Hot and Cranky

Yesterday went sideways right out of the gate. The husband came downstairs and said, “Did you know we didn’t have any water pressure?” He had taken a shower Tuesday night, but by yesterday morning, the pressure in the tank was down to 10%.

He worked his way down the troubleshooting flow chart and discovered that the control box to the well pump wasn’t working. Being without water on a hot July day is not a good thing. He managed to get the control box rigged up so that it was working, but I was sparing with the water usage until he could get home with a replacement control box.

And the rest of the day never did quite get back on track. I couldn’t run the mister in the chicken yard to help cool the clucks because I didn’t want to risk the pump going out again. The chickens were hot and cranky and pecking at each other. I went into the coop mid-afternoon and discovered one of the black Jersey Giant pullets languishing on the floor. One of the big chickens was beating on her. (Chickens get very mean to each other when they are unhappy, and heat makes them unhappy.) I thought the pullet might be suffering from heat stress, so I brought her inside, put about an inch of cool water in the laundry tub, and stood her up in there while I splashed water over her. She revived nicely after a bit and spent the night in the laundry room in a crate.

Everybody is peckish, including the farmer. I have never hated a summer as much as I am beginning to hate this one. Yes, hate is a strong word, but it’s how I’m feeling. This heat wave has no end in sight, and it’s increasing the fire danger every day. I worry about the husband being out in the heat all day, although he seems to have a much higher tolerance for it than I do.

I brought in what was left of the peas and cut a whole bunch of lettuce because it’s getting ready to bolt. We’ll be eating a lot of salads this week. The raspberries are coming on and we’ll need to start picking those this weekend.

I knocked out another T-shirt yesterday afternoon to test out my finished pattern. I think I have nailed it. This was some 100% cotton jersey from some unknown source. I’m systematically going through my pile of T-shirt fabrics and making them up into actual garments. A T-shirt takes about two hours, start to finish. The sleeves in this version are much better. I also experimented with coverstitching around the neckband:

I am not sure how I feel about it. It adds a nice detail and helps to keep the neckline flat, but it puts more thread into that area. Eh. I’ll wear this for a while and see.