August 17

 OH. MY.GOODNESS!!! Half past August.The time just slips by. I was just thinking that some of the trees have a tinge of yellow on their leaves. The days for the last ten have reached into the high 70s to mid 80s and the nights into the 50s and 60s. The gardens are doing well though I have squash doing well on the summer squash vines. However I consider them a success because the bees seem to have enjoyed them. The morning glory vines are blooming--finally. The little rose is still doing well and shows no sign of that mosaic disease that plagued last year's roses. The dahlias are providing a great show--too bad I have to grow them as annuals here. They aren't hardy enough for this area.

There are times when I seriously wonder if our high tech provides the convenience promised. Today is one of those times. I had to reconnect our blue ray player to our wireless router to get Pandora. Every so often the system kicks it off and I have to go through the frustrating process--AGAIN. I used to have quite a collection of CDs and often regret that I donated the lot to the local library. However, we have reached a stage where freeing up space and having fewer things to dust (barely) edges out having the things.

Just this morning the news had a brief mention that the Federal Government is projecting new water restrictions for the states on the lower Colorado River and Mexico because the water level is so low the operations of Hoover Dam are threatened. A story I saw yesterday said the Feds are telling the states to negotiate some binding settlement or else Federal mandates will be imposed. It may be of interest to note that electrical generation at the dam is now about 50%. Other major rivers are also running dry. This little story is about "hunger stones" on the Elbe river now revealed by the low river levels. Transport on the Rhine is threatened by similarly low levels. And after the wildfires in France I read that Paris got a month's worth of rain in 90 minutes. Paris isn't the only city receiving a deluge.