Nattering

Well, evil blogger cut my access to legacy blogger today.  I am now marooned on a platform of stupid user interface and bad ju-ju all around.  I'm very unhappy about this.  Of course, I'm pretty despondent about just about everything today.  I had to abandon reading the NYT and WAPO, I just can't take it.  I have not felt this way since Hillary lost.  

 When I link to something, I always want it to open in a new window.  Old blogger let you make that a default, new blogger makes you click on it every single time.  New blogger makes everything take more clicks.  Anyway, do any of you know how to make that a default?

There is nattering to be done, inconsequential things to be said and all of that which makes up daily life in a pandemic.  Yesterday we stopped to snoop in the house that's going up down the street.  I previously discussed construction techniques in AZ here.  They've progressed to the stage of applying stucco.  It's not sprayed, they have to have to hand trowel it on.  There is a mixer on the job site.  They load bags of Portland Cement and shovel sand in to it to make the stucco.  This has to be brutal in the heat we've been having.

The front wall with stucco applied.

Looking down the side of the house, we notice the scaffolding they are using.  The boards just sit on the scaffold with no point of attachment.  It looks like an accident waiting to happen, but what do I know?

The trichocereus next door has bloomed again.  It's surprising to see this since there has been no rain and it's not getting any water.  I like the yellow stripes on the second layer of petals.

When we ride up to the end of Lone Star, up the hill that hurts way more than it should, we see the quilt house.  We call it that because there will frequently be a quilt hanging in front of the garage.  The why of this is not known.

I can't tell if it's pieced or whole cloth.  Since it's their driveway I don't feel comfortable walking up and looking at it up close.  Look how the blue sort of meanders across the field. 

If this is pieced, it's really astonishing work.

In sporting news, Tadej Pogačar beat the expected winner of the Tour de France, Primož Roglič, by putting 1:56 minutes on him on the final time trial.  Jumbo-Visma had really controlled the race up until the time trial, and then it all went bad.  Tadej Pogačar ended the day with the White jersey (best young rider), the Polka Dot jersey (most mountain points) and the Yellow jersey (over all race leader).  It's an amazing result for a 21 year riding his first Tour de France.