Labor Day

It's hard to celebrate a holiday when one is not employed, so today and all weekend was no big deal.

I got up before sunrise to drink coffee with Kevin on the back patio.  He then went inside and never came back out.  It was approaching sunrise (6:01)  and he hadn't come back out yet.  When I asked him if he's not working today, he replied "It's Labor Day!"  Duh.

I wanted to walk Zeke and Sweetie around the 'hood, but  Minnie and Sadie wanted to walk, too, so I drove all six dogs to the maintenance road.  Sadie was looking excited, and even trotted to the back gate with the other dogs.  This always makes me happy. Once parked off the maintenance road, though, Minnie opted to stay in the Honda.  The rest of us, including Sadie, walked two miles (!) up and down the ATV roads.  Two miles is no big deal to me, but it surely must be for an old dog.

It was a pleasant morning, with a cool pre-sunrise breeze I enjoy so much.  I first walked north on the ATV road, but turned around by the dug-out area.  There is now a excavator parked there  and what looks like the base of what will be a solar panel.  I turned around here as there were cyclists on the pavement.  I went back south, then turned east toward the old ruins.

The pups discovered a dead juvenile hawk off the road.  It looked like it crashlanded into the ground, but upon closer inspection I could see it had been attacked in the air and landed, breaking its neck.  Falcons attack their prey, other birds, during flight and then eat their meal on the ground.  The dead hawk was already decaying and smelling, so it probably was killed the day before.

I felt accomplished having taken the dogs out for two miles.  The rising heat for the day stifled any other plans.  Los Angeles had a record high of 121F; it was a mere 97F in Hereford.  Kevin went to bed by 1:30pm and I took off at 2:30pm to meet Steve at Bone Dry, which opened for sit-down business on Friday.  We sat and chatted until 4:15pm when we departed and I met Susan on time at 5pm to walk the dogs along the river, adding another two miles but this time without Sadie.

Thus ended a very quiet holiday weekend.

***

Global cases 27,608,130 

Global deaths: 898,678

US cases: 6,486,377 (+26,413)

US deaths: 193,596 (+299)

AZ cases: 205,964 (+198)

AZ deaths: 5,219 (+0)

CA cases: 741,486 (+2,741)

CA deaths: 13,763 (+43)

IN cases: 100,394 (+590)

IN deaths: 3368 (+4)