Today's picture was taken in 1964, and shows a grocer giving watermelon slices to children. These days, the watermelons you get in the grocery store are not very good. Around here, a lot of farmers will plant a few rows of watermelons in their fields alongside the cotton, or whatever cash crop they are growing. Then, they have roadside watermelon stands when the melons are ready. Once you have one of those big Black Diamond watermelons right from the field, you can't hardly eat the grocery store ones any more. I have tried before to grow watermelons in a garden, but have never had any luck. The vines come up and look big and healthy, but then when they start setting fruit, the leaves get something on them that kills the vine. So, I have never quiet mastered watermelon growing.
We had some interesting comments yesterday about what implement was used to dispatch the snake after the peacock eggs. xoxobruce suggested it was a mattock. I had never heard of a mattock, so I looked it up on the internet. Sure enough, what some people call a mattock, is known around here as a grubbing hoe. It is used for heavy chopping for things like prickly pear or algarita. What some people call a grubbing hoe, which is one chopping blade on a stick, we simply call a hoe. NYCgeezer suggested I was describing a pickaxe. I think a pickaxe is different, in that the blade on one side is more narrow. Interesting the subtle differences in names and functions. I do think the mattock is the same thing as a grubbing hoe.
