I like this!

OYB!

Español!

The end result of my labor so far.

This was all that was left of the squirrel I left there yesterday.

I spend about 30 minutes a day doing Duolingo in Spanish.

Went to Stone Mountain. I wrote (talk to text) my newsletter on my phone.

Recorded a new episode of Verbal Surgery called “Take Cover.” It’s a good one.

Great talk with my Mom. We usually have a conversation on Sunday.

I continue to listen to books on tape in Spanish. Can’t say I’ve liked this series very much. I’ll probably go back to Harry Potter. I find it more amusing to listen to.

Went to the bank to deposit checks. Amen.

I wrote my newsletter at Stone Mountain. I come home to use my Mac to produce and lay it out.

Printed labels.

Shifted the recording I made onto my computer.

Kathy’s sister Ann went to the hospital today. Don’t think she was admitted.

Grandgirls slept over, so the blog is combined for the last two days!

I liked these!

I’ve been playing Horizon Zero Dawn again. I have to admit this is my favorite game of all time.

Always learning.

OYB!

Keep going!

Talked with my buddy Anthony.

Keep listening!

After two decades of living at my house wondering if grass would ever grow in my front yard, I’ve decided to go with what I know works: Monkey grass. SO I’m planting rows and will let it fill in, then start cutting it. It’s too shady for any other type of grass.

I dig it up from my back yard and plant it in my front yard.

The girls come to help, especially Everly.

Lots of digging, but I’ve figured out the fastest way to do it.

Keeping their roots wet until I plant them.

Hot Chocolate!

The whipped cream was a special treat.

They went to sleep about 9:15 PM.

Cooler! That’s why I did so much yard work.

Turn to the Sun.

And study!

OYB!

Once the girls leave, I clean the driveway, deck, vacuum the house, sweep the kitchen and clean the glass doors. Ashley and Miles picked them up around 11:45 AM.

After vacuuming, I clean out all the parts. That keeps the suction working great.

I’m always researching something. Including how to do the yard work better.

I go through the house and try to find all the stuff the girls will need to go back home. Includes clothes we don’t think fit them any more.

Went to Ann’s house to take her some meds.

I saw a dead squirrel by the street. Took it to my yard for the hawk and crows to eat.

I’ve been interested in these hand held synth/loopers. Finally got one.

Listened to this while I was doing yard work.

Just keep planting.

I’m alway thinking about better ways to do things. This is for a trashcan to roll around on. I put a towel on it and roll around while I’m planting. I needed something lower than the cans I normally sit on. Too much bending over.

Watering the fresh transplants.

I’m making curved lines to seem more like it naturally would spread.

Groovy!

My favorite scientist!

Cool.

So beautiful.

Tricky books.

Mr. Chuckles.

Beautiful weather with some strong rain at twilight.

Spanish. Just. Keep. Going.

Picked up the girls at Global Mall. Little sweethearts.

OYB!

Cleaned the bird baths. The raccoons use the dog bowl a lot!

I was teaching the girls about fingerprints. I zoomed these way in on my iPhone.

Doggie park!

Beauty all around us.

Filled up the blue pool for them to play in. The playgrounds get too hot these days.

Sharp shinned hawk.

Gorgeous.

Beautiful.

Cool.

Made brownies.

My neighbor’s gutter.

Got the groceries.

Released Verbal Surgery -856- “Dark Parking.”

Funny!

Interesting.

I’m always looking for interesting games.

Slightly cooler.

Good news.

Español!

Love these.

I kinda want to ride in this.

Love my girls!

Went to the bank.

Got gas. I’ve been working on points for my gas and it just came in. I’ll let Kathy check it out since she gets way more gas. Checked levels.

We went to Sonic and came home to have a picnic.

We made little s’mores for a treat.

I brought a fan out to help cool them off and blow the mosquitos away.

OYB!

Spotted a Pileated Woodpecker this morning. I always hear them first.

I have a life time warranty on my water hose. This is my second replacement hose. Lowes has been great about this. I’ve kept all the receipts and the little paper cover and both times it hasn’t been a problem. As I recall, it originally cost about $80, but I was really tired of rinky dink hoses that would burst almost immediately.

While the girls were playing, I went through all the stuff on the floorboard of my car’s back seats.

I organized the Summer stuff and took out the few remaining pieces of winter stuff.

The first project with my new hose! Transplanting the monkey grass from my back yard to systematic rows in the front yard.

