"Is this end the head?"

And we thought all we had to worry about was getting carried off by the giant vampire mosquitoes that have been thick since all the rain. Got a new camera today to replace the last one that cratered a few weeks back so have been a little lax in the postings. Celebrated the new pix-taking ability by promptly finding a worthy subject - a most unwelcome visitor. The good news is, yes: he is very much headless (but still moving much to Joey's concern) in the photo. A full grown near four footer and bigger around than my wrist with 7 rows of souvenir buttons. No one was hurt - other than a good spooking - and he was about as far away from the house as the property will allow. Jeree saw him first on our evening walk. She took it in stride but promptly left me to deal with him from great distances and to distract the dog. I handled him old school - really old school - caveman style. There was a handy pile of softball size rocks nearby to dispatch him with and an extra long mesquite branch to finish bashing his head flat. We had been gathering rocks and stacking them along the path to pick up later and all of our tree trimming left me with lots of long thick branches to choose from. Never considered that we were stocking an armory. The bad news is with all the rain and sudden burst of growth he may not be the last one to be hiding in the tall grass but since he is the first rattler, or even suspiciously venomous looking, snake we've seen in two years here maybe this will fulfill our quota for a while. Believe the double barreled 20 gauge may be my new "walking stick".

Have built the front porch eyebrow over the front doors on the house that will provide an extra layer of shade late in the day. Finished screwing off the metal roof - truly a thing of beauty to have done - and ready now for a good initial rain test. Still have some counter-flashing to do over the end bay windows and picked up lumber to frame most of the interior walls this coming weekend. Still deciding which direction to slope the gutter and the best spot to place the rainwater collection tank.