respublica

Melons!

I was pretty over the top this morning when I spied a couple of Cantaloupes I'd planted. After watch the vines grow and flower most of the summer I'd about given up on seeing any fruit, mostly because no bees were around to pollinate them.

But here is one of the cantaloupes, the other is just as big and I'm hoping we'll find more from now on. I put a ball of twine nest to it to show size comparison

 

Until today I never realized there was a "u'" in cantaloupe.

 

This has been tech week. Also a garden explostion

For some reason several of our websites, mostly Dale's) had issues which would not let us update or post. It seems like something is going on with regard to changes in security, but the hosts do not make it easy to get things up and running again.

He has a blog which is really not publicized because I keep it to add each day's Meyer Minute he writes so as to keep an archive. This website needed his credit card updated since his had expired. This is normally easy to take care of, but for some reason it just would not do it. Since I take care of this sort of thing for him, I sent in a "ticket" with the problem to the hosting company. Thankfully they remotely fixed this and he's back up and running.

But, there was also an issue with the list server he uses to send out a mass mailing for his Meyer Minute. We have never had a problem with this company in all the many years we've used them. The best thing about Dundee is when you call someone answers the phone immediately. We got that straightened out. It seems the internet is not all that secure anymore so I was given a different way to get on the server.

Dale has also had a heck of a time with his MLB app. It stopped working and if you know Dale, you know he loves baseball and likes to watch White Sox games on his Ipad through MLB. I've emailed them, received a vague response which did not help. So in this case MLB will not work for him.

In other news, our vegetables have really gone crazy. Especially the tomatoes. I have several varieties and they all are producing big time with no bad spots on any of them. It's kind of a miracle. I finished digging the last of the potatoes this week and they are all just as fine looking as the tomatoes.

Talking hedge Trimmers

This is one of those days when I walked around the yard and realized we needed to trim our bushes. We have a bunch of Yews which need cutting back as well as a couple of other types. But of course we somehow left our better trimmer over at the seminary when we moved. All we have is an old old Homelight that is super dull and needs an extension cord. I am very over dragging an extension cord around and plugging and unplugging whenever I change parts of the yard.

So I went online to see what is out there that is a well made hedge trimmer. I decided on the DeWalt 22 inch battery driven model. I was thrilled to see that Ace carried this trimmer so I went right over. Problem was, sadly, they had one left but it did not come with a battery. I mean, seriously? And they did not have a battery to purchase separately. I can't blame them too much, they seem to have sold a ton of yard equipment this spring/summer so lot of empty shelves.

I went over to Home Depot and they had what I wanted, at least I thought so. Quite a few of these DeWalts on the shelves, none with the battery. What is with this? Anyway, thankfully a really nice and helpful woman working in that area came along and asked if she could help. I explained the issue, she took out her store product computer and found they had four of what I wanted.

After some looking at her handheld computer she learned the battery included types were on the very top two shelves. This is not the lightest thing and in a long box. I had no idea how we would get it down and she was not a big person. But she said, this will be easy. I'll be right back with a big ladder. Whoa. The ladder turned out, thankfully, to be a huge, orange, thing that was more like a moveable set of stairs with a flat piece at the top. She wheeled it over, climbed up, juggled the box until she had a good grip and came down to my cart.

This was amazing. Still I wonder what the purpose is of selling a product that needs a battery and not including it. Or, stocking boxes of the battery.

Anyway, this is a great looking and feeling machine. The battery is charging in the kitchen counter and I can't wait to use it today, hot or not.

Thanks MoDOT

Wouldn't you just know the weekend we are heading to the Huzzah, MoDOT would be making botch all of I-44. We debated staying put, but Dale really wants to go down there, it's his happy place.

It will be near 100 degrees which is bearable along the river, but boy, how does MoDOT think it's acceptable for the crews to be working in that heat. Hopefully much will be done at night.

The thing is about highway work, if they publicize the highway will close at 8 tonight, you just know it will be mostly closed all day. If Dale would get his Zoom work done soon, we could get out of hear before afternoon rush hour out on 44 makes things really snarled up.

Folding Laundry will (hopefully) be easier

Yesterday I spent most of the morning doing laundry and realized for the umpteenth time that Dale has a lot of t-shirts. And, being retired he is basically living in t-shirts. And, polo shirts. The worst part is folding the darn things after they come out of the dryer and try as I may, they just don't get folded up evenly or neatly. It didn't help that he tends to take them off inside out.

As luck would have it during this laundry process I happened upon a helpful article on Smart News which promoted a t-shirt folding board. I"m not always a sucker for things that seem amazing but aren't, but this time I ordered it right away. I saw the video of a mother and her young son competing to see who could fold the most shirts the fastest using this board and I was hooked.

