With school back in session everywhere, my job, as usual, has gone from the pokey days of summer to the crazy “be everywhere” days of autumn.

One consequence of this is that working in the yard and the garden is less consistent. Some days I work until dark, but some days, like yesterday, my last assignment was at 3 pm, so I was able to mow, garden, burn the brush pile that was the mimosa that blew down in a storm, and my favorite thing, pull the razor-sharp Oklahoma grass burrs out of Hawken’s eyebrows.

Hawken is as curious as any dog (initially mistyped as “god”), has a lush coat, and is huge, so when he pokes his head into corners of the yard where the grass burrs grow, often far faster than I can weed-whack them, he sometimes collects them on his forehead, beard, and eyebrows. He is amazingly patient when I pull them out, which is not easy because they are deeply embedded, and razor sharp. I think it’s more painful for me than him.

Easily the funniest thing I’ve mowed this year is a can of blue spray paint I ran over last night on the riding mower. I kept it on the gun bench for painting targets, but when I moved the bench to mow the grass on that spot, I guess I knocked it off into the grass. When I hit it, there was giant “poof,” and a great splatter of blue, accompanied by the unmistakable smell of spray paint.

The sunset was beautiful last night.