Thursday Thoughts #36---13 Things That Annoy Me

The world if full of annoyances which if not ignored will drive us to tearing our hair and screaming into the night sky. So we ignore them as best we can. Today I will list some of my favorites.

THINGS THAT ANNOY ME  (Listed in the order in which they burble to my consciousness...nothing 'pops' into my head anymore):

1. Salad Kits.  These can be found in the produce section and they are plastic bags filled with chopped greens, and perhaps, a plastic bag of dressing as well.  I do admit that if you do not know how to chop lettuce you should stay away from knives.  But a SALAD "KIT"?  Puhleeze...just shred the lettuce with your hands and buy a bottle of dressing.
2. Any 'Housewives of'  Television Show.  No further comment, except if you enjoy these you need to go to more of your family reunions for entertainment.
3. Comments from My Children on How I Spend My Time.  Yes, I do spend inordinate hours taking and processing photographs.  Why does no one comment on how much time a chef spends perfecting his skill, a weekend boat builder in spending years on his hobby, your husband and his sports related stuff?
4. Cleaning the kitchen sink and finding 5 minutes later it is covered in tea leaves.  Enough said.
5. Lowfat Yogurt.  This stuff tastes like something weird and certainly NOT yogurt.  Ice cream and yogurt have to have fat in them or they are not worth eating.
6. Plastic Wine Stoppers.  Real cork has been proven to be the more environmentally friendly way to go and metal screw on tops have been proven to be a better way to seal wines for aging.  I HATE plastic wine stoppers and you cannot tell you have one until you remove the aluminum wrapper and spend an hour trying to pull out the stopper!
7. Provocative clothes for any girl under 14.  You can complain about childhood promiscuity and the danger of pedophiles...but if your kid wears a bikini or tiny skirt I am ignoring you.  If your 14-year-old wears white skin-tight slacks I am going to hit you up the side of the head.
8. People who assume you have an open book in front of you on your lap because you are bored and want to talk to them.
9. Congress.
10. Picky Eaters.  Wasted time trying to plan a meal or choose a restaurant that makes them happy.
11. People who read over my shoulder.  I apologize, but it is a quirk I cannot contain.  Hubby knows better!
12. Mosquitoes after the rain.
13. Late Acceptances.  After inviting my son and his girlfriend down for the 4th two weeks earlier and not hearing from him we gave up and decided to head to the city for fireworks.  He calls at 1:00 that very afternoon and asks if he can come down with his gal!

Anything particularly annoying for you these days?  (The oyster photo has nothing to do with this post...isn't that annoying?)

Friends and the Roles We Play

Here is another take on people that help us.

I first met Oscar about 4 years ago when we were putting in our lawn to this new house. (The lawn in the photo looks much nicer than it is...mostly mowed weeds.) I had already started a few flower beds and it was early fall and I was attempting to clean out some of the areas around the larger plants.  I could tell he was interested in my work and so I attempted a conversation in simple English.  Oscar spoke Spanish but was able to give me some advice on some of my plants as he assisted with the lawn.  Perhaps there was an ulterior motive to his attention, because later that month when we wanted to move some larger plants my husband gave him a call and asked if he worked outside the landscape company.  Fortunately, he said he could work on the next Sunday.

Later we started that large paving project which disrupted that blue bird nesting I had written about.  Oscar and his brother and other workers spent over a week in our front yard tearing up the concrete sidewalk, aligning the driveway, installing pavers and putting down a composite to hold them.  They had to re-work some drainage and adjust a retaining wall.  The supervisor, who was not Spanish but an overweight good ole' boy, rarely moved his butt from the tiny earth moving bulldozer as he provided advice to the three laborers through arm waving and calling out.

Oscar was smart, followed instructions exactly, even gave some good advice and we ended up with a lovely driveway.

