“The elephant keeps walking as the dogs keep barking.” — A proverb from India
“Rumor travels faster, but it don’t stay put as long as truth.” — Will Rogers
“When you are inspired by some great purpose, some extraordinary project, all your thoughts break their bonds.” — Patanjali
“Just remember, once you’re over the hill you begin to pick up speed.” — Arthur Schopenhauer
“When the axe came into the woods, many of the trees said, ‘At least the handle is one of us.'” — Turkish Proverb
“Every defeat, every heartbreak, every loss, contains its own seed, its own lesson on how to improve your performance the next time.” — Malcolm X
“Don’t be satisfied with stories, how things have gone with others. Unfold your own myth.” — Rumi
“The nice thing about standards is that there are so many of them to choose from.” — Andrew S. Tanenbaum
I just came back into the house from taking the picture below of our Queen’s Wreath. This is a very easy vine to grow in the desert as long as the appropriate exposure, water and support are offered. Throw in a bit of fertilizer and this plant does not ask for much else. As a matter of fact, the main challenge is to keep it in bounds as it is a vigorous grower and wants to do more than its fair share!
This (above) is still relatively early in the season. Below is a picture of what the plant looked like in a more mature stage.
As you can see, the plant is quite robust and that is usually a good thing; more plant, more flowers!
That would be true except for the Monsoon Season winds. With all that foliage, this vine on the trellis becomes a sail and catches the wind. This is a big box store trellis and we had to do quite a bit of modifications to make it work for us. The one weak point, which we realized right away, were the welded joints at the base of the trellis which hold the tab for what are now screws. Originally the trellis was packaged with eight inch “J-shaped” spikes that didn’t even have ridges. That wouldn’t support the trellis with the plant on the calmest of days.
We eventually buried concrete blocks in the ground and screwed the trellis to the blocks to offer a more sturdy support. There were other modifications as well, but that is for another post. (See the picture below with arrows indicating potential weak points where metal fatigue might occur.)
Even with the feet of the trellis well-anchored by the cement blocks and the screws, we noticed during last year’s winds that the trellis swayed back and forth quite a bit and we feared eventual metal fatigue on the tabs holding the screws and that they would break off.
We had tried to support the vertical posts of the trellis with rebar and then using old nylon stockings to tie the rebar to the supports and we even twisted wire covered with plastic tubing around the rebar and trellis to hold it together, but that did not hold tight enough for real support.
This year we decided to use hose clamps which, in theory, would hold the rebar more tightly to the trellis and hopefully keep movement to a minimum. You probably know them as the clamps used in cars to keep the radiator hoses attached to the metal valves of the radiator.
Here is a picture of the tools needed for the project:
2 – Nut driver to secure the screws if necessary and perhaps for use with the clamps themselves
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Here’s a better look at the nut driver and the hose clamp.
We secured the clamp around the rebar that was in place. Notice how tight the clamp is. The plastic around the rebar is really compressed. Also notice that a thin piece of plastic was used between the inside part of the hose clamp and the trellis to keep the paint from being scratched.
We later decided to insert an old piece of 3/4″ irrigation hose around the clamp to protect the metal instead of the thin piece of plastic. In the picture below you can see it on the right with the clamp coming out of it. Notice the long tail of the leftover/unused portion of the ratchet band from the hose clamp. That is where we use the wire snips to cut it off.
This is the final result. We did this in two places on all four verticals of the trellis and hopefully the rebar, being held tightly along the trellis, will keep it from swaying as much and reduce the metal fatigue on the supporting screw tabs (yellow arrow).
Only time will tell and so will I via a new post if things don’t work out!
If you want to read more about the Queen’s Wreath, you can check out our previous post Showy Queen’s Wreath – October, 2015
See more JBRish gardening and desert gardening posts here HERE
“After the ship has sunk, everyone knows how she might have been saved.” — Italian Proverb
“Son, your ego’s writing checks your body can’t cash.” — From the movie Top Gun
“It might have been done before, but it hasn’t been done by you!” — Elizabeth Gilbert
“Before borrowing money from a friend, decide which you need most.” — Addison H. Hallock
We continue our series of personalized (vanity) license plates in Arizona. To maintain individual privacy, we try to show as little information about particular cars as possible as long as we can reveal the license plate.
NOTE – License plate photos may have been archived for quite some time. The years indicated on the registration stickers DO NOT necessarily reflect the current status of any given plate!
We hope you enjoy these PL8ATUDES!
To Get Noticed!
See more JBRish PL8ATUDES HERE
“A good example is like a bell that calls many to church.” — Danish Proverb
“We are all searching for someone whose demons play well with ours.” — Heidi R. Kling
“Gold gives the appearance of beauty even to ugliness; but everything becomes frightful with poverty.” — Boileau
“It took me fifteen years to discover that I had no talent for writing, but I couldn’t give it up because by that time I was too famous.” — Robert Benchley
I have only been playing pickleball for a couple of years. When I began my pickleball experience and the serve was explained to me, the mantra at the time was “Hit the ball high and deep.” The idea was to keep the players on the opposing team back in the court and away from the net as long as possible and hopefully force a more shallow return because they would then be hitting the ball from an area near their baseline.
Instructors would sometimes point out how the serving team is at a disadvantage because they start with both players at the rear or the court while the receiving team generally has one player near the NVZ. Now that younger players and athletes who are coming from other sports are entering the game, there seems to be change in the service philosophy. The serve has been given a new status as perhaps a way to earn the advantage.
After about eight months of play, this is something I figured out on my own and here is my take on the situation…
I have tried to develop three elements to my pickleball serve:
With all this in mind, I use my general moderately fast, moderately high serve, but if I see a receiver moving up in the receivers box, I may change to hit it hard and fast. From time to time, I throw a spin at them just to keep them guessing.
Based on my observation in the games that I have played in club play, this is my biggest lesson:
On the serve, ball placement can trump everything else. If I can get the serve angled to the backhand of most of my opponents, I very often get a weak return. If the receiver is protecting their backhand and I can get it down the center line, I often get a weak return. I am only an average club player, but keeping an opponent off-balance has helped me win more points. I don’t necessarily win on a service ace, but as a result of a weak return and winning with a follow up third or fifth shot!
I am not an expert and I don’t proclaim to be a coach or instructor so don’t take my word for it. There are excellent players who are coaches and/or instructors and they currently seem to be offering similar advice.
You can read Death of the Meaningless Return By Mark Renneson, Third Shot Sports
Pickleball 411: Three Serves and Why You Need Them
And below is a video with Jennifer Lucore, Bob Youngren and Alex Hamner demonstrating a variety of serves.
“A mother’s arms are made of tenderness and children sleep soundly in them.” — Victor Hugo
“Comedy is tragedy plus time!” — Alan Alda
“Men are not against you; they are merely for themselves.” — Gene Fowler
“Please don’t ask me what the score is, I’m not even sure what the game is.” — Ashleigh Brilliant
“Journalism is literature in a hurry.” — Matthew Arnold
“I would break my back for the ones I love, but how many would push the wheelchair for me after?” — Unknown
“The unexamined life is not worth living.” — Socrates
“They were the kind of people who climbed the ladder of success wrong by wrong. [ed]” — Mae West
