Summer and I kited yesterday, finding enough wind on the ENE side to get our kites in the air over the cornfield. The dogs walked over our strings a couple of time and we did have some nosedives, but finally, they were up. It was a marginal day and once my unicorn kites zoomed for the corn only to pull up at the last minute.

THEN, Summer’s kite string crossed mine and her kite started to come down, and eventually it did. My kite was left flying from the spot on the grass where its string had come down. I should have run up and grabbed the string where it came out from under Summer’s string, but I thought I could wind my way to it quickly. Wrong. Almost there and the kite started down and I couldn’t jerk the string to send it back up. One of the reasons I didn’t drop the spool and run to the crossed point is because I saw a dog staring at me, thinking. “She’ll drop that spool and I will run and get all tangled in it.”

So we hauled it in through a sea of corn tassels and went in and watched a couple of VHS movies. Then we picked up and came home.

Today is overcast and dark and still. Perhaps the atmosphere is influenced by the kids’ knowledge that tomorrow is the first day of school.

And I must get all spiffed up – well, a minor spiffing. Oh, and I need to measure my neck circumference because I could not resist coughing up 36 dollars for this necklace.

Yes, we got a kite up at Mother’s; actually, I got another one up several times, but it was inherently unstable and kept nose diving. We put two rolls of string on the kite Summer had up there in the sky and then the string got tangled in a tree.

Then Summer got seriously tangled in the kite string that came down. Oh, that was fun. She’s out there with kite string and she gets tangled up. She’s 14, you know. FOURTEEN.

Oh, Summer, you know that thing about not running with scissors, well don’t run with dangling kite string, either.

I need to go whang my head on the wall.

I plugged in the camera wire to download a picture of  the LPSH cowbell from the Catholic Rummage Sale and found about 70 pictures of Shane in a Wubba exercise.  So, I guess this is pretty much the Shane post. However, Secret Agent Woo wants to send this message: Lunch A and Lunch B are okay because the food is hot.

I have no idea what the letters stand for, other than the H & S, of course.

Now, himself:

Looking at you.

Got the Wubba.

Ready to go.

Not this yard – Mother’s – and a marathon mowing session that stretched from about 1pm to 8pm. I had a couple of breaks, as did the mower, but I was pushing it and started thinking – I actually thought this – a machine doesn’t have a heart; a machine gets to a point and stops. I thought, “You should stop and check the oil because it is so hot out, but I didn’t.  So, at the very last, at the far north end, it chugged and stopped and the oil light came on.

Boy, that oil was hot. Machines are smart enough to know when they have to stop. I’m glad for that – especially when they are expensive machines. Maybe, though, some machines have hearts – like the planes in WWII that brought brought crews home on a wing and a prayer. But in an Indiana field there was no need for such heroics. I sat there, made a phone call, sat some more and then got it started and we went directly to its shed.

I was filthy with the sweat of the day and the thrown back grass clippings, but I pulled my Dorfman hat on

and looking like a character from The Grapes of Wrath, went into Taco Bell and ordered Deal #3 and a 99¢ 5 layer beefy burrito. ( FYI: Deal #4 is that same 99¢ burrito as its main item, while Deal #3 has a gordita supreme which goes for $1.89)

Oh, they just called to say the Catholic Rummage Sale is going on . . . .

I’m back. I took Cameron and he got a couple of VHS tapes and I got retro tableclothes for $1 and a vintage bell to ring a football games from a defunct high school (50¢º. The lady watched my choices go into the bag and said, “You have a good eye.” I told Cameron that was a great compliment. I also got a monk for a dollar, but it’s for secret use in a Christmas present.

Okay, now the FO girl. I got a call on the way up to Mother’s from Summer. Sounded like sobs mangling the words It was horrible. I knew better – she admitted it wasn’t bad at all and friends were glad to see her and she has Lunch A which is so much better than Lunch C.

Well, I am trying to convince her that we need to vacuum Shane with the wet/dry power sucker. He is shedding – big time. It’s as if baby bunnies are lying around on the floor . . . and our clothes.

