Pleasant summer weather now most days, except, for the very nasty drought.
High seventies, low eighties for most of the next ten days.

County Fair season in in full bloom and )&$&%^ once again i will not get to many I wanted to.
Farm/Threshing show season is also in full bloom now and , sadly, probably will only get to one or two.

Nut-job renter is evicted and his brothers picked up his stuff yesterday so now cleaning and fixing the apartment will be done so it can be rented, maybe by Sept.
It is sad some people need drugs to be semi-normal but it is a sad fact that is getting worse not better for reason best not stated.
Que sera, sera.

We have been fire evacuees since last Thursday, had barely 15 minutes to get some clothes and get out. We were sure the whole town was going to burn, the Tremont fire was ferocious devouring everything in it's path. But due to years of planning by the district, cleaning up the underbrush, and installing roof sprinklers, and many firefighters on the ground and in the air they saved our town , the fire burned all around it. We are waiting for the evacuation order to be rescinded and we can go home.

Margaret, how scary and stressful ! Very glad to hear that you AND the town are okay

Thank you, Sandy. We got to come home yesterday, the fire is still smoldering with some hot spots, lots of thick smoke, choppers with water buckets are still here checking them.

Margaret, wonderful news! Do you turn the roof top sprinkers on just prior to the evacuation?

Rj, no we do not turn them on, the firemen turn them on as they first have to cover all chimneys and vents so that the house doesn't get flooded,, then the water pressure has to be increased to pump that much water at once.

Wow, great idea!

!

I have started residing the garage at home, up here now to do a little work on the nut-job's ex-apartment. (More should be done than I am doing but time is short right now.)

I have three bush roses where I was siding and cut them down to the lowest size in in my life-time; they still have left gouges on me as I am slightly allergic to roses and if they scratch me , I BLEED.

It was dust dry in that bed so I dumped five gallons of water on it before I left; heading back tomorrow to hopefully finish the South side.
It takes on average three hours to remove siding and four to put it back but as I am no longer trying to pull old nails (you have to gouge a hole so the hammer can grip it) I now hammer siding out from inside enough so I can get on the nails, it should cut removal time in half.
I am using large nails and a two-pound short sledge to put them in; large hammer, less pounding.
With my fortune this overly hot summer will turn into an overly cool one when I get to the point of painting, but I hope to at least prime the garage before it gets to cool.

Last time I painted it weather turned the day after I put last coat on and oil paint does not like that cold weather; it does not dry or bond well to the siding.
North side, best quality paint, was still tacky near two weeks, but when mold inducing weather hit a few years later, where the best paint was , was impervious to the mold.

So tricky to find a good time to paint - that's why our deck is a mess! First it's too cold - then it's warm enough but too wet - then it's too hot and sunny and there's too many other things needing to be done, so we think maybe we'll do it in the fall - but then the weather suddenly turns to cold and/or wet, and on top of that we figure the snow will just mess it up again anyway...

I am campaigning to have it replaced with Trex, if anyone has any experience with that stuff (good or bad); one of the support posts heaved up rather badly a few winters back, which doesn't really bother me all that much but it seems to be driving hubs crazy, so I figure if we're going to do something major to the deck let's do it with materials that won't need so much maintenance. The cost might turn out to be a factor, but mainly I'm wondering how it actually holds up to snow and sun and whatever (it's on the south side of our house, so it does get pretty much constant sun exposure).

Got our Trex deck steps back in 2011 and haven't had a single issue with them.

Before and after. They still look new.

That's good to hear, Pirl - thank you!

You're very welcome!

Weedwhacker said: The cost might turn out to be a factor, but mainly I'm wondering how it actually holds up to snow and sun and whatever (it's on the south side of our house, so it does get pretty much constant sun exposure).

Sharon's niece has a quite new composit decking and it has warped heavily.
Sun will bleach it and from my days landscaping, no deck not made of wood has ever lived up to the salesman hype.

Problems With Trex Decking

In 1996 Trex launched its line of composite decking products to rave reviews and revolutionized the decking industry. Since that time Trex has diligently worked to revise, expand, and perfect their line of composite decking products. Going public in 1999, Trex has become the world's largest manufacturer of wood alternative decking products offering the industry's widest array of composite deck products, which are available in more than 40 countries around the world. Now it seems more people are becoming dissatisfied with the longevity and quality of Trex products. So, what are the biggest problems with Trex decking, and what can you do about them?
https://gambrick.com/problems-...

I've never had any of the problems cited in the article.

I think I had actually read that very article - or one that was similar - a while back. But then recently we talked to a contractor friend who said that the ones he's installed have seemed to hold up well, and gave us some tips about the installation - apparently the joists (? or whatever it is that supports the decking) need to be only 12" apart to prevent warping. Hard to know what to actually think!

And then in a recent Menard's ad I was looking at the various composite decking materials and there was actually one that said "fades gradually to a natural weathered color." Say what?? People actually WANT their deck to fade? So many things in life that I don't seem to be able to understand...

Weedwhacker said: Say what?? People actually WANT their deck to fade? So many things in life that I don't seem to be able to understand...

No matter what they want to call it, plastic is plastic and the sun will eventually win any game it plays with plastic.

Yes, the "plastic is plastic" issue is kind of where my mind is stuck too. That Trex sure looks beautiful when it's new, though - the landlord just put a new deck on the house that my Florida in-laws rent here for the summer and it looks great - but of course a brand-new deck of any kind looks great! LOL

Got, home last week and the rain gauge show 41/2 inches of rain.
I left in a massive storm but as bad as the rain was up North, the storm where I was , was not real bad though it did snap off a large, near 3 foot diameter Mulberry Tree at the house. (The Mulberry had three trunks when I furst took care of that lawn, now it is gone. )

Fifty miles NorthWest they had very bad damaging weather.
At home the storm did finally shake the last of the dead limbs out of a Maple tree that has been very annoyingly dropping dead branches for several years.

It also did to my beautiful South corn garden what a storm a weeks earlier had done to my beautiful North corn garden , left one third lying flat and twisted.
One odd part was, one variety, Lorenzo's Corn, was only four feet tall plus or minus, and the out side rows were standing but the wind knocked down the center section (it looked like some one had backed riding lawn mower in) .
It was a variety I had never grown before and I do not know if it was just very, very slow growing or had problems; it was just setting ears and was very , very tender.

My sweet corn had gone from eating stage to stalks turning brown in 10 days, so I just pulled a lot of those out of the ground.
I could not stay and do a LOT more work as I had to come back and cut up the tree plus Sharon has dude coming to work on the rental apt. bathroom and she wants me there.
My brother came home last weekend , so I did not get much done beside work on the garden but as fussy as he is (and a good friend) they both like the Chilli I made out of home grown tomatoes and chiles. (Used a different type of beans I got from a close out store I had never seen before and will probably never see again.)

Not mowing lawns every week and due to having to be available to help Sharon with the eviction, I did not get squat done this year as I was here, there and every where but not one place as long as I should have been so while I lost weight this summer I am gawd awfully out of shape, compared to what I would normally be this time of year.
Cutting up that tree and hauling it away will be far more nasty than it should have been.

It's "always something" -- but it seems like you got hit with a lot of different somethings this year, RpR. One thing at a time... and hope for a better season next year.