I dig holes, break up the dirt, and add water.

Then put the young plant in the soil. It is very rich, dark soil. It’s coming from my mulching leaves over the years. You can see what this year’s mulching looks like as the top cover.

Watering it down for the final time after the transplanting.

The girls rested, then I took them home. There was a group of young men playing football. I’ve watched them grow up.

I finished one of my books in Spanish. Can’t say I could tell you much about what happened, but I’m definitely getting better at the rapid comprehension. I tried several books I have in my library, but went back tot he Color of Magic series. The audio was just better and I like listening to the different characters.

Checked the mail at the office and made sure the ficus was ok.

Put the reservation in for the team coming.

Did the grocery shopping.

I’m really looking forward to the Banksy exhibit later this year.

Spanish. SI!

Duh. Right?

Getting warmer.

Picked up the girls.

I played some tunes from Thriller to them. They liked them.

We stopped by the grocery store to pick up some fruit and treats.

I also got them Kinder eggs. They had cool little cars in them.

I’ve been studying crows. The more I learn, the cooler they seem.

I’ve been studying their language. For instance, to let his family know where he is and that there is a food source nearby, they usually will make four caw sounds and then stop. After a few minutes, he’ll make the same pattern. I’m doing my best to copy that.

Today. I had a crow watch me bring food out for them. He stayed relatively close to me. This has been a relationship building thing for years. They are super smart (comparative intelligence to monkeys) and very shy.

Cleaned out the water bowls and bird baths.

Then filled up the blue pool for the girls.

OYB!

I got the girls lollipops. I didn’t really check out what kind Penelope got. It turned out to be a really hot one made with chilis! We plan on giving it to Miles.

I taught the girls about a new thing I figured out, raw s’mores. I don’t have to cook them, just eat that combo! Yum.

We got a pizza and went to the water wheel park at Stone Mountain.

The water was pretty cold, but they had fun.

A steady stream of kids came to play with the girls.

I’ve never seen azaleas this color.

After our swim, we went home and took a bath to get cleaned up.

Then over to my office to check the mail.

I had an end of school popsicle party for the kids at Azalea. They had fun.

I used my hose to fill up the blue pool. Later, I realized that there was a weak spot where a crimp used to be. When I came back from Stone Mountain, it was spurting over the yard. Bummer.

I have a life-long warranty on this. I got a replacement for the original two years ago. Seems like that must be about the life span. It’s super heavy duty and 100 feet long. Hopefully, I can get a new one tomorrow. I use that hose pretty much every day.

It was SUPER hard to get this off the faucet. I have no idea how it got so torqued down. No way I would have done it like that. It was like the two metals had bonded together.

I thought this was cool.

Español!

Picked up the girls.

Went to Waffle House for breakfast.

Then to Zoo Atlanta! They’d built a whole parking garage since I was there. Wow.

We went to the gift shop first. I told them they could each buy $5 worth of stuff. Everly chose little animals, tigers and bears. Penelope chose a little game.

Then the playground. Penelope took a pretty hard fall on her butt. Felt sorry for her being so sad. She got over it quickly.

Flamingos!

Love my girls!

Simba!

Beauty.

I love the gorillas.

This is a Hamerkoph nest. It’s an African bird.

I heart lemurs!

Everly tells the most intricate stories.

Apes looking at monkeys.

You otter look at this.

Looks a bit hair challenged.

Red panda seriously chilled out.

Beauty.

Komodo dragon giving you the eye.

Fantastic pitcher plants, native of Georgia!

Great talk with my buddy Ben Birdsong who is now the missions pastor of a methodist church in Birmingham, AL. He want to bring teams our direction. Amen.

I took his call while we were at the Zoo. It was that important to me.

More seriously stressed out animals.

She’s getting bigger!

On the train!

It was a hot day, but not bad. We got to the park at 9:30 AM. That was definitely the coolest part of the day.

Went by the office to check the mail.

I asked Pastor Bill and Brother John about using the sanctuary for the team on June 14-17th.

Went to the bank to deposit a check.

Released a new episode of Verbal Surgery “Side Lion.” Overcome your fears and carry on!

Funny.

This one took me a second.

Español!

Started my day earlier mowing. Trying to catch the cooler air.

Very dusty, but my safety glasses kept fogging up. I decided I’d rather see properly and kept the mask on and just went without glasses.


