Can't Buy Rain

Even though it looks like it might rain I'll bet you we won't see a drop.  It hasn't rained, not really rained, not even rained enough to wet the whole street, for weeks.  I think it's been 2 and maybe 3 weeks since I mowed.  That's not right, not in July, in August maybe but not in July and yet I'll be mowing one night this week because there are scattered weeds growing up nice and tall.  They're so thin that I can only see them when I sit in the car looking across the lawn.

This morning I was taking a picture of the red petunias when a pair of woodpeckers fluttered onto the chair.  I got one of them but they were gone too quickly for a second shot.

I finally gave in to startitis temptation and cast on a linen hankie washcloth last night.  I'm excited to see how it turns out but it's a pain getting things like this started, the first couple rounds it seems like the needles are in charge the way they tangle and twist.

I was a bad person and did the laundry yesterday.  One of the intake pipes that brings lake water into the city for us to drink, etc. broke last week so there's only one bringing in water so they said we needed to conserve water.  It isn't rationed they just asked us not to water gardens and such but I figure that no one wants us to be out of clean undies.  Right?  It's kind of a public service.  Plus we only have 3 loads so it wasn't too bad.

Durwood and I spent an hour in the afternoon counting and weighing out a whole bock of 100-calorie snack packs for our cross-country jaunt.  I did this a couple years back when we went to Yellowstone and it saved us from buying munchies in gas stations.  We'll pick up a case of bottled water and some Gatorade to take along too.  Hey, we've got tons of room in Durwood's big van so why not use it.

August 11-James-Jacques-Joseph Tissot, Spring Morning.  The sun shown so brightly in the garden that morning it made Jeanne glad she had gotten the umbrella out of the garage over the weekend.  She had her mug of coffee and the newspaper, everything needed to ease into the day.  She had barely read past the headlines when the phone started ringing.  Tempted to stay where she was and let the machine pick up, she was on her feet before the thought faded.  What if one of the kids needed her?  The phone was on the narrow shelf just inside the door so she reached in for it before the third ring.  "Hello?"  That was all she said before the voice in her ear drove her to sit on the step.  It was her mother-in-law fifteen miles from the doorstep and expecting to stay with her "a while."  Jeanne didn't know how long "a while" was but it was already too long.

I hope DIL1 and DIL2 don't feel that way about me.  They probably do, a little bit anyway, mothers can be so mother-y in a take-charge kind of way.  I try to know my place.  Anyway, look, it's Monday again.  Told you they roll around faster than any other day of the week, didn't I?  Oh, and I see the sun.  No rain for us.  Dammit.  Auf wiedersehen, kids.
--Barbara