Tuesday, August 21 - Rain, an Invitation, and Grilling

Got up early this morning to rain. It was our third storm in two days, but the other two only dropped about 1/2 inch of rain. This one was more substantial. I don't know but I'd guess 2-3 inches, over a period of maybe 6 hours, so it was relatively slow and steady with some bursts of heaver rain -- not enough to wash out the gullies, as this area is SO prone to erosion. We discovered that the dining room window leaks -- not a major problem to fix, and that the gutters on the front, though better than before, still need some work. Flashing and drip-edge should take care of the problem.

Barry walked half a mile (down and back) to get the mail, and while down at the mailbox, he met one of our neighbors. They got to talking, and Barry mentioned that later this week we were going over to Lancaster to a tobacco-cutting contest -- just to see how it's done. The neighbor instead invited us to our own tobacco-cutting, just 1/2 mile up the road. He said we're more than welcome to see how it's done, and maybe even grab a knife and do some of our own. Would I look like too much of a geek if I videotaped it? The tobacco from that field is stored in a barn just to the northwest of us -- I'll try to get a picture of a real tobacco barn, since it's just around the corner. The sides MUST allow air to flow through, so there are "shutters" on the side which can be opened. The pic will show those...when I can get a good shot.


Rick, we finally got the grill going. The T-Bone steaks we bought down in Liberty last week at half price got cooked. OH, man were they good and tender. Either it's just that they're cooked properly, or the beef down here in Kentucky is SO much better than the shoe leather we had in Maine. I "invented" a "potato burger" to go along with the steak -- basically mashed potato, garlic butter, cheese, barbecued onions, molded into a burger shape then broiled. Those were good, too.

I bought Barry a book on Kentucky wildflowers which arrived today. He's in the living room now reading it -- maybe I'll see him tomorrow! There are so many different flowers here, and we don't know most of them. Next of all is a book on butterflies -- I saw one the other day that was absolutely beautiful -- deep black with a bit of turquoise on the bottom of its wings. I thought it was a mourning cloak at first, but cloaks are huge down here and this one wasn't. I'll have to go on the net to identify it I guess.

Time to feed the fish. Even the bluegills are now responding to my "Here, fishy" call, and we feed them inshore and the catfish offshore to see that the bluegills get at least SOME of the food -- the cats are notorious vacuum cleaners, as I think I've noted. We did lose a carp that we had stocked about 10 days ago -- at $10 each, that one hurt. Oh well, that's the way things go I guess.