There has not been much of a noticeable change with ourprecipitation situation as of late, but at least we are having some cooler mornings & the evenings are a bit more bearable. Also, though it doesn’t help our local feelings very much, some of our more fortunate neighbors havereceived some worthwhile precipitation.Just in case you might have been thinking that I’ve totally lost my mind, that happened to be my “intro” line of last week’s article. It also adds credibility to the ol’ adage of “lots of things can change in a week!”!Now if you think I really might have lost it, I think that the lastparagraph was for about 3 weeks back. Things have been fairly busy on the home-front and seemed to get in the way of normal activities around the first part of each week. There have been a preponderance of smiles & grins on local ranch & farm faces the past couple of weeks & the town folk all seem in a lighter mood, as well. Cooler weather has brought some relief to our fair valley of the Pecan, not to mention what the well received rains did for the area. Quite a number of the stock tanks we’ve viewed seem to have run around, even though many had been cleaned out during the dry summer. I haven’t seen but a couple of the flood retention structures, butone seemed full up to the down spout, while the one at the ol’ Trussell place looked about half full. Richland Creek ran for a few days, but at least it filled all the dry holes. Cherokee Creek seems to be still running, as well as Rough Creek, at least down at the Colony end.Dove season was over this past weekend, as Sunday was the last day for our Central Zone. If you want to bird hunt any more, you might have to travel down to Hondo or points farther South. The Rivers have perked up abit as one of the Hardy Boys was talking of having to clean a 22 lb.Yellowcat, when he was in at the Lumber Yard yesterday. Jarvis & I would probably bait our lines in this interim lull, but most of our Perch tanks went dry during the drought. I think we might be able to find one that has a few left. The County will be putting on it’s “Hunting Britches” for theadvent of hunting season the next couple of weeks. I think the special Youth season is this weekend & then regular Rifle season opens the 5th of November. Anyhow, the hunters will be truly welcome as the long drysummer has been fairly well disastrous on our local financial situation. The Pecan Houses are showing some activity around the retail locations, so maybe they will have enough products & condiments on hand to supply all the visitors. I wouldn’t be expecting any break in prices this season, though.If you happened to notice any “thin-clads”jogging around Town early Sat. morning, you were witness to some of the fifty-odd participants in the 11th annual “Pecan Bottom Run”. This event sort of opened up the PecanFestival activities for the weekend. The 4-H Club benefit happened to be the best attended yet, and Lady Z’s Pecan topped Blueberry-Raspberry muffinswere all devoured. There was a good number of local participants that made it across the finish line, as well.Son, Will was in from Waco this past weekend, taking time to visit in town and out with Lucille, at Sloan. We did take time to visit the bird hunting Bottom out at Harkeyville a time or two & it would suffice to say that we were not in danger of exceeding the legal bag limit. We did, however,with the combined efforts of Shaw & yrs. truly, have enough in the pot to grill a mess of bacon-wrapped Whitewings following a visit down at the PecanJam festival on the River at Risien’s. I need not give a lot of space to the Pecan Jam here as there should be coverage on the worthy event in this week’s edition of the “News”. We would offer that it appeared to be very well planned, organized, and attended. Will enjoyed visiting with the different Wineries of our Hill Country region, as he’s taking steps toward putting in a Vineyard. We were especially impressed by the number of local folks that were enjoying all the activities down in the Park Sat. afternoon with Sloan Community seeming to have the highest percentage of residents in evidence. I even got to congratulate Sam Sloan on making another birthday.Buddy & I were both in a pretty good humor that afternoon as theAggies came out on top of the Cyclones in Ames, Iowa and we would imagine that the Cowboys of Okie State were even proud of the Red Raiders for the unbelievable outcome of their trip into Norman. The Rangers are also a game up on the Cards, so most Texans had a pretty good gaming weekend. Other than all that , let’s say that the Mayor & yrs. Truly will be trying to call up another rain anywhere out around——————Harkeyville!!!!!!!!!!There has not been much of a noticeable change with ourprecipitation situation as of late, but at least we are having some cooler mornings & the evenings are a bit more bearable. Also, though it doesn’t help our local feelings very much, some of our more fortunate neighbors havereceived some worthwhile precipitation.Just in case you might have been thinking that I’ve totally lost my mind, that happened to be my “intro” line of last week’s article. It also adds credibility to the ol’ adage of “lots of things can change in a week!”