This Video Game Called "Life!"

Recently,  I have realized that we are all in a video game.   Forget the "Matrix"!  We are actually in a game called the "Sims". And as Cheryl has noticed,  the person playing OUR lives has the difficulty set to "Hard".   Not impossible, mind you.... Just slightly more difficult than "Normal".  And definitely NOT on easy/beginner mode. 

Hard difficulty

So the mod we are currently playing  in our life is called "Farmer's Market".   We will take two college educated people and throw them into the middle of a remote area of Rural Iowa and ask them to make a living selling some product (Probably something that everyone already has... Like Soap!) where there are few to no people.  The conditions will be HOT to VERY HOT, with a constant threat of tornadoes, rain and hail.   They have a 2 hour window  to sell as many bars of soap that they can. Both of them have NO prior experience in either soap making OR BUSINESS!  GO!

IMPOSSIBLE difficulty!

Well, I'm sure I would be pulling my hair out if I were to be playing that game.   I would most likely abandon it and start playing XCOM where I save the earth from an alien invasion. ( Something I am apparently good at doing!)  But not MY player!  My player ( who ever he is...) seems to LOVE playing the Sims and loves the challenge of seeing how much misery the characters Ethan and Cheryl will endure.

To be honest, when I was in grade school, there was a game called "lemonade Stand, which sounds remarkably like the game above.   The only thing was... In THAT game... I made enough money to send myself to college.. ( In the game... not "real" life!  In THIS game, I had to work at McDonalds and Holiday Inn to pay for college.)   

So yes, the lines between video games and reality are becoming more and more blurred.  Even that last paragraph has me shaking my head trying to follow it.  But let's get back to Reality. ( Or at least, this simulation of reality.)Today's Farmer's Market!

Jame's the "Honey Guy" (with dog.)

I would put this in the "successful" category, as Cheryl and I sold nearly $200.00 of soap.  We missed setting a record by only one bar. ( Last week's farmer's market was our Best week overall.... so far) Even though it seemed like it was slow this morning... And it was VERY hot and humid,   a few people bought LOTS of soap.   Meaning:   Fewer customers... Greater sales!  We had several people buy $40 worth of soap in one transaction!  YEAH! 

This is why it is easier to sell soap to soap users than trying to convert non-soap users to our brand. ( Dial, Zest and Coast are not soap.... Just to clarity.) 

We also managed to sell Cheryl's Felt Pouches at the Washington market on Thursday.  The rain held off so we did not get wet, and people must have been in a "back to School" buying mood.  It worked out. 

In other news:   Cheryl has been antsy for bike riding in the evening.  Usually when the heat is at it's worst!   We hit the Kewash trail yesterday and discovered that the Hops are in full bloom!  We could harvest them now, if I did not already have an entire drawer already full from last year's harvest.   It was also a great year of Plums!  Wild plums could be found in areas where we have not seen them before.  And the neighbor, who has a couple plum trees, said they were nearly falling over with the amount of fruit this year. He is selling his house and moving, so I wonder what will happen to the plums then. 

A Small bird was found on the trail.  I could not see any above nest that he would belong to, but it is possible he might be one of the many ground birds.   It is tough to tell when he still looks like a cotton ball.  It is also possible that he was a Cuckoo that got blown out of the nest.  Whatever the species, he seemed to be able to run pretty well, and was nearly at the flight stage.  I let him go off the path near where we found him.  NO reason to let him be easy pickings for a fox or coon. 

My Chalk drawing in Washington.

Thursday's Farmer's Market.

Too hot to chalk today.  Cheryl wants to run Long tomorrow, and the heat is said to continue.  we shall see if the conditions change when they happen.   In the mean time, Stay cool!   Have fun!  And hopefully, you Sims Player will not get bored and play "Call of Duty" or "Mass Effect" instead.  Thanks for stopping in.

Rain, Storms High Humidity, and an Uncontrolled Garden!

Storm's a Brewin'!

 It has rained for the last few days here in Iowa.  You would think it would bring in cooler temps, but it did not.  Well,   Not for very long.   The night time lows were pleasant...  But the humidity cranked right back up there to unbearable.  Cheryl even ran in the rain on  Tuesday.   

Swirly clouds!  Fun!

The stormy clouds and lightning flashes could be seen even last night.  ( Though, no rain..) It was so humid this morning, we had dense fog!  Kind of cool... As long as you did not have to run in it. ( which we did!) 

