Death by Shovel?

I was driving home from lunch. Minding my own business. Listening to music. Intently watching the road. Traffic was going 'bout 70mph and I was ~50 yards behind a Tahoe that was driving in the middle lane. There was a mini van ahead of it in the right lane. Everything was fine.

The next thing I know I'm watching the mini van run over a shovel that was laying face up in the right lane, thereby tossing it into the windshield of the Tahoe. Only...it didn't go through the windshield. Thanks to Jesus, the flat side of the shovel had hit the windshield, and due to g-forces, or Newton's laws, or whatever, the shovel decided to use the still intact windshield as a slingshot of sorts.

The shovel, no joke, went flying at least 70 ft straight up into the air, handle separating from rapidly rotating metal shovel on the way up. As I'm staring at the shovel, seemingly frozen at the apex of it's flight, (we're in slow-mo vision here) I wonder: "I'm about to be under that thing. Is it going to land on the hood of my car? Or come through the windshield? I really don't want to be decapitated. Perhaps slamming of the breaks would be required at this point."

So...I did that. Slam on the breaks, that is. Though, it turns out, I didn't really need to. The handle ended up landing in the right shoulder and the rapidly spinning in the air shovel landed in the left shoulder. I drove past it a half second later, watching it bounce as I passed by.

The whole thing probably took 5 seconds. Shovel hit by minivan. One. Shovel hits Tahoe. One and a half. Shovel goes flying. Two. Three. Quick decision- BRAKES! Four. Shovel hits ground. Five.

When I drove by the slowing Tahoe, both people in the front seats were okay, they looked freaked out, their windshield was intact, but the entire thing was spiderweb cracked. Like I'm not sure how the driver was seeing through it cracked.

Anyway. Everyone was lucky. No decapitations. Shovel pieces landing not on the road.

Stupid mini-van. How do you not see a giant shovel in the middle of your lane? He was probably on his cell phone. Yes, HE.

AND! HE didn't even slow down or realize that he had sent a guillotine flying at someone's vehicle. MORON, I tell you. MORON.

HOLY...Mother of God?

That's what I could have said. But nope, that's definitely NOT what I said. I was at a couple of churches today doing photography for a historical book that's being put together. I was minding my own damn blessed business, when a wasp decided to fly up to my face. You know what I said as I ran away from the wasp?

"Holy SH*T!"

On the front steps of the stained glass doors of a 130 year old church that my ancestors brought to being, I, girl who emits curse words without thought or control, shouted the aforementioned utterance.

WHAT! Is wrong with me?! {sigh.} I apologized to Jesus and asked for forgiveness.

Then dropped the f word ten minutes later in the cemetery. Again, without thought or control. I asked for forgiveness again, but I imagine Jesus just rolled his eyes at that one. Don't worry. I'm appalled at myself enough for everyone.

ANYWAY.

Here's a local church history lesson, folks!

This is the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Dessau, TX. Built in 1876. A Texas Historical Landmark, with the lovely bluebonnets in front.

This is Immanuel Lutheran Church founded in 1874, this current structure having been built post fire in 1928. This, obviously, is a view from the cemetery with, what I think is, a crab apple tree in the foreground.

cows are morons

Cows are morons. Stupid, smelly, grass-eating, hay-coveting, follow-the-ass-in-front-of-you, "hey, let's hop over the fence because, well, that sounds like fun" hamburger makers. The young ones are pretty darn cute, but beyond the one month age I'm done. I don't like them, for all the reasons stated above (except the hamburger part), and because they're about 5 times my size and I'm afraid they'll decide to charge me. It's happened before people, hence my fear. I literally came within inches of becoming roadkill to a giant angry red cow. Laugh if you must, they just make me nervous. So, when all 50 of the cows decided to see if the grass was indeed greener on the other side of the fence for two days in a row this week, my daily annoyance intake level went off the charts. Why? Because it's my and my dad's job to get them back in the field! This whole operation wouldn't be so terrible, except I get so stressed because the cows always give us a hard time.

