Snakes Alive!

Unwelcome guests will sometimes appear to scare and annoy me. Like the one pictured. Not all of them slither on the ground, though. They cannot be dispatched easily with a shovel to the head ....

My computer seems to be in it's death throes and I will have to acclimate myself to a brand new one soon enough. Being old, I don't like lots of changes in routine happenings. I do not really type. It is a sort of three finger ballet I prefer and I can apparently do so with much haste. Because the computer cannot keep up with me. I find myself editing every other word for dropped letters.

I only have one window open while I am "typing", but it still happens. That is annoying, but it has started turning off and on with no warning. The keypad has a sticky "c" and the internal mouse died long ago. Once again I will impose upon my son to find what I want and get it so he can set it all up for me. I have a very good son. I don't mind paying for it, it is the set up part that I hate and he knows how to get his mom a good deal.

This is usually my favorite time of year. The week days are slow and easy and I can get a lot done .... well, they used to be, at any rate. We are still super busy with lots of travelers and winery goers. I had two older ladies here for three days in a tent. The weather has been perfect for that sort of camping. Warm days and cool nights.

Just because we are still busy in the office doesn't mean there are not a lot of pre-winter chores to be done. I still have quite a bit of fence to paint and the big sign in the front is about to collapse. I suppose it should be in a great state of rot, since it is almost 50 years old. Not that we have been standing by waiting for it to collapse. I have painted it several times and it has been reinforced throughout the years, but the time has come to just put up a new sign.

The old sign is made of 2X6's, cedar, of coarse and the letters were routed out, making it easier to paint, but still not great. Someone gave us a stack of 4' 2X4's and HeWho knows things said they would work great. He went on to tell me how he was going to route out some 4X4"s to frame the sign. The only thing he wanted me to do was to outline the letters on the 2X4's ...... so he could route them out "otherwise, it won't look right".

Being a dutiful wife I went out to the barn where he had this all set up on a picnic table (after he pondered what he would put it on for me to work on. He was going to purchase a piece of plywood to put on sawhorses .......). Anyhoo, his wife suggested the picnic table, what with it being the same size as the sign. I battled the wind and did my part.

A few days passed. A couple of times, I even heard the router. But, he made very little progress. I even suggested using some different materials. I asked if, perhaps wooden letters might be an alternative to paint or routing the letters. I researched and neither one of us liked the price of the letters. HeWho seemed to balk at the shipping time, like we had not already wasted a couple of weeks.

Next thing I know, he is dragging in a piece of plywood for me to letter and then he cut the letters out with the jigsaw. Just $24 and we have all the letters we need and extra material. Everybody knows how much I love a bargain. I don't think he was too happy with me when he started to cut out the letters .... I laid them out very carefully to use as little material as possible.

My part is done , all the painting of the letters and the big part of the sign, just needs to be erected and then touched up.
 


At the end of the day, though, I have the sweetest little guy waiting for me to cuddle with!