Over the years Oscar has been an irregular Sunday visitor to our home whenever we needed help with a project that hubby could not do alone but which was too small a project for the landscape firm.  He moved enormous plants, reset brick edgers, moved tons of earth, set up a small patio beneath my arbor and helped repair our deer fence.  He is always gracious and his English has gotten better.  Oscar has a generous smile and is a handsome man; I have watched him go gray.  He has two daughters the age of our President's that he has to leave back in Mexico with their mother for months at a time while he works in the United States.  He works at the whim of the landscape company.  Today he told us that they are laying him off for three weeks because of the slow down in demand.  He cannot afford to live here without a paycheck so is returning to his family during that time.  I cannot help but think how expensive this must be.  Expensive in monetary ways as well as expensive in personal ways.  His daughters have grown up and he has been far away most of the time.  He has had to live in a foreign land to earn money so that they can go to school, have clothes and a home.  I wonder how much they miss him.  I wonder if they will realize the sacrifices that were made when they have families of their own.  This lifestyle is somewhat like the lifestyle that military families must face.  Long days, perhaps even dangerous days, far away from their precious families.  Except our military does get benefits in terms of retirement and health care.  Oscar only gets an irregular paycheck.  I am sure (?) that the company would hire local laborers if they could find people who were willing to work under such arbitrary conditions and at such a low pay level.

I get a deep seated guilt (such is the disease of the liberal heart) when he is here.  We pay him slightly more than the landscape company and he is happy for the work, but I cannot help but feel uncomfortable in my safer lifestyle.  I feel like I am in one of those Hollywood movies and I do not fit the part, or if I am in denial...I do not like how well I fit the part.  I am blessed to celebrate the 4th in this country when I see the struggles other countries face trying to determine their path to a form of democracy that fits their culture and economy and with citizens that willingly come to our country for any job because they are aware of our unique freedoms and opportunity.

Helping Hands

I was thinking about the responses to my last post. If you are a handyman, it is hard to sit back and watch others do the work when you cannot. First, you have standards that are probably higher, second, you get pleasure out of seeing your accomplishments, third, you also like the puzzle and challenge, and fourth, you have a meaningful role in society. Sitting and watching sort of takes the air out of your tires.  When this opportunity is taken away, it can be hard to age gracefully and let others take over. I think it is much like the woman who was the great cook in the family having to turn over the job to others on holidays because she can no longer do it all.  No one can bake or roast as well as her, but we have to gracefully let others find their space.  While most of us like our independence and refuse to be waited on we should perhaps read Tuesdays with Morrie and try to emulate his generosity of spirit.

Another comment to the post was a question about helping in general.  The man I wrote about had had a very serious heart operation about two years ago and was bedridden for a while.  I brought over food and offered to food shop or stay at home so wife could get out of the house.  So, yes, these are neighborly contributions, and these are very important.  Perhaps, because almost anyone can do them, they do not seem as significant to me.  A silliness on my part, perhaps.

I just tend to be more impressed by the person who fixes my computer, my car or my toaster.  The one who looks at the corner of my deck and figures out the leak issue and then fixes it.  The one who can do that boring and frustrating stuff.

(Oh wait!  A really cool thing I once did when we lived overseas was upholster two seats for a homemade airplane for a handyman friend whose wife was an excellent seamstress but back in the U.S. for a month.  That was back when I could actually sew pretty well.  I was nervous doing it, but happy for a job reasonably well done.  The sewing machine and I now do not always speak the same language. )

Repaired

Middle class folks such as those of my household do not often ask for help on big projects from our neighbors.   In an agrarian society, barn building is a community event and fixing the old tractor can be done with the help of a neighbor or two.  As we earn more money, we become more isolated and less likely to ask for help.  Big projects we contract out and smaller projects fall by the wayside.  For example, I live in a rather fancy neighborhood where many of my neighbors hire landscape firms to take care of their large lawn and most have housekeepers.  My hubby is certainly not the handy type, and for now, I do my own housekeeping.

Yesterday I went to toast an English muffin in my upper middle class Krups toaster oven and when I removed the muffin, it was only slightly warm.  Hmmm?  I pushed the toaster button once again and after a time when the rods did not turn red, I realized something was wrong with this expensive 3-year-old appliance.  I checked the outlet, the fuse, and the plug.  The toaster itself was sealed like Tutankhamen's tomb and would require a dedicated electrician to disassemble for further investigation.

