Wednesday, 8 February 2023
Dawn came clear and cold, and colorful.
From mid-morning on, we heard drip drip drip, and the occasional swoosh of snow falling off the roof. The deck is now snow-and-ice-less, even…although the fields remain totally blanketed.
I’m enjoying being here in a February warm spell.
The title refers to cherry pie worries. Tonight: no pits. It is the final no-pits, as the pie is now fully consumed.
Tuesday, 7 February 2023
Sometime in the night, I heard the tiny tink-tink of icy snow. As the light arrived, the branches of the trees carried a new outline of white.
However, soon the temps rose, snow left the branches, and surfaces became slushy. Once, I even caught Mr. Sun out (not sure why the clouds appear so dense and grey). Overnight, temps will drop below freezing, to rise once again—to the high 30s, meaning Return of Slush.
Monday, 6 February 2023
Breakfast pączki. Tis the season.
Then quiet chatting over pecan shelling.
Out for a walk, we found this pair of venerable birches. I think of birch pairs as not terribly uncommon; I don’t know why there’d be a propensity for pairs in this species.
Finally, we had a two-pie dinner. Chicken pot pie for our entree, and cherry for dessert. With a side of cole slaw and another of sauteed boc-choy. We are living well visiting here, and being treated like royalty.
Sunday, 5 February 2023
We can call this a great river, at least within its region. It’s the Huron, in southeastern Michigan.
And this is two Great Lakes cleaved by a great bridge…Michigan on the left and Huron on the right, and we’re on the Mackinac Bridge. There’s no Mackinac Lake that I recall.
Snow is drifting across our road. For us, it’s a great road, but you’d probably think it’s just an almost two lane gravel road. We have a lake, over the hill in the distance, and it’s big, and grand, but not—technically—great.
Saturday, 4 February 2023
Sun-up, and we got on the road.
We drove and drove and drove. Then, the sun was dropping against a layer of thin clouds.
And we saw another celestial orb, not to be mistaken for a nosy Chinese balloon.
After dark, we reached the snow zone. Note, however, that the road and sidewalk are totally dry. No problems here…and temps overnight are to hover at freezing; that’s warm for these parts.
Friday, 3 February 2023
I walked in the sunshine today, so very lucky. Felt good. There was a bit of a breeze, enough that leafless stick-branches waved. I’ve been futzing around inside too much lately, including spending too much time reading about ancient transitional times, mostly in the Levant.
Thursday, 2 February 2023
Murky, rainy day…so this photo is from one year ago, on a much sunnier day…although you can’t quite tell that. Trust me.
I just read a NYTimes article reporting that bears rub up against trees so that the tree-bark resin/sap gets in their fur and acts as a tick repellant. These bears are I’m not sure where, but it seems rather northern, like Poland, and the trees include beech trees.
I hypothesize this model doesn’t work for southern bears, as leaning against southern trees (e.g., pines) is a good way to get chiggers. Now chiggers are not ticks, but, personally, I’ll take neither…critter infestations of the skin are…ick, yuck, and no thanks.
Article: “Bears May Rub Against Trees for Protection From Parasites” by Rebecca Dzombak, dated 1 Feb 2023.
Wednesday, 1 February 2023
The other night I had a dream that we went snorkeling from a boat, and they let us off to look around under a roof that provided shade. Very weird. I looked around the “reef” and discovered that it was molded concrete. It was not pretty, but there were critters scooting around that if they had been in the air would have been relatives of pill bugs and millipedes. For a while I was offended that they took us to a concrete formation that I thought the dive company was passing off as “real,” but then I got used to it.