Friday Smiles 523: Voting and harvesting

It's Friday, which means it's time to join Friday Smiles, hosted by Annie (at A Stitch in Time). Let's visit Annie and the other wonderful ladies who also share their smiles each Friday.   But first,

let's head to church.  No, I'm not going there for a service, but for my inalienable right to cast my ballot for, in this case, Mayor and Board of Education member.

 

This was the first day for early voting at all the polling stations.  The election office, which is downtown, has been accepting early voters for several days.  I can breathe a sigh of relief and now must wait till August 1 to learn the results of the election.  BTW, if you live in Michigan, Nevada, Pennsylvania, or Georgia, be sure to thank your poll workers.  They are under even more pressure because of the lies that have been told about them by former leaders who claim they hid ballots, destroyed ballots, etc.

It seems like this is my daily harvest of tomatoes.  No peppers most days because something has taken a bite out of several.  I also picked three more Roma tomatoes, but they are not as ripe, so need to sit a day or two on my kitchen window sill.

Sunday I was in my back yard, trying to assemble my umbrella.  Sadly, for the past two years, I didn't use it, but I left the stand outside because it is incredibly heavy.  

 

  When I tried to loosen the top bolt on the stand, it wouldn't budge.  Since I didn't want to strip the threads, after fighting with it for nearly half an hour, I doused it with WD-40.  Now it's soaking up the oil and I'm waiting until we are no longer under an extreme heat advisory before I tackle those threads again.  The image above is similar to (and looks exactly like) my base.  I found the image of this stand on the internet. 

As I was working away, I noticed this black butterfly that kept flitting back and forth among my herbs.  I finally went in, got my camera, and tried to take a few photos of it.  Sadly, it's wings were in constant motion, even when it was hovering.  It's the gray black image at the top middle of the photo.

I think I missed it when it hovered over the bee balm.

After chasing it around my herbal garden,

I finally gave up and moved on to other tasks at hand.  Tasks that were in the air conditioning, I might add!

And now for a few funnies:

 

 

 

 

 

    I think that says it all this week.  

Thanks for dropping by today.  Enjoy your weekend. PLEASE visit Annie and don't forget to start your weekend with a smile.