By mid-morning I had convinced myself we had to purchase a new toaster and headed out to the nearest store for this appliance. We purchased a model that was half the price and a less well known brand.  Once I got the box home and placed it on the counter a belated epiphany hit me.  I turned to my husband and told him that whatever was wrong with this old toaster/oven...it was something minor.  I just knew.  Maybe there was a fuse inside that had burned out?  I looked at the back with its dozen screws and then remembered that we had a neighbor who owned a rental farm and did all the appliance repair for his tenants.  He seemed to enjoy the challenge.  He was a very nice dude and so we decided to ask.

Well, it took him an hour, mostly spent taking it apart and putting it together.   He had guessed the problem even before removing the back and bottom as he had the same toaster/oven.  He said that the connector for the wires was usually flimsy and burned through over time.  He did not have a connector but had some electrical crimps which he used and now I have a perfectly good toaster and am planning a thank you dinner with neighbors sometime soon.  He lives in a very nice house but that does not seem to have made him brain or energy dead even though he is well into his 70's.

I often wish I had a talent that someone could use. I have sent some of my photo files to friends for wall deco, and have advised about plants, but I really wish I could do something more concrete in terms of being a plus in society...maybe some day.  My dad was an excellent handyman and my two brothers who live far away shine in that area as well.  I raise a wine glass to all those handymen who save the lives of us useless folks every day!

Eeahhh!

In my last post I mentioned that I had been doing some volunteer work for a local environmental group.  This involved hiking a mile through the woods (at three different places) and then taking a sample of the water from the river at the end of each of the three hikes.  Two of these locations required some down hill and up hill hiking and really got the heart beating and the sweat poring.  The last selection site was just off a highway and required hiking through debris that had either been thrown by cars or washed up by a nearby flood area.  That was the place I showed in the previous post.  Looks idyllic, doesn't it.  I neglected to show the sand bags, bottles and other stuff.

Hubby and I started this project at 1:30 P.M. and did not head back to the "lab" (really an extra room on the back of the museum/house) until 5:00 P.M.  We had to filter the samples for both chlorophyll and suspended solids which meant filtering six times...two for each sample.  Then some of the sample also went into a refractometer for a salinity check...the river was freshwater.  Finally three samples from each site were poured into little vials and labeled and frozen along with the filters placed carefully in foil.  I am just telling you all this to impress you with my technical skills.

I think we must have used a double filter for the first sample because we waited almost 20 minutes for it to filter through.  We reduced our sample from 300 ML to 150 ML and  the next sets took only 5 or 6 minutes to filter completely.  We also had to label the vials and the filters and create a data sheet as well as complete another log.  We were not done until 8:00 and we rushed through our cleanup of the area and headed to the nearby I-HOP for a quick dinner.  It was in the middle of dinner I remembered that I had forgotten to complete two blanks on the 'custody sheet' and so back we drove, retrieved the key from under the log as it got darker, tried to do this so that a nearby family having a picnic did not see we were getting a key, and made our way back into the little back room.

I am clearly not cut out for all the details of environmental work.

On top of all of this I have been tormented by chigger bites which I probably got when sitting on a log near the river's edge while writing in water temp numbers.  I have not had to endure these pests for years and had forgotten how miserable they can make you.  They are a mite, red in color, but too small to be seen by most human eyes, and when they bite you with special mouth parts they liquefy the skin after creating a feed tube called a stylostome of the skin cells.  Don't you just love this info?  This tube they create is the thing that causes the unbearable itching because they fall off when you first scratch and then die.  But the tube stays in for days.  You must NOT scratch because the more you scratch the more it itches!  It can take 10 days for this stylostome to reabsorb.  It is nice to know that their mouths are not very strong, and so, they prefer the tender skin of women and children.  I am now on day 6....ONLY FOUR MORE TO GO!   Eeeeaahh!

What is Your Excuse?

