A slightly different walk in the country...

A slightly different walk in the country...  With Cabo and Mako.  The puppies, on just their second long walk on leashes, were much better.  They're learning to avoid my big boots, and generally they're not pulling all that hard.  They're not learning to stay on one side of me, so I'm still getting leashes wrapped around my legs sometimes.  Oh, well.

It was a very pleasant morning, around 60°F, and fairly clear.  There's still some smoke in the air from far away forest fires, but the air is much clearer than it was last week.  The sunflowers are in their prime, all along the walk.  An alfalfa field about a third of the way along our walk is a week or so from cutting, and is vibrantly healthy; the plants are about 18" tall.  As we walked by this field, I spied a bit of unexpected color about 75' from the road.  I stared at it for a while, couldn't figure out what it was, so I walked out there to find out.  The puppies were hopping over the alfalfa, very cute. :)  When I got close, I saw that we had a child's pool float – quite an unexpected thing in the middle of an alfalfa field that's over a half mile from the closest house with kids!  I picked it up and hung it on a gate post (as you see in the photo above, with the field I found it in in the background).  On the way back home, I grabbed it and hung it on a post near our driveway entrance.  Hopefully the owner will see it and take it home.

On the way back into the house, I stopped to snap the photo at left.  It shows the sad condition of our beautiful copper whirligig.  Actually, the whirligig itself is just fine – but the thick copper post that held it is bent very sadly.  Last Wednesday, while Debbie and I were on a trip to Ogden, one car rear-ended another right next to our driveway, and the car in front ran down an embankment and right into our poor whirligig!  Thankfully nobody was hurt in the accident.  I'm a little surprised that nobody left their name and phone number with us, so that we could call and make a claim for reparations.  Now I have a repair job to make...