August Begins

I went out early this morning to take a few pictures of noticeable items of interest to me. The first thing out of the door, I noticed that one of the ducks was in the 'pool' and quacking at me as I stepped off the back porch. It's still amazes me that they don't need more water to swim and keep them happy.
 
Next I drove the Mule to the mum patch and there I noticed a ear of corn, a better description would be, a bare ear of corn. We had 'corn invaders' for the last few nights. I've tried to pick the corn as soon as it becomes ready to eat, but I think raccoons are beating me to a lot of the corn.
 
If the blooms are any indication of how many pumpkins we will have, it looks good for this fall.
 
The mums have had a major growth spurt with the recent rains and are looking quite well. I've left them alone for a little over a week, but they need the grass pulled from next to the plants as soon as we get another shower.
  
Back up the road, closer to the house, the 'Rose of Sharon' bushes are blooming and so are the 'Chigger Weed' plants.
   
Another type of flower that is currently blooming is the 'Naked Ladies'. The reason they are called 'naked' is because when they bloom, there is no foliage. The foliage grows early in the season and then dies and is gone when, within a couple of days, the stems shoot up to a height of around 2 feet and the blooms pop out within a couple more days.
   
I did a GOOGLE search and found out they are called "Amaryllis Belladona" and sometimes known as belladonna lilies. Here, they still are most often simply referred to as naked ladies. Did you notice the bug that is camouflaged and hiding in the 'chigger weed'?
 

Just Too Hot

Yesterday, I went out early and took pictures before it got hot. Today, I waited until evening and took a ride in the Mule. It's been too hot for me to be outside much. Linda and I mowed Tuesday, and I had to come inside after about an hour, because I couldn't see to drive the tractor, sweat was running in my eyes too much. I went in and out several times until I had finished. The temperatures have been in the mid 90s with humidity around the same number for a week and are supposed to be like that for at least the next week.
  

Pauline, Brent & Julie Visit

Pauline, Brent and Julie came over around 6 PM Friday and we talked a little bit, then went to Columbia and ate supper. After eating we returned to the farm and played with Julie and the dogs.
Saturday, we went outside to the pond and walked around a little bit, but quickly decided it was too hot for Julie and us.
  
We went back inside and took a few pictures and enjoyed the time with PB&J.
  
  
  
While I was holding Julie at the counter, something happened and it had us all giggling for a few minutes. In the early evening, Jason, Stephanie and Tommy came over to visit and see Julie. They stayed a little bit while they took turns holding Julie and talking with Pauline, Brent and us. Jason told Stacey they were going to the fair to watch the Demolition Derby and wanted to know if Stacey was going. They made plans to meet, so a little after they left for the fair, Linda fixed us burgers for supper, then Stacey and Brent went to the fair. Pauline, Julie, Linda, and I stayed at the house. Stacey and Brent returned a couple hours later and said they had met Jason and they all had watched the cars wreck.

100, 100, 101, 100

The Nashville forecast for the next few days had the temperatures at 100, 100, 101, 100 degrees. They stated that there had not been that many days of temperatures 100 degrees or above for 25 years. I don't know how hot it's been here at the farm, but it feels like 110 in the afternoons. Sunday it was extremely bad because it rained about 20 minutes around 3 PM. It wasn't enough rain to cool things off, it just made it seem like a steam room outside. I waited until 7 PM to mow and ended up using the headlights when I was finishing. Looking towards the weekend, it's supposed to be down to 97 degrees, ooh, what a cool down. Until cooler temperatures arrive, I'll be in the house most of the days.

Mule Serviced

It's too hot to do much around the farm, 101 degees, but we are still doing a few things. I borrowed a trailer and took the Mule to the ATV shop in town. It was a scary ride because the trailer was shortened by a tool box they had added. The Mule would barely fit and I worried about it bouncing off, but I strapped it down, went slow and made it without a problem. We dropped off the Mule and trailer at the ATV shop, took our rental DVDs back to the video shack and drove back to the farm. We had sandwiches for lunch, then a telephone call told me the service was done. Stacey and I picked up the Mule and returned it to the farm without any problems. Stacey drove it off the trailer and put it in the barn, then we took the trailer to Phil Garmon's farm and dropped it off. Linda came home from being an aide at the school and wanted Stacey and I to go to the school and do the paper work to become volunteers again this year. We went and set through the one hour meeting, filled out the forms and then went to eat supper. Back at the farm, I used the tractor to mow while Linda used the John Deere mower. We both mowed until nearly dark around 8 PM.