Call me nutty, but it comes today and I am really excited to try it.

I also decided to use one of those old fashioned clothes drying racks to dry our newly pulled onions and garlic. I love this and am doing them a few at a time.

New shades

The company who came and put new shades on all the windows of our house did a great, efficient job. I thought it would take all day, but just before noon they had finished. We are really happy with how they look. They let some light in and shadows of outdoor trees which makes it rather interesting. Last night I went up to the bedroom to put some things away and I was struck by how pretty the late sky looked through the shades, rather like a painting. The color of the shades is a white/gray, but the color changes as the sun and lamplight move around each room.

The big cover up begins today

We've lived permanently in our Collinsville house for exactly one year today after moving back from the seminary. During the months that followed we had a lot of work done in various parts of the house and put off window coverings until now. This house has a lot of windows. The original owner had windows in every room and up the stairwell. Not just one window per wall, often 3 or 4. We decided it was time to give them some cover and softness.

The company doing the work today is the same company which put in the exact same shades in our seminary house 3 years ago. We know the product is good and so is the workmanship. The shades will let in light but not overwhelm the room. They come with small unobtrustive chains to pull up or down.

Here is what the windows in some of the rooms look like this morning.

Reminded of a bad memory

My Facebook Memories section had a post I put up in 2012 which involved our car just stalling on 64/40 as I was driving over to Collinsville. I was in the middle lane when it just died and by some miracle I was able to jerk the car to the left and onto the only grassy area on the whole highway. It was really hot and I had no idea what to do. As I recall Dale was out of town so I called his assistant and she drove out to wait with me for a tow truck and then drive me back to the seminary.

This only got more crazy when the mechanic gave me this advice and I wrote it on Facebook:

"As an update to my car dying on highway 40 Thursday, here is the explanation the mechanic gave me when I picked it up yesterday. He couldn't determine whether it was the fuel pump or the fuel injector valve and not wanting to bill us for 800$ if it wasn't the pump, he said, "drive it til it dies again, then get another person to crawl under the gas tank and pound on it while you turn the ignition key. If it starts up, it's the fuel pump".

Right. Like I'm about to even consider driving it anywhere in hopes it will die on me again."

 

In the end we never drove that car again and found a new one, the truck we still have, Ford Explorer. All too often I pass that spot on high 40 and think about that day. 11 years ago today.

 

 

The never ending house projects

Just when I believed we were finished with doing things to this house, along comes another Dale idea. In our basement we used to have a bathroom-walk-in shower, toilet and sink. The shower got eliminated when we had the basement water treatment work done. The base of the shower is still there, but it holds the treatment machines. But, the toilet and sink were taken out for reasons I've long forgotten.

So Dale got the great idea to sort of wall the sink area in and build, I think, shelves in there. But, he bought a new sink today so I guess a sink will go in the middle of the new walls. He bought wood panels in recent weeks and began putting them up all around this area. He has been quite proud of this. He had to go to Chicago this weekend to preach at a new seminary graduate's ordination/installation at Dale's family's church.

Before he left he told me it would be really great if I would paint the walls he'd constructed so the sink things could go in. I felt I had nothing better to do this weekend so I said, I'd do it. I've painted many many walls, fences, doors, you name it, over the years so I wasn't really intimidated with this until I began. He built this area in such a way that to paint meant often trying to crawl under a 2 X 4 he put in at a height between my knees and waist. This job would have been better done by a contortionist, it was tricky and painful. But I got it done.

Here is how it looked at least on one side and how it looks now.

The middle wall.

And the all 3 sides.

I am still unsure exactly what his intentions are, but there will be a sink in the middle.

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Yes we have potatoes

For weeks I've babied our potato plants, especially those in the pots sitting on the deck. They grew lush branches and leaves so I'd hoped that meant there would be actual potatoes at the end.

I did notice just before we left for the river that the time was getting close to harvesting them because the stems were turning yellow and falling over. When we got home the first thing I noticed was that almost all the stems on one pot were fallen over and mostly yellow which had me deciding to get them out of there.

First I cut back the stems and then after moving some dirt out, we carried the pot to the yard and tipped it over. Voila! we did have potatoes, pretty red ones in perfect condition. Not scores of them, but pretty good for being in a pot. I have another pot to do, but it is not ready quite yet. There are also potatoes in the ground in back and they are not ready, but soon. I just love this.

These new potatoes are usually really good, creamy and tasty. I have them drying in a cool place in the dark in a cardboard box for now.

Looking at the rest of the vegetables on returning yesterday I was amazed at how lush everything was. I picked beans and praised the tomato plants full of green cheeries, plum, slicers.