Viewpoint*

The wind was blowing ferociously this morning. Things hitting the windows turned out to be the ends of the oak branches covered with new leaves. The temperatures were slated to climb into the high 80's later in the day and we I wanted to cut down the other streletzia before it got too hot. Neither one was terribly attractive with guided missles aimed at our heads, so we sat around for awhile waiting to see what would happen.

It seemed to be dying down so we decided to take Spike up to the meadow where we almost got blown off the mountain by gusty winds The wind must have interfered with Spike's navigation system too because instead of doing zoomies all over the big meadow he stuck pretty close to us. The meadow was looking beautiful with it's carpet of buttercups.**

Back home the intermittent gusts were still quite strong but we were seduced by the relative calm periods in between and did get the second streletzia cut down.  Pedro's crew will have to do the really hard part which is to dig out the roots and haul away the mounds of leaves covering our back patio. It would take more time and more green cans than we have to cut up all that.

Caroline made up for the mess in the patio by cleaning the house. That woman can talk the hind leg off a donkey but she certainly does get the house clean. And she works hard even when she's talking.

*wind blown clouds
** buttercup meadow