I have not posted because:

1.  My band width for which I pay many sheckles in gold has been painfully diminished the last few days.  It returned to normal speed just yesterday.
2.  Blogger will not let me load photos...I have discovered a work around 'cut and paste' but still unhappy.
3.  I have been busy collecting water samples in the river above ( a long story for another post).
4.  I have been on travel followed by company arriving.
4.  I have a more interesting post at my other blog anyway and suggest you go there for now and I hope the photos show up!

Old Stuff

There are people who almost salivate upon entering an antique mall or when given an opportunity to peruse the booths at an antique fair.  They make sure not to miss Antiques Roadshow (either the British or the American versions) on television each week.  And it is very difficult for them to just drive by a garage sale on an errand-filled morning.

I am not one of those people. I own way too much stuff and dusting is not my favorite thing to do.  While I find old stuff interesting and find a discussion of its creation or history interesting, it is only as an idle diversion.  I can count on one hand the number of times I have gone into an antique store and in most of those cases I was looking for garden ornaments rather than items to dust.
 
On a recent trip with my daughter we explored a large antique mall.  She was looking at antique jewelry and has a new interest in antique watches.  While I had fun looking at the items from my youth, antique lady that I am, it wasn't until I saw this vase below that I got motivated.  Most of my vases are generic from flower shops or previous interesting food containers and barely useful in holding flowers.
 
I saw this green glass charmer in a glass case and immediately bought it.  It is only about 5 inches high and perfect for flowers with broken stems.  I then spent the rest of the time looking at other vases throughout the store and found one more.  This is a tall art deco and I noticed after I purchased it that it was not truly vertical!

I have decided my new mission when I am bored wandering in an antique shop is to look for vases to replace my generic clear glass collection. (I have been having trouble with Internet band width and not able to do any blogging the last few days and while it has been good for my soul, it has kept me from posting.)

Motivation

Sometimes too much of a good thing is too much of a good thing. All of the days in my life are now Saturdays with only an errand or two on the agenda and the rest of the day to play.  No one thinks about being in such a situation some day when they are working a 50-hour workweek.  Let me give you a glimpse of the future so that you will not wander around with that deer in the headlights expression when you get here...you WILL someday.  What can happen is that, first, you lose total track of time.  You head off to your Thursday haircut and are surprised that everyone looks a little too directly at you when you walk in the door.  Then you find out that today is actually Wednesday and you hairdresser doesn't come in until Thursday...tomorrow!   Congrats, you just gained one whole day to your week of playtime.

I gain days and lose days with abandon.  They melt like snowflakes on the desert floor and I sigh with guilt when I lay my head against the pillow each evening realizing that one more jeweled snowflake has melted away and will never be seen again.  This also leads one to become a stranger to that feeling called motivation.  One does what one wants to do, NOT what one should do or needs to do or must do or even has to do.

I wander around my yard with either a camera or a garden trowel in hand until the angle of the sun reminds me that I should be thinking about dinner or calling a family member or getting the details together for that trip that is coming up.  It is like I was released from some time travel machine in a fantasy land and then the machine starts blinking reminding me I am back on the clock.

I used to work with lazy people like me.  I hated how they got the same pay check as I when all they did was show up to work and then wander from one office conversation to the next until the afternoon sun told them they had to do a few things at their desk before they headed home.  Retirement will not seem strange to them.

I, on the other hand, was full of motivation.  This motivation got me nowhere, but it certainly was overflowing in my spirit and probably irritated the hell out of other people around me at my work and certainly made my family roll their eyes on the weekends.  I could cram more items on a Saturday to-do list than anyone I knew, and just like the energizer bunny, get the majority of them done before the sun set.  I once painted an entire new 3,000 square foot house - primer, trim and stain - on just a few weekends.

Now my motivation is hiding somewhere.  I have a bedroom that has had spackle spots and faded paint for several years, I have floors with carpets that need cleaning, I have a fall car trip to plan, and I really, really, really should clean out a closet or two since I can no longer tightly close the doors!  But it looks like we just might get a nice sunset this evening down at the dock...so I will follow hubby who is checking on the crabs and then a couple of hours later my hunger will eventually make me walk back up and start dinner.  (THAT's where my motivation is, in my stomach.  Who knew?)

