Concrete

I haven't had the inspiration to write much here lately. (Not to mention that it is a nightmare to upload photos lately.)

I could post infinite political articles and videos but, so tired of 1) all of it and 2) preaching to the choir and 3) to what end?

Other than the daily horror show, things on the local level are not that interesting.

We left town in our tiny camper for a week in mid September. Social distancing and staying safe precluded browsing in quaint shops or eating in restaurants except for take-out.

Road trips, hiking, lounging around the campground was the extent of our activity. We walked around Antonito, Pagosa Springs, and Durango Colorado and Chama, New Mexico.

My sweet hubby, Leon...I am indeed a lucky guy

Attitude!

Snow in them there hills

Cano's Castle Antonito, CO

Enlarge to read about the Penitentes - San Isidro Catholic Church

Remnants of the Church

Have a beer

We had friends over yesterday for dinner...(A nice salad, green peppers stuffed with ground turkey, eggplant, and other tasty ingredients, homemade Italian bread, wine, crepes with sweetened ricotta and strawberries and peaches).

Having guests and cooking something special for them...something I've missed doing during the pandemic...we have had guests infrequently, mostly visiting outdoors on the deck. All of our friends have been very diligent, very careful almost to extremes. So we have felt both safe and, I think we have an enhanced sense of camaraderie and "family".

Back at the ranch, there has been a project I've been wanting to do and have been putting off for four or five years. Patching/resurfacing the concrete driveway which is/was cracked and crumbling. Spalling concrete is the technical term, but I think ours was a bit beyond that.

Not one to pay a company several thousand of dollars to do the job professionally, I rely on my proclivity to do it myself at a fraction of the cost or "Why spend good money to have something done right when you can do a half-assed job yourself for the price of a couple of dinners at a lousy restaurant?"

So, this afternoon, Leon and I got to work on the driveway. So far we've used five 40lb bags of Quikrete vinyl concrete mix to fix one section of the driveway. We are not quite done yet...maybe we'll try to finish up tomorrow.

I seem to take to concrete the same way I take to bread or pasta dough. Maybe it's in my blood. My maternal grandpa was a stone mason, my paternal grandpa could lay a walkway, one of my cousins is a mason.

I am an amateur do-it-myself-er. Leon assists with no complaints.

Before

Before

After

After