Night sounds

This time of year out here in rice paddy country is rather noisy in the early evening.  Thousands of frogs are singing their hearts out hoping to attract a mate.  It must work because in a couple of weeks, there are tadpoles galore in the water and soon little frogs are hopping all over the place.

Meanwhile, this is what we go to sleep by.

Accidents will happen

As I was mowing the yard along the top edge of the back slope, I ran over a tree stump that could not be seen.  The blade got stuck and bent it so the machine does not work now.

Now to wait for a replacement blade.

Then a couple of days later I was cooking something on the stove.  I needed a small bowl from the cabinet directly over the glass top, four burner stove from the left side.  The bowl I wanted was wedged between two others so as I was tugging a little, and suddenly the right side door opens and out tumbles four bowls that fell on the stove and the floor.  Amazingly, the bowls did not break, but got chipped around the edges and wound up in the trash.  Then I discovered the glass stove top got cracked around the large front burner, about half-way up.

Cracked stove top

Then on Saturday, our dependable front loader Maytag washer bit the dust after 14 years of service.  It had been making loud spinning noises for a few months, then it just gave up.  Henry took the back off and found the belt had worked its way off the drum and the exterior was rusted.

A sad day--the death of the washing machine. 

Rusted parts.  

 So we went to the local electrical shop and chose this Toshiba 7kg washer, top loader.  Japanese and American machines drain differently, so naturally, our water hookup had to be rearranged.  

 Henry got under the house and took photos of the pipes to figure out what to do.

 It took about a day and a half to get the water hooked up and now we have a new machine that is soooo quiet, I did not know the cycle was done until I heard the beep, beep, beep signal indicating it was done.   So nice.