I have obtained a new skill. It’s not one I sought out, but now that I have it, well, I have it. Together, the lovely C and I set up and carried out an IV drip for the Botanist, draining a high-powered antibiotic straight into his personal command central.

The low winter light is on the rise, and I so enjoyed the morning sky over the white landscape. Warm temps today have reduced the snow load, but They tell us more is coming.

Low light means graininess reigns.

I just had to escape the bleak grey-ness of the last two posts. Not only my mood, but the gorgeous colors in the dawn sky demanded it!

…Plus I’m wearing the over-exposed Party Skirt—which is new to this immediate geographic locale.

Apologies for the lack of inventiveness. On the other hand, this architectural wonder (ha!) could me my Cathédrale Notre-Dame de Rouen; of course, I’m no Monet, and I’m not painting this view.

Yesterday was a hurry-up day. Today’s been a “wait” day. General indications are of improvement, thankfully. It has taken longer for the roads, haha, given the near-constant snowfall.

We watched strange winter light as we passed through the Allatoona Hills (where the dam that stops up Lake Allatoona is). Overall the weather was good to us today, although big white flakes are coming down right now.

Big white flakes ≠ GA.

Night shot of the white hyacinth. Antidote to last (shhh snake) photo, if you need it….

Proving that I’m a sensitive person. Even a sensitive blogger….

Shhh. Also testing the latest version of Mars Edit….

Sorry for the crappy photo….

Yesterday afternoon, I was on one of those phone calls where you have to pay attention, but you are doing far more listening than talking. So, I saw a couple of clumpy new weeds out the back window and grabbed my gloves (thankfully) and managed to put the right one on one-handed, and proceeded out back to vanquish the fast-growing greenery while keeping up with my listening. And I started removing fistfuls of the young growth and realized that there’s a…strange…shape among the leaves.

Surprise!

I think some time back F told me this is a (non-poisonous) Storeria dekayi, aka De Kay’s or brown snake (I never would have known otherwise). This species never gets very big, and tolerates urban life in these parts.

Lesson: wear your gloves when you’re gardening and PAY ATTENTION!

We topped yesterday’s pimiento cheese (recipe now posted) by stopping at Sublime Doughnuts, over by Georgia Tech, this morning. As JCB noted, our doughnut treats (A-Town mocha for him; cinnamon roll for me) gave us the sugar rush that got us through a quick run at IKEA. We managed to avoid the “plastic crap” that often hops in your bag there, and got…other kinds of consumer product. Yeah, that sounds better….

This cries out for a recipe, and I promise, it’ll be forthcoming. For now, know that my (very small, statistically speaking) testing group preferred the smoked-hot-paprika-enhanced-version of pimiento cheese (of the two that I offered).