Morning Glories

Lady dove and mister cardinal accompanied me to get the paper this morning, along with gray cat and black dog, of course. Kitty never goes the whole way, but stops to go off so catlike on his own excursion. Something will catch his eye, a grasshopper or a tuft of delectable grass that needs grazing, and he will drift in another direction. The cardinal stopped at the inner gate, but the dove flew from tree to tree, curious about the dog and me. She's probably an old friend but hard to recognize from the others that hang around. We've had a pair of Mexican squealers (aka tree ducks) on the stock pond next door, and they were out this morning, too. The fawn twins made an appearance in the pasture beside us. Their mother leaves them to forage. She's wise to leave them in that pasture where they were probably born, because it's well-fenced and brushy.

Sun was on the rise, but just barely. No clouds, which is too bad because we could use a rain. The dog went bounding through the "north forty," joyous to be outside in the new day. She's almost almost always joyous about something. Her enthusiasm is contagious. I watched her roll in two different spots in the north forty, and hoped the poison ivy I spent all Tuesday morning spraying has begun to die. We have an abundance of it and I've vowed to bring it to its knees with herbicide. My back and shoulders were killing me after humping the sprayer around -- a fabulous excuse for a massage, which I had the next day.

I think I may have fertilized the crepe myrtles at the end of the driveway too much, or too late, or something. Every other crepe in South Texas is in glorious bloom except for ours. They have luxuriant foliage, have doubled their size this spring, but no bloom. I'm not complaining too much because they needed the growth, have struggled since we planted them our first Fall. I worried they hadn't made it through last winter after the awful '09 drought, but they've prospered and I'm glad of it, just would've like to have seen a bloom or two.

The owl woke me this morning. He made his normal hooty call but some other unfamiliar sound as well. I don't know if that odd cack! meant he found a meal or what, but it was sort of hysterical sounding and brought the dog to the alert at the sliding door. I tried to go back to sleep but the light was growing, and I had a full, pounding head -- damned allergies. I cleaned at Daddy's yesterday. Dust was so thick I don't know how he's managed. His cleaning lady has finked out on him, and he's had a severe gout attack this week. He needs help but I hesitate to step in. He's so fussy about having control of his own life, which I totally understand, but at times he seems to be floudering -- and declining. Even my SO has commented on Daddy's decline, saying it's more noticeable just since Christmas. But I try not to worry, or anticipate, and just enjoy him while he's still with us. We're taking him to dinner at the Country Club tomorrow, which is Father's Day. Of course, my SO is a father, too, so it will be my treat. Guess I'll bake something special for afterwards back here at the house.

No new writing but I am researching something. Don't want to talk too much about it, but I think it will be an article, eventually, that I might be able to actually sell.

Onward ....