Description:
a personal list of elements that help me remember that any day will have some redeeming quality
Contents:
FIre Grilled Burgers
Today was not a great day. 'Nuff said. But I had that hamburger in the fridge, and although it was gray and damp outside, it wasn't actually raining. So, I told you I was going to use some of my nice new woodpile and have a little fire.
They were yummy! Enough for tomorrow too.
Just Another Sunset
I'm off to slumberland. Here is today's sunset. You know, this view lasted for just a few minutes, but that one moment in a day of oil changes, shopping, and tasks nibbling at my ankles with little piranha teeth in a sea of "not enough time," was enough to keep me smiling. Enjoy.
OK, I confess, I brushed out the stupid electric wires
Same Award - Two Directions
Well, I apologize for for not getting a post up last night. Truth is, I had a chance to make $50, and I really had to take it! So I was up all night, slept from 7:30 till 12:30. Then did errands, talked to my best friend on the phone, did a few odds and ends, walked Maggie, ate, watched Jeopardy (ok... now you know my weakness) and here we are.
So, I've been simultaneously awarded the "Best Blog Award," by Vanilla Seven, and Chuck at Secondary Roads. I can't say that I think I've got the "best blog," but I do appreciate that some folks think its good.!
I'm supposed to pass this on to 15 other blogs. Well, between the two blogs that gave me the award, most of my favs have been covered. Hmmm. I'm falling asleep! I'll post a few now and try to get some more later.
English Wilderness has been one of my favorites for a long time, and I don't think I've bestowed an award on John yet. Great nature pix.
Dennis the Vizsla is a new friend of Maggie the (mostly) Vizsla. He'll make you laugh!
BSC Design has some great use of color and shape in photos. Lots more fashion interest than usually interests me, but you'll like the artistic style.
Mature Not Senile is the personal blog of Jude with lots of entries to identify with.
Sugar the Golden Retriever because I'm a sucker for dogs that look like Chips, and the yummy apple cinnamon chips recipe.
As the Crackerhead Crumbles because FishHawk always finds the coolest blogs to share.
Oblog for interesting commentary from Norway.
I have one nice pic for a separate post then I think it's off to bed for me!
Maggie's Tips - Wear Orange
Hi there! I haven't had a chance to tell you what's on my mind very often. Today I'm thinking that I should tell you about my vest. Mom says it's orange, but since I can't see colors, I have to take her word for it. But every year in the fall, she makes me wear this thing when we go outside. And she wears a hat, which she doesn't wear any other time of year.
She says this is so that all the neighbors who are making disturbing noises in the woods can see me. I don't know why they can't smell me. I can smell them. I can smell that the animals are moving around a lot more than usual. Can you see the other people wearing orange in this picture?
Here they are. Did you find them? They are across the railroad tracks. Mom says they are very careful; good neighbors. But she's found other people nearby who aren't so careful. So, here's my tip- do like my mom says... WEAR ORANGE at this time of year.
P.S. I got to chase a cat! I don't know where it lives, but I chased it right out of my field!
On the Beach - Part 2
Here are the other five pictures that I selected from my walk on the Lake Michigan Beach early yesterday afternoon.
I think this is one of my favorites, even of the 10. I took a lot of pictures of the waves running along these eroded pilings. The water coming in was interesting as it broke in foam along the wood. The water running out was interesting as it swept back, sucking the water from the sand. But then I realized that there was just one moment after the wave ran out when the sand still had a film of water and showed a reflection. Then the sand absorbed the final moisture and the magic moment was gone. It took several tries, but I "caught" it.
This is just a lone seagull. It's not even really focused very well- I had the telephoto out too far to result in a crisp picture. But when I looked at it later it seemed to capture the lonely feeling of the beach on this sunny but chilly day, with moderate waves.
When I turned around and faced south, instead of north, there was the sun on the water. Yet, I think that even though this picture shows more sun than the other "scenery" picture from yesterday that it actually looks much colder.
I'm always fascinated by these lines in the sand. They are just ridges that mark the extent of the reach of previous waves. Of course, any that are covered by subsequent waves are washed away, so the patterns of the lines change every few seconds. I seem to come home with a collection of pictures like this from any beach/camera opportunity.
Finally, there is this one. I took the picture and thought to myself that it was probably just going to be deleted after I got home. I was trying to catch a picture of a leaf being caught and carried off by a wave. But when I looked at it (and this one really needs to be viewed larger), it turned out to be such a complex mixture of textures and shades of gray that I think it is one of my favorites!
