Farewell Summer!

The summer is gone, it was too short but very nice.  We did not have any storms but I was able to keep everything watered.  I think the Jack Rabbit I see around has eaten most everything he can though.  That is not good.  I will have to find something that he does not like I guess.  I have learned how to pace myself and only do certain things on certain days so I do not overdo.

I especially enjoyed having the bird bath in perfect view from the patio window so I often caught birds enjoying it.  Of late there have been two huge pileated woodpeckers, supposed to be the largest woodpeckers in the world, hanging around the bird bath and the two trees.  In reading about them I find they like carpenter ants and dead trees and like to make nests.  If they eat all the carpenter ants around here that will be a big plus.

I spent July with my house shut up and the humidifier on because I was so congested and I figured the allergies were bad and then I started this "ban the bloat" diet and had to give up dairy.  Voila, my congestion cleared up after a few weeks without dairy so I am making that a part of my lifestyle, too.  I like all the soups I have been making and good food I have been eating.  Even eating steel oats for breakfast now and almond milk and enjoying it with all the fresh berries I buy each week.

I have also been doing more walking, which Sadie loves, and I lost about 10 lbs, so that is good.   Actually that means I have lost about 40 of the 50 lbs I gained after joining Richard in the mortgage business in 1980.   Feeling great, still need to get more off the waistline if possible.

Last night I could not get to sleep so I kept listening to the Ron Chernov history book "Alexander Hamilton" and finally finished it.  It was very enjoyable and I will not remember it but the musical helps to remember the important parts.  Glad I got to meet Eliza, his wife, she was a very choice person.  It is very disillusioning to realize how imperfect men are, politicians especially, so egotistical and power hungry and jealous of each other.  No wonder we can never get it right as far as our country is concerned.

The other book I finished was Elin Hilderbrand's "The Blue Bistro".  She writes summer romance novels all taking place in Nantucket, but she is really a good writer.  How she can come up with so many different stories is only amazing but I have liked every book I have read, which is at least 6 or 7 of them.  There are about another eight or so to go and she looks young so will probably keep writing.  I have read a lot of other books this summer but I have not listed them all.  Actually I do not read them, I listen to them on Library to Go on the App Overdrive.  Love it.

I do not understand why I get so many drafts of what I am writing.  I will have to look at it tomorrow when I am not so tired.