(And of course I went to here  to read Moannie's version of aging after finishing writing this!  We are both so cheerful these days!)

Recess

Taking a break from blogging.  My brain is a little fried and I have weeks of activity ahead.  Won't be gone too long.  You cannot get rid of me that easily.

My Virtual Love Letter

I could not have imagined a drift or even catching a tsunamic (yes I made a new word) wave into this community called Bloggers.  Who knew so many people wanted to put their thoughts into words and share those thoughts with strangers?  Each of my bloggers has at least one or two (if not hundreds) of lightning strokes of genius as they share deeply personal thoughts and parts of their recent days or years long ago and mold them carefully into phrases that reflect the humanity of man and in some cases true poetry.  They share their lunches, decorating efforts, cleaning processes, broken marriages, conversations with crazy folks and their unique as well as common thoughts.  While held up to the light individually, they may not have much substance, but when woven into the light of years of blogging they are the stitches of a tapestry of a unique and complicated human life.  They are the snare of the jazz piece.  They are the rare spice in the soup of mankind.  They are the laugh of that old joke told in an unusual light. 

If we had met at a wine or ice cream bar our outspoken ideas may have halted the minute we found our differences.  But with blogging we slowly learn that we are all so VERY much alike in spite of our politics, religious beliefs, sexual preferences, and taste in cooking.  My bloggers are patient with me.  They chuckle at my desire to really get their opinion on my photographs...a free lesson from the audience...and they sigh at my own efforts to try to write prose or poetry, but do not discourage me.  They cannot believe that I value honesty (with a spoonful of sugar) above all else.

That is the key.  NEVER discourage someone from trying to express their opinion but be willing to also express an opinion gently in a different light.  This world is changing at impossible speeds these days and we barely have time to sift the false from the true.  One thing I think I have learned is that truth is rarely exciting or shiny like a diamond (or winks at you).  Truth is gray and solid like a bridge to the future,  Truth always is in the distant light, and if we disagree, it is because we have not changed our rose colored glasses, quite yet.  

Through with the Fiddle and Faddle

The original in all its glory.

Number 1 with wind in the shrubbery hiding the laptop.

Made monochrome to hide the shrubbery blur and moved a tree!

Added back a little color.

Fiddled and faddled and tried the various suggestions and actually not looking for affirmation as was suggested by Grannie.  This is hardly a great photo for that!  I think I just miss not having a photography club nearby and after loading many photos to RedBubble and getting only generic compliments from other photographers...decided to try a new route.  I will not bore you in the future with this, rest assured.  Just a trial.  I took this with a Canon Powershot, so I guess the fidelity that I got from across the campus at a distance was surprising to me.  I do love this little camera that fits in my pocket.

I did not try to hide his face this time.  The photo when cropped is now much smaller and as a result would not be good for anything larger than a few inches in print...but I had fun(?) working on this.  Tell me if you like one more than the other and as you can see, I moved some landscape to cover the laptop and a tree, and no color filters were added.  You will need to click on photos to enlarge.  This would not pass muster for any publication other than the web.  I really appreciate those of you who were polite enough to take time to review and critique and that fact that this photo was not one in which I had vested any emotion, made it easier for me to take advice. 

Your Turn!

I recently took a stag's leap and loaded some of my photos onto a communal/commercial site called RedBubble.  It exists for artists of all types to show work, compare thoughts, and for a very few...to perhaps sell something.  One would never get rich at this, but an artist could get some small recognition and an outstanding artist would get his/her feet wet.

All that has happened to me thus far from this venture is some nice, very general comments from others...nothing I could grow by.  I was hoping that other photographers would critique (gently)...tell me to use a different filter, a different background, frame/crop it in "such and such way" or not be so lazy next time and actually use a tripod!  Or perhaps explain why they found it somewhat derivative.  Add to this the fact that the photographer cannot really view his work with a critical eye.

But they know the fragile nature of themselves and all artists and are afraid to even venture in that direction.  I, on the other hand, actually wrote to one photographer and had no shyness with my suggestions for a better background in taking a picture of an antique piece of glassware and she was grateful for my advice.

