Amongst a few raindrops
Monday, 11 August 2014
Chore day*. High point was a picnic lunch stop here. A lone seagull witnessed our dining…hoping.
* Chores included laundry, library, tire fix (whoops; tire’s low!), big groc run….
Musings
Happy effect
Sunday, 10 August 2014
This was stage one in a slight redecoration of the front porch. We stretched the lights around the floor (easy) to see how far around 49′ of lights extended—the whole way, it turned out! After this, we used the staple-gun to attach them to the horizontal beam above the windows (not quite so easy, but not difficult either).
Complexity: floral, bureaucratic
Saturday, 9 August 2014
I love the laciness of Queen Anne’s lace. Perfect name.
I loved spending a half-hour this afternoon floating and bobbing in the lake. It’s warm. Shallow lakes do that….
I really love that our good friends from NE (as in, New England) arrived today. Soooo great to see them.
Our travelers opted to short-cut through Canada instead of looping down around Lake Erie, and with whatever (bombing? Ebola? Friday-ness? Latin American immigration problems?) they waited one hour to do the border thing and cross into Canada, and TWO hours of waiting in line to cross back into the USofA. And all of a minute for them face-to-face with the customs/immigration folks in both cases (if I have it right). Sheesh.
Local economics
Friday, 8 August 2014
Hey, a Great Lake! This is Lake Michigan, near the northern shore; the other end laps on Chicago’s toenails. I like this limestone bed that I’m standing on—it acts rather like a shelf along this section of the shoreline. That lighthouse is modest; it’s on the pier off Manistique aiding navigation into and out of the small port. Mostly it’s used by pleasure boaters these days, although the park where I was standing to take this is named after a ship that went down in the late 1950s, about 23 miles offshore. Twenty-foot waves are tough on marine craft.
Two summers ago, if I remember right, it looked like the paper? mill in town would close—a huge blow to this community, which otherwise is managing to hold on with a high school, small harbor, and I think a small clinic. Turned out that at the last minute it was sold, and continued in operation.
Meanwhile, over in Gulliver, the yard seems to have the largest stockpile of logs we’ve ever seen there. Acres. Not sure if it ships into Manistique, or farther west. Pretty sure, though, that the logs leave 1) by rail, and 2) towards the setting sun.
Visitors, winged
Thursday, 7 August 2014
When I was “cleaning up” in “the garden” this morning, the section over by the rhubarb (still don’t have the right nutrition, light), a hummingbird came by. For as small as they are, those fast-beating wings make a LOT of noise.
[Irony: the bird was nosing into the milkweed blossoms. One of the “weeds” I was removing, was…milkweed.]
Later, I took the Guru out to show him my progress, and this flutter-by toured with us, even rested on my knee for a bit.
Orchard update
Wednesday, 6 August 2014
The apples blossomed late this spring, and we thought the blossom density was moderate at best. I see, though, that the trees are loaded with fruit—still very tart-fleshed.
I guess this means the doe/fawns we saw yesterday (and others of their species) probably will have tasty nibbles before the snow gets deep.
Four-foot family
Tuesday, 5 August 2014
About 9:30am a pair of fawns, largish but still spotted, bounced out of the long grass to gambol about near the house on the mowed grass. Moments later, Mom appeared, moving more deliberately and cautiously. She followed approximately the same route, drifting west, and not stopping for more than a listen or a nibble. Her flanks were sleek and reddish-tawny.
Plants’ world
Monday, 4 August 2014
I pretty sure these are black raspberries, and not blackberries. Ripening next to the peonies.
I clipped the grass around them by hand when we last were here, not knowing if they would bear fruit (or whether we’d be around to know…). It’s all back. Time for more grass-removal.
Wait five minutes
Sunday, 3 August 2014
I think of this as a harebell, but I have scrutinized the flower ID book, and it may be the gone-wild cousin, the common garden bellflower, with lanceolate leaves.
This and that chores this morning—like whacking back the grass and weeds around the “garden-let.” Probably more on that another day.
Mid-afternoon, we began hearing thunder. Over quite some time the sky went from bright to quiet raindrops, and then overcast.
It was drippy-droppy rain, the kind the Botanist would have said was a “light, soaking rain.” It lasted the best part of an hour, and cooled things off.
After another hour or so, the sun is back out, the temps have risen, and only a few droplets remain here and there. Well, plus the garden soil is damp (aka sticky)…meaning tomorrow would be a good day for a bout of weeding and plant-submission activities.
The light, the light
Saturday, 2 August 2014
We enjoyed the extended sunset-glow and watched the beach-fire at the same time. Heavenly!
The water level is down somewhat (yea!), and we saw several avian fly-bys zooming just above the water moving parallel with the shoreline. Mostly ducks, I think.
While we were mellow, the mosquitoes found us, and, geeze, they are aggressive at present!
Our neighbors (year-round residents) observed that this evening was the first that felt like summer, as it has been cool to very cool all summer (last winter, too!). So we shall behave summerly!