Flooding....

Click to enlarge for better viewing.I really had plans to post some other photos, but we went for another drive today...on the way out of town we went down by the Wabash River. I wanted to take a photo of the railroad over the river that was in the photos on my blog on April24 of this year.
This is showing some more of the farmer's fields under water...
And if you click on the photo below, you will see a 'family' of bats up in the very top of the roof...I happened to notice the bat guano on the floor of the covered bridge and looked up and there they were. This is the best I could do, but it isn't too bad of an effort. I do not know what a group of bats is called and I actually wondered if this was a family. I think there are seven of them...

The photo above is the covered bridge at Bridgeton and down below is the old mill at Mansfield. I have seen these two places in all kind of weather after lots of floods, but I have never seen the water this muddy! We had more rain last night, but I think about an inch was all we got.

A few views after the flooding...

Click pictures to enlarge!

We are starting on my husband's first full week of retirement. It still has not sunk in that he is not on vacation or something. He stayed very busy the first few days he was off. On one of the days last week, one of the 'bosses' asked Rachel what she thought her dad would think if they called him in to work...I forget what was broken/not working, but they were missing him.
However, he has missed a lot of excitement by being retired...his former place of employment almost lost their new powerhouse. They sandbagged the place today, and also hired someone with a backhoe to dig a big drainage ditch around the powerhouse. They also had to lock down because they lost the alarms on the fence.
We mowed the yard this morn--I did most of it while he repaired our outside light fixtures. There was a little bit of the yard left to do, and I have had a stupid cold or allergies or something, till I just let him finish. He feels weird with me mowing the yard, but the only time I haven't mowed the yard was during the last few years I worked. So I feel weird if I don't mow it.

After doing that, and a couple household chores we decided to go get a bite to eat. I took my camera 'just in case.' And walked outside and immediately knew I was going to be happy to have it along. We wanted to go on a drive in a nearby county, but I was not sure the roads were open...the paper said they were closed unless for emergency. And I firmly believe in staying out of the way when so much else is going on.
So instead we went for a little drive near here...and these are pictures of some that I saw....for one thing, the only brick road I know of. You can tell that the water was up and over it by looking at the plants laid down by the flow of water. This is not a place I see when it rains, so don't know if this is normal or out of the ordinary.

But I feel confident that the fields had been planted, and I think they are a loss. Poor farmers. There is all that expense of seed, etc. plus all the time it took to get the crops in the ground. So much time and labor lost.

The boys

Click to enlarge for better viewing!

I haven't shown the babies in a while...so here are the boys. About the only time they are still is when they are sleeping. Bubbie, on the top does a lot of sleeping. However when he is awake, he likes to keep things stirred up. If nothing else, he likes for us to play chase with him. And he loves Shelby, our old collie/shepherd mix.

Cougar, who I first called Chunky Monkey is still very close to his sister. He reminded me so much of my original cat called Cougar that I was all the time slipping and calling him that, so just decided that was his name. He is even lanky like the original was. He likes to play with his sister, but does not like to play with Bubbie cause Bubbie is too rough.

Like the original Cougar, he can smell fresh hamburger a mile away. They all will eat it, but he begs for it. I tried to snap a couple pictures of the Princess, aka Puss Puss but she just cannot be still. The only way almost to catch any of them is when they are sleeping. I will try again in the coming days.

We have started letting my two kitties and Mother Cat outside, but we make Bubbie stay in. I would rather have them all stay inside, but the two females will run you over to get outside. It is understandable with the mother, since she was an outside cat the first two or three months of her life, till my daughter took her home.

Besides having a fear of one getting run over, they have really interfered with Mama Squirrel. She only comes about twice a week now...and even then is not quite herself. She will come running when I see her and call her name, but once she gets here she is very leery of everything. So I really miss her easy companionship. We used to sit at the picnic table or I would sit on the edge of the porch and she would sit beside me...and she will sit at the picnic table but just not very long. Before she would sit there as long as I was feeding her.