Pulchritudinous thorns
Wednesday, 27 October 2021
I have been noticing the daylight becoming shorter. Also, I found backlighting beauty.
Musings
Good and best and good
Tuesday, 26 October 2021
I think I’ve noticed this before. Still, in this light and with all the bright green growth from this season, the corner 2-and-3 frames look fantastic.
Made a run to Little A-Town to see the Gray Sisters and their people. Lots of laughs and good times. En route home, we heard the first half hour of Game 1 of the World Series. Braves did darned well in the first inning.
21st century pondering
Monday, 25 October 2021
I’m guessing this is a Stereum species. They prefer deadwood, and this is on a decomposing stump. They prefer oaks, and the stump is oak-wood.
Autocorrect wants it to be sternum. Not the same at all. However, since I’m guessing, can I criticize autocorrect for guessing?
Southbound, continued
Saturday, 23 October 2021
From northern Ohio, we pushed south, beginning while it was still full dark. Here’s a maple tree we found in Kentucky.
And its samaras.
Eventually we made it to ATL, with traffic problems here and there necessitating a creative route home. The Guru is stupendously good at serendipitous routing. I am unaccustomed to this view of downtown and some of midtown.
DIA visit
Friday, 22 October 2021
We visited the Detroit Institute of Arts this afternoon with friends. Starting with the Diego Rivera murals (1932) is an obvious choice. One section is of workers on an automotive assembly line. I thought this fellow has a modern hairstyle, or maybe I don’t know 30s hairstyles.
The first special exhibit we saw was Ofrendas, shrines for the Day of the Dead. They were multicultural rather than just the iconic cempazuchitls, or marigolds. BTW, the zuchitl or suchitl or xochitl suffix means flower.
Our main goal was “Detroit Style: Car Design in the Motor City, 1950–2020.” While there were lovely concept cars, there were more drawings, the kind you never see, that are only in offices and workrooms away from the public eye. A fun nostalgia trip.
Elsewhere, I was enamored of these three lovelies when I spotted them from across the room on a large ceramic vase.
I may be wrong, but I thought the title of this was “Three Tigers.” The eyes have it.
Goodbye bridged to hello
Thursday, 21 October 2021
I said goodbye to the grove for this year. Notice how many leaves are hanging on.
I said goodbye to the barrel reflection, and dumped the barrel and rolled it inside for the winter.
We crossed The Bridge to return to extended temporary trolldom (trolls live beneath the bridge, ya’know).
And we said hello to dear young newlyweds at Farm Club, northeast of Traverse City and highly recommended. What a starter, no?
Always something
Wednesday, 20 October 2021
Just a few of these left…what an exquisite lacy silhouette.
Today was overcast, so this photo is from another morning, with early light on the upper branches of this, the Ghost Elm…ghost because it’s dead and the bark has sloughed off, and the wood is silvery, and it’s dead most likely because of dutch elm disease. [In elementary school, I did a presentation on DED; big hit with the kiddies, as I recall (sarcasm).]
Time to say goodbye to Ghosty, as we’ve begun a process to get the tree guy to down it strategically without also imperiling our electric service line. I think it used to be in the yard of the Red House, which burned in about 1960, barely within my memory.
Enjoying the moment
Tuesday, 19 October 2021
Such a gorgeous morning, I had to visit the beach and greet the sun.
Just me and the foam. Solitude. Peacefulness.
For the record, plenty of leaves are still on in the maple woods, and even green, but they are thinning.
Quotidian tales
Monday, 18 October 2021
Without doubt, the most beautiful part of today was the extended morning fog, caused by the sun after our overnight frost. A friend says this, our first frost, is perhaps six weeks later than average. That’s a huge discrepancy. Anyway, we’ve been enjoying the relative warmth.
Usually the sun hits and doesn’t climb very long before most of the fog dissipates, leaving a few lingering wisps that then disappear. Not today; the fog was uneven on our property and hung around for quite a while.
We did two big(?) chores today. This morning we did laundry, which had been delayed because the “dro” was closed on Friday when we intended to do it, and the sign indicated it’d be closed all weekend. And the other dro has no change machine, so we had to wait until Monday, that is today, to return to the first choice dro. Got the wet clothes hung out for the sun to dry, and then trimmed barberries, two wheelbarrow loads worth of errant branches removed. As the sun started dropping most of the clothing was still damp, so I distributed it around the sun porch with its abundant solar gain (and a ceiling fan). It looks like the aftermath of a clothing explosion. And now it’s mostly dry. One triple load’s worth.
Onward, phased
Saturday, 16 October 2021
We had another gorgeous morning here in the North Woods, or maybe the North Woods and Fields and Lakes.
I set my goal with prepping a new bed for two rhubarb crowns that are being smothered and otherwise slowly snuffed out in their current location. I hope this will work, otherwise I’ll be transplanting them again.
In my recollection, I spent the most time and energy on moving soil and combing through it to remove roots and rootlets, so as to reduce competition by quack grass and other floral familiars.
Tomorrow, weather permitting, I’ll attempt an actual transplant.
To finish up the narrative of the day, the afternoon weather became dicier, with overcast and some raindrops, so I made a large pot’o’chili, which we greatly appreciated as we watched the sun fail to warm the sunporch sufficiently to allow opening the doors to let warm air enter our main living space. If that makes any sense.