When will it be winter?

It's been warm here lately. Very warm. NE Oklahoma doesn't have nearly as much hot weather as S. TEXAS, but it does get it's share. It doesn't last more than a few days to a couple of weeks, but to hear these people up here gripe... That being said, I still don't like extremely hot weather! We've spent most of the day inside the house with the a/c going. We did manage to sit out on the back deck this morning for a while. We would have stayed out longer, but the little bit of wind we got was blowing over the cow pasture before it got to us and we could tell! Stinky!

We are going to get the hardwood floors in the rent house redone, we finally made the decision. The guy will start on the 13th, and now that I've seen some of his work I have to admit that we are getting a very good price. The kitchen, bathroom and master bedroom will not be done. The kitchen and bathroom are linoleum tiles and the master bedroom will have to be carpeted because it is an add-on and never had wood flooring, just a cement slab. After the wood floors are done, then we will see about the master bedroom floor. We are going over there tomorrow, very early, and get the last few things done. I get to do the lawn mowing this time, which I am going to do as early as possible because of the heat. I told Bill that I think he must have arranged his accident just so he could get out of mowing! But there really isn't too much else to do. Bill will paint the front porch with the specific non-slip paint and he'll put the porch railings back on. Otter get to start the inside cleaning, but it's mainly just wiping the counters down and things like that. We are not going to mop the bathroom & kitchen floors yet, that will also be after the hardwood floors are done. We are going to wait on repainting the garage. It's too hot right now to do it, and Bill's not really able to be on his feet for that long anyway. If we were going to sell the rent house now, then we would probably arrange for it to be done, but it can be rented out with the plan to repaint it in the near future. We'd like to be able to get the "For Rent" sign out by the first of September, and it looks like we will.

I rescued a baby mockingbird this morning. I saw a parent bird fly from a tree in the neighbor's yard and I could hear what sounded like a baby bird peeping. Then we saw the baby follow the parent, the baby managed to get to the branch of our tree. But it couldn't quite get it's footing and it somewhat gracefully sailed straight down to the grass. Frasier saw it at the same time I did, I told him No and he stopped, then when I was trying to pick the baby up so he wouldn't get it, the baby flew a couple of feet and landed at the bottom of the fence. Bill had to tell Frasier to stay, and I was able to get the baby bird then. And Mom/Dad was right there, dive bombing me! I held baby up so whichever parent it was could see that I wasn't hurting it, then it flew out of my hand and landed several feet away in the field behind the house. The adult bird saw where it landed and went down there, so I think that the baby was going to be ok. I really prefer to just leave them alone and watch, flying lessons are fun to observe, but Frasier would have eaten it if he could.

And the hoard of hummers has arrived! There were about 7 of them out there today. I filled two feeders yesterday and the other two are probably going to need it tomorrow or Monday. The feeder in the kitchen window has finally been found, there is a male ruby throat that claims that feeder. We think that this is the beginning of their southern migration. As early as it is, that could mean a hard winter is coming. Think we'll stock up on firewood soon! Just in case.