The good (-ish) news is that the Plants seem to be much happier now with a bit of a drink.  My Garden is a lost cause this year.   The free Tomato plants I planted got off to a late start and we seem to be behind everyone else by about 3 weeks!  ( Maybe more!)  I can see that there are a LOT of buds on the Grape Tomato plants ( Grape, not cherry?   I guess so.) 

The Sunflowers are all gone to seed now, feeding the Birds better than the bird feeder ever did last winter.  The Hops vine seem to be thriving!   I see lots of lowers, so I am hoping it will produce cones this year.  

The Cardinal Creeper has been fighting an uphill battle this entire time.  I begged, pleaded, and pointed out every plant I had to the Land Lords so they would not "trim" them off.   And out of 8 plants,  only three remain.   However, I finally have my second flower of the year!  The vine that was hidden in the Hops vine, seems to be doing the best as far as flowers.   The one growing along the trellis is certainly big, but has not produced flowers yet.  Fingers crossed the Landlords ( and rabbits!) leave them alone for the rest of the summer.

And finally,  Peppers!  The Habanero Pepper plants were a freebie from the local store that I thought I would take a chance on, ( Having never planted  Peppers before in my small  garden plot. )  The Slugs ate three out of the 5 plants.   And the remaining two plants have been enveloped by weeds and sunflowers for most of the Summer.  However!  Yesterday, Cheryl discovered that the plants were still alive, still Growing!  AND had peppers on them!  

We both sampled a small one and about burned out faces off!  I thought these were going to be "sweet" peppers.   SURPRISE!  I'm not much into hot and spicy foods, and the heat index on these guys is Way off MY charts.   Cheryl says she will attempt a Salsa with Strawberries.  Apparently the sweet berries offsets the heat a bit.  We shall find out. 

Farmer's Market tonight.   Cheryl wants to bring some of her pouches, so we will have to see how that pans out.   The Soap does not like the high humidity and heat, so we will be leaving that home until the seasonal temps change a bit towards the cooler side.   I'll have to report on the success later.  Thanks for stopping in.

A Subaru Update!

'Tis Monday! And Cody gave us a call to let us know the Subaru situation. First:  It is not bad. ( Finger's Crossed!)  Turns out, the timing did not quite jump as he had thought.   And the issue was not on the side he had thought.  Instead, a small carbon build up on one of the Piston Heads was causing a stop gap as the top of the piston hit the top of the cylinder.   Translation:  2 more weeks without a Subaru!

At the end of the day, we are getting two new head gaskets, a new water pump, a new Timing belt, A new Harmonic crankshaft pulley, and possibly new wires and spark plugs! ( More on that later)  All for half the price of a gasket job!   Which is a little more than I had originally signed on for, but a LOT less than I was expecting.  

As much as I brag up the Subie,  He is old.  And Subies DO break.  And we have to put this into perspective  It has been 5 years since our last head gasket repair.  In that time, we have put nearly 200,000 miles on him.  That also goes for the timing belt, water pump, and any other basic engine surgery.  I changed out the Spark Plugs and wires three years ago.  They are supposed to be changed out every 60,000 miles or 48 months.  So we are going to swap them out while the engine is out of the bay.  The ones I put in three years ago were a little past their usefulness.  However, they were still firing at least.   

Well, after re-reading my previous posts from 2017 and 2018,( and 2016!)  it seems that MOST of my problems stem from us not replacing key parts before the manufacturer recommendation specs.  And, living here in Iowa, we tend to put a lot of miles on our car.  One of the downsides of living in the country 25 miles from civilization. ( and your job, and groceries, and running trails...) If you think about things that way,  we are probably more lucky than we know.  

The guys have been very cool about things, and answered all of our questions.   The said: Aside from carbon build up, the engine looks pretty good. The reason for the extended time is that they will be sending the engine block to the machine shop to be cleaned up, so that is another slight preventative maintenance we can add to the list.  (I think whenever head gaskets are changed, they send the blog to a machine shop to get cleaned up. )  They even said they will clean up the engine bay while the engine is out.  Possibly because they don't want to get their hands any dirtier than necessary.  

So two more weeks without the Subie.   Bummer!  But I'm hoping he will come out of this looking and feeling brand new-ish.  Well, as brand new as any vehicle over 350,000 miles can feel.   

