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July 22, 1999 Put together the wheelbarrow (and wasn't THAT a pleasant job, with the directions consisting mostly of an ant-size exploded drawing with little dashed lines running every which way to show where things are supposed to hook together - yeah, right!) Puppy wants petted. Mom is sweating over the wheelbarrow. Mom's hands are full of lock washers, nuts, and bolts. Mom tells Puppy firmly, No. Puppy pretends not to understand. Mom manages to get a couple of bolts in while puppy is crawling all over/around/under/and through. Mom VERY FIRMLY tells puppy to go away. Puppy pretends not to understand. Mom cusses and groans over the unreadable instructions and ignores puppy. Puppy finally gets bored and wanders off. Cat decides this would be a good time to force that pesky human to pet him. Mom just managed to get rid of puppy, now must dissuade cat. Mom realizes that she has put the legs on without putting on the stabilizers. Mom cusses a blue streak because she must now disassemble and reassemble and she doesn't have the right size wrench so she's doing this with an old adjustable crescent wrench that won't stay set. Cat is licking Mom's toes, Mom decides to ignore cat as toe-licking is considerably less annoying than the puppy's acrobatics. Puppy looks up from where she is annoying one (or both) of the older dogs, realizes that cat is annoying Mom. This information is processed by what passes for a brain in puppies and teenagers, resulting in the sudden realization that annoying mom is PUPPY'S prerogative, not that pesky cat! Now Puppy and cat are trying to shoulder each other aside while vying for Mom's attention. Cat bats Puppy, Puppy shrinks back, then springs forward to bowl cat over and insert self between Mom's legs, nearly bowling Mom over as well. Mom cusses both animals roundly. Eventually manages to complete assembly of the wheelbarrow, in the hot sun, and with the wrong tools, and despite the attentions of the animals. Mom rests. No, Mom collapses. Mom eventually returns to consciousness. Returned to her chores. Hauled all that wood from last year from its scattered-all-over-the-field position into a couple of big piles. Hauled the uncut stuff as well as I could out of the way of the truck that I HOPE is coming tomorrow to drill my post holes for the house. Got stung. Picking up all that durn split wood and little logs and pitchin' them toward the pile was not a Good Idea, my back complained. Picked a few ticks of me and the dog. Hauled up a 20' log that was in the way, lifting it over my head to pivot it out of the driving path. Suddenly realized it - and now me - was crawling with ants, who proceeded to let me know in no uncertain terms that they did NOT appreciate the moving plans. Suddenly developed some upper body strength from who-knows-where, tossed the huge log to the side (further than I had thought to drag/roll it) and began to do the AAACK-ANTS dance. Didn't have to pick ticks this time, I think I got 'em all during the ant dance. While continuing to move the wood into (hopefully - who knows what's still buried out there in the grass) one big heap, forgot to bring my water back-pack back out with me after a brief R&R (rest and refill, required in today's 90+ heat, which doesn't bother me near as much as most people, but still .) Picked more ticks. Startled a bevy of wolf spiders (well, two, big ones) Startled me, too. Picked up a log only to find mud daubers attached to the bottom of it. No one was happy with this turn of events. Didn't get stung, though. That happened earlier. More ticks . . . Now I know where they all are. Hope they didn't follow me back to the camper . . . Shortly thereafter developed a pounding headache and a case of crash-and-burn dehydration. Well, crash and smolder, anyway. <VBG> Collapsed in the camper with the AC going full and the fan blowing RIGHT ON ME, weakly sucking water out of the Camelbak I had left inside. Picked just one tick. It's after 5, they must have all knocked off for the day. <VBG> Having (somewhat) recovered (the last time I felt like that was when I did a 12 mile leg of the MD 150 mile bike-a-thon with no water, in Alabama, in 95 degrees, because I left my water bottle sitting back at the refill station) I went out to finish hauling logs. I sure hope those telephone poles are not sticking out in their way, because even ant-powered, I ain't movin' those suckers. Having completed the log-hauling (at least as much as this 40 year old body is going to today), took a nice long hose-shower, which the puppy found totally bewildering. (Why is that human standing there? THAT'S WATER! RUN AWAY!) Now I am heating up some wash water (having used all 175' worth of sun-heated hose water for my shower). Then I will bestir myself to open a can - don't think I can face chopping up carrots, celery, and onions to make black bean soup today. Despite the whatever-stings, the ticks, the whiny back muscles, the ant dance, the possible sunburn, the cold water at the end of the hose shower, I think I had a pretty good day. For one thing I got a bunch done. For another - while I was putting the wheelbarrow together I saw this HUGE mutated-looking beetle flying around. YIPES that's a weird looking beetle flashed through my mind, to be replaced almost instantly, as it flew toward me and hovered in my face, by IT'S A HUMMINGBIRD! Green and red, and big . . . er, that is, TINY . . . as life. Right in my face. Hovered there for a few seconds and then was gone. It was there and gone so fast it my grasshopper hunting cat didn't even have time to react. (Probably what was going through his mind - WOW! That's the biggest grasshopper I ever saw! How's it stay up in the air like that?) Incredible! Even beenie-weenies for dinner can't spoil that!
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