Started raining last night in the middle of the night...

So I was glad I'd done the yard work and gotten it all mostly done. Went out there after getting up at about 10am, and it was a swamp. There'll be no mowing today. Just went out to get a look, and most of the standing water is soaked into the soil, but there's still a few soggy bits.



Now the sun is out and it's muggy as hell out there. I tell ya, after years and years of drought, we need all this rain, but enough is friggin' enough!



Both of our local lakes are way above normal levels, due to this several month long deluge. After being 20 to 25 feet below normal for years, they've filled now to over 25 feet above normal, with only the tops of trees visible where boat ramps used to be.



Glad I got a chance to plant a few things last night before quitting work.



Still have a few things to put in, and plans to buy more, but need to pull a few more weeds in the step garden before I can do that. Elected not to go there last night. Enough was enough.

Well, It's Fathers Day, and dad and the others will be coming over here at about 3:30 so we can hit the Outback. He loves the hell out of their coconut shrimp, and I love the Bloomin' Onion. If you get a chance, and why the hell wouldn't you, ask for the onion with honey mustard sauce to dip it in. It's a hell of a lot better tasting than the mustard they normally give you.



I've been hangin' with this dude since the folks were stationed in Bermuda in 1960, and we're still in business. We've had our ups and downs, as folks will, but we love each other to death, and everything is working out the way it should.



I grew up thinking his choices in life, to leave home and spend 32 years and 9 months in the Air Force, had made my life harder (this is us, just before we left England in about 1970) Who'd a thought this little kid was gonna grow up to be such a Sasquatch?

Sis and I both grew up longing for the stability that we saw in our cousins lives. Their dads never left Bell county, making a life here. Their kids didn't have a lot of the stuff we had, or travel and live in the exotic places we did, but they didn't have to go to a half dozen elementary schools, and two or three high schools, like my sister and I did. She had it worse than me, being older and around when he was lower in rank and moving almost every year. Our cousins lives seemed so much more well adjusted and happy whenever we'd visit.

Well, I moved down here in about 1994, and had a chance to learn a few things about those cousins. Turns out that never leaving central Texas can put a huge set of blinders on your head, and turn you into a ridiculous friggin' redneck. After banging my head up against that set of folks for a few years, trying to build a relationship like the one I had always longed for, I came to the realization that our different lives had made us very different people, and that I liked who I was a lot more than the fools many of them are comfortable being.

I grew up a huge amount from that realization, and it changed the way I saw my life in a big way. In retrospect, I wouldn't change a thing about how I grew up. It made me who I am now, and I like who I am a lot. I just wish I'd somehow had this epiphany 40 years ago. It would have saved me a lot of grief.

I still regret not being born about ten years sooner, so that I could have gotten to know my paternal grandfather, or spend more time with my maternal grandparents when they were younger, but there is nothing to be done about all that, and no good reason to linger on the feelings. Fate is fate, and there is no fixing it. You are dealt a hand in life, and I've waisted a huge amount of my time regretting my cards when I should have been learning how to play them, but that's getting behind me too. Onward and upward from now on, full speed ahead.



Dad and the ladies should be here in a while, so I'd better get busy makin' the place right for inspection. You guys have a great Sunday, and all you dads out there enjoy your day. Take care, cheers.