My yard is almost exactly .5 acres. It’s a lot to mow a forest. I just realized last week that my property at this time of year has almost zero blue sky from the ground. It’s all tree canopy.

It was really hard work. I went over a lot of it twice to much up the leaves.

Picked up a lot of sticks.

This is the pit they the contractors dug back in the 70s. I keep filling it up with sticks and leaves and rocks, but the mycelium decomposes all the organics.

Got cleaned up. Used a lot of TekNu the solution for getting off poison ivy oils before I took a shower.

OYB!

Wasn’t quite as hot today.

Got the groceries.

I filled up my bird seed bag.

This looks intriguing. I think the grandgirls would really love this. Me too, duh.

My gardenias have started to bloom! I trimmed some of them off to put in water and put in the kitchen. One of my very favorite scents.

I thought this was interesting.

I love my gardens.

Wow! I can’t wait to see this! Banksy is by far my favorite artist. This exhibition is in London right now. My buddy Anthony will be seeing it on Wednesday.

Still doesn’t feel THAT hot.

Cool!

Español!

OYB!

Downloaded the episode of Verbal Surgery I recorded yesterday onto my Mac.

Worked on my backyard again.

The first cut after the winter is always the hardest.

I loaded up the Gorilla Cart three times with branches and big rocks.

I used the dolly on this really big rock.

I pulled up some monkey grass. Some still had roots, so I figured I’d plant them in the front yard. I put them in a pot and watered them down to keep the roots alive.

My goal is to always do the hardest part first. I wasn’t really intending to do the sides, but they are definitely the hardest parts.

Transported a squirrel.

I had a good talk with my Mom. I intended to record an episode of Verbal Surgery, but didn’t feel up to it. That yard work really is WORK!

I certainly didn’t know that word, but the concept I get.

Español! This is just Duolingo. Doesn’t count my listing or watching sessions.

Cool.

Exciting! He’s my favorite!

OYB!

Beauty! Certainly made yard work a lot more pleasant.

Almost everything in my garden is blooming. Gardenias look like they’re ready to explode with blooms.

K and I had Thai for lunch. So good.

Went to Stone Mountain to record Verbal Surgery “Dark Parking.”

Jesse said this was her favorite book. I’m enjoying it so far.

Did the SW part of my back yard. My right arm is still bothering me with tingling, so my goal was to keep the work under an hour.

It’s pretty tough. It took longer today because I had to dig up poison ivy when I found it. I also smoothed out the dirt over where the septic tank is. Hard.

Removed!

It was incredibly dusty. Easy to see when the sunlight hits it. I went and put a mask on. It helped a lot.

I have to pull the mower in and out of the recycling pit. Difficult.

I hurt my hip working in this area.

The SW section is one of the hardest. Glad to have it done.

I’m enjoying playing Devil May Cry 5. It’s got special tools to up your abilities.

Got the groceries and put them up.

Full Sun Moon.

Whew. I got a pretty bad sunburn on my back and chest. Ouch.

I like this guy.

Wow. What’s up with people?

Cool.

So true.

Little beauties!

Back to Waffle House.

Spanish!

Gassed up the car and checked the fluids. Cleaned windshield.

I heard this today. Put it on our playlist.

Went to Walmart to get new swimsuits. Of course we never JUST get that.

They loved the new bracelets and kitty ears.

Cleaned and refilled all the bird baths.

OYB!

Beauty!

The gardenias are getting ready to blossom. Decided to add some fertilizer to all the plants I have near the road: pink magnolias, gardenias and cherry blossom.

They like to play restaurant. Everly is usually the waitress. She likes to call people, “Sweety.”

Swimsuits!

We ate the rest of the Waffle House grub.

This caught my eye.

The girls took the plate and made images out of them. Penelope said this was a “super villain.”

The boxes are still providing amusement.

These were a big hit. Especially with me.

Another in a string of gorgeous days.

While the girls napped, I vacuumed the house.

Blew and cleaned up the garage.

Cleaned off the driveway.

And the deck.

Transported a squirrel.

Ordered groceries.

Released Verbal Surgery -854- “Headmaster.” Great episode.

Cleaned and refilled all four hummingbird feeders. I have only seen a couple once or twice. Really disappointing. I used to have two birds that would just hang out at the feeders all day long. I remember years ago I had as many as 14 birds at once!

Info on K’s bed.