Back to it…

The newly clean now-a-playroom garage!

I've been "detoxing" over the long weekend and a few days before–trying to get the house straight (after 11 months here, it's about time), thinking about revisions but forcing myself not to write just yet until it's all in my head, organizing school for the girls, working in the yard, melting in the heat, and generally enjoying time with the family.

And today all that ends.

Sigh.

Actually, I'm looking forward to getting back into it–I clearly needed the break. Looking back, there were only a few days in the last ten years (yikes!) that I did nothing work related at all (okay, thinking about revisions isn't exactly "off" but there's only so much brain shutting down that I can do!). That's the downside of working for yourself; when I was practicing law, most of the time a vacation meant a vacation and some downtime naturally followed, so this was a nice bit of time.

This weekend, we went out to some little towns in Central Texas and did the wine tour thing. I didn't take pictures, but it was an eye-opener. Not because the wines were so amazing (though some were) but because I had no idea the drought here in Texas was as bad as it is. Here's a pic of our poor Lake Travis, 46 feet below normal:

Lake Travis at 46.52 feet below normal. (PHOTO BY CHASE A. FOUNTAIN/TEXAS PARKS AND WILDLIFE)

We passed Lake Buchanan, and I was looking out at the scenery not sure what I was looking at until we drove about 15 yards from a boat dock…and there was no water. Truly sad stuff, and you can see driving around how it has affected a lot of little towns that make a large portion of their income from tourist business in the summer: fishing, boating, all of that has, literally, dried up.

And stupid Lee didn't dump any rain on us at all!!

Of course, the drought is horrible, but what's scary are the fires. They're all over the place right now, and a news report I read this morning said that over 500 homes had been destroyed and people have lost their lives, including a young mother and her baby. It's heartbreaking. Our neighborhood is spitting distance to Leander and Cedar Park and Pflugerville, all of which have massive fires, and the neighborhood itself is surrounded on three sides by very dry ranch land. Yesterday was horrible because of the incredibly high winds that came in on Sunday; hoping today calms down and they're able to contain them. Last I heard, they were zero percent contained.

If it's raining where you are, send some our way!

Share this: