Just A Short Update

Just a short update with a few photos to let you know we are fine, all of us have a pulse and nothing has really changed since the last post. The is Henry sound to sleep with Watson holding his head in place so he can clean the inside of Henry's ears and later his jowls as Henry will wake up soon after. It is a daily morning thing now but it will eventually change.

From Sunshine To Storms

Just like anywhere else in the USA, weather can change in an instant. I know my weather changes from yesterday afternoon to this morning are nothing compared to those having severe weather up in the Dakotas, Montana, and the Central Midwest yesterday. I caught some of the national weather stories last night. My worst weather of the day is not suppose to start until around noon, about the time I tune into my IU game. How will the satellite signal do in high winds and thunderstorm conditions? I am hoping the forecast is wrong

So anyway, back to yesterday. It was beautiful. It got up to 72° and as you can see Stella and Heidi were in shock. They couldn't move, they couldn't think clearly to figure out if this was a dream or was spring really here. Stella and I did take an afternoon walk but it was without the camera because it was a spur of the moment ... I didn't know I was going for a walk when I went outside with her. She decided we were.

Heidi heard me ask if she wanted her toenails cut. I wasn't sure if I was going to have to pick her up to take her to the backyard for that task or if she would eventually agree with me that her nails were way past due. I thought I'd give her time to decide, I didn't want to force anything on her. She is the best of all the hounds I've had when it comes to trimming her long nails. Winston was the second best, and Sadie was 0 on a scale of 1-10.

I was a little surprised that neither hound sprinted to the backyard and head dove into the grass with excitement. They acted their normal slow, analytical self, deciding just where they were going to go. I decided I'd walk around the yard enjoying the warm sunshine, maybe they would follow me.

By the time I returned Heidi has almost decided it was time. I went inside and traded my camera for the nail clippers. Without me saying a word, she followed me to the backyard, laid down and rolled over on her side ... true story. Within a few minutes all of those extra long nails were trimmed back to where none of them touched the ground when she was standing. She sprinted for the door because she knows a dog bone is always her reward after getting her nails trimmed.

Stella was not as cooperative. She use to like having her nails trimmed but after three of them she decided she had enough. I had to get a few more while she was sleeping on the couch last night but even that woke her up. I have two more paws to do today, someway.

They say we will get high winds today with our thunderstorms, but in our area that is only 20mph - 30mph. That will still make a howling sound up here on the hill though. That sound is what woke me a little after 2am.

You can see from the rain we received last night there is some flooding starting to show. He installed a huge drainage system a few years ago that starts behind that corner of trees on the left, diagonal in that low area to the trees on the right ... but by this afternoon that will be flooded as if his drainage system is not working.

The crushed egg shells continue to get whiter as it rains more. We are currently above the average for rain/snow this time of year and will add another inch to that surplus today. I better get my lawn mower ready for a lot of work this spring.

This shows why I am filling in all of the worn, low spots of the carport floor this spring. 44 years of wear will do that to concrete I guess.

A sure sign that all hound walks are canceled for today. The field was still soft from underground saturation yesterday, it will be muddy today. Stella doesn't like getting her paws wet and I don't like water running up the sides of my boots either.

Yes, these low spots will be filled in and repaired this spring.

As you can see my blog design has changed again this morning. I like the format, I just can't decide what colors to use, header image or no image. I even changed my computer back from Apple's "dark mode" to "light mode" and both desktop photos ... I put their desktop picture of Yosemite on my other monitor. I think it was the National Geographic channel a few weeks ago that was showing the movie "Solo" for free ... quite a movie and quite a climb for "free climbing."

I was in the mood to watch some movies late afternoon yesterday. Inserted the first DVD, the player changed my tv input to the blu-ray player input as it should. Then the screen went blank. After trying many things, reading the owners manual for the dvd player, I finally went online and found out that it was a common problem with Samsung DVD players ... I had just been lucky the past few years, having no issues.

By the time I tried their troubleshooting steps a second time ... my remote for the dvd player would not work. NOTHING worked. I went to the Best Buy website, put "Sony Blu-Ray Player" in the search and had a few to choose from. With $40 in rewards that I had forgot about and an expiration date of March 23rd ... I guess it happened for a reason.

I bought a Sony 4K Blu-Ray player with a lot of stuff I won't use for a pretty low price after my $40 discount that they showed at the final step for checking out. Instead of driving to Bloomington to pick it up I took them up on their offer for free shipping and a delivery for tomorrow. (Friday) That was the second Samsung dvd player that has stopped for the exact same reason.

