Cactus getting weird

My backyard cacti are getting weird on me. This was a piece that broke off in a windstorm. I stuck in the ground and it’s been growing happily since. Now it’s apparently decided it needs Mickey Mouse ears.

Meanwhile, the original, now 12 feet high, has decided to grow—what the hell?

Well, they are mescaline cacti.

Maybe just enjoying a little of their own medicine?

Window awning

Big-ass bandsaw blade. I had to go to the aserradero today for a piece of lumber, or else wait until they reopen on 10 January.

Later I saw a guy carrying it out, so my guess it’s going for sharpening while the place is closed.

My project is rebuilding a window awning bracket that rotted.

You can see the diagonal piece missing in the back. The board propping it up was one I made to hold up an avocado branch I thought might break under the weight of fruit. It was exactly the right height.

And the cutout I made for the branch was perfect as well. I love it when stuff like this happens.

Our new park

What was just a huge empty round grassy area has been planted over the years with a variety of trees, many of them identified with wooden signs. In the last year it got upgraded with an arbor with steel benches…every time I’m there I take the hanging trash bucket and empty it in nearby trash and recycle bins…and…

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…a play area with slide, swings, and seesaws. And it gets used!

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In the other direction, a family gathered in the shade of a tree, the father kicking a ball with his very young son.

And in the last couple days, in the shade of some anacahuita trees, a concrete picnic table and benches have appeared.

A cell tower goes up

A few days ago, returning from the dog walk, I spotted the base for a cell tower installed a couple hundred meters from my friends’ house. I took a picture to make a before-and-after.

Alas, I didn’t have the correct angle. But from one day to next, they’re now staring at this thing from their patio (much clearer than here, with the tree blocking it. They’re perhaps the only people I know who don’t own a cell phone, a thought no doubt horrifying to many.

As is my reply to people who ask why I didn’t answer their call. Because my cell phone was turned off. And the VOIP land line is frequently unplugged.