After months of summer withdrawal, I’ve finally started to get my fill of fun over the past few weeks.

Once our production of “Les Miserables” was completed, I found myself with plenty of spare time, especially at night.

As I’ve written before, I’d been craving all things summer, including baseball, grilling and generally just soaking up the sun with other entertaining activities.

I was excited to hear that Rugby was hosting the regional Babe Ruth Tournament. The team had struggled to score runs in the regular season, but it wasn’t a problem at the tournament. Rugby finished third, and lost by only one run in each of its defeats.

I was out at the tournament a few times to shoot photos and I was pretty impressed with the Rugby team. They had some strong pitchers and hit the ball really well and for the most part, made all of the plays.

As a proud Lions member, I was saddened I wasn’t able to make it to Music in the Park until just a few weeks ago. But I’ve made it to the last two and even got the old barbeque grill out to enjoy dinner at one.

I also got to serve some ice cream at the most recent Music in the Park, working side-by-side with my main man, Larry Fueller.

As for the grilling, I was a guest at Terry and Cathy Jelsing’s farm last week, where I was able to sample some of Terry’s special home-smoked sausage and threw some axes, where I was soundly defeated by Terry.

It’s a lot like darts, except you throw a hatchet into a target on a tree trunk.

It was a blast, and even though I didn’t come away a winner, I can happily report that no people or pets were injured during the game.

I introduced them to a beverage called the “John Daly” (an adult version of the Arnie Palmer), and got to hear some great stories of Cathy’s days as a ink-stained wretch in the newspaper business (much like myself).

I had a great 4th of July, and took in all of the parade.

My little bluegrass band, the Roughriders, provided some entertainment for a gathering at Jarv Munyer’s place. He was a great and gracious host and delivered all of the party’s guests to the fairgrounds to watch fireworks.

I can say, unequivocally, we had the best seats in the house.

Unfortunately, all of my fun has got me behind on gardening.

I did some weeding, but my a few of my tomato plants look like they’re being engulfed in weeds, so I’ll need to make time for a few more hours this weekend.

As for the “weed” (or as most people call them, a pepper plant), I made an attempt to replant it. And it looks like it’s making a strong recovery.

The only sad news to report is that July is more than halfway over. But there should be plenty more beautiful days to enjoy the outdoors before the summer ends.