Hotter Than Expected

Weather stations in Nashville reported on Thursday the temperature hit 104 and that is the hottest it has been in the last 20 years. Today, it cooled down to only 97 degrees. Whew, it's pretty hot when 97 is a cool down. The humidity has went down a little the last two days. This morning, Linda went to work at the day care and then Stacey and I went to Grumpy's for breakfast and to meet Jason. We ate and talked to Jason and a few of the regulars, then picked up Stacey's prescription at the pharmacy. Linda came home from working and took a long nap. About 4 PM, I went out and mowed around the area where the old house used to stand. Sweat was running down my face just from driving the tractor. After finishing, I went inside and cleaned up, then we all went to the Farm House for supper. With forecasts for temperatures above 95 degrees for the next seven days and no rain, the grass may slow down and we might get a break from mowing. I just hope we don't have to start watering the mums during this heat wave.

The Way It Started...

I was playing in a softball tourney in Decatur IN, about 85 miles from home in Anderson. We were in between games and a law officer pecked on the window and asked if I was Mr Norris. I said, "Well, maybe." He said, "Sir, your wife is having a baby, there's no emergency, please drive carefully." I told him thanks and we headed home after telling a few others that I had to go. After an hour and a half drive, I walked in to find Linda setting on the couch. Her water had broke earlier, but she wasn't having any labor pains. We went to the hospital around 11 PM that night. Our son was born at 7:24 AM the next morning, August 12th, 1979.
 
We decided on Brent David Norris as his name. We took him home and began the process of raising our son. Brent was like most other babies, developing and growing and getting childhood diseases. But soon, he was out of the baby stage and into the boy stage.
 
This is when it became real fun to have a kid. We could buy toys for him that I liked to play with too. We set up a train room with a slot car track on the same board and I had many hours of fun putting the cars and trains back on the tracks after he would wreck them.
 
As he grew older, his tastes changed.
 
We lived in Park Estates and it was a nice place for kids to grow up. We added a lane on our driveway and put up a basketball goal so the kids could come to our house and play.

We signed Brent up for Little League Baseball and YMCA Basketball and involved him in lots of other activities. We enjoyed boating and Brent learned to water ski and liked swimming, so we decided to put him into a swim club to teach him to be a better swimmer.
 
We had found something that Brent really liked. He took to competitive swimming and started training for swim meets. His club even swam in a meet at the Indy Natatorium, where the Olympic Games had been held.
 
Brent did well in swimming on the Highland High School Swim Team and after graduating high school in 1997, Brent went to Western Kentucky University and swam on their team when we moved to KY.

While at WKU, Brent met Pauline and they began dating. Brent graduated WKU and a few years later, they were married in April 2006 and live in a house they bought north of Smith's Grove. Brent called Linda and I and said that Pauline was at the hospital ready to have a baby, so we went and were introduced to Julie Ann Norris on June 20th, 2007. Yesterday, Pauline called and asked if we wanted to come over for dinner so Stacey, Linda, Missy and I drove to their house and played with Julie, Pico and Poco and set around talking with Pauline and Brent. Pauline fixed a nice chicken dinner for everyone. We wished Brent an early "Happy Birthday" and headed for home.

On the way home, I thought about all these times and how much 'richer' my life has been from the enjoyment of watching Brent grow into a man and become a dad.

Happy Birthday Brent!

Another Dog For The Farm?

