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The White Stripes - "Elephant" (2003 - V2 records) My Photographs You like photos? I love taking them. Click here, if you wanna see some of my work
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Tuesday, Apr. 29, 2003 - 8:31 p.m. No, I didn�t blow up Casa Roadiepig. Hard is it might be for you to believe, a house DID blow up here in Mohall today. It was described on the evening news as �abandoned�, but someone must have forgotten to turn the gas off when they left. Pieces of it ended up almost a block away. The house is totaled, with fire damage to the houses on either side of it, too. Just a reminder: That was NOT MY HOUSE�� I woke up at my usual workday time this morning. Maybe even a few minutes earlier than normal. I guess my mind was tired of installing the new gas lines, over and over again, and wanted my body to get on with this job. Everything went very smoothly. The old pipe had a plug in it, blocking the gas from leaking out. I was sure that it would be locked down tightly, and would be hard to remove. It broke loose with only a little elbow grease. After that, all it took was patience and lots of pipe dope. The hole was already in the floorboard, so all I had to do was cut through all three layers of linoleum (how many years of flooring do you think that is?), and tighten everything down. Not too much, thought. I didn�t want to crack a fitting or something, did I? After I assembled everything, I did the �soapy water� test. This (what everyone told me) is the way to check for a tiny gas leek. Slop some of the mixture on every pipe joint, and any leek will cause bubbles to form in the liquid. None did. Since my sense of smell is terrible (too many years of allergies), and since Lease was at work, I asked Cheryl next door to be my gas �sniffer� for me. She checked both rooms, and proclaimed them free of the rotten egg� gas smell. I then had to wait for the delivery guys. They stopped by at 10:30, a half hour early. Cool. They hauled off the old wreck, and then installed the new stove in less than 30 minutes. They did a nice job, making sure there weren�t any leeks from their connections, and leveling the legs on our uneven kitchen floor. Considering I get the $40 for delivery and setup back in the form of a rebate, I sure am glad I didn�t decide to haul this thing myself�.. They finished in time for me to take Lease to lunch. The temporary cap our dentist put on Lease�s cracked tooth came off this morning. She didn�t eat anything crunchy or hard. She was only brushing her teeth, and was being extra careful on the bad tooth�s side of her mouth. For now, she has decided she doesn�t want to go back until her appointment for the cap fitting, 15 days away. If the raw nerve decides to act up again, she might change her mind. We just grabbed a quick lunch (Burger King). My purpose for picking her up for the meal was mainly to get her out of the office. It was too nice a day to spend all of it inside of a cubical� The second �day�, as described in the title above? I spent the afternoon fishing. I picked the Nuclear Power Plant Lake. Since the water is heated, I figured the crappie would be in a spawning mood. In the Big Lake south of here, the crappies are still suspended in 10 feet of water. This is what people who have the time to name the various stages of a fish�s life call a �staging mode�. Since I was fishing from the shoreline and not in a boat, that makes them hard for me to reach. All I know about �staging� is that it means the spawn is about 2-3 weeks away. When they spawn, you can see the fish in 8� of water or less, laying their eggs and such. They will grab your lure, even thought they have to see you. They are just super aggressive at the perfect time. The crappies were close to the bank, but not in the shallows. I caught 16 nice fish, plus a bucketload of bluegills of all sizes. Since I wasn�t planning on keeping any fish today, the size of these fish didn�t matter. Just to be able to take in a beautiful mid-spring day was my reward. I fished in a hidden cove that we found about 25 years ago. To reach it, you have to walk down an old, abandoned gravel roadway. This road has been taken back by nature in the 30+ years that this lake has existed. Where once there were vehicles, there now are wild flowers in varieties I have not seen before. I ought to take a field guide with me the next time I go there, just so I can figure out what some of them are. This is the road that provided two of my �lost� irises in my garden. On one side of the road, there once stood a farmhouse. All that is left is a rusty fence, a small paved driveway (still not reclaimed by grasses and trees), and what is left of the flowers the former owners once grew around the property. The iris plants are now in too much shade to produce blooms. That hasn�t stopped the corms from multiplying, covering an area of at least 30 square feet. Three years ago, Codeman and I were on our way to the cove when he noticed the irises growing along the fence. I dug a couple of the plants with my bare hands (not hard to do, because irises grow right on the surface of the soil). Last year, those plants bloomed for us for the first time. It took me a little while to remember where they came from, since I have picked up several of these old heirloom plants this way. When they bloom this May (if they bloom, I should say), I will post a photo here for you to see. Since they won�t ever bloom again on the old homestead, my garden gives them a second chance to show their blooms to the world��
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