Friday, September 25, 2020

Friday - 196th

Are you tired of reading these words -- "it was a stunning day?"  Oh, but the skies were blue, and the warm breeze was so strong, and the temperatures soared to near 80F (26C), and the gold that's touching the leaves right now seems majestic, and the dainty asters popping up in the prairies are like candies in a candy jar and if you can be outside today, you want to stay there and never go in.


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Morning walk to the barn, with a moment to pick a few handfuls of weeds. I figure if I do a little each day, I'll get on top of the areas around the sheep shed. What to do going forward is still a puzzle, but perhaps I can spend winter months pondering over how to keep those weeds out of there next year.

Breakfast.


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Hello, cat. And Ed.


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We do just a few tiny projects around the farmhouse -- like, the gasket around the freezer door is ripped and not too clean, so we pull it off, clean it up and put it back on, upside down so we can no longer see the crack. (If there is a cheap fix to a problem, Ed will find it.) But really, we spend very little time indoors. Instead, we hop on the motorbike and head out to our local park, taking the trail that has served us well for years now.

(on the way, the cranes...)


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(the giant oak and, well, the tall guy...)


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(love and friendship, among turtles...)


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(choppy lake)

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Fall colors? Sure, but they are subtle still.


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Except in places where they are resplendent and bold.


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In the afternoon, after a careful filling out the bubbles on the ballot...



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... we're again on the bike, motoring first to our City Hall, where they have placed in the lobby a drop box for ballots. It could not be easier. We came equipped with masks and disinfectants and, considering we encountered no one and had to touch nothing, we used neither.

[By evening, our votes were recorded as "received!"]

Next, we go over to County Materials where we examine the cement blocks we'll be using for our front steps. Yes, I think we finally have a decision in hand. Ed's agreeable to moving ahead with the help of Mr. Retired Mason. He'll be building our front steps in mid October.

Our last afternoon minutes are spent on farmette land, examining the grape that has climbed over and into the box elder tree. It's a concord grape (nice taste in the flesh, plenty of seeds and an awful skin), planted by Ed a long time ago and it is the only grape that consistently produces (here and in the grape arbor) edible grapes. We leave most to the birds, though some amount of sucking and spitting out the seeds is a very autumnal small pleasure for both of us.

And there you have it. They say that we wont be seeing days like this again until spring 2021. Can you think that far ahead? I cannot.

And did I mention that it was an utterly stunning day?


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