!Now if you think I really might have lost it, I think that the lastparagraph was for about 3 weeks back. Things have been fairly busy on the home-front and seemed to get in the way of normal activities around the first part of each week. There have been a preponderance of smiles & grins on local ranch & farm faces the past couple of weeks & the town folk all seem in a lighter mood, as well. Cooler weather has brought some relief to our fair valley of the Pecan, not to mention what the well received rains did for the area. Quite a number of the stock tanks we’ve viewed seem to have run around, even though many had been cleaned out during the dry summer. I haven’t seen but a couple of the flood retention structures, butone seemed full up to the down spout, while the one at the ol’ Trussell place looked about half full. Richland Creek ran for a few days, but at least it filled all the dry holes. Cherokee Creek seems to be still running, as well as Rough Creek, at least down at the Colony end.Dove season was over this past weekend, as Sunday was the last day for our Central Zone. If you want to bird hunt any more, you might have to travel down to Hondo or points farther South. The Rivers have perked up abit as one of the Hardy Boys was talking of having to clean a 22 lb.Yellowcat, when he was in at the Lumber Yard yesterday. Jarvis & I would probably bait our lines in this interim lull, but most of our Perch tanks went dry during the drought. I think we might be able to find one that has a few left. The County will be putting on it’s “Hunting Britches” for theadvent of hunting season the next couple of weeks. I think the special Youth season is this weekend & then regular Rifle season opens the 5th of November. Anyhow, the hunters will be truly welcome as the long drysummer has been fairly well disastrous on our local financial situation. The Pecan Houses are showing some activity around the retail locations, so maybe they will have enough products & condiments on hand to supply all the visitors. I wouldn’t be expecting any break in prices this season, though.If you happened to notice any “thin-clads”jogging around Town early Sat. morning, you were witness to some of the fifty-odd participants in the 11th annual “Pecan Bottom Run”. This event sort of opened up the PecanFestival activities for the weekend. The 4-H Club benefit happened to be the best attended yet, and Lady Z’s Pecan topped Blueberry-Raspberry muffinswere all devoured. There was a good number of local participants that made it across the finish line, as well.Son, Will was in from Waco this past weekend, taking time to visit in town and out with Lucille, at Sloan. We did take time to visit the bird hunting Bottom out at Harkeyville a time or two & it would suffice to say that we were not in danger of exceeding the legal bag limit. We did, however,with the combined efforts of Shaw & yrs. truly, have enough in the pot to grill a mess of bacon-wrapped Whitewings following a visit down at the PecanJam festival on the River at Risien’s. I need not give a lot of space to the Pecan Jam here as there should be coverage on the worthy event in this week’s edition of the “News”. We would offer that it appeared to be very well planned, organized, and attended. Will enjoyed visiting with the different Wineries of our Hill Country region, as he’s taking steps toward putting in a Vineyard. We were especially impressed by the number of local folks that were enjoying all the activities down in the Park Sat. afternoon with Sloan Community seeming to have the highest percentage of residents in evidence. I even got to congratulate Sam Sloan on making another birthday.Buddy & I were both in a pretty good humor that afternoon as theAggies came out on top of the Cyclones in Ames, Iowa and we would imagine that the Cowboys of Okie State were even proud of the Red Raiders for the unbelievable outcome of their trip into Norman. The Rangers are also a game up on the Cards, so most Texans had a pretty good gaming weekend. Other than all that , let’s say that the Mayor & yrs. Truly will be trying to call up another rain anywhere out around——————Harkeyville!!!!!!!!!!