A week ago, I posted about us going to the school and signing up to be volunteers. What I didn't mention was that there was a dog hanging around the school. Linda had told me that it was hanging around and if someone didn't get it the dog catcher would come and take it away. As we went inside, one of the teachers stopped me and told me that very thing. I told her that Linda had said she didn't want another dog. The teacher said OK. On the way home, Linda and I talked about the dog. Linda was worried about another dog at the farm getting hit on the highway. I told her that if she didn't take the dog the dog catcher would take it and then it would be put down and at least at the farm, the dog had a chance. We didn't say much more about it until yesterday. I asked her if the dog was still hanging around the school. She said yes. This morning Linda called home and said the dog catcher had the dog in his truck and was ready to leave with it. She wanted to know if he could bring it out to the farm instead of taking it to the dog pound. I said OK, so about 15 minutes later he arrived with the dog in a cage in the back of the truck. I had set a couple of bowls in a barn stall and put food and water in them. He put the noose around the dog's neck and let her out of the cage. I picked up the dog and carried her to the stall and removed the noose. The dog catcher and I talked for a few minutes and he told me to keep the dog pinned up for a few weeks or she would run away. I told him we would and that we would feed her and get her used to us before letting her run loose.
  
It remains to be seen whether the dog will stay around or not.

Anybody have any suggestions for a name?

Thanks, But She's Not Lucky

First, I want to thank those that posted suggestions for the name of the female dog. Lucky was by far the most suggested name. Sorry, but we won't be naming the dog Lucky. I should have mentioned that fact before I asked for suggestions. The reason we won't be using Lucky is...
When I was about 8 years old I went to the lake with my Aunt Rose and Uncle Leo. We were boating and pulled the boat over to the bank to have a picnic lunch. While we were eating a little dog came in the area and it looked kind of bad. Like no one was feeding it or taking care of it. We fed the dog and my Uncle said we could take it home with us. I kept the dog at our house and named it Lucky. Lucky we had found it, lucky it had a home now, just Lucky. It wasn't very old and Mom, Dad and I worked with it to train it to go outside to potty. After about 3 weeks the dog was becoming house broke. One day, I let Lucky out and went back to my room for a couple of minutes, then went back to let the dog back inside. I saw Lucky had crossed the town street, so I went after him. I went across the street, spanked his butt once and told him to get home. He headed across the street and was immediately hit by a car. Dead, no questions about it. I had just sent the little dog to it's death. I spent the next month crying in the basement about the stupid thing I had done. I've never forgotten that mistake and ever since, I have never sent any animal across a street and I have cautioned everyone else to never do it. So, for that reason, this dog won't be named Lucky.
Stacey came up with the name we will use, if the dog stays around the farm. She mentioned that our last dog was Cooter, named after a character from the TV show, "The Dukes of Hazard" and that we should continue with those characters' names, so the dog's name should be Daisy. I liked that idea and so did Linda. That was Catherine Bach's character on the TV show. Now, we just hope that Daisy will stay around the farm. Stacey and I went to the barn around noon and checked on Daisy, she was drinking water and doing OK. We went to Columbia and ate at Wendy's and I picked up a couple burgers for Missy and Daisy. We went back to the farm and did a few odd jobs and as I went in and out of the house I checked the thermometer on the wall on the back porch. It read TOO HOT!
  
Yep, that's 101 degrees in the shade and on a sheltered porch wall. I walked down to the barn and checked on Daisy again. She was OK. When Linda came home, we took the hamburger down to the barn and Linda fed it to her. She ate it all, then drank the water from the bowl. It looks like she's going to eat and drink, so maybe she will gain a little weight.

Walking The Dog

It rained about 20 minutes on August 6th and before that the last rain was July 28th. Since there hasn't been any rain in the last 10 days and the temperatures have been over 100 degrees the farm is starting to look a little brown. The grass is still growing slowly thanks to the dew, but the creek has quit flowing and is drying up.
 
We are spending most of the day inside in the air conditioned house. It is too hot to be outside very long at a time. The TV stations reported that it was a record temperature in Nashville yesterday. The temperature was 106 degrees and was a record for the day, but not the highest ever recorded in Nashville, 107 is the highest ever. Linda came home from working at the school and a little later, we went to town for supper. After eating, we picked up a new dog collar and a six foot leash. We returned to the farm and Linda and I went to the barn and played with Daisy in the barn stall. I put the collar around Daisy's neck and hooked the leash to it. She remained calm, so we opened the door and went for a walk. We walked down to the creek to where there is some water left and let Daisy drink from the creek and splash around a little.
  
