Sunday, June 2, 2013

LET THERE BE LIGHT (In the yard)

When EVERYTHING happened a couple of years ago and the house flooded we came back to find that the rehabbers, restorers and rebuilders had cut the power to our big floodlights on the roof as well as removed that handy outside electrical outlet in the back. Some more mumbo jumbo about codes that we never completely (like a lot of the codes consisting of "move that pipe to someplace entirely inconvenient and impossible to reach in case we need to replace it someday" understood.

All we knew was, suddenly, we were unable to see the dogs at night in the yard and, more to the point, unable to check for varmints before we let them out.

 
We had nothing to go by other than the moon and flashlights to check for

(photo by Google)
 annoyed raccoons


  (Photo from Google)
 
annoyed possums
 
And so on.
 
Since Doc will not go out at night without an escort with a flashlight and/or Llewis or Conley this has been inconvenient. The biggest problems is actually not being able to check for skunks BEFORE I open the door and send the pups roaring into the night.
 
Some women are handy with tools. I know what a shovel is, and a trowel, but wrenches and hammers leave me in a cold sweat. Unfortunately, for the most part (He did put my grill together withouot mishap) DH is about as "handy" as one of the dogs.
Doc is good at deconstructing, but not at putting things back together again. He and DH share some traits that  way, altho DH at least makes an ATTEMPT to put things together.
 
But see, we have a neighbor who is a master electrician.
 
So yesterday Roger came over and began putting up new floodlights.
But it rained. And rained, And rained. The yard looks like a rice paddy. The Garden, which I have allowed to go wild, looks like Indochina.
 
So Roger had to quit, plunging us back into blackness in the yard.
And what does he do?
 
He sets up his own floods on his pool deck overlooking our yard! So I step out the door and it is virtually daylight at 11 at night!!!
I still went out with the dogs because Roger had left some things behind and I was afraid the Bassets and Doc would build an escape route over the fence.
(Actually I didn't want Doc eating Roger's stuff.)
 
But it was such a thoughtful gesture. Do we have cool neighbors or what?
At least on one side....