Timmy's birthday was a blast
By Sheila Donnelly/Austin Daily Herald

It is getting scary how dry it is. We really need rain. I don't remember my flowers ever looking so dried up before, as they are this August. The corn in the fields is drying up on the stalks. This week we aren't supposed to have any rain either. I saw on the news that the pope was praying for rain. There are wild fires out of control in Europe as they are out of control out in the western part of the states. One thing the dry weather is good for is outdoor work of mending the roads, building and painting. No one needs to mow their lawn as often either as the grass isn't growing. I like that there are fewer mosquitoes because it is so dry. It is also good weather to go swimming in these last few weeks before school starts.

My son Timmy turned 10 last Friday and I took four of his friends swimming at the Austin Municipal Pool. We were there at 1:30 p.m. and Timmy and his friends were the only ones going down the water slide. They liked that there were so few swimmers. When we left at 3 p.m. more people were coming so there would have been longer lines for the boys to take their turn to go on the water slide. We had a cook out for the boys at our house afterwards. The boys had a great time running all over our farm. Timmy got Legos, Bionicles and a toy airplane for gifts.

The boys took the toy airplane out to the pasture away from buildings and electrical wires to fly it. The plane came down in high weeds and it took them a while to find it. The plane was a hit but it was hot so that the boys came up by the house to sit at the picnic table under the shade to play with the new Legos.

While the boys were having a peaceful time doing this, Timmy's oldest brother, Danny, came to the party and gave Timmy his first BB gun. Timmy's friends live in town and became bug-eyed when they saw that Timmy got a gun. They forgot about the Legos and all wanted to hold Timmy's new gun.

Danny and Timmy's dad instructed Timmy on safety and told him and the boys to never point a gun at anyone. Then Danny set up empty cans to use as target practice. The boys didn't want to go home when they could shoot a BB gun. We had some old beer in cans that had been left outside for two months and they shot at them. They thought that was the best thing hitting the beer cans and having the beer spray out like a water sprinkler. I had to call one mother and tell her that her son was going to be late coming home as they were having too much fun shooting at beer cans and she said, "Well, that's one thing we can't do here in town. I'm glad he's having fun."

I told Timmy that he can't shoot at birds or I would take the BB gun away from him. So far he has been more interested in playing with his Legos and has gone outside with his BB gun when someone older is with him. I have only shot a gun a few times and I have little interest in shooting.

Tom is not very good at shooting things and doesn't like to hunt. When we do have predators in the yard like skunks we have had to call neighbors to come and shoot the animals. This year we had to have someone come shoot a skunk that wouldn't leave the yard and a woodchuck that was eating my garden. I'm glad that Timmy is having a chance to learn this new skill and he eventually will take gun training when he is older.