In the mean time, we will continue to go to Farmer's Markets with the Loaner car: a Honda Santa Fe.  It has the room that allows our tent set up and soap boxes to fit nicely.  And I can get my bike inside easy enough.   By the way!  The 88 Oldsmobile was so big, I could fit my bike in the BACK SEAT!  Talk about roomy!   I'm thinking they do not make many vehicles like that anymore. ( Anything that is NOT a minivan or Suburban. )  

Girls helped with Dino's.

Also, I will continue to chalk in the park.   It rained hard this morning, so I'm guessing most of my previous murals are gone.   Which is a good thing! As I was running out of places to do my drawings.   Yesterday, a couple of the girls showed up and joined in to put a couple dinosaurs out there.

Washed away by rain...

   Too bad their drawings  did not last longer...But that is Ok!  They seemed to have a good time and I let them do a lot of the chalking.   With a little more encouragement, they might come down and do their own chalk drawings in the future. (Now that they know all of the tricks and tips.)    However,  School started today!  So looks like they will not be showing up anytime before 3:00 in the afternoon... For the rest of the year.   So I will have the entire park to myself once again. 

Thanks for stopping and and hearing my sad tale of Subie Woes....   Hopefully,  two weeks from now,  we will have a happier ever-after story to share.   We shall see.

A Very Busy Week! A Very Busy DAY! Cheryl Runs For Watermelons!

The remains of the crankshalf Pulley.

  Whoa!  A lot has happened over the last few days.  And now I have to catch everything up in a single blog post?   How can I possibly fit it all in?  

Well,  I could skip a lot of details.   Leave parts of the story for later blog postings. ( But that usually ends up on the cutting room floor...) Or I can do my best to simply keep the story brief, interesting, and actively paced....  Let us begin!

 First,  Subie has been in Hospital for the last two weeks getting his timing belt, water pump, and Camshaft Pulley replaced.  Only the Cam shaft needed to be worked on.  All other tasks were scheduled as "preventative maintenance."  The only reason it was taking so long was becuase they had been booked up for two weeks, and are the only real mechanics in town.  The mechanic has done many of timing belts water pump replacements   before and actually has two Subies of his own!  So we figured we were in good hands.

Rubber has been destroyed!

But then... the Crankshaft pulley slipped.   Causing the piston timing to be thrown off in a Boxer Engine. Something I feared would happen to me if I had attempted it, had happened to the pros!  So what does this mean? 

It means it will be another week before we get our car back.   It means we are getting a new head gasket for the left side of our engine... for free! ( So far, anyway...)  AND it means Subies Engine will be pulled out and inspected thoroughly for any signs of wear, leaks or hidden damage.   So... good things!  Right?  

Subie's current condition in "Hospital"

We shall let you know about that on Thursday, when the task is projected to be completed.   The guys were really cool about letting us know what happened and walking us through the process.  The even upgraded our Loaner car to an 1999  Delta 88 Oldsmobile sedan!  (Same car my Dad LOVED back in the 80's.)  It is a Boat, but has a soft ride and luxurious feel...  Like gliding on a cushion of air! I see why my Dad loved that  Delta 88 so much.  

 "Good Sportsmanship" ribbons.

All that to say that today's festivities have been up in the air since we brought Subie in over a Week ago.  TODAY!   Cheryl ran the Watermelon Stampede 10K in Muscatine. 

We have been planning this for a while now.   Last year they cancelled the vent, and Cheryl was keeping an eye on whether they would have it this year.  When she found out they were,  she signed up!  

Early Morning rain

Thus creating the Subie "disaster" that was inevitably going to jeopardize the possibility of attending it.  I secretly believe Cheryl self-sabotages certain events with her mind... by manipulating the universe into throwing a wrench in our plans when there seems to be nothing that could go wrong.  (How else would you explain a Reliable Subaru suddenly having a minor mishap?)  But I digress...

At the Start.

There was a slight possibility of rain in the morning!  But it never really happened.  (Despite Cheryl's mind powers!)  Only a small sprinkle in the beginning.  Perhaps MY mind powers were preventing hers from creating bad weather. Well, I can hope at least...

 

Sexy Cheryl Still...

A Barbershop quartet sang the National Anthem. (Again,  MY mind powers at work....)   And shortly after, the runners were lining up!   I joined a few Farmer's Market acquaintances to cheer Cheryl on as she ran by.  ( James "the Honey guy" and the The Baker who did RAGBRAI.) 

Cheryl's Sexy runner legs.

Crossing the Finish

At least the overcast skies and cool-ish breeze kept the even from being a "Suffer-fest." The 10K route was a giant loop, so I had to wait for her at the finish line to run in.   She came in ahead of my mental pace, just over 48 minutes!   We walked over to the print out and got her official time. 

