not so hot

Our first heat waves are in the books, and they were pleasantly brief and ended with strong west winds that kept the house cool. As noted before the first one ended with thunder and a lot of rain; nothing so dramatic this time.

Today was an excellent day: we awoke to morning clouds that burned away just before 10AM. Most of the day from noon to 6PM was low 70s but a quick half-hour pushed the high to 79°. A couple of hours later the west wind came in a rush, and at 7:45 we are in the mid-50s!

An excellent day to get work done, relax, and work a little more. A few well-placed fans and the house cools quickly. The next several days will be in the 60s so that was just enough fun for now.

I've pressure-washed our deck - again - so if tomorrow is the last Warm Day we can get it stained. I washed it thoroughly last fall but timing was off for a staining, so it endured the harshest winter I'd ever seen!

The day was also excellent thanks to my encounter with three deer in our yard. They were distracted by a neighbor's chain saw so I got to the edge of the deck just before they romped over to the edge of our yard nearest to the deck, about 20 feet away. I clucked softly and they looked me over, but preferred my sound to the ones next door. I took a 1-minute video and here's a snip from it. The one on the right is still watching for the chain-saw!

cute v. pretty

I recently took the compost out to the future-garden-area, and spooked one of the three DLF (deer little friends) that often come to visit. The other two sauntered into the yard and the third rejoined them pretty soon - and they almost immediately began foraging on the azalea flowers

What does one do when confronted with cute deerlings eating pretty flowers?  Well in my case, I grab a camera :+) the K-r and DA50-200 to be precise.  I was standing about 20 feet away on the deck, and only received an occasional glance as I clicked away --

The flowers will be back next year - who can say about the deer?  Just don't let me catch them in the blueberries, which is where that first one may have been munching!