randomdreams

It has been hot, 106F yesterday, with the wind out of the south-east which always sets off my worst allergies.  Around here they call them the Diablo Winds.  It looks like there is now a cooling trend that will take us back into the low 90's again.  Although the last few days have been hot, in reality this has been the coolest summer we have had for many years. 
With the warm weather the garden is cranking out loads of produce.  I really should make pickles tonight. There is enough okra for a couple of jars of pickles, and there are lots and lots of cucumbers, though not very many pickling cucumbers.   The shade cloth seems to be doing its job of keeping things from burning. 
Chena's class yesterday went well.  We learned Send and Return.  Each of us had a cone set in front of us, and were to send the dog out and around the cone. Chena was happy to do it, though I'm not sure she quite got the concept.  We practiced having our dogs Stay in the down position while the instructor strolled around playing a loop of ducks quacking on her phone. Chena did break position on that one, but not the next one, which was a squeeky toy and a plastic bag being rustled around. During the  Backup was another new command for the class.  I've been practicing that for some time with Chena and she has it down.  No we are working on going straight back. We practiced Touch, where the dog touches a hand or item with their nose.  The instructor suggested we might want to put a buzzer next to the door so the dog could ask to go out. NO, NO, NO!!  Chena would be much worse than any cat about wanting to go in and out through the door!
While at dog class I handed the instructor, Nancy, a completely revised Core 2 handout.  The one she had given us was terrible.  Last week Kim got very confused about what we had been taught, so I wrote up notes for her. While doing that I referenced the handout which was a hodge-podge of disorganized bad writing.  Since I was already writing up notes, I went to work on it.  Nancy was surprised and a bit taken aback, but after glancing at my work and thinking for a moment she admitted that she knew the Core 2 handout needed work and that it had been hastily pulled together from multiple sources, which was blindingly obvious.  I don't know that I got it all correct, but at least each command is formatted the same, the commands are listed in alphabetical order so you can find them, and instructions don't stop mid-sentence.
Back at the Ranch, I've been spraying Firefly down with water.  She loves it. Then she goes and rolls in the dust. Sigh. Thank goodness there is a silicone based product in her mane and tail so they don't tangle too readily.  The dirt tends to fall right off. 
I saw a very large rat out at the hay pile last night. I have no idea where rats like that are coming from, these are rats that normally live near human dwellings and don't do well in our arid landscape.  I suppose now I'll need to bury my compost for a while.  Hopefully the screech owl I hear at night will fly by and take care of the problem. Or Chena will catch it, she tried last night.

I'm having trouble with my internet - still. It is SLOW.  Almost, but not quite, dialup slow.  Donald is having trouble downloading his email.  Web pages are taking forever to download.  Streaming stalls out frequently.  My internet is wireless, broadcast from one of the nearby mountains.  I can understand slow service when a big storm is pouring rain down, winds whipping around the antennas.  But it is a clear, quiet summer day and my internet is SLOW. I'm about to order Starlink.  Much as I don't care for Elon, it is my only alternative.