weekend's over?

I've ordered a new engraving bench. It should arrive this week. This is going to be a huge honking mess, because I pretty much need to take apart the entire "studio" in order to put it all back together anew. So I'm not going to move anything until I'm sure I have all the pieces to put together a completely functional engraving bench, because I won't be able to do anything until it's all totally assembled. What a pain! But I'm excited about the prospect of (finally!) engraving metal!

I've run into a case of artist's block on the turkey scrims. That's quite rare for me. I had to make some deviations from my original leafy background plans, so that kinda threw things for a loop. The backgrounds are actually done, and the turkeys themselves are the foregrounds, so now it's the middle part that's got me kinda muddled up. I think I know what to do though. I'll show you eventually...

In the mean time I've been focusing on the last remaining image (on the backside of one of the turkeys) and I can't show you that one. I won't be able to show all the work until the entire gun is engraved and reassembled, which I don't expect to happen before Christmas (though my part will be done in the next few days, oh thank goodness!)

The tree guys came out on Friday and removed the fallen tree (the one that squished the fence). Two of the 16' top rails were broken. One was salvageable (only a small piece broke off) but the other needed to be replaced. One post is broken underground and now leans inward toward the pasture, and wiggles. However, it's set into a cement strip that borders the yard, so removing it would be a serious pain in the booty, and putting in a new one would be an even more serious pain, and since the hot wire (at least theoretically) keeps the horses from abusing the fence, I decided to just leave it. I say theoretically because I've found several bent insulators, which means someone (Gwen!) is still trying to scratch on it. What a turd. Anyway, that stretch of fence will never win a beauty contest. The wire got so totally mashed down that it was impossible to totally straighten, so it's kinda rumpled, and the post leans a little. But, it'll get the job done, and the good news is I did not dislocate any body parts while working on it.

The little blue chicken is great, and not spoiled at all. Nooooo not at all, uh uh. ;-) I put her outside during the day, and of course she complained, so I took her out to the pasture with me, and she just followed me around making all sorts of happy noises, flying up onto whatever part of me is most inconvenient at any given time. My animals are all so helpful. Soooo helpful.

I took this photo last week, here's a little California gold for you. I think two of you will know exactly where this is. :-)



This is my favorite time of year. It's been crazy humid for the last few days though, and kinda warm. I don't know how people survive in the south, hoo boy. I would not be able to live there.