September 5: Dust

I complain a little about dust; because of the high incidence of unpaved roads and garden plots in my home area, it's very common. But that also means that it forms an integral part of the olfactory sense memory of late summer for me. Also, when a pickup truck drives by in late evening when the sun is slanting through the trees just so, it's really pretty.

September 6: September haying

The farmers were working hard this holiday weekend, getting in the last crop of hay before the forecast rain on Tuesday. This is rather obvious, but maybe some people have never thought of it before. When you cut hay, just like when you cut the grass in your lawn, it's green (or at the most light yellow) and has moisture in it. After the hay is cut, it has to lie in the field until it's good and dry, but not so long that exposure and sun bakes the nutrients out. If the hay is baled while it's still wet, it will of course get moldy in in the middle of the bale, or if some air is able to get in there you could even have decomposition, which creates heat.

But this weekend, the weather was perfect for haying: dry, sunny, some wind.