Anyway to get to my point and the purpose of the blog post title...I have posted below a photo I took recently at the nearby university campus.  When I uploaded it onto my computer I was touched by the love between the young couple revealed in their body language and his face.  I took the photo in a public place and was not using a telephoto, but I felt that not camouflaging their identity would be rude.

My questions to you (and answer honestly or not at all) is what do you think?  Opinions as a viewer...you do not have to know which end of the camera works...just your immediate reaction to this photo as an observer.

Does this photo capture that romantic feeling?
Have I ruined it by trying to use various software filters to hide identities?  Would it be better to just show him?
Is it so derivative it hurts your eyes?
Color and tone?  What do you think? (I tried for a romantic pink tone.)
Other compelling comments?
This is not one of my favorites ... so feel free to be honest.

Thursday Thoughts #35 -- News Tidbits

1. The columns of light beamed into the sky during the 9/11 memorial actually had to be turned off for a time because over 45 species of birds were drawn toward it away from their normal migrating path!
2. If you drink at least one cup of coffee a day, you are 23 percent less likely to have a stroke.
3. If you are not well rested you are more likely to take risks, whether it be gambling or making a serious financial decision...so I recommend you get some good sleep before negotiating on that house contract.
4. Your cell phone is the most foolproof on getting correct time over your watch, your alarm clock, and the microwave.  We have way too many clocks in our lives.
5. Yahooligans.com returns only kid-appropriate links if searching the internet with children.
6. According to Robert Brady (his May 22 post) things are even much uglier in Japan since the earthquake.  Seems that even the Japanese leaders lie to their people.  Her in ego-centric USA, we no longer hear much about this tragedy.
7. Obama's visit to Ireland was pretty exciting.  One would have thought he was a rock star...either that or the Irish get really friendly after a few pints.
8. I finally learned where the term meme came from.
9. I was excited about reading this.
10. Twitter paid 40 million to purchase TweetDeck...I am so behind on this stuff.
11. According to the New York Times "Climate scientists have told city planners that based on current trends, Chicago will feel more like Baton Rouge than a Northern metropolis before the end of this century."
12. Marriage is on the demise according to statistics...people just want to live together.
13. Someone discovered that the Republican candidates in the U.S. are going to "tweak" Medicare and Social Security so that instead of  a social service program, they operate more like a free enterprise service...who would have thunk this?

Holding On to the Center

I think that the one thing I search for as I age and find I actually have time to think  and search is the "Center  aka Balance."  I look for that middle ground where everything can clearly be seen, where, if I stand straight and tall with my arms out wide, I feel in complete and peaceful balance.  That place, where, if I stare straight ahead, I can see into those loving eyes of my family and read their minds and accept what is revealed...changes and all.  That place where I know I am home and there is nothing hidden or unknown that can take me by surprise.  That place that is safe and pure and honest and where I am not looking over my shoulder at the mess that is catching up with me, or the old age that is catching up with me, or that bundle of guilt that I keep in a dark locked trunk behind the shed door...the bundle that shows how much time in my life I have wasted and all the mistakes I have made.  It is that place where the future is only obvious change and not unnecessary challenge.

Truly retired means there are no longer any excuses for not being in the Center of your life.  Even if you are fighting a serious disease or supporting the fight of a medical challenge of a loved one...you finally have some time for concentrating on the Center.  Actually you must dedicate time to remain in the Center or you are of no use to anyone off-center.  In retirement there is no longer a career or children to pull me off-Center.  I always admire those people who find the gift in everything that happens to them.  Not the sugary frosting top bow...but the solid center gift of what happens to them and with a gentle sigh they can see and accept that it happened and realize it is there to make them pause and to grow to become more solid and able to fit in between it all.

