2~ August on the Little Bird House Farm

Don't tell anyone I said so, but this summer has been quite mellow, as far as weather has been concerned. I'm afraid I'll jinx the whole thing, and we'll finally be hit with a heat wave that reaches to the coast, or brings even greater masses of visitors, seeking cooler temperatures, to fill the beaches and roads. There have been hot days, for sure, and the humidity gets pretty heavy, but I know it can be worse. Much worse, and I dread that. In the meantime, I keep relishing the warm, but not scorching weather, and loving those Summer Clouds. Here, on the coast, we get low clouds, and fog, but the real clouds, the thunder heads, cumulus clouds, with projecting heads, churning and climbing into the sky... they are east. They make a spectacular show, from afar, and up close, they're majestic and powerful, portentous. Yesterday, the thunderheads seemed to build so tall that it was as though they were collapsing under their own mass, and the clouds toppled and spilled west, threatening rain, and flood. The air was heavy with the chance of a deluge. We waited. Hoped.

All is well on our little farm. Well enough. I could admit that the goat's and chicken's cottages are in desperate need of renovations, or maybe, honestly, it's time to tear them down and begin anew. Didn't we just build that? The run, the shelters, all of it? Okay... if I ever said that "cute cottages are ideal housing for goats and chickens," I was in a delusional haze. Naive. Dreaming. Chickens should be in concrete bunkers that can be hosed out, and goats probably could use the same. They need industrial strength construction, with any surface that can take power washing. Lately, I have been pining for upper body strength, engineering knowledge, and power-tool skills, all of which I would apply to basic, sturdy, easy to clean shelters for goats and chickens.

Just the same, all is well on our little farm. We get lots of eggs, and lots of cucumbers, and lots of teeny tiny tomatoes, and so much passionfruit is on the fence, that I could open a passionfruit fruit stand, and stay in business all summer. The flowers I planted have had mixed success. None of the lobelia made it, but we have little zinnias, and bright cosmos. We brought home some more zinnias, taller ones, too. Mako Hen approves. It's time to take out the basil... in spite of my deadheading efforts, which were valiant, it's still going to seed. The bees approve, and I like that.

We could feel the weather, the restless weight of those heavy clouds, and we waited for rain. It did not come. Not here, anyway.

With Infinity More Monkeys, a picture a day.