We walked back to the barn and I coaxed Daisy into the barn stall with a piece of left over pizza. She walked in, I unhooked the leash and tossed the pizza into the food bowl and stepped out of the stall and closed the door and latched it. That went better than I had thought it would.

Bush Hogging

This morning I took my mp3 player and wore long pants when I went to the hay shed around 5:30 AM. The Ford tractor's battery was too weak to start the tractor, so I hooked the battery charger to the battery and plugged it in to the extension cord. I started the FarmTrac and went back in the 'holler' to mow some of the grass areas. The temperature was in the mid 60s and it was nice working on the tractor and not being fried. I mowed the hillside, along the branch and the area where we have several little trees planted. It took about an hour and twenty minutes and then I went back to the house. I told Stacey and Linda to dress and we would go eat in town. We did, then checked out a few hot rods that were having a rod run and had stopped for breakfast too. There were several nice cars and trucks. Back at the farm, I went back to the hay shed and started the Ford tractor, took the charger off and set it aside. I backed the tractor out of the hay shed and headed back across the creek. I bush hogged around a walnut tree at the corner of the hay field and the entrance to the other hay field.
 
I used the bush hog to trim both sides of a 4-wheeler trail along the hay field and then cut the weeds in the gully next to the hillside where I had mowed earlier.
  
Linda and Stacey went to Campbellsville to shop while I stayed at the farm. We had a break in the temperatures, it only made it to 98 degrees today. Around 6:30 PM, I went for a ride in the Mule to check on the mum patch. With no rain in the last couple of weeks, the mums have not had any attention from us because there's not much we could do. The ground was too dry and hard to pull the grass out, so we have watched to make sure they're not wilting from lack of water, which they aren't.
 
The pumpkin patch, on the other hand, is in trouble. The vines are showing signs of heat stress and some have died. There are pumpkins, not as many as we expected and they aren't that big.
 
After making a lap around the patches, I continued across the creek and drove around the hay field. It was mowed a few weeks ago and the 'Johnson Grass' is growing and looking OK.
 
I can't say the same for the creek. It has stopped flowing and the water is starting to completely dry up. There are some puddles left, but not many.
 
Maybe the next few weeks we will get some rain from the hurricanes headed towards the USA. It seems...

"One man's poison...
is another man's cake."
Rupert Hine

Testing Daisy

Stacey had an appointment with Dr Rice today and it went well. We were in and out of the office in about a half hour. No change in dosage of her medicines, so that is good. Afterwards we stopped and ate lunch then came on home. Linda worked at the after school day care and when she came home, she took Daisy for a walk around the hay fields. Stacey and I picked them up in the Mule while they were at the creek. I drove down the highway to the mum patch and we closed the gates after we drove inside. It has been a week since Daisy was brought to the farm and we wanted to see how she was doing about coming to us when we called her. We separated inside the fenced in area and turned Daisy loose. We left the 12 feet of leash dragging on the ground as she ran around the area. It seemed all she could think about was finding a way out of the fenced in area. That wasn't too pleasing, we were hoping she would be interested in staying with us, but that didn't happen. After about a half hour, we grabbed the leash and loaded everyone and Daisy in the Mule and headed back to the house. Linda put her in the barn for the night. She had Daisy in the house yesterday and Missy was hurt a little by Daisy either wanting to play or catching Missy like a rabbit, I'm not sure which it was, but Missy squealed

.

