It was a dark and stormy afternoon...

The contractor and his helper started work on the gazebo yesterday. When they got here (before eight o'clock in the morning) the sun was out and it looked like a perfect day for working outside.  Within a couple of hours, it started to get cloudy, then it started to get dark and the wind kicked up so badly that one of the chairs on the porch went flying. The contractor kept working, with one eye on the sky and one eye on the gazebo, and even in all of that wind, they were out there trying to beat the rain that we were sure was just a heart-beat away.

As dark as the sky got, and as fierce as the wind was, we never did get one drop of rain. And, thankfully, because we had the trees trimmed not too long ago, the branches weren't dropping from the pecan trees which are right over that gazebo.

When you're out in the middle of so much land, you can see for miles away, and in weather like yesterday's, the change in the sky is so evident, and can be very frightening. Mother Nature makes one humble, to say the least.... when she's in a temper, there's no stopping her.

That dark sky yesterday morning lightened up into a bright and sunny day within half an hour's time. We could see the dark clouds off in the distance, and some of the little towns around here may have been battered with the rain that we never got.

When the contractor and his helper left, the new posts were up on the gazebo decking... they used concrete as a filler so they're not working today, giving the posts in the concrete time to 'just set and be happy.'  They will be back tomorrow, with the material for the roof.

Yesterday morning, we were hearing the cows from the other side of the hills... they had been crying for three days, probably because their calves were taken to market. The sad sounds of those cows are just heart-breaking and I don't think I'll ever get used to those poignant cries.  When the sky darkened yesterday, the cows went quiet... and when the sun came out again in the afternoon, the cows were still silent.

And today... the cows are silent still.  So quiet that it's nearly un-nerving.