Category Archives: rain

rain, weather

Rain, Rain, Go Away …

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… come again another day.

We have had rain nearly every day for the last week. More than 3 inches in the last two days alone. Given how little rain we normally get, this seems like a flood of biblical proportions.

Coupled with the rain has been lightning and thunder and wind – so Molly the wonder dog has been Molly the shaking dog hiding on my feet. It’s funny but Molly will hang with L as her best buddy until the thunder starts and then it is time to find me. She seems to think that I will save her. {*grin*}

The worst part about the rain is that it is keeping the area dry land wheat farmers from harvesting. Every day while it is too wet and muddy to harvest is yet another chance for hail and wind to destroy the crop. Not a good thing.

The answer to the falsehood in the list of woes and happenings from last time was the boredom of Netflix being down. Everything else was true.

(Does anyone else feel that the new beta blogger tool leaves a lot to be desired? I know that I do.)

electricity, rain, stove, thrills, weather

VBS and Other Tales

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It must be time for VBS (Vacation Bible School) in this neck of the woods.

Why you ask?

Well … we have had severe thunderstorm warnings, a tornado warning, and even a brief flash flood warning in the last 4 days. All in the late afternoon or early evening. When did VBS begin at church and what time does it meet? I’ll give you three guesses and won’t even count the first two.

Tonight brought forth water and more water as it thundered and poured water in sheets. Of course the gutters on the house chose then to suffer downspoutnodrainus, a nearly always fatal disease caused by pine needles in the craw, i.e.

The water was cascading out of the gutter and everywhere except out of the downspout. Me being me, I decided then would be a good time to unplug the downspouts while I waited for my chicken to finish baking. No need to get a hose or turn on the water; mother nature is dumping enough you can’t even see your hand in from of your face.

(No wonder – my arms have shrunk so I can’t possibly see them!)

As I am standing there with my arm in the air and my hand in the overflowing gutter, pulling pine needles out of the downspout and enjoying the icy water running down the inside of the sleeve of my rain coat, across my chest, through my pants. down my leg, and into my shoe, the thought crosses my mind about possible obituary headlines for when I am struck by all the lightning flashing nearby. (And how is that for a run-on sentence?) Some of the better ones included phrases like “Dumbass Former Mayor Dies Holding Hand in Air During Lightning Storm”, “Idiot Gets Grounded Just Before …”, or even “Franklin’s Experiment Sans Kite Proves Fatal To …’, etc. The worst thing was that the ice water running through my pants was the most thrilling moment of my day. It’s been all downhill after that.

I suppose my thoughts of electrocution came from replacing the heating element in the oven earlier this afternoon. Nothing like throwing both stove breakers (Ask me how I first learned that there were two double breakers for the stove.) and unplugging the (3) cords from the stove before disassembling the lower oven to pull out the old element and put in the new one. I have to hand it to GE. The stove was a high end model purchased by the people we bought the house from more than 20 years ago. In that time I have had to replace the broiler element and now the oven element. Never a problem with the burners or the built in microwave or the computer … Had to replace a little plastic knob on the cleaning timer, but not much else. they just don’t build ’em like that anymore.

Time to go put on dry pants. The thrill is gone. {*grin*}

fall, newspaper, rain, rumination

Meandering ruminations

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While I pondered weak and weary …
My apologies to Poe, but those words really sum up what the day has been like here today. It poured rain off and on last night and today has been wet and drizzly all day. What more could you ask for to herald the arrival of fall. Nothing like a wet, drizzly, overcast, cool day to bring home the arrival of that precursor to winter.
One thing that really irks me about this weather is that the paper delivery guy always throws the paper down on the front sidewalk where all the water flows. Thus, even though he bags the papers, the plastic bag just fills with water and the result is a soggy mess.  His predecessor was wonderful – he always put the papers on the front porch.  Not so with the new guy. You can tell when the old guy subs for the new guy because all of a sudden the paper starts appearing on the front porch. I guess I shouldn’t complain – at least the paper gets here. Does your delivery person do any better?
It occurs to me that perhaps I should ask a different question first: do you even subscribe to papers in the physical form? I find that I use both online and paper versions. The preferred form  depends on why I read that particular paper and how often I read it.  I find that online versions of papers work OK except for crosswords and comics. Crosswords because I am not a fan of the electronic entry forms I have used. It is more acceptable to me to print the puzzle and then fill it in with pen. Then I don’t to have to be tied to a computer to fill it in. Crossword puzzling is a time as available thing for me and the opportunities tend to be hit and miss, with more misses if I have do it on the computer. I like my comics in print because I tend to be a clipper. I like to cut out and pin on my bulletin board any comic which strikes my fancy. It just isn’t the same to me when printed on the laser and then clipped and pinned.
In any case, it was late this afternoon before the papers got dry enough to get to my beloved crossword puzzles. I always try to do the New York Times crossword every day. I then do others if the opportunity presents itself. I find that the NYT crossword is always interesting and I like the ebb and flow in difficulty that matches the week. Monday is usually trivial and then it gets harder and harder, culminating in the Saturday beast. But then Sunday comes and the puzzle can be easy or hard, but always fun.  You can probably tell I’m an addict.
Well, I’m off to my now dry NYT crossword!