May 13-19, 2024

Weather | 5/13, p. cloudy, 60°, 78° | 5/14, 0.75" rain, 58°, 65° | 5/15, 0.11" rain, p. cloudy, 55°, 75° | 5/16, cloudy, 60°, 78° | 5/17, sunny, 56°, 81° | 5/18, sunny, 60°, 83° | 5/19, p. cloudy, 50°, 87° |

• Monday, 5/13: Quincy Trip & Turkey Dinner
  
  • Our forecast called for a 90 percent chance of rain. Only a few drops fell as radar showed rain clouds drying up as they approached us.
  • Mary watched a caterpillar on a motherwart plant in the chicken yard rid itself of some tiny piece of tan debris that was on its back.
    
  • I drove to Quincy to pick up some coffee beans that were shipped via FedEx. I diverted the package to the Walgreen store. I also bought four 20-foot lengths of 3/8-inch rebar that I cut up with a hacksaw to fit in the pickup.
  • On the way back home, I noticed newly spread out gravel on the road at the end of our driveway. I also noticed a new dog kennel with a dog in it behind our neighbor's house. No loose horses, no cow/calf in their pasture, and dogs in a kennel all points to major changes at that residence...all to the betterment of neighbors like us.
    
  • While I was gone, Mary baked a turkey. Upon returning home, we enjoyed a very yummy meal, complete with mashed potatoes and gravy, green bean casserole, and a bottle of 2021 pear wine.
  • Katie called from the airport at Santiago, Chile to wish Mary a belated happy Mother's Day.
    
  • A group of eastern phoebe babies are in the nest under the metal roof of the woodshed.
  • I watched the last half of the Carolina Hurricanes defeat the New York Islanders, 4-3, and the Dallas Stars beating the Colorado Avalanche, 4-1.
    

• Tuesday, 5/14: Finally Spending Gift Money
  
  • Rain fell for most of the day, especially in the afternoon.
  • After breakfast, Mary spotted a coyote in front of the south chicken yard. She and I both ran outside, but didn't see it. For good measure, I took an old broom handle and pounded on the steel wall of the machine shed to make a booming sound that echoed through the woods.
    
  • Mary baked four loaves of bread...YUM!
  • I balanced the checkbook, then spent a bunch of time online determining how to spend old Christmas and birthday money.
    
  • I made a decision to order a new Peak rotary fly tying vise. Here's a LINK to it. With this vise, instead of winding the thread around the hook, you simply turn the handle at the far end of the vise to wind the thread on the hook. I saw this type of vise in action at a fly tying class I took last year and it works very nicely.
    
  • Mary saw two ruby-throated hummingbirds fighting for the rights to a comfrey flower patch in the far garden.
  • Toward dusk, we chased deer away from our fruit trees. The first time, Mary saw a deer venture toward our cherry tree that she chased away. Later, I was down to just underpants, due to getting caught in a downpour while moving rebar from the pickup to the machine shed. Deer were munching on our south apple trees. I shouted out the south living room window and they barely moved, so I ran outside, hollering and clapping, and they leaped off, into the west woods. Mary said it was funny watching Underwear Man chasing deer.
  • While going to bed, we heard two raccoons growling and arguing at each other in the east yard.
  • I watched Game 4 of the Canucks/Oilers NHL playoff series. Edmonton won, 3-2. The final Oilers goal came with only 39 seconds left in the game.
    

• Wednesday, 5/15: Shopping & First Cicadas
  
  • Mary and I shopped in Quincy, today. It was quiet, so shopping went well. We bought a solid rubber wheelbarrow tire. Mary tried pumping up a tire on one of our wheelbarrows on Sunday, just to have it go flat, immediately. We're tired of always replacing wheelbarrow tires, so we'll try the non-pneumatic type. We also got three rolls of chicken wire fencing, plus a month's worth of groceries.
  • The pickup's heater/AC fan is making a loud noise. I suspect a mouse nest in the blower unit. We drove around Quincy with the windows rolled down. Vehicle engine noise is really loud as you motor around. I wonder what red neck asses with their stove pipe, non-muffler pickups will do when gas engines dwindle away. Will they put speakers on their jacked-in-the-air pickups so they can still drive loud rigs?
    
  • I saw the first cicada this morning. We're due to get the 13-year and 17-year cicadas this year.
    

• Thursday, 5/16: Great Spring Blossom Aromas
  
  • We're noticing more cicadas hatching out. They leave behind a complete exoskeleton on grass and tree leaves. Mary saw a robin carrying a cicada in its mouth. Insect-eating birds will be full this spring with cicadas.
    
  • We have large swamp dogwoods growing along our lane that are blooming and attracting bees of all varieties (see videos, below). You can hear a goldfinch singing in the first video. It always sounds like it's asking a question. The tiny blossoms smell like vanilla, or elderberry flowers.
    
  • Another amazing smell comes from multiflora rose blossoms. A multiflora rose grew huge in front of the electric fencer box on the southeast corner of our house. Its blossoms emit a wonderful, spicy rose perfume right now.
  • Mary cut garlic scapes, moved houseplants outside for the summer, and mended several articles of clothing.
  • I mended old chicken wire fencing that developed holes when I pulled it out of tall grass roots. I also spliced new chicken wire fencing onto the old wire, mowed the area where I'm putting the chicken wire in the near garden, and put nine more rebar posts in the ground. I'm halfway down the long north side of the garden.
    
