Today’s title is quite literal.

I threw out my back first thing this morning picking up Stretch from under the table to waterboard him. I hobbled around most of the day and was showing a bit of improvement  by early afternoon when a truck driver called to tell me he was in the alley with a delivery for me. The delivery was a new 60″ x 25″ x 2″ solid maple top for the outdoor kitchen. Since it weighs 63 pounds, it was delivered by freight. So much for my back getting better between wrestling the top off the truck and into the office (you have to pay a lot extra for the driver to get it any further then the end of the trailer), then into the car, and then into the house. At least Laurie helped me get it into the house. The top is beautiful. Basically a giant butcher block.  I replaced some open shelves with an oak cabinet in the outdoor kitchen a couple of weeks ago. The maple top is replacing a short piece of an old elevator door I had on the shelves. The elevator door is a nice, solid brushed stainless surface, but it is nether wide enough nor long enough to cover the cabinet and the refrigerator. The maple top will also go better with the oak cabinet.

The carne adovada is wonderful, but I think I’m going to add a little more red chile. Since I doubled the carne, I was curious to see if the chile marinade would be enough spice and liquid, but I believe it’s not quite enough by itself.

 

 

I left the office late tonight — one of the consequences of taking Thursday off last week to make a long, and productive weekend at home. When I got to my car, I noticed one of the only other cars left in the parking lot was a booted Mustang. Everyone else but me and the owner of the Mustang had the  good sense to go home at a reasonable hour (good thing I pay for a parking permit).

While getting back into the car at the post office, I noticed the sad state of the handicap parking spot next to me — I could really relate to it with all my sore joints, sinuses that make my teeth and ears to hurt, and my overall stiffness that makes it hard for me to move. With all the work I’ve been doing on the property, the thunderstorms moving through, and getting back on my bike after months of not riding, I feel wet, run over and broken like that poor handicap symbol.

I just finished cooking 30 pounds of carne adovada stew. I did several things differently for this batch: 1) I doubled the amount of carne adovada from 5 to 10 pounds; 2) I cut the amount of potatoes in half; 3) instead of cooking the potatoes with the frijoles, I pan fried them with onions and garlic until they were golden brown and slightly scorched around the edges, and 4) I only used the chile the carne adovada was marinaded in for the chile sauce and chile flavor. By not adding extra red chile, the stew came out moist but not soupy. The final result is wonderful from my initial taste test, so it should be fabulous, and “to die for” tomorrow after the flavors age and blend together over night.

 

This lovely young woman was simply adorable in her flapper-style hat— she and her friend make a handsome couple, as well. They were standing outside the sanctuary at Central United Methodist Church after the service this morning chatting with another person, when Laurie told me I should get a photo of her. As a pesky photographer, I interrupted their conversation and asked the young woman to pose and then had her friend join her. They seemed quite amused by the old guy with the camera.

When I went on a ride this afternoon, I met another rider at the top of our road who was also doing a lap around Corrales. The rider turned out to be Dr. Reiger, who is a veterinarian at North Valley Animal Clinic on Alameda. He lives south of us so he was using the north/south portion of Price Ln to get to Dixon Rd.  While we were chatting, I asked him about the rattlesnake vaccine they are advertising on the clinic’s marquee. It’s not for rattlesnakes, which is a good thing, since catching rattlesnakes to get them vaccinated would be quite dangerous.  The vaccine is for dogs, and it helps them build up antibodies to rattlesnake venom. When it comes to critters like rattlesnakes and porcupines, most dogs don’t have enough sense to just leave them alone.

 

 

This June Bug was cuddling on my finger this afternoon. I kept putting it on different plants around the edge of the deck, but it kept going back to my finger. I finally got it interested in a butterfly bush.

I actually got a lot of organizing done this morning and into the afternoon before I got rained out. The first rain that came through was a real downpour. Puck came in soaking wet, and stuck his tongue out at me when I was trying to get him to look at the camera. After it passed over, I got another hour or so of work done outside before the next rain came through. The second rain was nice and steady. The cats, June Bug and I sat out on the deck listened to the rain, and watched the birds play in it.

 

 

I believe these cans of lubricating oil for aircraft turbine engines have sat on the shelf in the pump house since the day I was born. The date on the top of the can is the month and year I was born. Why my dad had, and kept these cans of oil I’ll never know.  The solar panels are history, as are a 1000 pounds of old, dead mowers that were laying around the property. Acme Steel Recycling is a really cool place — a lot of nice people work there taking mountains of scrap metal off our hands and paying good money for it.

