Red Shafted Flicker
Taking cattle to the desert (click to see)
Curtis when he arrived Friday.Woke up beautiful fog that soon lifted. I love the shredded clouds that waft over the hills and canyons. It's a cool morning.
Saturday late afternoon we got another thunderstorm and rain as has been “normal” for several weeks now. This time there was an abundance of thunder and lightning and it woke me up from a nap. The main storm seemed to come from the south, which is a little unusual. I wondered if the power would go off. But there is no electricity south of us all the way to Farson. and that is a small blip on the landscape. Not much in that direction for lightning to strike - a lot of empty country.
It rained large drops that drummed on the studio roof, making "rain on the roof" especially loud. The wind rippled the hay – now about a foot high or more – looking like waves on the green prairie. It's a thing I love to see.
So lo and behold just about as the storm began in earnest, a man called – he had to be one of the weathermen from NOAA in Riverton. He said his name but not his job. Sandra told him to call me because we were the furthest south with a phone. She’s a weather spotter. He asked a lot of questions about the storm. Said their radar wouldn't reach the low elevations over here because we are in the "shadow" of the Wind Rivers. He said the worst of it should only last 20 or 30 minutes, but they were concerned whether it could hold large hail up to ¾ of an inch and wanted to know if we’d gotten any hail. We didn’t get hail here but it put down a lot of water with large heavy drops. Heard on the radio that there was a tornado watch/warning in most of the counties in SE Wyoming until midnight. There was a lot of flashing lightning and rain for about three hours and thunder rumbled nearly continuously. It was an interesting diversion in an otherwise very quiet day. Muddy Creek is high, and I’ve heard a lot of the irrigation ditches north of us have too much water.
Bonnie said: "I'm surprised that you didn't get hail. We got a lot and it looked like we were on the edge. Towards you it was much darker so I thought it was worse but I guess not. It didn't do my flowers any good. Kind of shredded the petunias. "
The book I’m reading – Shadow Country - has E. J. Watson killing Belle Starr http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belle_Starr and fleeing to Floriida. It’s a novel, so I was curious how the author began with that piece of history and made it plausible. Like, how do you sake one rather obscure name in history and make him and all his relatives and neighbors come to life. I googled Belle Starr and found out a lot about her. And one of the suspects in her murder was E.J. Watson, a real person! I have a feeling that this E.J. Watson will end up not being the same E.J. Watson – or something like that. Anyway all his neighbors “executed” him, and the story goes from there with flashbacks and accounts from each of the characters. The way he writes you feel you are there in that time and place - the keys next to the Everglades on the west coast of Florida.
Joe drove his truck out to irrigate before the storm, just mostly along the main ditch. Usually a lot of debris will float down with higher water and then clog up the laterals. The dogs are finding something bad out there to eat, and Sparky looks kind of sick. Neither of them wanted their dinner. But Raven did eat the canned food. I gave them.
Today Joe is working on that utility room sink faucet. It has still been leaking. He's really giving the faucet the once over. It gives him something to do. We may still have to find a new one that fits.
Today is Flag Day here in the United States. Two hundred thirty-two years ago, on this day in 1777, the government officially adopted the Stars and Stripes as our national flag.