On a graph sent to me by my financial adviser (yep, I do have one of those) the Center is that place in the middle of the graph where the Y and X meet.  This magic happens between the far flung four corners on this graph which are labeled Lower Risk-Higher Return, Higher Risk-Higher Return, Lower Risk-Lower Return and finally Higher Risk/Lower Return.  The only honest place and sure thing on this graph is Lower Risk-Lower Return.  The most attractive place is Higher Risk-Higher Return but there is not much air in this corner of the graph whether representing financial life or daily living and it is a place you cannot stay long but probably should visit briefly for the thrill every once in a while.  (It is funny how this graph replicates life.)

I live in a culture of excess with lots of glittery lights and magnificent smells, and addictive sounds and therefore, trying to find the Center with the coals warm glow and to remain balanced as I am made stronger by fire is a daily challenge.  It is like yoga and meditation...a most peaceful and rewarding place that allows you to forget about all the corners of your world, past and present, but it takes lots of work to get there and to remain there and most of all to just let go of the idea that you must be on a path to somewhere else.  The only place I must be is right here and right now.

Essential Things You May Have Missed Out On

It amuses and amazes me everyday how I have become that old person who looks back on life and wondered how I ever got through it without all the aids, gadgets, networks that are available today.

I raised two delightful and complicated children back then.  We did not have seat belts in cars and my friends who smoked were allowed to smoke while we went somewhere.  Miraculously my children survived both these dangers.  I unknowingly fed them foods in containers lined with carcinogenic plastics or probably sprayed with dangerous pesticides.  School lunches included the vegetable ketchup to balance the repast.  Abandoned refrigerators and mean dogs were the greatest fear in neighborhoods.

Because I am a technologically savvy grandma, I purchase gifts from my grandchildren via that new magical mall, the Internet.  These companies then automatically assume I need paper versions of their inventory as well and my mail box begins to regurgitate colored catalogs of items beyond my wildest dreams.

There are gates and locks and containers that even an enterprising raccoon would have difficulty surmounting.  Children now have their own luggage when they travel, and sunglasses and helmets when they are out riding in that dangerous but very comfortable stroller.  With the added cup-holder and side music speakers, as Fran Lebowitz says, they are never leaving that stroller.

In the latest version of one of these missives offering "thoughtfully selected products," I have the opportunity to purchase a Potty Watch that alerts small children with lights and music to remind them to go to the bathroom at preset intervals...I cannot help but think of a child who would become dependent on this and could not go to the bathroom without the alarm...you know, that idiot CEO at the board meeting!  I could buy a pillow that supports good posture in small children when they sleep...unless they sleep sideways across the bed as does my grandson #1 or with the pillow over their head as does my granddaughter.

There is even a strange device that one uses to remove mucus from the noses of little ones who have not mastered the art of blowing.  The mother puts it against the child's nostrils and then puts a little plastic tube in her mouth and proceeds to suck on the tube.  The text assures us that the mucus goes into a tissue and not the mother's mouth.  It still looks very unsettling in the photo (above) of mother and child using it.  The real clincher is that the publisher claims it has been used by European parents for years.  (They probably write in the European version that it has been used by North American parents for years.)

How did our baby "animals" survive without this stuff?  What new wonders will be available to my grandchildren when they begin to raise their little ones?  All of these do not belay the real dangers of global climate change, air pollution, water pollution, crime, drugs and daily stress that our little ones have to battle.

Hummingbird Moth

(I was supposed to post this on MY OTHER blog...but got mixed up and am too lazy to move all the html code...so here it is!)

This is Hemaris thysbe (at least I think that is what is is) commonly known as the Hummingbird moth.  Got these photos while he was hanging out at the dianthus pot on the back of my deck.  They turned out nicely, so, of course, I had to share even if in reduced pixel size!

There is not much known about this moth, except one site said the scientific name was based on the Pyramus and Thisbe  love story where Pyramus finds Thisbe's blood stained scarf assuming she had been killed and thus impales himself with his own sword.  The Hemaris part is based on "Haemorrhagia as a reference to blood-like coloration" 

I also found this quote  "The courtship behavior of hawk moths is very complex. It often involes pheromones, love songs and aerobatic flights. This type of behavior has been noted in the cream-lined hawk moth from Asia, and is currently being studied in the North American species. However, many different hawk moths, such as the ocellate hawk moth, also found in Asia, do not have these behaviors. Rather, they tend to have broader wings and fly more clumsily. They have no tongues, do not feed as adults, and show little courtship behaviour. (Kitching, 1999)"

I see this often in the summer and sometimes people think they are a stinging insect because of their size...not so.