 

 

Before I drove off the scale with my load of scrap metal this morning, the woman at the window handed me a receipt with the loaded weight printed on it and told me: “Drive to area five at the end of the road. We are not responsible for any damage to your truck!” I understood her last comment after the crane operator directed me to back up under the “claw” he was using to toss scrap metal onto the mountain of discarded iron and steel. No sooner had I exited the truck that he grabbed a claw-full of scrap I had piled to the height of the cab, and tossed it onto the iron mountain. He was going for the second claw-full when I snapped the photo. I was impressed by the crane operator’s skill at picking stuff out of the bed of the truck without damaging anything but the scrap.

I loaded up the truck with the aluminum roofing and solar panels I dismantled yesterday, but by the time I got everything else done, it was too late to make another run to Acme. I’ll take the aluminum first thing in the morning, and then gather up more scrap metal laying around the property and make another visit to the “claw”.

I went on a very short ride this afternoon before the lightning and wind made me reconsider.  Now that the winds have died down, there is a steady rain falling. The temperature dropped from 85 around 5:00 pm to 68 by 6:30 pm, about an hour after the storm blew in. The temperature is holding at 68 on the deck with the rain pattering on the canopy. It feels cold after working out in 85 degree temperatures this afternoon.

The kitties enjoy the rain. They like to lay around on the edge of the deck watching the rain — then all of a sudden take a stroll around the garden in the rain, come back to the deck all wet, and ask to go inside.

 

I went out around midnight to move the hose to a different drip system, and noticed the moon was really beautiful shining through the thin layer of clouds. I got Laurie and we sat out on our star gazing chairs and looked at the moon and the few stars we could see peaking though the clouds outside the bright glow of the moon. I noticed the moon was bright enough to light up clouds to the north and actually back light the spider lilies next to where I was laying.

I used the holiday to repair one of the drip systems, take apart a couple of old metal desks and an ancient cast iron table saw that were in the shed; then I picked up other scrap metal around the yard, and loaded desks, saw and scrap metal in the truck so I can take it to the scrap metal place tomorrow morning. I also finished removing the aluminum roofing off the big house, and took apart some old solar panels so I can haul them off to recycling with the aluminum roofing tomorrow after I haul off the scrap metal. After I got the roofing stacked up and secured so the wind wouldn’t blow it around (it was 2:30 pm or so by then), I went for a 10 mile ride on my bike, showered after my bike ride, then made a salad and grilled steaks and fancy sausages for dinner. Laurie made fancy biscuits to go with dinner, and chocolate pudding for desert. We listened to the City’s firework show, and got up occasionally to watch some of the sprays of color glitter through the trees.

 

 

 

I don’t know if these couples were coming back from shopping or coming downtown to party, but you can tell from their various states of dress and undress that it was hot. If they had been shopping, then they might appreciate the City of Albuquerque’s current plans for the lot they are walking across. The City bought the lot in 2000 and leased it to the Park-it Place — that’s were I used to park behind the office. But earlier this year the City didn’t renew the Park-it Place’s lease, kicked everyone off the lot, so they could try to get developers interested in building a grocery store on the lot.  At least a grocery store is a more practical use for the lot than when Mayor Baca wanted to include this lot for a downtown baseball stadium. I’m sure downtown dwellers would appreciate having a grocery store in the neighborhood if the City can get a grocer interested in opening a store downtown.

 

It’s raining! Our monsoon season appears to be starting on time this year. Everything in the garden seems to be enjoying the rain — even the cats. The black butterfly fluttered round the garden the other morning flying from plant to plant, touching on them and hovering without making a full landing, and constantly fluttering its wings. Its behavior seemed strange, but after taking a closer look at the photos, I believe it was laying eggs.

 

 

This moth was quite taken with our petunias this morning. There were many dragonflies zipping around above the irrigation water. They chased each other, hovered for an instance and zipped back and forth over the water. I tried to get photos of the different dragonflies as they hovered, but they don’t hover for long, so the blue dot dragonfly was the clearest shot I got. These dragonflies never seem to land, and are different from the ones that do land. There were green dot dragonflies, and probably other colors, as well, but I didn’t get very clear shots of them.

Back on the bike — Day 4: I managed to get in 12 miles between storms at 6:30 this afternoon. The Jack Rabbit showed up and brought a friend. They both beat me in the sprint tonight. I need to work harder.