The journey continues...

Brian Bilbrey July 5, 2015

In the Dark

Well. Dark-ish, sort of. Metaphorically. We still had electricity. But no phone, no Internet (well, except the cell phones), no TV. Our FiOS connection went down on Friday, and stayed down until a tech got here today and replaced some of the equipment. I used the enforced ludditic interlude to do some work in the woodshop, including sanding and finishing: Sanding and some finish applied on Friday (when it rained). More finish applied with intermediate sanding on Saturday (when it rained), and final assembly today (when it didn't rain, but I was waiting for a FiOS tech). The final product…

Brian Bilbrey June 29, 2015

More Rain

Well, not today, exactly. Nor yesterday, as such. But we had a pretty good storm roll through on Saturday. Sunday ... (yes, yes, the day I forgot to post on, again. Sigh.) Sunday, I was talking to my folks, and realized that since we returned home from California in the waning days of May, some 31 days past, we've had 11.7 inches of rain. Our weather has been positively tropical. I'm looking for mahogany and teak trees to start growing before my very eyes! We got a few more tomatoes out of the garden, about twenty HUGE FREAKING cucumbers, and…

Brian Bilbrey June 26, 2015

Marriage, Garden

A bare majority of a group of old people (hereafter known as the Supreme Court of the United States, AKA SCOTUS) today says that some people, who want to marry other people, but weren't allowed to because some other, other people are less enlightened ... well, the people are now allowed to marry any of the other people that they want, and the unenlightened people can get bit. Or move to someplace where only unenlightened activities are permitted. There's still plenty of that to go around. Anyway, happy for my happy gay friends, both those I know and those I…

Brian Bilbrey June 21, 2015

Stormtime

Yes, yes, according to the calendar, it's called Summer. But around here, it's Stormtime. The calendar season of Summer coincides with the combination of heat, humidity and passing fronts that yields lovely, lovely thunderstorms. Well, *I* like them, more or less. Lexi, however... For a while, she just sat there in the corner of the sectional sofa, facing the cushions, and shaking. Finally she yielded and tried to hide behind me (or between me and the cushions). That may have involved trying to excavate a cavity either in a cushion, or through my kidneys. Hmmm. The other less fun thing…

Brian Bilbrey June 14, 2015

Heat

Summer officially arrives next weekend. But so far as I can tell, it arrived this last week. 90+ degree temps, high humidity, big thunderstorms. Today, in fact, we had a storm line pass through that gave us a bunch of lightning and thunder, and 1.4" of rain in 45 minutes. Note: Lexi really hates thunder. She spent the entire storm (and last night's late storm) huddled against me, trembling. * * * The garden is doing okay with this heat, though. I saw one tomato starting to turn color - that's a good sign. Once I spot that, I'm usually…