Did You Disappear?

Several people commented in posts and even commented on my blog comments on the recent two-day outage of Blogger...although Blogger did not admit they were out of whack for that long because you could read what had been published in a prior time.  I had been pretty busy away from the computer during that time and only noticed at the very end when I was trying to check my posts.

It was a little frustrating for me not being able to post anything or read anything new, but because I am easily distracted  I moved on to something else. 

Some of you wrote that you felt as if you had been cut off from communication with an important side of the world.  I began to wonder if I would have felt the same if it had been a rainy or cold day where I was stuck at home with nothing to do.  If I had time to reflect, I am sure that I would have been a little panicked at not being able to get in touch with readers of my blog.  What if Blogger had gone down permanently?  I am sure they have back-up servers to return to a prior time...but what if?

Peruby has a disaster recovery plan idea which she wrote about.  I never thought about a back-up plan for a hobby, but that is an interesting thought.  How did you feel about all this?  Do you have a back-up plan?

Huh?

Our Master Gardeners are having their big plant sale this weekend and I have been very busy labeling and transporting small and large potted plants, building (!) plant benches and identifying plants. Earlier in the week I spent several days with my daughter helping with three little ones as her husband was on a week of travel.  She was nursing a cold on top of everything else....so, if you will excuse me, I really think I need a nap right now...then I will do research on this Blogger issue.

Bloody Murder at Tabor's Yard

(This is a warning that the following post may contain content too violent for children or adults with a sensitive nature, and no, Tabor did not kill her husband.)

It was a dark and stormy night...no, actually it was the middle of a sunny afternoon.  There were ominous shadows flitting through the trees...no, it was a beautiful spring breeze rustling the new growth and that is what tricked me, that made me oblivious to what was to come.  There were an unusual number of blackbirds flying back and forth across the lawn.  Thats lends a little ominousness to the mood...doesn't it?  There was also the sinister buzz of black flies in the air...the type found in any Stephen King soundtrack.

I had just emptied my overcrowded dish of plant succulents, finished their re-planting and was heading down my driveway to obtain some soil to mix with the sand.  As I walked I noticed ever so superficially something bright red on the driveway pavement...a lovely rose petal, perhaps?  I continued my saunter under the large leaning tulip poplar that will one day fall across this driveway and kill someone.

Then, without warning, I felt something wet fall onto the outside of my hand just below my watch band.  Rain released from a tree leaf?  I looked down and saw wet, red blood!  A nice juicy spray of drops across the back of my hand to the base of my thumb.  I looked up and saw the tulip tree leaves winking at me and nothing else.  I looked back down at my hand and quickly wiped away the blood on my muddy jeans, and that was when I saw body parts scattered across the pavement!  Truly a CSI moment.

Here's looking at you!

I backed up a yard or two and again tilted my neck to look into the tree.  Many of you have already guessed what I saw.

He was not going to interrupt his casual lunch of shad just because I was doing yard work!  Today I learned that osprey do not eat the eyeballs, and now I wonder why not?  And I realized how much they fertilize the earth when they eat... if not eating over a paved driveway, that is!  The ants were soon having a picnic, though.

And at least it was not bird poop that fell from the sky on me....

The Other Mother

Today's post is to honor those mothers who have lost children through disease, war, or accidents of life's decisions.  Today is a most difficult day for you to get through because it is the deep reminder of that river of pain you swim through each and every day as that child is no longer a part of your life.  Or perhaps, that child has disappeared into a dark alley of the world somewhere and while you think of them often, today their presence hangs most heavily on your heart as you wonder what has become of them.  Your memories of their face are static in time and do not console you.

Today I place a virtual hand on your shoulder and another across your heart and I lay my head on your shoulder as I try to understand your pain and wish you some peace.