On Monday they got out and dad took the tractor to get some hay to lure them with and I took the Gator. Once we got to where they were not supposed to be, he parked the tractor and we took off together in the Gator. We had to chase them down, go this direction, that direction, drive super fast to get there before they got by us, hope I didn't fly out of the Gator, yell at them the whole time, sometimes get out and chase them on foot, hope they didn't get mad and charge me, and round them all up and get them through the tiny gate opening. Once that was accomplished we had to start the long arduous process of getting them to the barn, a mile away. Dad had the precious hay on his tractor and started driving away with it and usually the hay-coveters follow. What did they do? Stand there like dumb shits, and, "Moo!!!" So dad started going super slow calling them to follow, and I had to drive the Gator back and forth yelling at them to, "Go!!! Move!!! Get outta here!!!" And they just stared at me. Until I almost ran them over with my trusty vehicle and only then did they decide, "Ohhhh, right! I don't want to be hit with that." So, slowly but surely they all caught on to the idea that I did indeed want them to get a move on, and they started following my dad. The ones at the head of the pack kept going with their eyes on the hay and the ones in the back kept stopping to stare at me as if they were trying to figure out what species of cow I am, why I'm not as fat as them, and why I don't speak, "Moo!" So, the whole time I'm yelling at them to keep going, wondering if I can get away with murdering one of them, and trying not to completely lose my nerve. Thirty minutes later we made it to the barn and closed the flimsy barbed-wire gate behind them to keep them in the field by our house for the night so they couldn't go back and get out where they got out earlier. Only, we woke up to discover the next morning that they had trampled through the flimsy gate, found another field with greener grass on the other side, and my dad and I had to start the whole infuriating process all over again.

The bastards are now sitting in the steel enforced farm lock-up until all fence lines are secure. I wonder if I could kill them all and start my own hamburger joint. Bet ya' I'd make some MOO-lah! Ha. Ha-ha. Die...

Get it right for once!

This is a picture of a central Texas sunset the night before Hurricane Ike hit the Texas coast. You can see the bands that were a part of his cloud cover. Very cool, I think.

Just so you know, weathermen are complete morons...

I live in Austin, Texas where a certain weatherman at a certain local weather station stated that without a doubt the capital city would indeed be getting a LOT of rain from Hurricane Ike. A thunderstorm! Rain! A cloudy day! An end to the quasi-drought we've been enduring! Hoo-ray! Days before Ike was supposed to hit I noticed people gearing up for the nasty weather that was to come. I found crowds at the grocery store buying out nearly all the water bottles and ice, lines at the gas pump 3 cars deep...and this was in Austin, which as you should know is no where near Houston! I can only imagine how much worse it was there. Even on Friday, the day before it was supposed to make landfall, the aforementioned weatherman maintained that we would see a 90% chance of rain showers and storms for Saturday. Now I know that Mother Nature can change her mind at the drop of a hat and I'm willing to forgive the unpredictability of a minor direction shift in the hurricane's path, but seriously...It's Saturday in Austin, Texas and I kid you not, I wake up this morning and the local weatherman (who I will forevermore refer to as "Mr. Moron") might as well have said, "Whoops!". He was trying to explain that Ike had shifted from the predicted direction, taking a course that would deprive ATX of any rain, at all. "A big fat zero." inches of rain for Saturday. That's a direct quote, mind you. This is not the first time he's messed up ladies and gents! All year I can account for numerous occasions when he has called for rain and it must have evaporated into thin air...no pun intended. Literally! Where the heck did it go?! I think his computer model forecast interpreting skills are lax. Why do you ask do I care? Because I LIKE RAIN! Can I get one good torrential downpour on my house PLEASE! And yes, I like to blame the weatherman. With one sentence he sets the whole city into a fury of preparing for the worst, making everyone spend money on things they don't need, and he sets me up for a happy day and then all my hopes get dashed when his forecast is wrong...Moron, I tell you! Moron!

I also must contend with the weathermen who like to stand out in gale force winds in the middle of a hurricane shouting into a microphone, trying not to fall over all the while trying to bring the viewers news about "what's going on out there". As I watch with incredulous disbelief at their intelligence level, I keep waiting for a huge piece of debris to knock them over. It is kind of entertaining to watch though...

Don't get me wrong. My heart goes out to all of those affected by this hurricane, I sincerely hope that everyone is alright, and I feel blessed that my home and the homes of those I know have gone unharmed. But, seriously. I don't think just a little bit of rain is too much to ask for. Be careful what you wish for, I guess.