FIGHT!

A recent sunrise

OK. Now that I have your attention...

The next few months of walks will be pretty much the same - hot, humid, boring, insect-filled. We have missed much of the fruit and wildflower filled bits. [It is odd to be lifted out of your "place" and then dropped back in a month later. A week is hardly noticed, but you miss a great deal in a month.]

So, I may not write as often (and I am catching up on other walks from that long month anyway) unless there is something to write about...like today.

Does heat cause fights?*

I don't know...I get a little cranky when I start to sweat. Anyone in the family will tell you that. But I just try to cool off - jump in the river, take a shower, stand in front of the refrigerator - you know. But what about other folks?

We wandered down the block, waived at our good neighbor BP who just celebrated a birthday. He was out walking their schnauzer (beautiful dog - good breed - non-shedding).

Continuing on we saw a woman with a terrier like pup. I see her when I drive down for my park walks with a friend...always on the same strip of sidewalk. Then I noticed the older woman who always has a beautiful yard (and often plants the things my mother loved, shrimp plant, zinnias, ferns, bougainvillea) had not picked up her paper. I try to pay attention to the houses of our elderly neighbors. You never know.

I told DH it was strange for her not to be up and then saw her sitting in the breezeway. "Do you want your paper?" I called. She stood up (housecoated - like Mom would have been/cigarette in hand - not so much) and sotto voce began to tell me about the woman with the terrier. "She lets her dog poop in my yard and doesn't pick it up!" she said. Knowing I was in the clear (I had a fresh bag in my hand) I nodded my understanding. "I just told her I had a camera up and would have her charged if she let that happen again without picking up after her dog," warned she (of the lovely yard) and continued "And then she said that she had heard I had a mean streak!"

I shook my head and almost "tisk-tisk-tisked."

We stood there for a few minutes more and commiserated about people who are irresponsible dog owners and thus irresponsible neighbors. Then I moved along to join DH and Paddimus. "I'm always able to turn a 30 second - here's your paper - into a 30 minute conversation," I admitted. DH nodded knowingly.

Sure. It wasn't exactly a "fight," but it is as much of one as we see (or need) in the neighborhood.**

And we had a cranky moment or two over the dog's harness. Like us, she is getting old and has some loose skin around her neck. She can no longer wear a collar as it will rub a sore. And she has escaped any harness we have found. The back and forth was nothing to write about - just cranky followed by my sighing, eye-rolling, "she's a dog."

It is my replacement for 18+ years of "they're children." DH, an only child and retired Army guy (used to people doing what he directs), used to say that there should be expert children-raising people. "You drop them off after birth and pick them up at 18 in time to go to college," he would say. [My sighing and eyerolling is not new. And I probably give him cause for a great deal of it as well.]

We retreated into the cooled house.

Patience returned.

Yeah, maybe it's the heat.***


NOTES:

*http://www.the-scientist.com/?articles.view/articleNo/30906/title/Do-Heat-Waves-Spur-Violence-/

**Dudes, we had a "drive by" about 20 years ago. Arguing about dog poop is more than enough conflict.

***Our temperatures are in the 90s by the end of the day. We start about 75 (F) with high humidity - it's a sauna.

Another recent sunrise - see the clouds? HUMID.