It was already hot and sticky when I left the house on this Saturday morn. Regretfully, I had to divvy up my a.m. agenda between a walk and yard work. I set out early to get both things accomplished, and decided to head down to the railroad tracks in Wyandotte as the large, leafy trees along Emmons Boulevard provided a little respite from the sun that was already high and bright in the sky. It was a clear and cloudless morning and no breeze to speak of. The neighborhoods hummed with air conditioning units working hard again and since the dew point, like the humidity, was so high, it was hard to tell if the automatic sprinklers had made the grass so wet or it was just a heavy dew. I made the trip to the tracks and immediately turned around and headed back for home. By this time more dogs and their owners were out and about and there was the unmistakable whir of mowers and weed whippers as people scrambled to get their yard work finished before the impending stormy weather.

Once home, I removed the pedometer and noted I had chocked up a quick 3 ½ miles, then I switched to my comfortable old loafers and headed outside. Whew, it was hot now. I dragged out my push mower and did a hasty job on the front and back yards, then went into the backyard to scrutinize the weeds to see if they needed my attention. I was happy to see I had held those prickly thistles and creeping and winding buggers at bay, so I just had to nip my roses. The bees were all over the yard, busily sucking down the nectar from the coneflowers and the roses along the fence. They were burrowing down deep and very involved with their mission, so I waited a bit, went back in the house for the camera, took a picture, returned to the house, and back out in yard where they were still there. Finally, rather impatiently I had to shoo them away with my pruning shears, so I could tackle the roses. In case you’re wondering, yes, these are the same Knock Out Roses which at Mother’s Day I thought had given up the ghost. These rosebushes have rallied back and are full of blooms, the end result of cutting them down to mere stubs, alot of organic rose fertilizer and crossed fingers. Hmmmmm – maybe I do have a green thumb after all. Speaking of digits, I never work in the yard without heavy gloves as I am so terrified of bugs. Somehow, while pruning the spent rose blossoms, a wayward thorn pierced through my heavy leather glove and stabbed me on my right ring finger. I yelped immediately, then, because I was annoyed, I yanked off my glove to pluck it out, but it was already embedded deep into the pad of that finger. I figured I would deal with it once inside the house, but standing under a bright light, I saw the thorn was lodged so far down I had to perform minor surgery. A sterilized safety pin, a quick rinse in alcohol and a band aid to pad the big wound and I was good to go. Or, so I thought. I favored that finger, trying not to bang the boo boo, while I did a few things in the kitchen, then sat down at the computer. Ouch! Well, good thing it is the weekend, so no pounding the keys for a few days … I still got this blog post done, even though I tried to refrain from using the letters “o”, “l” and the numeral “0”. Well, if I was going to sustain a casualty from the backyard, I sure am glad I messed up a finger that gets very little action on the keyboard!