Musings

Here’s the desiccating “riverbed” that was running with water yesterday in the same stretch of road. I have seen so many desert places across the world on GooEarth that look like this on a gigantic scale. I find the braided paths and subtle shadings mesmerizing.

I had seen the hole and the dirt smear before, but today I spotted the perpetrator, ehem, builder. My grandparents called them Chippies. [I don’t know if it had a double meaning to them.]

Somehow, when we inventoried menu possiblities, we ended up with a blond dinner. That’s cauliflower from the neighbor’s garden, plus scrambled eggs and quinoa. [It tasted good, perhaps better than it looks?] And a very colorful green lettuce salad with tomatoes (garden again) and wee rounds of chives.

Posted at 7:23 PM | Comments Off on Shades of beige

Can a morning be murkier? Rain. Mud. Looked like the sky wouldn’t clear for a week.

So we set off to assuage our need for some activity, and pfft, by just after noon: sunshine. We found flooded rivers and huge puddles down along the Lake Michigan shore. It took more than our latest rains for these floods! Decorative carts in Nahma were all in puddles—four of them! Nahma must have a year-around population of something like 300, so that’s an outsize effort.

Came across this small gang/rafter of turkeys…two hens on each side of the tom. The ladies split two to each ditch. He went with the ladies on the right. We motored slowly past and assume they reunited.

Eventually, we stopped at the Thompson fish hatchery. It was after the buildings were locked, but we could walk around, following the yellow fish road.

I don’t remember this machinery. They pump fresh water from a super deep well, then swap out trapped nitrogen for oxygen (they oxygenate the water). However the water smells of rotten eggs as it has a high sulfur content.

The one open water pool was the waste pond downhill from the hatchery. All the nutrients from the fish and excess food is removed here, before the water flows back into the wild. Big sheets and islands of algae.

Even a few “no fishing” fish. Speckled trout?

Posted at 6:42 PM | Comments Off on Water themed day

We haven’t stopped at Seney’s Boot Hill in years, so we did today. It was buffed up perhaps fifteen years ago, but nothing since, so it’s entering another genteel decline. Strange plastic items survive better than most of the wood.

We went on to the refuge, and it’s mushroom season…mushrooms and swans. And the usual marsh critters and plants.

Parent trumpeter swan in front of perhaps three-quarter grown swan/cygnet—when do the youths become swans?

I’m speculating: giant aphids?

Not sure what nibbled this mushroom down to the gills—I know turtles like them….

Speaking of turtles…painted turtle?

Posted at 7:24 PM | 1 Comment »

Arty foam on the beach. Note: this means there actually is beach. This is special after the super-high water earlier this season…that lasted for months.

See: beach.

We whiled away some time just watching the water, lapping waves, passing birds. The dock was terrifically scenic.

Posted at 7:51 PM | Comments Off on The Lake

I confused a passing runner as I got out of his way and stopped, so I could return to take this photo. But he was long gone by that time and didn’t know my maneuver was mostly to take a photo and not because he’d surprised me. [There’s a short story in this.]

There’ve been plant photos, but no flower pictures since the 17th. I’d say it’s time. [Not really a story.]

Proposed story moment: interrupted hobo bath. Cleaning on two fronts—water fountain and chemical—both in a limited way.

Posted at 7:18 PM | Comments Off on Story gems

Glow before full sun.

Effect of full sun.

This brought happy memories.

This brought none…because: no pool. Heh. Reasonably clever name, though.

Posted at 5:20 PM | Comments Off on Salmagundi

We went up in the mountains.

To a lake.

Where D and I did some snorkeling! It was cool and lovely and beautiful. And fun.

We also enjoyed a picnic before looping through over another ridge before returning to Inside the Perimeter™.

Posted at 7:00 PM | Comments Off on OTP™ adventure, heels up

Days are getting shorter. Sigh.

Caught my eye. Even though the sun wasn’t quite up yet.

Ah, there’s the sun. Time to head home.

Posted at 7:34 PM | Comments Off on Short sentences, just ’cause

The sun found me soon after I began the return leg of my walk. Hot and humid air, with dry, dry soil. [Using dishwater on the basil, BTW.]

We realized we had a bit of cabin fever (the hot-weather, summer kind), so we took off on a unplanned route west and north from The City. Don’t remember seeing this corner-Stacey before. Guess that’s one reason to take a Sunday drive.

Our loop was long enough that we needed a necessary break…right by the Visitor Center for the Kennesaw Mountain Civil War National Park of Parks. The entrance is disguised by vegetation (like this American beautybush) and a new (decorative) split-rail fence that a goat could push over in about thirty seconds. You can see both on your next visit. And cannons.

Posted at 6:57 PM | Comments Off on Sunday drive

We found this cemetery-on-a-hill view of downtown Hoh-noh-loo-loo. That’s Diamond Head on the left horizon.

Temperature is higher here, although humidity is a teeny-tad lower. But you’d pretty much only notice if you had a measurement device. Your skin might not.

Posted at 9:16 PM | Comments Off on Revisit memory