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August 11, 2022
A Clean, Thin and Spooky August
By Mikie Baker
The Bandera Prophet
This long summer of hibernation is starting to warp my brain. Got me to thinking – what are you doing while you hide inside surrounded by the blast of frigid air conditioning? Most of you probably stream. Me? I clean.
Who invented Spring Cleaning anyway? Maybe Yankees? I know they stay inside for months on end in the winter so maybe they need some good exercise in the Spring like cleaning. For us Texans, we’ve all stayed inside much more than normal with this Summer from hell. A woman can only take so much, so now I spend my weekends Summer cleaning. Sigh.
I went on a cleaning rampage after the Adult Eating Machine and the Tiny Texas Twister left the premises. They stayed in our guest cabin for a couple of months. I didn’t have the courage to enter the cabin while they were here, so when I finally did, I discovered, too my horror, that the place was trashed, and all the furniture had been moved around. I decided it was time to attack. I spent Saturday mornings with a mission to reclaim a calm cabin where guests wouldn’t be terrified.
The minute I was done, Poco the Great Pyrenees decided he was so hot, he’d go find some dirty, stinky, smelly, nasty water to stand in. This white dog was then black from the hips down. No matter how I tried to wipe him off outside, he still wandered in with several cubic feet of dirt on him. He was kind enough to drop it all over the house, so it was impossible to go barefoot inside without ending up with enough dirt on your feet to start a new garden.
What did that mean? More Summer cleaning. At least my new hobby is productive. It also means I really have no life at all.
The final perk to this Summer from hell is dusting. With no rain and a ranch full of dead grass, I feel like we’re living in the Saharan Desert. I know when I can’t control my sneezing, it’s time to pull out the Pledge. So now, I’m in Summer cleaning mode and it’s pretty boring. But not as boring as watching golf on television.
The other thing I don’t understand is why everyone starts a diet in January. Man, that’s biscuits and sausage gravy weather. And it’s too cold to take a nice walk outside without an entire winter exercise outfit which you only need for a month or so in South Texas. I was never one to bundle up with everything including a ski mask just to take a brisk walk.
I think we should start our New Year’s resolution for a diet in August when all you can possibly stomach is a cold salad for dinner. Another thing that’s nice about going on a diet in August is getting up pretty early to avoid the heat of the day and taking a walk. For a brief few minutes, it’s cool outside and if you close your eyes, you fall. No, that’s not it. If you close your eyes, you can almost imagine fall. Almost.
So however, you get through the Summer from hell, try and be productive about it. If you prefer dust and streaming, I say knock yourself out. Me? If the house gets too clean (like that would ever happen) do what I’m going to do – start putting up the Halloween decorations just to cool off. And celebrate my birthday early like I plan to do!
Who invented Spring Cleaning anyway? Maybe Yankees? I know they stay inside for months on end in the winter so maybe they need some good exercise in the Spring like cleaning. For us Texans, we’ve all stayed inside much more than normal with this Summer from hell. A woman can only take so much, so now I spend my weekends Summer cleaning. Sigh.
I went on a cleaning rampage after the Adult Eating Machine and the Tiny Texas Twister left the premises. They stayed in our guest cabin for a couple of months. I didn’t have the courage to enter the cabin while they were here, so when I finally did, I discovered, too my horror, that the place was trashed, and all the furniture had been moved around. I decided it was time to attack. I spent Saturday mornings with a mission to reclaim a calm cabin where guests wouldn’t be terrified.
The minute I was done, Poco the Great Pyrenees decided he was so hot, he’d go find some dirty, stinky, smelly, nasty water to stand in. This white dog was then black from the hips down. No matter how I tried to wipe him off outside, he still wandered in with several cubic feet of dirt on him. He was kind enough to drop it all over the house, so it was impossible to go barefoot inside without ending up with enough dirt on your feet to start a new garden.
What did that mean? More Summer cleaning. At least my new hobby is productive. It also means I really have no life at all.
The final perk to this Summer from hell is dusting. With no rain and a ranch full of dead grass, I feel like we’re living in the Saharan Desert. I know when I can’t control my sneezing, it’s time to pull out the Pledge. So now, I’m in Summer cleaning mode and it’s pretty boring. But not as boring as watching golf on television.
The other thing I don’t understand is why everyone starts a diet in January. Man, that’s biscuits and sausage gravy weather. And it’s too cold to take a nice walk outside without an entire winter exercise outfit which you only need for a month or so in South Texas. I was never one to bundle up with everything including a ski mask just to take a brisk walk.
I think we should start our New Year’s resolution for a diet in August when all you can possibly stomach is a cold salad for dinner. Another thing that’s nice about going on a diet in August is getting up pretty early to avoid the heat of the day and taking a walk. For a brief few minutes, it’s cool outside and if you close your eyes, you fall. No, that’s not it. If you close your eyes, you can almost imagine fall. Almost.
So however, you get through the Summer from hell, try and be productive about it. If you prefer dust and streaming, I say knock yourself out. Me? If the house gets too clean (like that would ever happen) do what I’m going to do – start putting up the Halloween decorations just to cool off. And celebrate my birthday early like I plan to do!