I’m having my coffee, watching my Backyard Buffet guests, and procrastinating about getting on the recumbent bike. My Buffet guests this morning seem to be happy that I have filled up feeders again last evening especially the darn starlings. I don’t know how they always manage to know when I hve freshly filled the feeders. There is one feeder in particular that they flock to and it is filled with a product called “Bark Butter Bits”.  These bits are just small nuggets of something like peanut butter and everything loves them. The starlings, the blackbirds, the bluebirds, the cardinals, wrens, finches, and especially the woodpeckers all hit up that feeder as soon as I fill it; and of course, it is one of the most expensive of the foods that I buy. The surprising thing is that the squirrels won’t bother that feeder at all. This morning the blue Jay has joined the fray too so there is going to be a battle of the “long beak” birds over that feeder. I also put fresh water in the birdbath so they will be going from the feeder to the birdbath with regularity.

It is the first of October and rather that being a cool fall day, it is already eighty three degrees this morning and going up to ninety five today, again. That will break a 100 year old record temperature for today. The month of September was the driest on record with only eight tenths of an inch of rain for the whole month. And we are not expecting any rain for most of this week either. The weather dude said that maybe Thursday we will see a shower but it won’t amount to much. And while the majority of the country is suffering through a heat wave, the north west portion of the country has already had snow fall measured in feet instead of inches. The state of Montana has declared aa state of emergency for portion of th high elevation that received over forty inches of snow over the weekend.

This weather though is allowing our farmers to get out into the fields and get the crops in. I’ve only talked to one farmer’s wife but she said the corn harvest is really going well. They need rain to help the soy beans though. The news reporters too have been out in the fields talking to farmers and they too are saying hat it is going to be a good harvest. That is really good news because the spring forced a late planting season due to all of the rain we got then and many mid west farmers didn’t get to put corn in at all. I always worry about my friends who are working on harvest because they work too many hours in the day and that causes them  to lose concentration sometimes which leads to front accidents and injury. So I keep them in my prayers for a safe harvest.

Tomorrow I have to cover Pastor Art’s Bible study for him because he has a funeral to do. He does a lot of funerals. But, he has been a pastor for over sixty years and a lot of people and their families know him. I have been blessed to be able to work with him these past two years and have learned a lot from him. His training is Southern Baptist but he is ecumenical enough to fit in with our congregations.

I guess I have put off getting on the bike long enough. It isn’t a big deal, I just put my IPad up on the bike, tune into to You Tube music videos, put on my ear phones and peddle away to no where. It’s good exercise and gets the heart rate pumping. While I’m doing that, go have another cup of coffee for me. Have a blessed day, and stay in touch with the gracious God who created you. Shalom.