Summertime... And the living's easy.

Porgy and Bess…  How I’ve never seen thee.. 

Here’s a few scatterings of thought from a scatterbrain. 

Babcia and John are on their way right now to California.  Safe trip, little hombres…  Burn me a redwood when you get down there.  (Well, not all at once.)  Remind me to take up HAM radio as a hobby when I get some time put together…  John’s got some really cool tubified electronics.  Tubes are cool.  Until you have to move them. 

It’s hotter than snot this weekend.  High of 30 or 31 C for the whole weekend.  “Okay,” I thinks to myself, “Wouldn’t it be FABULOUSLY cool to get one of those inflatable boats and take the kids and my lady-love down the river?  I’ll go to Crappy Tire right after breakfast and buy one!”
  Only problem:  It’s hotter than snot and everyone else in the city had the same idea.  I swear, there wasn’t a single raft on the shelf, but there were three in the checkout line by the time I got there.    I’ll leave it for the Lady-love to express herself. 

We went up to Dickson Dam again today, this time joined by my lady-love’s sister and her family.  Not a single picture on the beach this time.  See the previous photos, please, and pretend that they’re current.

Do you know how to judge when a good time was had by all?  It’s when you get home and the dog just plops down in the shade and is so tuckered out that he doesn’t even wag his tail when you walk up to him.  I think he told me to give him a day, he’ll be ready to fetch again tomorrow.

It’s been a good day in a doggish sorta way.  After we got home, KA picked 101 Dalmations to watch for a movie after dinner.  When I was a kid, I had a record that was basically the dialogue from the movie and more or less told the whole thing, but for the life of me, I can’t remember seeing the whole thing before.  I think they call it puppy love.

Of course, a bunch of this started when Mr. Bug and I got started talking about dogs a day or two back.  He mentioned his neighbor had a Leonberger.  They look quite hard to lose in the cushions of a couch and I got strolling through the photos.  I don’t know any other way to say it, they look adorable.  With the tangent to my favourite dog, the Borzoi.  I’ve heard that they’re a little tough to hide under the bed when your Mom isn’t looking, too.  I have to say, Bud’s pretty much got me sold on Border Collies.  And still, I thought my lady-love’s first comment when I got through the door would be, “You’ve been looking at dogs again, haven’t you?”

Of course, my financial planner extraordinaire (and great friend, and possessor of Ozzie, the snack-sized dust-bunny dog-like critter) came over Friday.  We had dinner, a good chat, and the wheels are back on this little red wagon of mine.  Sure, it’s a little wobbly, but there’s only so much the wise and mighty can pull off when they’re working with me.  On the bright side, it’s been a hard day’s night, and I’ll keep working..  Well, I suppose I’m beyond that for the moment.

Which takes me to that particular moment – I’m sure we all have it – when out of the blue, your lady-love (or, if you happen to be the lady-love, the Prince Charmin of your dreams) turns to you and says, “Oh, by the way…“  In this case, it was, “By the way, you have to mow the lawn today.“  Okay, it’s not such a hard thing to do, and frankly, I kinda enjoy doing the yardwork..

We got a bunch of plants from my Mom’s yard and transplanted them.  Most are doing fine - the vine isn’t doing all that swell, and the bulbish-pink plants of mystery are dying (but they’re bulbs!  Aren’t they supposed to be dying?)  This is entirely NOT a “gardening in Calgary” kinda blog.

On the bright side of things, there’s nothing quite like the fresh scent of fresh-mown peonies.  You’ll parden me, I have to go make amends to my lady-love before she reads this and finds out what it’s all about.