We Went to the Animal Fair...

 

Yes, the birds an the beasts were there! As well as some pretty awesomely scary rides!! Take the freaky Pharaoh above... please! (*1) There was a terrified child being tortured on that Egyptian nightmare; the mother looked totally unconcerned. The child has no doubt been scarred for life by his/her experience!

A big hit with us fair-goers was the hall of fruits and vegetables. Rows of multicolored Swiss chard and plates and plates of peppers, beans and eggplants, each more splendid and appetizing than the last. Cathy was searching- in vain!- for some vegetable dish to consume and Bob remarked how ironic it was that for all the fruits and veg on display, there was none to eat. He thought it was a missed opportunity to have a giant farmer's market. But honestly judging by the girth of many of our fellow fair attendees, vegetables were NOT what they were chowing down on. (*2)

Look at that lovely rainbow of peppers! Clever display!

And award-winning apples, attractively arranged into diamonds. Oh! the produce... what a fair should be. We saw some pretty heroically giant pumpkins, too.

The flowers were a big hit, too. Lovely dahlias and exotic coleus and zinnias and hydrangeas and celosia: all looking pretty good despite four days of being on display. We had an altogether super time, and were an appreciative audience.

There are a few things we missed. We never did make it back to see the many chickens on view. Somehow skipped right past the pigs and cows and missed the bunnies... Also we never made it to the marketplace tent where we would no doubt have been able to purchase cheeses or maple syrup, all locally produced. We were too busy being seduced by the terrifying marvels of the midway, (*3)

I also missed having fried dough topped with tomato sauce; probably a blessing. But as it was Bob's first time to the Durham Fair, we did our best to sample a bit of everything. As we boarded the shuttle bus which would deliver us back to our cars, we spied a Monster Truck demonstration that was enthralling a vast crowd, seated on the hillside. Alas! Maybe next time...

(*1) All of the photos in this episode of my blog were taken by my sister Cathy, who did a marvelous job of documenting the fair. I was too busy stuffing deep fried apple fritters in my mouth to take pictures!

(*2) Unless humongous paper platters of ketchup soaked greasy french fries count as "vegetables".

(*3) Who thinks these rides up? Not one of us appreciated the allures of rocketing upside down in a metal cage- it all looked like barf-inducing torture to us! (Especially after piles of greasy french fries and chocolate covered bacon. (an actual offering...))

NuTruk!

 

Hooray! Look what landed in our driveway! A new truck for Bob (and Rita) to drive and enjoy. No, it is not brand new, but it's the newest vehicle (2014) we've ever gotten- even newer than our beloved Red Rover (2010? I think?) Anyway, we're pleased as punch... and relieved.

Do you know how hard it is to find a good used truck?!?! With an eight foot bed? (practically unheard of in this day and age!! They're all those weird stumpy long cab, short bed fiascos. We NEED the long bed- think sculpture and hay bales and gravel...) Believe me, used trucks fall into two categories: really old, decrepit- (suitable for "total restoration), with 200,000 miles or really new and costing major $$$.

So I think- WE think- we got lucky, especially as (what were the chances?!?!?) this crazy truck was located in our town. We were even able to have our mechanic check it out. He loved the truck; he was very impressed and said, "Except for needing two front tires and wind shield wipers, it's a great truck". That made us happy and reasonably certain we wouldn't regret buying it.

All we need is a new "Bernie" sticker for that naked bumper! We took a field trip and looked at a pretty much identical truck out in Willimantic last week. It was good to have a comparison in cost/mileage/color/year but there was no comparison. That truck handled oddly and even made a loud clunking noise when we tried it (universal joint?) But the dealership sales man (who looked like a character out of Twin Peaks) and the greasy young sales "closer"keep emailing and asking "what's it gonna take to get that Ford into your driveway?" I informed them we bought another one...

Anyway, between the new car and the new truck we should be happily motoring for years. And as was "helpfully" pointed out by a friend, accelerating the Climate Crisis.

When It Rains, It Pours

 

We all know that we've been suffering through a drought: well, no more! While I welcomed the much needed rain, the fact that it was delivered in a monsoon-like one day event was pretty stunning. I heard four inches in some spots; a month's worth of rain in one day! And some of that decided to inundate my studio.

The site of the worst leak was right above my woodstove. I entered my studio last Tuesday to find the floor wet, the stove dripping and the ceiling drooling. As witnessed above, I placed buckets and waste baskets and towels to mop up and collect the deluge. I'm still drying out today, two days later.

Fortunately, nothing of import (read: my artwork) got wet.

I emptied this tub three times! To bad all this water wasn't available a month ago... The grass and parts of the garden are recovering but face it; it's already September and how much time do we really have left to garden. Now there's a grim thought! We all waited all winter for the gardening season, it starts out really nicely with a mix of sun and rain and then we were thrust into the driest two months in who knows how long. Hahahahhaha!! The "joys" of gardening!

To take our minds off all that watery mayhem, here are a few delightful pictures of our morning glories; erupting into their own heavenly blue cascade of waterfall-like loveliness. Here's another shot:

This variety is called "Flying Saucers' and is so interesting as each flower is striped and sotted in a different pattern. At least the flowers enjoyed all the rain.

Things have been busy and distracting, the ceiling leak was only part of it. In the last week alone, my poor horse Neko showed symptoms of a new infection (or recurrence) of Lyme disease and is unrideable and on antibiotics for a month, we're discussing have Maggie (the ancient Mexican pony) euthanized, our favorite pizza place went out of business, two friends got sick with COVID, we're driving around looking for a new(er) truck (*1) What else? Hey! isn't that enough? Oh yeah, the queen just died.

(*1) Much much harder than you'd think! We need/want a long (eight foot) bed and they're all short and stumpy. We don't want all that extended cab nonsense and guess what? That's what 95% are. And every truck out there is either really old with like 220,000 miles on it or really new and waaaaaaaaaaaaay too much money. We are in process of checking one out right here in our town. Stay tuned: it may be the one.