August Showers bring...Fairy Circles?

There's not a lot of "news" to pass along.  No snake sightings.  Life has settled into a routine.  This is more about the everyday observances that Neta and I encounter on our (mostly) daily walks when we take a break to get away from "the office".  There is always a new fire ant hill or three to take care of, or some pecan branches that have broken and fallen into the yard.

We usually walk Sammie around the perimeter of the yard once or twice a day.  If we notice something that we haven't before, we usually look it up when we get back inside.  Lately we've been encountering a lot of mushrooms.

I'd always pictured this part of Georgia that we're living in as dry and dusty farmland.  In all of our visits in the last 11 years, over many Christmases, Thanksgivings and summer family reunions, we'd only seen it rain a handful of times.  Since we've moved down here it has rained (showers) about 75% - 80% of the days we've been here.  Some have been quite heavy and flooded the yard, only to see it soak right in in less than an hour.  Others have just been spotty showers, enough to douse any ideas of starting or finishing mowing the lawn.

The last couple of weeks while the rain has slacked off to about 50% of the days, it has brought with it a bumper crop of mushrooms and even a couple of Fairy Circles.  Just a quick look out any of our windows and you can usually spot what looks like a golf ball from any view.

Here's a sampling (I did not look up the specific varieties):

NOTE:  For those of you who aren't aware, clicking on the pictures gives you a full size view.

Looks like a golf ball
from the window

Little Puffballs of some type

A different perspective

A different perspective

And this is the Fairy Ring in the yard beside the house.  There is another one further across the property, but it's not a fresh as this one and starting to turn brown.

A Fairy Ring

It's like Siamese Quintuplets!

And I didn't even get stung by a fire ant while taking this picture.

Neta's first post!

I'm finally writing an entry of my own, and the topic is laundry.  That's right: laundry.  I am woman, hear me roar.

What can I say...laundry is an important subject to me.  But this post is kinda sorta about home improvement.  Plus there are before-and-after shots, and who doesn't love those? 

Before we moved, we had these beauties:

The before, before shot.

High efficiency, front load washer and dryer.  Don't let the stacking fool you, these were full-size machines and I could get a ton of clothes in one load.  They had a million settings, they were fast and quiet and all around awesome.  But there was no way we were going to try to move these ourselves, so they had to convey with the house.  I consoled myself with the thought of the even more awesome set I'd buy once we built our new house.

But...we're living in a rental for the time being, and that rental didn't come with a washer and dryer.  We decided to just buy a used set that we could leave behind eventually (by this point you may be sensing that we weren't eager to move appliances, and you would be correct).  Our plan was to find a set via Craigslist right after we moved down, while we still had the moving truck and dolly.  That worked out really well except there was only one person selling a set when we were ready to buy, and that set was pretty rough looking.  But the issues were cosmetic and the price and timing were right, so we got them.

As you can see, it was quite the come down:

Before

Nasty before shot

The previous owner was a big fan of Spray & Wash, and she always held the stained piece of clothing over the open washer while she sprayed it.  Her aim left a bit to be desired, thereby teaching her (and me) a valuable lesson:  the stuff that is designed to get stains out of your clothes will also try its hardest to get the paint off of your washer.  I had no idea how strong stain remover could be, but it had bubbled the paint off of the inside lid and the top of the washer, allowing the metal underneath to begin rusting.

Now again, this didn't affect the washer mechanically, it just looked ugly as sin.  And I am a person who needs beauty in my life.  At first I thought I'd just get some appliance paint and touch up the bad areas, but then I decided to get a bit creative and have some fun with it.

Finally ready to paint.

First I had to get all the bubbly paint off.  I put a garbage bag inside the washer, tucked up under the inner rim to catch all the gunk.  Then I went at it with a paint stripper sponge, which is like a green dish scrubby on steroids.  It worked really well, but every time I thought I'd about gotten it all I'd find another bubbly spot.  Next I broke out the putty knife, which scraped off even more paint.  I wound up uncovering a lot more surface than I expected to - that Spray & Wash is powerful stuff!

