I wonder if that post title will draw some extra hits. I’ve been awfully busy lately at work. Summer is a real grind sometimes. Many projects and little time.

The aloe vera plant at work is busy too. It has flowered again (I posted on its previous flowering back in February.) but this time the flowers were a little less colorful and didn’t secret sap like they did back in the winter.

This time the aloe is making little pods.

I asked the plant’s primary caregiver if we could leave the flower stalk a little longer to let the pods do their thing. We opened one up to look and there were these little whitish specks inside that maybe are immature seeds.

My wife says that letting the pods mature might be taxing on the plant.

So that’s all for this post. Anyone out there familiar with this kind of aloe please comment. Hope your summer is going well!

Yeah, I know, that was last weekend. It’s been a busy week at work. But I’m finally getting around to writing this post …

I managed to get in bicycle rides all 3 days. I’m breaking in a new Terry “Fly” saddle (the economy model). Friday the 4th was just a quick shot down to Henniker and back. Saturday was a bit longer ride, but one with a destination. I had to get up to New London in order to tend to my friend’s cat, a 14-year old boy cat named Pichu. My friend was away for a week and since I work in New London, I took my lunch hours during the week to spend with Pichu, giving him his quarter can of cat food, checking the endless bowls of kibble and water, and scooping out his litter box. I brushed him a few times too and he gave up lots of fuzz. Toward the end of the week there were a few cat fuzz tumbleweeds on the living room floor.

Sunday was a longer ride with a friend that I posted about last summer . This is the guy who rode his bicycle across the country solo upon reaching his 60th birthday. (See “Oregon to New Hampshire-Bicycle Odyssey” in my blogroll.) We met in Bradford and briefly discussed directions and routes. It’s really amazing how many bicyclists are so random when it comes to choosing routes. We decided we could go about 30 miles, see how we felt, and then continue or turn back. I suggested my “default” route, the Henniker-Hillsborough loop, which I could do “with my left hemisphere tied behind my back”.

Route 114 cairn v. 3.0 remains standing. This angle nicely shows its daring style.

It was a beautiful day, and I think we made it all the way to Henniker before my riding companion’s beeper went off. This was a Sunday morning, he was not really “on call” but having the pager and cell phone and all … We changed up the Henniker Hillsborough loop by riding along the river to Hillsborough and then back roads to return to Henniker. We were back in Henniker when the route-changing call came in. A car needed to be picked up in Concord, so now we would have a destination. I was drawn to some bright colors by the roadside while my riding companion talked on the phone.

I’m not sure what these are, but took a picture anyway. Oh wait, I DO know, they’re flowers!

So we got into Henniker and headed south to Weare, then east to Concord. It was a hot day and there were lots of motorcycles on the road. The road dust was sticking to my sweat. We took a slight detour off the main routes to ride along a nice (but short) little paved bike trail. It runs right alongside the interstate for a bit and I’ve noticed it from I89 hundreds of times but never ridden on it.

Interstate 89 southbound lane is just beyond the trees at left of frame.

The bike route comes out on Silk Farm Road, which we took over to Clinton street. We rode down to the new cross road that goes from Clinton over to Concord Hospital. Apparently this road had just opened a few months before and took many years to materialize. It’s a nicely engineered road and surely cuts a few minutes off the ambulance route from I 89. We rode up the steep Rum Hill road just to the east of the hospital complex. I was getting a little tired when a duck called to me from a trashcan.

Or maybe it was a goose.

The colors of this tree’s leaves caught my eye. This is a beautiful Concord neighborhood.

So we stopped at the house, loaded up the bikes on the rack, went in to take on and leave off some liquids, then headed back up to Bradford in a nice car with a GPS display that showed our progress. It had been about a 50 mile bike ride and it was nice to relax in the air conditioned vehicle. I should have slept much better than I did last Sunday night.

Apologies in advance, and I know I’ve written this before, but this has to be the TRULY stupidest post EVER. I recently noticed that a couple of old posts with the word “birthday” in the title consistently get the highest number of search hits. Day after day after birthday. It’s ALWAYS someone’s birthday after all …

So, without using the word birthday one more time, let me at least attempt to make this worthwhile to you, dear reader. It’s nice that people use the internet for such innocent things as birthdays! Oops. Didn’t mean to write birthday again. Sorry. In return for your patience, I offer this little cheery idea.