Over 40 overall finisher!

The Real trophies!

We were unsure of what the placement meant.  It looked like she had placed # 2 in her age group!  IF that was true, she would not win a coveted Watermelon!

 "Good Sportsmanship" ribbons.

As it was,  she did not win a medal.  Instead, she won a "participation ribbon" for her efforts.   That would be depressing if it were not so funny.     But shortly afterwards,  the director called Cheryl up by name.  Turns out she won the Master's Award for Female over 40.  

Here's your Prizes!

Melon and Glass drop.

 

 

A lovely award and a fresh watermelon!  What could be better than a Watermelon as an award for winning in a Watermelon Stampede?  Well,  The glass teardrop looks pretty good too.   It is going on Cheryl's Trophy wall, along with all her other life achievements.  Unfortunately, there is not enough room for the watermelon, so it looks like we are going to have to eat it. ( This will be the first time we will be eating one of her trophies. Until she wins a Pie  from the Apple race 10K  someday... ) 

The champions line up!

Say "Cheese!"

So Cheryl was a Champion today.  Despite the spotty training, shaky weather, car trouble, the lack of self esteem and total uncertainty of the future.   I would like to think MY mind powers helped bring that about.   Well,  I can hope at least...

After the Ceremony, Pictures, and  bananas,  we headed to the Farmer's market to chat up our peers.  Turns out we did not miss much of Thursday, after skipping Thursday night's Farmer's Market in Washington.  I guess the heat and music kept people from buying much.  

On our  way home, we stopped by the Lone Tree Fall Festival.   We pass by Lone tree every time we head to Muscatine, but have never stopped in to check it out.   Today, we decided to give it a shot.  

Like many small towns, the crowds were small.  The festivities were even smaller!   But unlike Wellman's  Tri-County Pork Festival,  there was stuff there that I actually enjoyed!  

Old cars on display!

Wild Willy Jeep!

Like Old Cars!   I love checking out Cars that have been restored to their former glory.  Or seeing cars that are unfamiliar.   Chatting up the old men who restore them is always fun too.   There was even a Wild Willy Jeep!  However,  Cheryl does not geek out on cars very much...So mostly that is something only I enjoy. 

Radio controlled Airshow!

And then there is the Radio Controlled Airplanes.   Even though I have never flown one, I still find them fascinating!  And would love to probably spend hours watching them dart around in the sky.   However,  Cheryl does not like radio controlled anything... So mostly that is something that only I would enjoy.  

And finally there were these instruments of WAR! Come on!  Who has not played Army as a little kid?  Or continued that role play and joined the REAL Army to continue the fantasy?   I may not like war all that much, but I do like playing with all those toys.   And what caught my eye was the 4.2 Mortar!

4.2 Heavy Mortar.

I was an 80 mm Mortar Man when I was in the Army back in '93-'96.  And I got to play around with the 120mm Mortar just before I left!  ( The 4.2 replacement.)  The 4.2 has a rifled tube, unlike the smooth bore of the 120mm mortar.  Both are big, heavy, and explosive!  At least you could carry the 80 mm.   No one wanted to carry it, but you could.  The heavy mortars were restricted to mobile artillery tracks or permanent fixtures.    This one was found in Rock Island, collecting dust when a VFW guy acquired it from the quartermaster.  Some old man gave me the entire story.  

M1A1 Tank!

Along with the M1A1 Abrams tank!   This one was acquired after the Abrams was declassified and decommisioned.   They have removed all of the "guts," and the outer shell ( or husk)  of the tank  sits on top of a slab of concrete 4 feet deep to support its weight.  The same Old Man told me the entire story about all the steps it took to acquire this piece of equipment after the Army had decommissioned it. 

Unfortunately,  Cheryl does not like Tanks, Mortars or anything that has to deal with War.  So mostly that was something that only I would enjoy.  

So now we are back home,  celebrating our big win over Life's little tragedies.   Our plans consist of relaxing, petting the cats, and possibly eating watermelon.   Mostly because we have no room for a giant melon!   And the glass trophy would not taste as good.   

Sidewalk Chalk cats...  maybe tomorrow.

There!  Finished!  Was this long?  It certainly looks like it.   I will have to drone on about my chalk drawings another time.   Hopefully they will not end up on the cutting room floor.   And it appears that the rain did not wash them away as had been predicted.   I guess that leaves tomorrow wide open.    Thanks for stopping in!