daily slice-of-life photo blog of a Gen-X dad
I got some new strings for my concert ukulele and they sound fabulous! I don’t have a very discerning ear, but I can tell that these Martin M600 fluorocarbon strings are a bit brighter than the Aquila strings that came with the ukulele originally. For only about US$6, it doesn’t cost much to give new strings a try, so why not? And these are sort of clear which makes my ukulele collection a little more varied. Fun fun fun!
The ice storm in Texas is over, and fortunately the only damage we sustained was to one of the trees in our backyard. Two of it’s large branches broke under the weight of the ice so today I cleaned up the debris.
It took a few hours to cut the branches into small pieces using the hand saw and small pruners, then tie them into bundles and the work went smoothly. I ended up with 14 bundles, and now they are by the curb ready to be picked up with the trash. We’re allowed to normally put 7 pieces of trash out in addition to our large bin, but I am curious to see if they will take everything.
I saved the larger branches and logs to use as firewood when we go camping. The firewood for sale at the park or even the supermarket can be expensive!
The damaged tree will probably have to be removed because the limbs that came down make the tree unbalanced, and I am worried that it will fall into the deck. So, when we get our trees trimmed in a couple of months, I’ll have them take that tree away.
The last picture in today’s post is of one of the last pieces of ice I found today. It’s shaped like the United States, don’t you think?
I hope you had a nice Sunday! またね～
I’ve been playing my ukuleles a lot lately and have learned a new song: ひこうき雲. This song is by Yumi Arai and was recently featured in the Studio Ghibli film The Wind Rises. It’s a sad and beautiful song.
So now that I have memorized it, I can concentrate on playing it cleanly, which is very difficult for me. But that applies to all the songs I’ve learned! 😂
I hope you had a good day!
The sun came out today to signal that things are getting better in Texas. The snow and ice started melting and I took advantage of the warmer afternoon to ride my bicycle a bit. I’ve missed the sun so much.
If you’re not able to go out, please come with me for a virtual ride around the neighborhood:
I hope you had a good Friday!
おやすみ！
It appears that the terrible mess we have in Texas has an ending in sight, but many people still do not have electricity to keep warm, nor clean water to drink. I’m hoping tomorrow brings good news, but this evening, I will just take a photo of the hazy sunset to remember the day.
