Sometimes, particularly when it rains here in the summer, I get to thinking that it is going to keep on raining and that it’ll end up being a monsoon sort of season. This has happened. Three or four years back it rained continuously, for three months straight, for all of June, July and August. Not this year. It has rained, and rained hard, but only three times, and just for two days straight.

We’ve been to the Creek twice this summer. Twice we filled two dozen five gallon buckets and doled out the water to the livestock and to the plants. Right now, the buckets are again empty, but

the holding tanks are three quarters full. Pete is now out watering. The sun’s shining brightly. It’s going to be yet another nice day, weather wise.

We’ve been taking advantage of the glorious weather and getting things done around the place. Yesterday I first worked in the upper quadrant; I cleaned the goat and chicken pens and then turned compost. I brought Tinni up from down below (he lives in the lower quadrant) so that he might mow down some of the upper quadrant vegetation. I kept an eye on him and the chickens, who I’d let out of the coop. Red Hen followed me around – Freebird went back to the roost, where it was cooler.

I then moseyed down to the middle quadrant where Pete was by then working on the carriage shed. A few days ago we purchased a used driving cart from a friend. We have one other cart. It’s a bit too large for our horses, so we brought this second, smaller one. We’d stored the old cart in the storage shed – it needed considerable work and to be enlarged. So Pete, being Pete, dove into doing a total revamp.

I cleaned up the area, and then got a wild hair up my nose. I decided to pull the stored wood out from under the garbage shed – my rationale was that it might harbor slugs, should we have a monsoon season. A few minutes into it, I foresaw that this was going to be a major project. But by then it was too late to call it good. Wood of all sizes and types was scattered about the yard. I wasn’t going to put it back for this would be a waste of time.

I took a break, went up to the house, and listened to phone messages. There was one. Our hay dealer called and said that he had quite a bit down on the ground, and to come and get it. Pete called back and said we were on our way. We hustled. So did everyone else. What a scene. There were at least a dozen other customers picking up hay off the field. They were piling it onto hay trailers, into pickups, and onto hay wagons. Ants never worked harder. And no wonder. The hay was lush, green, dry. And the price off the field was lower than it’s been in years.

We loaded our two rows – 50 bales, into our trailer, and once home, resumed working on our respective projects. The carts were stashed in the rebuilt shed, the rotty wood was tossed in the pickup, and the hay was stacked in right hand side hayshed. Ahh, but the night was young. After dinner, I took the dogs for a walk and Pete weeded the garden. Done, we began planning the next day’s activities.

Next: 184. 7/6/14: K-9 Search and Rescue and Confidentiality Issues