Previously users had to paste custom JavaScript into the URL box of Google Maps to be able to display the latitude and longitude of an address. With the latest version of Google Maps, this is no longer required.

1. To begin search for your desired location as you normally would.
2. Next, right click the red “A” pin displayed on the map. Select What’s here?
3. Once you’ve clicked What’s here?, Google Maps will automatically display the (latitude, longitude) pair in the Address search bar at the top of the Google Maps page.

Conversely, if you have a lat, long combination you can plug that into Google Maps to show a location:  43.27069053158456, -75.28080940246582

Kathryn re-joined the Dirty Skirts team for another Dirty Girls run in the Buffalo area.  This time the race was held at the Elegant Builders Raceway Park, a racecourse (i.e. level ground).  The Dirty Girl obstacle course is not timed or competitive so one can go at their own pace.  She ran the 5k mud run in 37 minutes with someone she met at the race, Nina, and then re-joined her team to repeat the last third of the race course.

Before and after pictures of Kathryn.

The end of our gardening season is coming.  We have had a couple nights of frost and needed to cover the garden.  Out of view of this scene are acorn squash. Shown in the foreground are yellow wax beans that I planted the yellow wax beans late as replacements for the peas (largely eaten by the dogs).

Then there is a row of brussel sprouts, broccoli and volunteer cherry tomatoes.  The brussel sprouts will continue to grow into snow season; we are trimming small broccoli heads; the cherry tomatoes were a mistake.  I should have pulled them out to keep them from spreading all over the garden.

There are three rows of tomatoes Burpee Early Girl and Roma tomatoes. Finally a row of prolific green beans.

Eric and I built a fire pit in the backyard and held a small bonfire while he and I played badminton over the clothes line.

Kathryn has been canning in the wanning days of summer

• 26 quarts of peaches
• 29 pounds of blueberries
• 12 quarts of cherries
• 29 pints of green and yellow wax berries
• 3 pints of elderberry jam and 3 pints of elderberry tonic
• 7 quarts of tomatoes

While we were in Utah the rabbits ate the beans down, but they recovered nicely and we are now drowning in green beans.

If you are at our house this Thanksgiving there is a good chance that green beans will be on the menu.

The cook had some spirits to help her get through the process.

Yummy tomatoes.  Probably there will be more to come.

This past weekend we took our pop-up camper to Soft Maple Campground.  Kathryn and Eric took the camper up on Thursday afternoon and then returned to participate in our Thursday night Sand Fleas volleyball playoffs.  Friday morning Eric played in his scramble golf party.  After golf, Kathryn loaded up the dogs, picked up Jack and they drove up to Soft Maple.  I drove up to Soft Maple on Friday night following the AYSO coaches meeting arriving about 9pm.

Saturday the boys went swimming in both the morning and afternoon.  In the afternoon they heard about a rope swing on the island just out from Soft Maple campground.  Before dinner we launched the canoe and paddled out to the rope swing where another family was enjoying the plunge.  We watched for a moment or two and then the family left and Jack/Eric had the rope swing to themselves.  Below, Eric swings out from the bank.

The following day, Sunday, the boys re-visited the rope swing and they ‘competed’ in making creative jumps called Tarzan, Old lady crossing the street, Superman with his cape on fire, Escape from a burning apartment, largest splash and highest splash.  Below Jack prepares for his jump and completes a nice ‘pencil jump’.

Eric makes some interesting moves.

Everyone got into the act fishing for bass, blue gills and “bunkers” in Robert’s Pond.  Eric was fishing for bass.

Barbara and Kathryn did a lot of chatting during Barbara’s fishing stint.

Kim’s daughter and friends were novice fishers and got really excited when they caught a fish.  Instead of fishing for ‘lunkers’ they said they were fishing for ‘bunkers’.

Eric and I did a little large mouth bass fishing from our canoe at Whetstone Reservoir (https://www.google.com/maps/place/Houseville+Gulf+Rd,+Lowville,+NY+13367/@43.6896942,-75.4966286,16z/data=!3m1!1e3!4m2!3m1!1s0x89d8ee883af2a5d3:0xe85596d7e58bf05a )

Looking back towards the dam you can see wind turbines in the distance.

The reservoir is shallow with lots of cover in the way of weeds and stumps.  We ended up fishing with weedless plastic rigs.

After fishing upwind for an hour we turned around and headed back to the car hoping to avoid the pending rain.  We ended up fishing about 1/2 back and paddling madly for the rest.  We got loaded up just as the hardest rain hit.  It was a nice fishing trip.

This weekend we had consecutive days of dry sunny weather so we waterproof the deck using 5 gallons of an oil based clear waterproofing. All told there was 1,145 square feet of  deck floor and stairs, not counting the railings.

After waterproofing the deck Kathryn, the dogs and I took a short walk around our woods to check out the elderberries.  The dogs are always glad to go for a walk.  Cullen is particularly happy since he found the deer bones 1st.

Kathryn checks out the elderberry bushes along the north trail.  It seems the fruit is sparse and small.

The catnip behind the ear is effective vs. mosquitoes, but not deer flies.

Back home we sat on the porch for a bit while the dogs cooled down.

The last week of our vacation people were sending us text messages and pictures of what was happening back here, which was significant flooding, much of it in the Herkimer/Ilion/Fort Plain region but also some south and west of Utica.  We got home early Tuesday morning and it wasn’t long before Kathryn got called by the Red Cross; except for one day of  work and one day Jen and I had promised to take Eric to Water Safari.   Since we got home the weather has been hot and humid and, fortunately, the rain seems to have moved out of the area for a while.  But it is hot (90) with high humidity (82%).

Eric finished up lacrosse with a bang, playing very well, contributing both assists and some goals.  Now he is going to golf ‘camp’ on Friday  mornings and playing pick-up basketball league on Monday nights.

Kathryn’s long ago and long time neighborhood friend, Judy came to visit with her grandson, Christopher who was visiting her from Georgia.  Kathryn and Eric met Judy and Chris at the train station in Rome on Sunday, took them to lunch and then visited Fort Stanwix.  Monday the boys went swimming at Trenton Town Park and then played pickup basketball. The boys got along very well, which gave Kathryn and Judy time to just visit.  They returned to Rochester via train on Tuesday.

We are back into volleyball with mixed success; we got rained/thunderstormed out of a Wednesday night match which we made up the following week, but that entailed playing 8 games vs. Connie and Dale Postal’s teams.  I think we split our games.  Thursday night we had a single early game vs. Roger’s team and prevailed 2-1 in close games.

Eric is doing swim lessons the last two weeks of July and we are planning to go to Maine with the Helmers in August.  Summer is flying by and we haven’t done any camping, let alone canoe camping.

Thursday Jeanne, Barbara and Nathan arrived in the afternoon.  Jeanne and Barbara took the boys for ice cream while Kathryn and I played an early volleyball game.  Friday Kathryn, Jeanne, Nathan and Eric went tubing down the West Canada Creek.  Bradley Grogan, Hobart and Perry replaced our jet pump with a submersible pump during the heat of the morning.  In the evening we went shopping at Gander Mtn and went to dinner at Outback Steak House enjoying the air conditioning in both places.

We had a violent thunderstorm upon our return to our house, but it lowered the temperatures.  Saturday the boys went fishing and swimming in the pond before returning home.

Sunday I got a truckload of mulch which we put around the house.  We plucked 100+ fishworms from the mulch near the peonies and roadside trees.  We fixed the dock in the pond by sealing the plugs with silicone and re-fastening each barrel separately.  Hopefully the barrels will stay sealed and float the dock.