First of all, an update on David's broken hand: It's mending very nicely. The pain seemed to go away quickly, and he's only on antibiotics now. The main problem is not being able to use his right hand and being left-handed for the first time in his life. Not easy, I'm sure. He has come over for supper once or twice, and my wife and I went shopping for him a couple of times. Doing OK.
We had a spell of hot weather here a few weeks ago--hotter and stickier than normal for mid August, with highs around 90F (32C). Then it eased off.
That's good, because I've been hopping since that trip my wife and I took (one upcoming post) and then a visit to S and her GF (another upcoming post). Since then, my life has been all about the start of fall sports, writing for a special section, another summer weekend festival and, this weekend, the county fair. Plus a couple features, a day out of town because of my mom, the annual cable board meeting and football scrimmages.
As president of the cable board, I had to write a report to our members, including the digital project we are working on--digital and HD coming to town this fall. But many major decisions haven't been made yet, so my report also had to be non-specific. I laid it out to the members, and I think they understood. Maybe the underlying frustration came through.
That meeting was held Saturday morning. On Friday, we had the football scrimmages, the local teams' only chance to hit other teams before the regular season starts next Friday. It was taking place at a city about 60 miles away, starting at 9 a.m. Some thunderstorms moved through during the early morning hours, and the ground was still wet when I left for the scrimmage at about 7:15 a.m.
So I got there about 20 minutes early and called home--my wife would be up by then, and I wanted to know if it was raining back there. She had news for me: They said on the radio that the scrimmage had been canceled (fearing more storms), and the two county teams would hold their own scrimmage--just the two of them--at the local high school practice field, five miles from my home. Except I was at the original scrimmage site, about 60 miles away.
So I quick had to drive back home, and I got to see much of it, anyway. Talked to the coaches, got my story written ...
The rain threat continued on Friday, and showers passed through during the afternoon. I was assigned to get photos at the truck pull that evening. It was already muddy enough in the arena Thursday night as the tractor pull took place ...
... so what would it look like now? Obviously, I had to see.
Just as I was leaving for the truck pull, rain struck. I zipped up my raincoat and drove to the event. Water was running through the unpaved parking lot, and water stood around the outside of the arena. There was rain. Then there was more rain. Then a cloudburst. Then more rain ...
It was real pretty ... if you happen to have webbed feet and quack!
I had a great vantage point--up in the grandstand, under a roof. But the dirt arena quickly got inundated. They finally called it off and rescheduled it for late Sunday afternoon.
That was the end of the rain. The fair had mostly sunny weather on Saturday, and the sun will stay around today. My wife and I went up to the fairgrounds Saturday afternoon. I went back my myself for the demo derby (another county cultural high point; they always get a packed house) that night, and then I'll be up there yet again for the rescheduled truck pull late this afternoon.
After all that bustling about and confusion, fall sports season will seem relatively calm and orderly.
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