I didn’t have any late afternoon or evening assignments at work so I was home by about three. It is cloudy and warm out, so by five I decided to get some yard work done. I pondered digging the garden. When I told Abby that I was planning a garden this year, her face lit…
Continue reading →Michael called me the other day to complain that I sort of left everyone hanging about Abby’s condition in my last entry. So let me say that Abby is much better, and may be returning to work tomorrow. Over the past year or two our marriage has gotten even stronger than before, and one thing…
Continue reading →Last night and this morning, rain. For the first time since June, there is water in the pond. It’s too late to green up the pasture much, but it will help everything overwinter better. The big news in Oklahoma over the last few days has been a spate of earthquakes. Abby and I slept through…
Continue reading →Abby and I are spending the whole weekend together, which is unusual since I ordinarily work on Saturday. Despite the sweltering heat we are having a pretty good time. We nap and cook and piddle. This afternoon we went out to lunch, followed by the requisite shopping trip. Presently I am teaching at the college…
Continue reading →My lower back is still acting up a bit, although it is better than just two weeks ago, thanks in part to changing chiropractors. One thing that gives me relief is walking, so most evenings when the mowing is done and the light starts to mature, I walk in big circles around our patch of…
Continue reading →Despite a nation-crippling winter storm roaring through overnight, Abby and I both went to work this morning. I shot some images for the daily, plus a bit of video for the paper’s web site. I spent the rest of the morning helping put out the paper on a skeleton crew, and shot a few more…
Continue reading →I am saddened to report tonight that Coal, the black goat who lived in our back yard with his half-brother Buxton, died today. He’d been off his feed for a few days, but I had no idea he was that sick. Our goat-owning friend Melissa Rollins says that her large animal doctor told her that…
Continue reading →Anyone who has ever lived in the country knows that it can be a little wild at times, and by wild I mean that the wildness of nature is always close. When Matthew and Michelle were on their way to visit this weekend, I warned them that a handsome green frog had appeared in my…
Continue reading →Tonight I worked at a chore that I routinely put off because it is so unpleasant, and unpleasant on several levels. The chore was the removal of about 20 volunteer trees that had grown up in the middle of Abby’s Rose-of-Sharon bushes that line our driveway. I find this unpleasant because I have to kill…
Continue reading →As I write this in the twilight of Christmas Eve, we bask in the glow of a successful holiday. Abby, tired from our dramatic drive home and opening presents, has gone to bed with Sierra the Chihuahua at her side. I am at my computer, and of course Max is chewing up a hot dog….
Continue reading →Tonight was the last night for the cantaloupe vines in the garden. The vines are actually only one plant, since I was occupied caring for Abby when the seedlings were germinating, and I was unable to thin them and fertilize. The result, however, was that the one plant ended up making a decent number of…
Continue reading →My global fans might remember that last year I power washed the front of our house and the propane pig. It was very effective, and I fully intended to do the whole house, but it got cold, then rainy, then winter came, then summer came, and before I knew it, a year had gone by….
Continue reading →This bizarre image is actually Abby doing one of her regular exercises, which therapists and trainers call “bridges,” but which Abby knows by the nickname “Chihuahuas.” Normally the move is performed by laying on the back and placing a weight on the abdomen, then bridging up, holding, and lowering for a set number of times,…
Continue reading →If you don’t love dogs and the cute things they do, please disregard this post.
Continue reading →Both Chihuahuas, Max and Sierra, have tenderness at their injection sites from yesterday’s rabies and DHLP-P vaccinations, and Max has been running a bit of a fever. As a result, he is very lethargic, and hurts all over. It does not, however, make him less cute, as this image of him cowering under one of…
Continue reading →Abby and Dorothy (our defacto Mother-in-law) are in Baltimore this week with Abby’s daughter Chele, who in Baltimore is known by her actual first name of Dawna. (Pay attention now – this will be on the test.) While they are gone, I am increasing my chore slate by about five fold, since I can tear…
Continue reading →The process of culling the garden and throwing it to my ruminants continues. I find the experience a little sad as I stand in the chill air, remembering the huge harvests; the bushy green tomato vines that smelled so good, the giant stands of bright marigolds, the crisp bell peppers that turned orange and red…
Continue reading →