I use to have a Samsung tv, so I bought the Samsung dvd player at that time.

I can hear the wind and rain off and on outside while I write this. About all I can tell is that I will be watching basketball at 12:30pm hopefully without signal interruption, and explaining to Stella why we are not taking any walks today. She will figure that out soon enough when she goes outside this morning. Heidi may not get off the carport at lunch if she sees and hears the rain and wind.

While I tried to post this at 9:30am, I lost my HughesGen 5 satellite internet signal.  :)

I added these recent photos after I posted this morning. This is right after their lunch, and Stella was not interested going out into the yard. Luckily she dumped her tanks first thing this morning before her breakfast.

At least it is not snowing and single digit temps here in 'the tropics' of Southern Indiana.

Another Year Ends With RAIN

It's pretty amazing to look back through the blog to previous years, the exact date, to see how things change within that 12 month period. I can also search certain dates in my large Photos Library on my computer and see the changes all on one screen. It wasn't until I looked back in the older blog to see that last year it was -1° with a windchill of -9°. Consequently the hound walks were canceled for the day.

Then the foggy brain cells of mine remembered last year. The coldest winter in history here in 'the tropics' of Southern Indiana. For over a month from December 15th to January 15th it never was warmer than 32° and many of those 30 days had high temps of single digits ... some below zero.

I started this post this morning with on the first two photos of Stella. It has been raining all night. Add all of that water to the saturated field, it was not walkable. Stella knew it before she stepped off the carport. She stood listening to the rain drops that were falling from the tips of the tree limbs, but it wasn't raining. She knew we were not walking at 8am. It was too dark, much darker than those two photos show. She stood in the yard a little confused.

Heidi didn't think it was that bad by lunch time, as she snuck around the corner of the house. It was warm enough to be above her threshold but she didn't stay outside long.

After raining all morning it didn't look bad for standing water. Reinstalling a new drainage system is the first thing on the list for a March/April time. It's old and obviously not working as good as it use to.

Early afternoon the winds picked up as predicted and rain was blowing from the west

About the time I thought it was over, I had a "Weather Advisory" hit my inbox, telling me high winds are scheduled for later this afternoon or early evening. Will those 40mph - 60mph winds disturb my tv satellite signal while I try to watch two good football games?

A little after 2pm the lights flickered, the internet lost service as well as my tv signal, with it raining so hard I couldn't see outside. When you see the amount of standing water you will not believe that short burst of rain was less than 20 minutes long.

Stella doesn't like to walk through water. Just to the left of those posts is her way outside. She snuck around the car thinking she could bypass the large puddle

She stood and thought of a plan. She had gone outside this morning to dump her tanks but likes to always go out after lunch. Walks were cancelled today so she knew she would not be able to get to the field. She doesn't like getting her feet wet.

Not until I cleared all of the overgrown brush in this area a few years ago, did I have that water path down the center of the yard. In fact with all the heavy brush, I never saw standing water of any kind in that area.

When the neighbor's culvert is flooded, that's a sign of a lot of rain water. Before December 1st we were 10" above our annual average of 42". We have had three major rain storms this month.

As Stella walked along side the car ... she saw more flooding ... she was stopped and would not go any further.

Sniffing the air, she didn't see any way nor smell any way of getting outside into the field or yard. She slowly turned and headed back inside to wait for a try later on.

We decided to "button down the hatches" and prepare for high winds. With the ground so saturated I am never a fan of high winds. In 2008 with more rain than what we have now, straight line winds pulled every tree out of 80' of bank, landing those trees parallel to the house. The closest tree was 8' from the front door and the front yard was covered with fallen trees.

I hope the winds don't disturb my satellite signal. I'll be watching the Michigan State - Oregon game at 5pm and Northwestern - Utah game at 7pm ... right during range of time for the high winds warning.

62° today in 'the tropics' of Southern Indiana.

Happy New Year !!!!

The Hounds Put Their Rain Boots On

After two days and nights of a lot of rain, you'll see some standing water behind Stella as we started our walk this morning. As we moved to the back of the field the 'pond' increased in size. None of that bothered Sadie of course ... to her, it's the field and it's time to track scent.

Hard to believe another Friday is here in 'the tropics' of Southern Indiana.