Just A Couple Small Surprises

 I decided to walk past one of my recently replanted gardens the other afternoon on my way to get the mail, checking on possible rain damage from a heavy rainfall on loosened soil. I almost tripped over the duck which had bedded down between a well-set Japanese iris clump and the wall of the house. It's not because I was going to walk through the garden, but her calmness as I approached made her slow movement away from me a double surprise. First, because she was there. I've had rabbits in the garden, or squirrels, even a racoon. They are easily spooked into a run in the opposite direction, which sometimes is only the far end of the live trap from me.  But this female mallard merely stood and waddled calmly away while casting her head back to see - perhaps - if I had any food for her. In her case, "away" merely meant down onto the grass where she settled down calmly, unchased as I continued past. 

She wasn't limping, a possible excuse for not avoiding me. She never raised her wings, though they didn't look to be clipped or dragging, another possible excuse for not rushing away. She did keep an eye on me, but very calmly. I decided she must be very used to humans, especially when she was still on my grass upon my return with the mail. A check a while later didn't show her in view. I concluded  she was likely healthy but way too used to humans, possibly having been raised by somebody thinking doing so after finding an egg was a good idea. I only hope she can fly well in a couple months before the lake ices over and manages to hook up with others of her breed to learn the best pathways for the trip.

The mail itself was the other surprise. It started - to my awareness - weeks ago with an email, letting me know I was to benefit from a lawsuit against my insurance company. There had been some kind of legal/financial misbehavior on the company's part which I'm still not clear on, other than it meant they took too much money from their customers and had to repay.  I as a customer was on a long list of beneficiaries for getting a refund in the mail, and all I had to do was return the email to them via a form I'd get sent after a click in a specific spot. I was to enter the series of letters and numbers already on this form, identifying me and my case and expect a reimbursement in a few weeks. I had several days to reply, or not.

I let that sit in my email for a few days. It must be spam, right? Scam maybe? Except as I looked at it, it did appear to have been sent by my insurance company, no weird email address. They didn't ask for any further information beyond the letter/number codes already in the email. They didn't need bank account info to put it in for me, they'd be mailing me a check. As the deadline to file neared, I looked it over searching for anything that seemed off about it. The insurance company was already on an ACH payment system for monthly bills, I had indeed been their customer since we moved in at our current address. I couldn't find a reason to avoid sending them their own code back to them. So with days to spare, I did. 

Today was the deadline to reply.  Yesterday the check arrived. I wasn't expecting it to be very much, and I got that part correct too. However, I had to drive into the Twin Cities to my credit union to deposit it since the local ATM which works with them is only a cash machine. Oh well, I needed actual cash funds as well, so my lawn mowing lady can get paid later this week. I'd stopped in where that "free" ATM machine was yesterday but as a holiday weekend just ended, it had been tapped out by EVERYBODY two days earlier, and not scheduled to have their cash supply refilled till mid week. It happens that way there every holiday weekend. We know to tap it ahead of holiday tourism. I just had no need to do so until now. All in all, I needed a second road trip! I'd had my own planned road trip the day before, heading up to Crex to see how things fared with the drought, seeing what might be worth shooting with my camera. I found unexpectedly colorful ferns along the roadsides all over where I'd expected instead just dead brown due to the drought.

The dead brown will be along soon enough. I've never caught them in any stage other than lively green or end-of-year brown. Yellow, orange, and red were supposed to be for trees! Hmmm, maybe next year's photo contest? Would they believe it was real?

Now I needed a second road trip into the metro in order to deal with the check. Of course it happened the day after gas prices rose about $.25 per gallon, which I needed to fill my tank with. If I'd filled up when I got home the day before....

 Starting with the deposit, the withdrawal for two weeks lawn mowing, after which the ATM has no excuse to have funds again, and a later charge to fill my tank, my reward for applying for the lawsuit payout was two weeks of mowing paid for and part of a full tank after some weekend driving, before dipping into current funds. I guess I could call that a win...?

I had been thinking maybe some ice cream on my way home....... I guess my insurance company wasn't greedy enough to have to reimburse for ice cream too. No real surprise there.  Oh well, yogurt and blueberries are almost as good. If they were better than "almost" it would have been a real surprise!

Covid's Back

OK, I'm sure it never really left. But it's fall, kids are starting school, people are flying back in aerial  germ cans to go to work. Whatever the timing is and why for other people, I just heard from my daughter that she's just tested positive for it.  We'd had plans together for next weekend. Obviously they are now cancelled. I'm hoping for "just postponed".

Just a few weeks back I'd asked my primary doc when was the best time this year for getting the latest booster for covid. Steve and I have always been first in line - or as close as possible - for every shot and booster offered. He's never tested positive. I've had it twice. One hears of new variations, possible new ways to fight it better, and hopes for the latest whatever to come on the market by some specific close  date.  So I ask.

