The weather was perfect.
75 degrees with bright sunshine and a gentle breeze.
We’d spent the day mowing and trimming and weeding….
And everything looked perfect.
Lilacs were cut for vases and perfumed the air with the scent of a long awaited spring.
And we ended the day with adult beverages on the big barn porch…. where the only thing to worry about was walking back inside for refills.
Life is good.
Have you ever seen something for sale and thought, WTH?
I do this quite often and feel it’s my duty to share.
The first strange item is called Q-flex.
And while I agree no one wants knots in their back, you have to admit this just looks…. wrong.
It seems to be 1/3 shepherd’s staff, 1/3 haying scythe, and 1/3 hook from your great grandfather’s old vaudeville act. Anyway you look at?
Wrong.
Next up? A tongue cleaner.
Holy crap! If your is turning brown and you can scrape that much disgusting residue from it’s surface?
Bad breath might not be the only malady you’re suffering.
A posture remedy is next in line.
Admit it, posture realignment wasn’t the first thing you thought of when you saw this was it?
So wrong.
This next item simply boggles my mind.
The magic of a corner piece? What kind of freak would buy this!
Everyone knows all the fudgy goodness is found in the middle.
Epically wrong.
And finally, there’s a product that you’ve no doubt seen before.
This requires no explanation, and while I can’t personally attest to its wrongness…. I did find one of it’s reviews more than a little amusing.
Clearly this poor fellow had an issue.
Because when Taco Bell doesn’t end in the appropriate volcanic eruption? You know you need help.
Have Squatty, Will Travel.
Go west young man, and poop in peace.
That’s me. Always missing the big events.
Half the time I’ve never heard of them or even knew they were a ‘thing’.
Case in point – did you know May was National Masturbation Month?
I didn’t either!
But it was, and I missed it.
I also missed this:
For which I am eternally grateful.
Okay.
But I’m not sure whether I should be thrilled or horrified.
Well isn’t that special?
So please, someone do the research and let me know if any records were broken.
I’ll be busy trying to figure out how to tag this post without attracting every porn spammer in the blogosphere.
So work continued on our project from Hell.
Trim completed, we started shingling the back half of the roof….. and if you know anything about the baby barn?
You know it wasn’t going to cooperate.
Oh, the first row was perfectly level.
Unfortunately…. it was also 5/8ths of an inch short.
If you’ve ever done roofing, you know what a nightmare this is. Tiny little strips of shingles had to be cut for every row and you can’t put them at the end. No, that would be too easy. They had to be tucked somewhere in the middle so it didn’t screw up the pattern… which meant cutting one other shingle on every row as well.
Time consuming? You could say that.
It literally took us all friggin’ day to do the back half of this little roof.
Okay, so the fact that the husband bought the wrong size flashing at Home Depot the night before (because he went without me and therefore to the wrong store) and then had to go back to Home Depot to return it the next day and get the right size flashing (again without telling me and therefore to the wrong store ) and because Home Depot doesn’t sell the right size flashing ( we’d bought the right size flashing across town at Lowes a month ago ) he also had to take a trip to Lowes.
The moral of that lengthy run on sentence? Tell your wife before you go somewhere so she can tell you you’re wrong. It will save you time and aggravation….. and she’ll thoroughly enjoy it.
No, that ridiculous waste of time didn’t help.
Of course, yours truly telling the husband he should have checked with me first didn’t help either…. but you know I had to.
Needless to say I put some physical distance between us after that comment.
I’m not sure the big barn porch was far enough, but at least it was out of hammer strike range.
So progress was slow, but it was progress.
And here’s a picture of a spider carrying off a dead fly….
Just for variety’s sake.
And then finally it was done.
But I didn’t get a picture because I was inside cooking dinner.
Hey, you’ve seen one crooked baby barn roof, you’ve seen them all.
We now have daily duck visitors.
A pair of mallards who make me smile and cut grapes in half. It’s the best food for ducks…. though they prefer to nibble on deer grain.
They’re here off and on all day but make a point of showing up about 4:00pm when I put out the nightly treats for the deer.
You would think the considerably larger deer would scare them off.
But in actuality, it’s the opposite.
The deer is frightened of the ducks and makes sure to eat on the opposite side.
Keeping one eye on those terrifying birds the whole time.
Because wouldn’t you rather laugh?
There.
That puts things in perspective.
Yes.
For quite a bit longer by the looks of things.
Don’t you just hate when that happens?
Hell, in Maine…. it already does.
Good rule.
Most definitely.
Grocery stores have become the new I-95. Wrong way dumb asses, rubberneckers, and the road police who do 25 miles under the posted speed limit.
Move aside people….
River needs double fudge brownie mix. And tequila.
A fitting finale.
WTF indeed.
It’s not like I don’t welcome and feed all our visiting critters enough of a variety.
Three types of bird seed, suet, strawberries, peanut nuggets, oranges, grape jelly, blueberries, nectar, deer grain, salad scraps, old bread, apples and pears…
Christ, I even buy special dog food with taurine for the foxes.
And we don’t have a dog!
So yes, I was a little peeved when I went to sit on the barn porch the other day..
And saw that one of them had done this –
And this –
As well as this –
On every single seat cushion.
Ungrateful little bastards!
On a late afternoon trip to Home Depot for baby barn supplies….and okay, maybe a plant or two…. we were desperately hungry and hit the McDonalds drive thru.
If you know how much we hate McDonalds, you’ll know how desperately hungry we were.
Geranium perched between my legs, we scarfed down the (is this supposed to be edible?) food.
And while we were doing that?
They gathered.
One by one, on both sides… as well as in the front and the back.
Not wanting to re-create a Tippi Hendren phone booth scene, we ate quickly and fled.
Trips to the grocery store are so much more interesting these days.
And by interesting, I mean annoying A.F.
Take for example… the ample directional signage.
Since I am a fully functioning literate adult, I read this and my brain processes the instruction quite quickly.
For those unlucky souls who don’t possess my lightning quick reasoning? There was also this helpful accompaniment.
Pretty straight forward, right?
Then why…. on every single aisle I traversed…. did I have to dodge customers coming straight at me? Many without the facial covering the store… and now this particular town…. requires.
Regardless whether you’re on board with the whole mask, social distancing, 6 feet apart regime…. it’s this grocery store’s policy and they’re doing it to try and keep you safe. You don’t have to shop there, but if you do? Please pay attention… and study those pesky one syllable directions.
I’d hate to inadvertently (on purpose) stick my foot out as you pass by.
Baby barn work commences…. again.
And I have to ask – are we the only ones who take a year to remodel what is in essence a small shed?
On second thought, don’t answer that. I don’t want to know.
So we’ve moved around to the back half to finish our utterly favorite part…..and by that I mean the hellish nightmare that is angled trim work. I believe we’ve established we suck at this and not wanting to break tradition, we still do.
How badly do we suck?
I’m glad you asked.
Badly enough to require shaving corners with less than modern tools if you’re my other half.
What….
You mean 1940’s saws aren’t still viable members of the tool arsenal?
Yes, that’s always my reaction as well….
But the husband says it still has life left in it.
Corners were turned…
Though not all of them where they should be…
As the poppa barn ( who’s still screaming for paint and agrees with River how wonderful he would look in a nice rusty red with white trim ) looked on in horror.
To be continued.
River's world..... 