"Cabbage - a familiar kitchen-garden vegetable about as large and wise as a man's head." - Ambrose Bierce

Re. that quote up there from Bierce - Helmut Kohl, the former chancellor of Germany, had a name that literally means "cabbage head."

A local dog rescue shows up in my Facebook feed. This morning they featured a dog available for adoption that they said was a Beagle/Spaniel mix.
Great. You can have a dog that barks incessantly and humps your shin at the same time.

This morning's options included the Tour de France, the men's final at Wimbledon, the F1 race from Silverstone, and church.
This is why I make sure I have Sunday commitments at church.
Pam stayed home so she wouldn't "scare any little children." The bruising is getting better...very slowly.

After some light sanding of the primer layer the hood and two front fenders will be ready for paint. I didn't sand between primer and paint on the roof and as a result have decided to sand that down and re-do the color. There are too many imperfections that I thought would disappear with four layers of color. Nope. And because it's a broad flat surface at nearly eye level they're too obvious for my mild case of perfectionism. No worries. A few hours of work and about $1.50 in paint should solve the problem.
Without exception, everyone here I've told about what I'm doing has dissed the idea. I want this to look as good as possible so that when they see it they're appropriately embarrassed by their negativism. It will still be a 10-footer, but I want them to be surprised at the quality of this alternative budget friendly method.
Sinful pride?

I'm making a trip up to see my mom and brother in Seattle the very end of this month. The trip includes a stop in Tacoma to drop off a weanling that a gal from Seabeck, WA is buying from Marta. We'll meet at the Tacoma Mall for the exchange - I give her the goat and she gives me gas money - and then I'll drive the last 50 miles to the place mom lives.
I'm planning to take the truck. It's 27 years old and has 183,000 miles on it but it runs well and is very comfortable. I should have put enough miles on it by then to have completed a shake-down and know of any issues. It's big - extended cab with an 8' bed and 4WD - but the alternative is Pam's Blazer, and I am NOT a fan of that thing. I've driven it up in the past and drove it to Phoenix last January, and it's almost annoying to drive. The MPG won't be as good in the truck but I'm getting gas money for the trip up and will therefore only pay for the return trip. I'm hoping for about 15 mpg on the freeway. I've yet to go through the first tank since getting it 10 days ago. I'll fill it up this week and find out what I'm getting around town. With a 26 gallon tank a fill up won't be cheap.

I got home in time for the fifth set of the Djokovic/Federer match. Back and forth to the very end and the most excruciating part IMO was watching Roger's wife agonize over every point.
Against any other oponent I'd pull for Djokovic, but I was hoping Roger would win. However, a 14-12 tiebreaker after the fifth set is pretty good tennis by both of them.

Thomas Edison said, "I haven't failed, I've just discovered ways that don't work." Several things strike me about that statement. I note the plural of the word "ways." Persistence. And an attitude that says it will happen; it's only a matter of time.
I put another layer of primer on Sally's sides and fenders that I'll sand with fine paper before putting on the color coats. I can see already that this is going to be a key improvement - thicker primer sanded smoother. I may still have issues and a result that isn't what I can accept but I've discovered what doesn't work and with this adjustment to the process am moving the right direction.

That said, if you can avoid it do not paint a car with any method in a single-car "garage" with a dirt floor out in the woods. We only have 8 or 9 weeks left in my Sunday morning class. I'll get two weeks off before starting another 52-week class the first Sunday in October as we go through the Bible again.
I told them this morning that while they are more than welcome to do the class again I'm assuming most of them will not. And I'm going to miss them. We've become a community, a group in the sociologist's use of that word.

I cleaned the chicken coop this afternoon, too. They had been on pine shavings, best suited for chicks. But at this age it works to use straw and it's a lot cheaper. It's also a bit scary for them. It was funny to watch them decide if they really dared go back in the coop and walk on that strange stuff now all over the floor.

Tomorrow starts a new week. One of my goals is to have both the slides and the handouts sent off to Joe & Michelle in Brazil so they've got plenty of time to do the translation work. And there's a lot of to do. It's not fair to dump all this work on them at the last minute.