Try being nice to somebody at work tomorrow. Don’t be obvious about it or it won’t work properly. Wait for them to do something first, then say something like “You know, you really did a NICE JOB not screwing that up like you usually do!” A little praise goes a long long way, I’ve learned.

And never miss an opportunity to wish anyone …

Happy Birthday Whenever It Is!

There’s a saying. Every dog has his day. Today was Oliver’s day. At 4:30 p.m. He was just outside the back door, tethered to my wife, as always, when a stupid, stupid chipmunk made its last bad decision. According to the report it darted right in front of The Dogmatic One, who snatched it and dispatched it with all necessary speed. Apparently the entourage was just on the way back in from some other mission when Oliver attritted the enemy. He was ordered to drop the enemy corpse and get inside the house. When I arrived home from work an hour later he was in a real state. He was in a full-blown dissociative fugue of Victory! Over! The! Rodent! He was staring the thousand-yard stare.

He’s had a lot of stress lately. Yesterday, in the middle of the afternoon (approximately 1530 hours), my wife and Oliver spotted a fox in the back yard. She got a pretty nice picture of it. (She’d gotten a pretty nice picture of a gray fox back in September, exploring another patch of our yard. I wonder if it’s the same fox or a relative. And what the hell are they looking for in our yard? There’s no buried treasure, I already checked.)

It’s a gray fox. Needless to say this sighting cost Oliver at least one marble.

Yes, you would rather see Graphic Footage of Oliver’s Triumph, but none exists. So instead you get the fox picture from yesterday. I retrieved the enemy’s remains and pitched them over the fence behind the garden, beyond Oliver’s territory. Then I weeded in the garden. Oliver was let out on his tether. He cried and cried and tangled his leash around the corner post of the shed three times as I got the garlic bed weeded out. He was either reliving his combat scenes, looking for the chipmunk body, or maybe both. Still in the dissociative state, he wound his leash around the post 5 times, thrice. And I had to come unwind him. War is hell.

Oh look, the walking iris bloomed again!

I know!

WTF?!?! We’re in the middle of the Dog & Chipmunk War story and here’s a stupid flower picture. What’s the point? None really. This is the flower that blooms and shrivels in 24 hours. Then the flower stalk flops to the floor and sprouts the baby plant. Hence the name “walking iris”. Is something meant by this? Nope. Don’t think so. Do you?

Summer is officially here now. Unfortunately, now the daylength begins to shrink toward the next solstice in December. It was a beautiful day. We had our customary weekend breakfast early and I got out on the road by 8:30. My wife went to our daughter’s apartment. I figured I’d make that one of my ride’s destinations. I was back home by 3:30. It ended up being the longest ride so far this season- 75 miles. I would list the route but that would be a crashing bore. Just the highlights … as always, my eyes stray to the roadside for interesting objects … You may not know this, but when I post these ride pix, I compulsively place them in the order in which they were taken. Big deal, huh?

Unusual roadside detritus. First and only time I’ve ever seen a musical instrument (pennywhistle) on the roadside.

Not too much further up Route 103 I came upon a mysterious (and amusing) home-built shrine. There’s a decent little cairn. There are 6 painted disks of cast concrete. One looks rather devilish. But there’s also an angel statue. It might take archaeologists years to figure out this site. Usually such sites also have a plastic trash barrel overflowing with Old Milwaukee empties. While stopping to take the photo, I hoped that no angry natives in loin cloths would come running out of the house or garage to yell at me for stealing their souls with my camera. None did. Phew!

Looks like a little Easter Island in Newbury, New Hampshire.