I hope you have enjoyed this walk on the beach! Chuck, over at Secondary Roads, liked yesterday's picture of the single oak leaf. In fact, he has written a poem based on how it made him feel. You can read it at Oak Leaf on the Sand. Thanks, Chuck- I like the poem!
On the Beach - Part 1
After church today, I went for a walk on the beach because I wanted to stay in town for a folk music concert in the afternoon (which was really fun, but not the point of this post).
I went with the idea to try to find some pictures that are a little different from the usual beach scenes. Not that they are bad, but those of us who live near Lake Michigan get overdosed with sun and sand and waves.
I came home with way too many pictures! But I narrowed it down to 10 that seemed interesting. I'll show you half today and half tomorrow. I really like things that look like something else (as you may have figured out!). This sandy "cliff" is only about two feet high. But it reminds me of desert dwellings or a setting for a fantasy game, or... you tell me...
This is the very edge of a wave as the last of its energy is being dissipated. Just a few bubbles left. Have you noticed that you can click to make the pictures larger? I'm finally getting my photo pages set up pretty much the way I want them. Most of these pictures look better when they are bigger.
It was hard to believe that it is November. I went looking for a solitary experience, but there were several groups of people enjoying the "warm" weather. It was great, but after 30 minutes I was pretty frozen.
One lone leaf just out of reach of the last wave...
I ate my sandwich and apple, and retreated to the car and half a mug of still-warm coffee. Then I headed for the library to wait for the concert to start. Ended up checking out the complete works of e. e. cummings. I can't remember the name, or a full line, of a poem that I'm sure he wrote, so I'm searching by brute force.
Five more tomorrow!
Rediscovering Jenks Creek
Today was our trail club's regular monthly hike. We just managed to sneak it in before gun deer season which starts tomorrow. Most hikers choose to leave the woods to the hunters for those weeks. Too many accidents happen.
But after the group broke up, I chose to hike an extra two miles. This is a section of trail that I've hiked at least 3 other times. But I had completely forgotten how it follows the lovely little Jenks Creek here. Most people don't even know it's there at all. See the road crossing? Just a guardrail. Modern road building certainly makes it easy for travelers to be completely unaware of landscape features, especially small ones like creeks.
Following the trail, there are places where you can get a clear view of the creek. It may be more noticeable in the woods this fall because we had such a wet October and has flowing water. Here it looks like a definite stream bed, but in many places it is braided and becomes swampy in its small floodplain.
This is a very typical look at the creek bed. There was actually quite a bit of motion to the water. I always like how the tape grass seems to flow like green water in the current. The streams in these woods look so brown because of all the tannins from the oak leaves.
You know that I just find textures and patterns fascinating. So the final three pictures are just sunlight on the water at various places along the stream.
Any little trickle of water can become a wonderful palette for the impressionistic brush of sun and shadow.
I hope you enjoyed the little journey along Jenks Creek with me. This afternoon, thanks to the clearing reported yesterday, I mowed all my trails in back of my house, getting them ready for snow. The skiing is much better when I get the weeds and berry canes cleared. It was hard to think about snow under the blue skies today, but it IS mid-November!
One Job Done...
This is a big file. It was a big job. Nothing too exciting. I just want to celebrate its completion! I actually started Oct 28, and have been doing one wheelbarrow of wood almost every nice day.
Stay tuned, now that I have a nice woodpile of hardwood I think I smell grilled hamburgers in my near future!
P.S. What's up (down) with my Alexa rank? It keeps dropping. Big frowny face. I know it's a 3-month average, but we should be getting past the time I was gone by now...
Why I Don't Walk in the Woods in a Stiff Wind
I guess this is in the nature of a safety tip. But I'm not trying to tell you anything that I don't remind myself about often, too. Every once in a while you hear an oddball story where a tree fell on a camper's tent in the wind and injured or killed them. So... it's always good, when setting a tent up, to check for nearby dead trees. But that danger is pretty rare. This one is a bit amazing to me.
The picture above is pretty much an ordinary photo of the cemetery. But you might notice what looks like a small dead sapling to the left of the large tree. It's not a sapling. It's a branch, only about an inch in diameter, that blew down and stuck itself in the ground.
Here's the hole when I pulled the stick out. I left a foot in the picture for scale.
Here's the eye opening part. This was only a kindling sized stick, right? But it was buried in the ground... nice compacted ground... 2.5 to 3 inches. Think about the force required to do that. Think about the comparative resistance of skin and muscle compared to hard ground... Think twice about walking through mature forests in a high wind, ok?
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