  • I listened to the last half of the Rangers/Canes NHL playoff game. New York scored four goals in the third period to win 5-3. The Rangers advance to the Eastern Conference final. I also listened to Game 5 between the Canucks and the Oilers. Vancouver won 3-2. I got tired of constant negative comments by the Edmonton announcers, so I switched and listened to the Vancouver announcers, who gave more positive comments about the Oilers than what was coming from the Edmonton group.

Swamp dogwood blossoms on the lane attracting bees.

More blossoms with cardinals singing in the background.

• Friday, 5/17: Cool Sleeping
  
  • Mary cut more garlic scapes. All garlic plants look very good.
    
  • Mary trimmed the forsythia bush so we can walk by without ducking to go north or to the pickup. She also cut back on the Virginia creeper vines. They grew up the porch handrail, putting feeler vines out as if the plants were trying to touch you as you walked into the house. They also were halfway across the storm door. That's all gone. Mary also did in some  motherwart plants in the chicken yard to give us a better path to the coop door. Too many tall plants in the way and we're collecting chiggers, which is not good at all!
    
  • Mary took the scythe and cut tall grass in the middle section of the far garden to make hay for our chickens. She spread the grass to dry in the sun.
    
  • I took apart and cleaned the small air conditioner that cools our bedroom. It was messy with dried insect guts and dried frog bits. I call it bug bacon. After putting it back together and replacing a few rusty screws, I installed the AC in one of the bedroom windows, taped around its inside to keep out bugs and warm air, and started it up. We now can enjoy nice cool air for sleeping.
  • Missourians call them black gnats. In Minnesota, they're known as white socks. These nasty bugs are out in full force and they love me and my ears. At the end of evening chores, I put on a head net. I can't see very well out of it, but when I wear it, I don't have to constantly swat tiny gnats out of my ears that seem to ignore bug dope.
  • Cicadas are starting to sing a little bit from the trees. Their exoskeletons, that they shed after emerging from underground, are everywhere, along with holes in the ground that indicating where they emerged. (see photos, below).
    
  • After drowning in hockey for several evenings, I decided to forego the NHL, tonight. I'm glad I did. The Stars/Avalanche game went into two overtimes. Texas won and will play the winner of the Edmonton/Vancouver series.

Cicada exoskeletons left on greenery.

Holes left in the ground after cicadas emerge.

• Saturday, 5/18: First Floor Air Conditioned
  
  • A southwest wind pushed hot southern air into us, today.
  • Mary cut more garlic scapes and turned the hay to help it dry.
  • I took apart, cleaned, assembled, then installed our largest air conditioner into the west living room window. It cleaned up nicely. Six rusty screws needed replacing. It's size means it takes me longer to clean and reassemble this AC. Now our first floor is nicely air conditioned.
  • I wore a head net while working outside and laughed at gnats that couldn't get to my ears.
  • At one point I spotted a large beetle on the storm door screening that had what looked like large eyes on its back (see below). Mary identified it as a click beetle, Alaus oculatus. It gave out a large click when it jumped off the screening. Their larvae live in decaying wood, preying on the larvae of wood-boring beetles.
  • Cicadas are growing in numbers, developing a weird noise in the woods. In the morning, it resembled a leak from a propane tank. By evening, it was louder.
  • The fly tying vise showed up in today's mail. It looks extremely well built. Thank you, Mom and Katie, whose various gift monies contributed to this nice item.
    
  • I listened to Game 6 of the Edmonton/Vancouver playoff series, where the Oilers won 5-1.

  

  A large click beetle.

• Sunday, 5/19: Picking Up Hay
  
  • Mary mowed south of the far garden and around the compost bins. She also mowed down the grass between the electric and bunny fence so she had a trail to the area between the north and south sections of the far garden. It's an area we don't garden in, because it's low and water flows through during heavy rains. It's also where Mary cut tall grass to dry for hay, which she picked up and moved to the second grain bin. She put four overstuffed wheelbarrow loads of hay into the bin.
    
  • I finished splicing old to new chicken wire on the anti-bunny fence around the near garden. Then I hacksawed and pounded in 12 rebar stakes holding up chicken wire in that garden. I'm only four posts away from finishing that project. The final chores will be installing a chicken wire gate, then cutting branches into what resemble tent stakes and pounding them into the ground between the rebar stakes to hold the bottom of the chicken wire to the ground. I already see places where rabbits have pushed the bottom of installed chicken wire out to get under the fence. These additional stakes prevent bunnies from borrowing underneath the chicken wire.
    
  • I added water and vinegar to the four switchel jug insect traps in the apple trees. Enough dried molasses was in the jugs to remix into the concoction. Only the jug in the McIntosh tree contained liquid. The other three had molasses paste. I need to replenish these jugs sooner.
    
  • The cicada sound keeps getting louder from the neighboring woods. It's like a squadron of mosquitos are approaching, but the roar is deeper than a skeeter buzz.
    
  • Humidity increased in the evening. We expected storms that blew up in Kansas to get us overnight, but the weather dried up, based on radar that we saw the next morning.