 
I finally got all the softened paint scraped off and sanded smooth.  The trash bag inside the washer turned out to have been a brilliant move (she says modestly) because it caught all the gunk and was super easy to clean up.

Ewww

Shiny & clean!

After a couple of coats of white enamel it was beginning to look like a new washer again.

I knew I wanted something funky and colorful for the inside lid, but I was short on ideas.  Robert suggested I paint "RUN!" in drippy red letters, as a surprise for whoever moves in after us.  So tempting, but no.  Emily suggested I check Pinterest for ideas, which I did.  Big mistake:  nothing else got done in my life for the next week.  I still didn't find anything that really struck my fancy but it did spark an idea.  Amazon to the rescue with some vinyl wall stickers!  I let the enamel dry for a few days before applying, and then I let my inner artist out.

My inner artist doesn't get out much.

I love it, especially because with the lid closed it just looks like any other boring white washer.  While I'm really looking forward to having a fancy new set, I'm pretty tickled with my fun, like-new washer.

When was my last tetanus shot?

Where are my sunglasses?

The obligatory side-by-side shot.

Primal Fear

So I haven't blogged about snakes in a while, so here is a fix for those of you fascinated by our "Croc Hunter"-like lives.

WARNING - The following text will contain information about snakes and a picture of the latest snake.  Also, if you are a member of PETA, you may not want to read about how we deal with venomous snakes going forward.

Last week, while Neta was in Raleigh, I found a large copperhead in the yard.  I almost stepped on it.  Sammie (our dog) was out in the fenced in area we made for her.  I decided to go out and play with her.  I walked down the steps of our side porch, called her to come play and looked down.  There was a copperhead  about a foot from me.  He was completely unconcerned...but I was.  I now had to corral a dog that was in "play mode".  She playfully ran right in between us.  The snake flinched, but otherwise still didn't care.  I managed to grab Sammie and as I was leading her into the house, the snake began to move away.  When I went back outside, he was gone.  He lives to fight another day.

Then two days ago, Sammie was barking at something out in the yard.  Neta went out and saw a snake.  She opened the door and Sammie came running with her tail between her legs.  FINALLY!  The dog saw a snake and understood the danger.  I grabbed the hoe from Neta, but upon arriving on scene saw that it was a rat snake, and harmless.  I pinned his head to the ground so I could pick him up and relocated him to the field next door.  Non-venomous snakes get relocated, not killed.

Last night was a different situation altogether.  Robert came in from walking Sammie around 11:30.  He said there was a "big, thick" snake in the front yard.  I heard those words and immediately thought "rattlesnake".  I was right.

It was a Timber Rattler.  This brought Neta and Emily out to cheer from the safety of the front porch.  Cheering is somewhat of a misnomer.  It was more of a constant, insistent shouting of caution (like I needed to be told that) in many different forms.

I approached him with the shovel.  He looked just as he does in that picture above, just stretched out, without a care in the world.  I struck him with the shovel, but it was only a glancing blow.  He turned towards me and started to rattle.  If you've never heard that sound before in person, upon hearing it, you will immediately know that danger is near.  The reptilian part of the brain just knows that something is seriously wrong.  It sent a chill up my spine.  I am not going to lie...I WAS SCARED.

Without going into too much detail about the battle, let me just say that he coiled up to strike at one point.  That adds another layer to the danger that you feel.  Now he's not only mad, he's in "KILL MODE".

I stayed a safe distance and managed to land the decisive blow.  Immediately the rattle stopped and I knew he was dead.  I made sure he was dead with a few pokes of the hoe.  We measured him at 50 inches.  Much bigger than the last one that we saw a few weeks ago.  I carried him over, with the end of the hoe, and deposited him in the edge of the woods.

The adventures continue...