On my way through New London a couple of other bikers passed me though I’m not sure why. As they were pedalling ahead of me I caught up with them riding at my normal speed (about 13mph). Usually cyclists that pass are the younger stronger fitter types that ride in the 20+mph speed range. I chatted them up … where’d you start from? where you going? wow nice bike, etc. They were nice guys, roughly my age, and one had a fresh injury on his elbow. They revealed that they’d had nearly simultaneous mishaps at a drink stop earlier in their ride, and thus decided to call that place “Doofus Corner”. This turned out to be foreshadowing. Their ride ended in New London.

Continuing on, I stopped and visited at my daughter’s place for a few minutes, sampled a piece of cranberry Amish Friendship Cake (a current fad circulating in ziplog bags hereabouts), visited the bathroom (which was spotless!), refilled my Camelback with water, and was on the road again, continuing to Salisbury, then Webster.

Saw this awesome restored Mercury in Salisbury.

I made a big loop through Contoocook and Henniker. Stopped at the covered bridge for a drink, a rest, a tube of Gu Energy Gel. It was there that I realized that Propel Fitness Water sucks. So does Vitamin Water. It’s either Gatorade or plain old H2O. There I was about 60 miles along and somewhat tired. As I mounted my bike and started to pedal I lost my balance and flopped over. I scraped my left forearm and elbow, but no bleeding, luckily. This was foreshadowed earlier. Sim sa la bim. Don’t know what that means. How ’bout I say “wa la” instead?

At mile 72, I am happy to report, I saw that the Route 114 cairn had been restored! O happy day!

The cairn is rebuilt on the adjacent piece of ledge.

It’s quite an impressive structure in this incarnation. I’m attributing it to the same builder, though I have no way of knowing for sure. When Oliver and I surveyed the site a few weeks ago, I looked around in the woods for stones that might be used to rebuild and didn’t really see any. So cairn builder either dug them up or brought them to the site. You gotta love the way those top 2 rocks balance on that really long 3rd rock. Thanks cairn builder! Outstanding work! And happy summer solstice to all!

For the record I think Twitter is really dumb. Even the name. But this post is really short since I just have 2 photos to share.

Mom’s guitar. That thing in the strings is a humidifier to keep it from drying out. It’s a 45 year old instrument. It looks and sounds great. I need to learn more chords.

I wish you could see how Oliver trembles while he watches the chipmunk. George Carlin would blush at the stream of swear words going through his little spotted head.

It seems that the dry spell has come to an end. With only half an inch of rain for May and with June half over at 2 inches of rain we seem to be back on track for precipitation. The gardens are just about fully planted. A little later we’ll have a look. This is a rather lengthy and perhaps boring post. Oh, and there are also some really disgusting bits. I apologize in advance.

Let me tell you about my vow of silence!!

So Father’s Day was pretty good. I’m a lucky guy to get Father’s Day a week after my birthday! And it’s just SUPER when those fall on Sunday! After breakfast and the weekly dump trip, we went to the feed store in search of some more seeds. Found the carrot seeds but no pumpkin seeds. That’s a bad thing. We need them punkins. After the required Sunday dawdling and planting some carrot seeds, I took a bike ride to Newport.

As mentioned the Chicken Farmer graffiti is restored.

Got home at about 6:30. My daughter was there and got me a wonderful Father’s Day gift, one of my favorite things: a six pack of Long Trail Double Bag. Thanks sweetie!! We arranged to go get some fried seafood takeout from the High Tide over in Hillsborough (a 20 minute drive). It was good, but I recommend eating it there unless you live in Hillsborough. Then takeout would work. Fried stuff doesn’t travel well. Their onion rings are wonderful!!

So I have today off from work and arranged for the guy to come and pump out the septic tank. Originally he was to come in the later afternoon, but he came in the later morning instead. I’d already uncovered the top of the tank. It costs $240 for the “honey wagon” to come suck all the sewage poo out of the 1,000 gallon tank then take it away. The young fellow was cheerful and fast. You know I had to take some pictures. For those of you keeping track, we’d last pumped out our tank 4 years ago. It was February 2004, and our toilets were not flushing well. So we waited a little too long. But the tank was healthy! There were little tiny scatophagous maggot creatures wiggling around, doing their best work on our disgustingly human waste.

The “honey wagon” has a vacuum tank and a long long hose.

A job to be glad that you don’t have.