Just a little update on the freshman and FO (Freshman Orientation): She is now at East Noble High School. She said she didn’t understand why everyone wanted to grow up and said she wished she could be five forever. I opted for three – I figured that was a cozy, secure time and I don’t remember the angst of being three – if there was any. I think I remember Pokagan Soda Pop and finally getting people to realize I liked the red kind, rather than the orange.

I remember not really wanting to go to kindergarten. See, that was a five memory; I don’t really think I’d go for five. Six was big, fat pencils and seven was the dreaded school music teacher. Don’t even want to think about eight – that might have been when I discovered I had the hang of the school thing and didn’t think it necessitated me sitting all day in a little chair/desk thing.  Free reading time was cool, though. Getting called on early was crucial because they you could zone out. ‘Course, there were some kids who’d complain, “They want to go first so they don’t have to pay attention anymore.” They were right

Ninth grade was Mrs. Wheat’s algebra class. I think she was the age I am now. Her late husband’s name was Phineas and he had been the band director who wrote the school song. She was nerve-wracking. Then I had her for geometry in tenth grade. Oh, yeah, the days at the board with a proof. I remember one time she looked at my work from her chair in front ans remarked, “That looks a little funny, AmeliaJake.” And I asked, “Mrs. Wheat, do you mean funny as in strange or funny as in ha-ha?” I was serious . . . she scared me that much. I think the class got a laugh out of it; I don’t remember what Mrs. Wheat said. Probably, just as well.

I think it is preposterous – this starting school so early business. No one asked me about it, but that hasn’t stopped me from giving my opinion over the years.

In the near past, I have just focused on the early date of freshman orientation, but this year, due to the presence of a certain female freshman in our house, I am more fully experiencing the big FO.  I don’t know if the stress level will climb or not for the next hour plus. I was irritated about having to take myself over to the dentist’s for a cleaning, but now I sort of welcome the time in the chair with my cell phone off. Someone else will get the call about a certain freshman who duct taped herself into her locker and won’t come out.

I got up innocently this morning, after having being mugged by an horrible nightmare, and looked at my email. There, listed as coming in about The Leaning Cow, was one from LZP. Of course, you could read it below, but I think we all need to wander around trying to get this one out of our minds. No, we don’t ALL have to; I just don’t want to  be alone.

Here is it . . . coming at ya:

SPAMORES….  take two individual slices of spam and put peeps on the middle… don’t do this while camping  in the great Northwest or you will end up as Grizzly bear droppings.

See, my dream about driving a tiny white sports car and driving through a gas station, hooking onto a hose and ripping it off the pump, pales against the image of Spam patties with peeps between them.

Boy, cast aspersions on Spam and people will speak up. And go to the trouble of sending pictures. This came this afternoon from Der Bingle.

Der Bingle stood in a grocery and took pictures of his Spam. It is a simple sentence, one that I am compelled to repeat over and over again – kind of like in wondrous awe.

Very rarely does the man use his phone for pictures . . . but, of course, this is SPAM. I wonder if he had them triple bag it? Will the Ohio Redoubt become The Spam Cafe & Roadhouse?

Word by word from LZP:

Enclosed in the package is a case of spam.  Not really it is a sparra paddle (sparrow) that was used by Dr Bill to whomp sparras. The Rack from which these paddles hung with the names of the hunters is ready for restoration and display. In the dead of winter after dark all the of age men-folk would go out to the darkened barn and with sparra paddles in hand they would start hooting and hollering to scare the sparras into flying around and then they would get whomped. It was important to keep the sparras out of the barn because they would poop all over and spread disease…. the dreaded sparra poop disease. At least once usually twice during an epic sparra battle one or two of the hunters would get whomped in the back of the head by another less than bright hunter, or they would fall out of the hayloft. After these hunts the men-folk would gather round the supper table and feast on Spamwiches, as it would take 10 – 15 sparras to make a sandwich. I have also packed in some peeps to be used as practice sparras.

(I will be taking a better picture of each item, but I wanted to show the whole effect right off the paddle.)