Baby Sitting Julie

We left home a little after 9 AM headed for Smith's Grove. We were about 5 miles from home when I noticed that the HHR's Driver Information Center was indicating a problem with the engine. I kept going towards Columbia and as we neared the Cumberland Parkway our progress was halted by traffic being stopped. There had been a wreck and traffic was completely stopped in both directions. After about 20 minutes we were able to continue and as we passed the wreck we could see it was a pickup truck that had hit a tree almost head on. We turned on the parkway and continued to Glasgow, where we exited to eat at Hardee's. I filled up with gas while Linda and Stacey went in and ordered, then I joined them. We left Missy in the car and after about 10 minutes I used the remote start feature to start the HHR. We quickly finished eating and went outside to find the car had not started. Missy was OK as it was still cool inside the car. We continued on to Pauline and Brent's house. Brent was working and Pauline and Julie were at home. Linda immediately picked up Julie and began playing with her while Pauline went to shower and get ready for her eye appointment. Pauline told us that Brent and her had taken Julie back to the doctor for her two month checkup and the report was good. It was decided that we would take two cars to Bowling Green. I was to take the HHR to the Chevy dealership to have it checked out and Linda, Stacey, and Julie would ride with Pauline in her car. We loaded the cars and everyone, then left for Bowling Green. I drove to the Campbell Chevrolet Dealership and was told quickly that they could check out the HHR, a week later on Wednesday. I told them that was ridiculous and that I was not going to drive 90 miles in one direction in order to come back in a week. I left and drove to the mall and met the others as they were unloading the stroller and Julie. We went inside the mall and Pauline went to the eye appointment. We went shopping in the mall and made a lap of the stores fairly quickly. Pauline had told us it would be about a half hour, so we were back and sitting in the mall area outside the optometrists. We had to feed Julie a bottle and Linda changed a diaper. No big deal, but Pauline was apologizing when she came out after the examination that had taken an hour and forty minutes. We ate a late dinner at the food court, then left the mall. My work was done, I guess, so they told me to go back to the house and they were going a few more places before coming back. Back at the house, I waited and Brent came home from working. We talked and watched TV until the girls came in from shopping. Pauline had taken pictures of Julie and Brent and I edited those pictures and everyone looked at them on the big screen TV.
  
  
Did you notice in one of the pictures there is a real live animal? Too cute! We stayed a little longer, then Linda drove the Triump TR3 and followed us home in the HHR. We made it home a little after dark without any problems.

A Little Bit Of Rain

Overnight, we had a few mild thunderstorms go over. They dropped about two thirds of an inch of rain and were gone by daylight. We ate a quick breakfast and I went outside to mow the front yard. I noticed Linda took the Mule and went to the mum patch. I finished the front yard and went inside about 10:30 AM as the temperature was nearing the 90s. Linda followed me inside a few minutes later and she told me she had been weed eating. Stacey and I fixed sloppy joes for lunch and we watched TV for a while. We had another period of rain, maybe 1/4 of an inch, then it cleared up again. Linda went back to the mum patch and was pulling grass out between the plants when I received a phone call from our neighbor. Steve was unable to get on the internet after Duo-County had made some changes to everyone's network IP settings. I made a quick trip to their house and, with the help of Brent over the phone, was able to get their PC back on line. Stacey and I watched the NASCAR race at Bristol the rest of the evening.

Stacey Gets Dressed

A few days ago, Stacey met Jason for breakfast and she gave him a couple Mark Martin souvenir items. They talked during breakfast while Linda and I were eating at a different table. I guess, sometime during their conversations, Jason had asked Stacey to accompany him to their church and this morning was the day. Stacey showered and dressed and I took a few pictures of her right before Jason's family picked her up.
 
After they went to church, Stacey said they went to the Pizza Hut to eat lunch, then returned to the farm. Stacey showed us that Jason had bought her a shirt when he had been to a WWE Wrestling event in Bowling Green. Stacey tried on the shirt and I took her picture again.

Hazy, Lazy Days of Summer

It's still hot and fairly quiet around the farm this week. The temperatures are still in the upper 90s. Linda has been working at the after school day care and Stacey and I have been staying inside mostly. A few of our mums are starting to bloom and Linda pulled most of the grass away from the plants. We've made a trip to Burkesville to see if anyone could align the TR3, but no one has the specifications for the settings, so no luck on that. Today, we went to Glasgow in the afternoon and made some shopping stops before eating at Mancino's. Stacey found two newer CDs and after buying those we listened to them on the way back to the farm. Linda is planning to go to IN this coming weekend.