Weather | 5/19, 1.67" rain, cloudy, 55°, 67° | 5/20, 0.09" rain, cloudy, 59°, 67°
| 5/21, p. cloudy, 50°, 63° | 5/22, sunny, 43°, 61° | 5/23, sunny, 44°, 69° | 5/24, cloudy, 53°, xx°
| 5/25, xx°, xx° |
- Monday, 5/19: Thunderstorms
- We experienced rain from thunderstorms in the morning and at night. Mary and I both bounced out of bed at 6:30 to disconnect freezers and the fridge due to lightning strikes. That storm gave us a third of an inch of rain. After dark, a slow moving thunderstorm traveled through us, constantly thundering. The nighttime storms gave us another 1.34" of rain. It was dry enough that most all rain soaked into the ground.
- Mary cut scapes from the garlic plants. This means that we ought to be harvesting garlic in a couple weeks.
- I put a question out in four buy and sell groups for Lewis County, MO, on suggestions for a good welder within the county to remove the old coupler on the tongue of the trailer and weld a new one in place. I got several suggestions. I selected Hudson Welding in LaBelle, run by an older guy and his two sons. They are close and seem to charge reasonable prices. I drove the trailer to the welder in the afternoon. He asked if we lived in the house north of a pond on our gravel road and when I explained that it's where Mary's uncle, Herman Hutton, once lived, he replied, "I knew Herman very well."
- In the morning, Mary reported that the egg numbers coming from the hens were dwindling. At the end of the day she collected nine eggs...not dwindling at all!
- Mary had two barn swallows zip around the house twice and pass within a foot from the brim of her hat. On the second pass, they were twittering as they flew by her face.
- As thunder barked outside at night, I read several chapters of a book entitled Canoe Trip: Alone in the Maine Wilderness, by David Curran. It's a fun read.
- Tuesday, 5/20: Dandelion Wine Racking
- I racked the dandelion wine for the second time. The must sat over the fines for about 2.5 weeks, but it didn't harm the taste. The specific gravity was 0.993 and the pH was 3.1. Just over 0.2 grams of Kmeta was added to the must. I lost about 750 ml of liquid, although Mary and I drank a couple small glasses of the wine. The initial taste was rather bitter from the dandelion petals, with a sub flavor of citrus, from the orange, lemon, and lime. The aftertaste was amazingly close to the taste of grapefruit juice. We thought it was delicious. Give it time to age and this will be some mighty fine wine!
- We found out that Bill will be here from this upcoming Saturday through Tuesday.
- In the morning, two hummingbirds flew by Mary at knee height between her and the door, as she stood on the front porch. In other words, they were about six inches away as they flew by Mary.
- These days, when we need some lettuce or spinach, Mary just goes into the garden to pick our our "grow"ceries (see photo, below).
- I finished reading the Canoe Trip book.
- Wednesday, 5/21: Wild Kingdom
- We went for a wildlife walk when we took Plato on his morning stroll. First, we noticed a bunny on the edge of the lane. Then a doe deer ran out near the bunny, looked at us, then zipped back where it came from. Next, a tiny fawn, that was maybe a few days, old ran out into the lane. It tucked its head into a bush as if it thought that by hiding its head, we couldn't see its rump that was out in plain sight. The bunny was long gone, thanks to the deer circus. We turned around to give Mama and her baby some space. Finally, two wood ducks and a great blue heron flew overhead. Welcome to our Wild Kingdom!
- I gave Mary a haircut.
- I checked with the welder handling my trailer and he was working on it at that moment and said it was almost done.
- While Mary cleaned house, I mowed the lane, the south orchard, and the trail by the small cherry trees west of the house.
- Mary cleaned up a lot of garlic scapes in the far garden.
- After I finished mowing, there was a message that the trailer was done. I drove to LaBelle and returned with the trailer. Mary did all of the evening chores while I was away. The welder told me that the trailer manufacturer originally welded the tongue up so well that the old coupler came off in pieces. He did a very good job putting a new one on and installing a new trailer jack.
- I watched the Edmonton Oilers/Dallas Stars NHL playoff game. After two periods, the Oilers led, 3-1. Dallas scored five unanswered goals in the third period to win, 6-3.
- Thursday, 5/22: Birds, Shopping, & a Movie
- We had a turkey hen walk through our property in the morning hours. At 5 p.m., while Mary was looking over Plato for ticks, a turkey hen erupted into flight from the path next to the near garden and flew north. It was probably the same bird as the one we saw this morning.
- I went shopping in Quincy.
- I got two flowering plants for an early birthday present to Mary. One is a New Guinea impatiens and the other is a petchoa, which is a hybrid between a petunia and a calibrachoa. (see photo, below). The petchoa has exceptional disease resistance, improved heat tolerance and cleaner foliage than traditional petunias. Mary plans on repotting them.
- Mary noticed all kinds of colorful birds on our property throughout the day, such as a male Baltimore oriole, rose-breasted grosbeaks, ruby-throated hummingbirds, cardinals, eastern bluebirds, and common yellowthroats. "It's like living in a tropical forest," she said.
- We watched a movie I picked up for $5 at Walmart called Plane. A lot of work went into that film title. It's actually a good movie.
- We had a turkey hen walk through our property in the morning hours. At 5 p.m., while Mary was looking over Plato for ticks, a turkey hen erupted into flight from the path next to the near garden and flew north. It was probably the same bird as the one we saw this morning.
- Friday, 5/23: Ripe Mulberries & More Fireflies
- Mary repotted the two plants I gave her yesterday.
- It was a low activity day for me.
- A mulberry tree that grows in the middle of the cedars south of the near garden is full of ripe, red berries. Ripe mulberries in May is quite early. This is good, since we're starting to see color on some of the pie cherries on the big cherry tree. Again, this is early, too. Mulberries help to keep birds away from cherries.
- I watched the Edmonton Oilers beat the Dallas Stars, 3-0, to even the series at 1-1.
- We noticed quite a few more fireflies in the grass field south of the house when we walked Plato on his last outing.