A smile on Cherie's face

7/6/09 Monday

You should read Saturday and Sunday's posts as the kind of go together. Start with Saturday and then read Sunday to put my thoughts in order.

We had some good hard rain yesterday, or Saturday. Maybe both days, I can’t remember for sure. I do know that I left the water on the blackeyed peas for at least a day and night and perhaps two days. This on top of some hard rain. We picked our first blackeyed peas Saturday. I hope I didn’t drown them out. They are predicting a run of hundred plus degree days starting Wednesday with Thursday at 105. Now that the ground is moist and soft there is much I should do to take advantage of that.


Yesterday I put trellis all around the veranda. There’s a lot more I must do to finish the job. For now it’s just tacked up there. One of those strong West Texas winds will tear it down. So much to do and so little time. It always gets dark before I want it to. The Morning Glory vines will quickly cover this. It put a big smile on Cherie’s face, one of the biggest pleasures and goals of my life.

Tomorrow I take Ben to the vet to hopefully get the pin removed from his leg. The tick wars are not going good. I spray and pick them off of Ben but they always are there. We’ve sprayed his sleep area and bedding. Cherie woke up with a tick on her arm the other night. We’ve given Rascal and Trixie a couple of baths with tick and flea shampoo but still find ticks on them. Gretchen we just can’t do. She’s too afraid of everything and too big to hold down. I managed to spray her a bit before she ran off. The Bio-Spot stuff seems worthless. Frontline is a good product but out of our budget right now.

Got to work. I found another rattlesnake yesterday but couldn’t get to it. It’s under one of the piles of lumber I have, one of the piles I intend to move and place on a raised platform. Right now it’s covered with now wet sand like everything else is. That’s the purpose of the raised platform. But with the wood on, and now, due to the build up of windblown sand, in the ground it will rot easily. Just something else to do that I can’t get to. So the snake was there but there is no telling where it is today.

I had Cherie get the gun she bought for protection out so I could use it on the snake if needed. First I wanted to train her how to use it. I’d been meaning to do that ever since she got it but, like everything else, didn’t get around to it. So I carefully explained to her the proper way to hold it, to always keep it pointed to the ground or up in the air, to be careful to never point it at someone even by accident. I showed her how to aim it and explained that her finger should never be on the trigger till she was going to fire it. I fired the first round so she would have an idea of what to expect. Then I handed the gun to her and instructed her to fire at the ground. It didn’t work, just sat there, no click or anything. Taking the gun I found that the spent shell had never ejected. It jammed when I pulled the slide back so I had to pry the empty shell casing out and get another round in the chamber. Handing it to her again she aimed and fired. It worked but the shell casing again jammed. Nuts!! This happened the next three times I fired it. We bought a $400.00 piece of brand new junk. Cherie had forgotten to mail in the warranty card so we’re screwed. At least it’s good for one shot and perhaps to scare off any would be threat.

Got work to do so bye.
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One of the used tires I bought last week started going bad Saturday. I was heading to Midland to help a friend when it felt like the tire was out of balance and it began bouncing. Actually, when I think about it this happened Friday because I had Cherie drop me off at the friend’s on Saturday because of the bad tire. That’s how this memory can get things confused. So long story short the tread was coming off the tire. I took it in to where I got it this morning. Fortunately they had a used tire of the correct size so I had them put it on. The policy here is simply that there are no guarantees on used tires so I figured I’d have to pay for this second one. When I asked for a $5.00 break because the other tire only lasted a week he told me to not worry about it, just consider it even. This saved us twenty five bucks. For some of you $25.00 isn’t much but for us it’s a whole lot, especially when we’ve got a vet bill coming up tomorrow when we take Ben in. This is how it seems to often work out for us and we are always grateful at how God provides. Like the sparrows of the field who don’t worry about their next meal I don’t worry about our needs either. It just happens as long as I don’t get my hands in things and mess them up.

I took our trash to the landfill and did some stuff with the seeds we are starting for fall planting but then got one of those monster headaches that put me down. Took a couple of aspirin and laid down for two hours. I still have the headache but it’s tolerable now so am fixing to head out and get something done. As always it’s a tough decision regarding which of the many things I need to do I will do. No matter what something gets neglected. I will call the old man and see if I can use his disc tomorrow while the ground is still wet. Today I think I’ll take the carb off the tiller and clean the sand out again so I can use it. At some point I want to build some simple platforms to put lumber on so I can move it out of the sand and perhaps find that rattlesnake. Then there are T-frames to build for trellises and beds to prepare for fall planting, which begins this month. Plus I want to plant the hay around the apple tree area and side yard. This I can till under after mowing to enhance the soil.

Time to go.