. The door man did show up and said he would get started on it in a couple of weeks, which means he would start this coming week but I haven’t heard from him confirming that.