Still Hot, Still Humid...

...but not quite as unbearable as last weekend or yesterday.  Today the windowsill thermometer did NOT say 100 degrees at any time during the day.  Not even a momentary flicker.  Tomorrow is supposed to be much cooler and drier.  Hallelujah.


I found something to elevate my pot of strawberries on the patio to try to keep them out of the clutches of the rapacious chipmunks--one of DS's cast off Ale Pails from his early homebrewing days.  It's the perfect height and I think it looks just right there in front of the petunias and zinnias.



And just after supper I ate these two very nearly ripe berries.  I was going to leave them on the plant until tomorrow but when I went out to put a new bag of birdseed in the can on the patio I found a barely pink, unripe, and gnawed berry on the doormat.  Not going to leave my precious berries out there for any Tom, Chip or Dale to gobble up, I picked them and ate them myself.  They were wonderful, sweet, and juicy.



This afternoon I spied this fuzzy little glutton in the grass.  Baby bunnies, while cute, have been known to eat my ferns.  This does not please me.  Baby bunnies can eat all the grass and clover and fallen birdseed they desire but they'd better stay out of my ferns.



I got flowers!  The doorbell rang this afternoon while I sat on the couch knitting and look what it was.  A beautiful vase of red carnations and baby's breath from DS and his family.  Just because they love me.  I've had a challenging month and they wanted to send me a floral hug.  Somebody raised those children right, both of them.




Speaking of knitting, I got the 5" of even rows done on the right front of the Montparnasse Eco Cardi and started the decreases.  As I did on the left front I'll decrease one stitch every third row for 30 rows (10 stitches fewer) and then every other row until I reach the desired 12 stitches, hopefully I'll run out of stitches to decrease just about the time I reach the length the sweater piece is supposed to be.

July 5--Sir John Lavery, The Peoples' Pool, Palm Beach.  You can see prosperity in the very size of the place.  There was room for everyone and everyone came.  The mothers sat in the narrow band of shade that hugged the west wall.  Young women draped themselves on the pool's edge, the better to catch the lifeguard's eye.  The children splashed and played in the shallows, their high voices echoing off the salmon pink stucco walls.

I just heard a few "a day late" or maybe "leftover" fireworks but tonight's here-and-there explosions can't hold a (Roman) candle to last night's bombardment.  I was sure the noise would keep me awake but I'd been up and down the stairs carrying wet laundry and then out in the hot and humid hanging sheets on the line so many times that I fell right to sleep, didn't even finish the last five words of the writing prompt until just now.  I don't think I'll have much trouble falling asleep tonight either.  *yawn*  Okay, that's just silly.  Typing the word "yawn" made me yawn.
--Barbara