I guess I owe you an apology Internet. The title of this post is Mid June Garden Update and here I’ve literally dragged you through the … well you know. I’m sorry. I DID warn you … But you should be glad I didn’t get a good video of the poo-chompers at work. I tried. How disgusting are they? (Rhetorical question) So disgusting that they would turn even Romi’s stomach! Moving on … Let’s see where were we?

Oliver had a trim the other day. My wife bought some new blades for the clipper. They were nice and sharp! The Dog don’t like being clipped.

His eyes burned with the fires of Hades! He tried to bite the clippers.

I had to help hold him still after taking the photo. Toward the end of the procedure he was really mad. Growling and snapping. I had to hold his mouth closed and scratch his neck (his favorite type of heavy petting). If getting-a-haircut-Oliver had a last name, which he doesn’t, then his middle name could be Cerberus, that wacky hell-hound. Luckily, without a last name one cannot have a middle name. Right?

But the result is worth the trouble. Happy cool dog with a giant head.

Lookin’ good Oliver! (This chipmunk has lately been taunting Oliver mercilessly.)

So the aloe vera plant at work is doing its thing again. I posted about this magnificent plant back in February. Thanks to Nancy for keeping this plant happy and telling me when it starts flowering.

It’s just getting started. I wonder if it makes seeds?

Back at home, the garlic is starting form scapes. Now I find out that you’re supposed to be picking the scapes before they start to curl. But they look so cool when they do that!

Almost like question marks. Garlic asks: WHY? WHAT? HUH?

The Hood River Garlic Farm has a wonderful website. I see that I planted my garlic way too close together last fall. So the garlic bulbs, which should be harvested in July, will probably be pretty small. Oh well, next fall I’ll know better. Garlic is bed #1. Bed #2 is some lettuce and about a half dozen tomato plants. The main tomato patch is behind the barn, but it’s nice to have some tomatoes close by.

Bed #3 (left edge of frame) is (are?) peas. They’re flowering.

Bed #4: onions in back, brussels sprouts in foreground.

Note the thick band of weeds between the peas and bed #4. They are growing in the path between the the beds and are thick with chamomile, poppies, dill, and mustard. Weeding there will cause too much “collateral damage” to the plants we want to keep. Plus, the weeds in the path are harder to pull because the soil is more compacted from us walking on it. And the other thing is that the peas don’t seem to mind having the weeds shade them a little? These are the top 3 excuses for not weeding.

This is starting to get a little boring isn’t it? Read on, please, and don’t forget my 100% Money Back Guarantee. Anyway, beds 5 and 6 are cabbages (green and purple), cauliflower, and broccoli. If I’m bored with this how must you feel, Internet?

Bed 7: carrot seeds just planted, bed 8: glads, green beans. The rocks are the first cairn attempt after CuriousC’s Cairn Meme. FAIL.

By way of apologizing again I submit that this post is as much for my own garden records as anything. Apologizing for the tedium I mean. I often feel this way when giving garden tours to people who politely ask for them. I feel their boredom too. Justa buncha plants. Sheesh. La dee da.

Hey look, we got a new bird feeder! The perches are a little short for the grosbeaks- they have to flap a little.

OK and here’s what Oliver looked like before he got his trim.

Whaddya mean “get a haircut kid”?!? You talkin’ a ME?

Beds 15, 16, 17: hot peppers, peas, cauliflower and the jerusalem artichokes.

Look we skipped a bunch of beds. You didn’t miss much so don’t worry. To wrap up the garden update, here’s a final shot of the corn, tomato, and winter squash patch over behind the horse barn. My wife found some pumpkin seeds today at the farm store down in Henniker. Thank heaven! Another disaster averted.

The corn is there but pretty much invisible. Squash out of frame left. Paste tomatoes near the barn.

I’m sure everybody is wondering where I planted the rutabagas this year. Well I didn’t plant any. And I probably won’t. Last year I WAY overdid it on the rutabagas and many of them went into the compost after they started sprouting around February. Probably not gonna plant no taters either. However, we are trying to grow some okra and cotton. So there ya go- the Mid June Garden Update.