Her answer was that no new protections or immunization combinations are coming out in the near future, but be sure to  renew our boosters early this fall. At our ages, Medicare coves them. As for flue shots, there will be a best-guess formulation for the likely varieties out this fall, so we'll get in the line October first. Same coverage for those. There are some good things about getting old. Hey, If I made good art with my wrinkles, I'd be wealthy! Then again, maybe my contribution is to make my surgeons wealthy.

Meanwhile I sent my daughter the information I learned early in covid years about how to deal with it once you've caught it. First is paxlovid, providing that's still the best on the market and you or your insurance can cover it. About year three in the ongoing pandemic there was a sudden, poorly explained clamp down on using it. I'd just gotten my second case of covid, was told I'd have to pay for the shot myself, but simply didn't have an extra thousand in the budget. The only difference noted in my illness without paxlovid was brain fog severe enough that I didn't recognize how bad it was except in retrospect, marveling afterwards in my stupidity.

The rest of the symptoms weren't severe, unless you count long covid. I lost my senses of taste and smell for a long time. Taste came back... sort of. Mostly I still can't smell a thing. But then there'll be a few minutes in some totally random day when suddenly my nose returns for a bit. Not all comes back. Usually it's a single thing. I missed smelling fresh mown grass, but got a reprieve for a  couple minutes, once. Not since. For years I couldn't smell skunk spray when Steve was overwhelmed by it as the car passed a roadkill. Then I smelled one, once. Period. It goes like that, a quick sniff of something, then quickly squelched, for good, at least so far. Skunk? Once. Bacon frying? Once, briefly. Onions being cut? Same. Get the pattern? I almost compare it to a single receptor being healed, then whatever caused it returning, with some new tactic to make sure it doesn't get "cured" again. I'm told I raise fragrant flowers in my garden. Can't prove it by me. Good thing the blossoms are lovely. The scent of gunpowder is supposed to be strong on 4th of July. Was the west wind  from the wrong western direction? On the other hand, I used to hate fresh tomatoes. Something isn't there any more and I find them delicious.

I'm still trying to decide if it's a good or bad thing I can't smell my own combinations of nasty stinks. If I'm doing a good job of tamping them down, then hooray. If other people are simply being polite by not commenting, then not so much. About a year into long covid I read that my symptoms are officially on the long covid list. I'm not alone! And compared to other people's lists of long covid symptoms, I figure I'm blessed. Things could be so much worse. Barring something like a gas leak, my symptoms are not considered life threatening.

But my daughter has covid now, and while I am certainly not a medical professional of any kind and not about to suggest ivermectin or bleach for use in or on humans, or going out to sunburn your nether regions for some idiotic incomprehensible reason, I memorized a list back when of what to do at home to minimize your illness. 

Much like the "Spanish flu" epidemic in the early 1900s, the worst way to get sick with covid is to have your body over-react to it. It's called a cytokine storm. The body's fight goes into overkill, harming healthy parts of you. Studies showed that it happens with covid on (at least) two fronts, each of which have over-the-counter remedies to help fight it. One is like an allergy reaction in overdrive, and cetirizine is the better allergy medication which slows that down. You can get the expensive  brand name or the generic, but one, twice a day, helps prevent that reaction. (It helps that I already take that daily, and have it on hand.) The second reaction is much like the way your body reacts to something by giving you  heartburn, and studies have Pepcid AC working on that reaction. It also has a generic version OTC, but don't ask me the name. I haven't needed to know for a couple years now, but mostly those generics are on shelves next to the brand name items. Read the labels.

One more easy thing helps. Covid drains you, depletes your energy. Taking a high dose vitamin B Complex pill twice a day for the first few days helps with that. When your normal returns, go back to whatever your normal vitamin intake was. Almost nobody needs more than standard daily vitamin dosages.

Of course it's always best to avoid getting it at all. Masks still work. Social distancing still works. Hand sanitizing still works. Best, injections against the disease still work most reliably. Denial is a crap shoot. If you're going that route, I could wish you "good luck", but just ask yourself exactly how that works  for everybody. How many deaths has the world had so far? One estimate taking into account the reluctance of certain governments to admit incompetence or scare off tourists, is 35 million.  Just how much power do you think my "good luck" wish holds over the planet,  and follow that by just how sarcastic you think my "good luck" might have been  if you''re avoiding masks, staying close to other possibly sick people, not washing your hands, and neglecting immunizations.

Yes, exactly! So take care of yourselves. Or.... "Good Luck To You!"

Walmart Wants Comments... Or Do they?

 Every so often I get an email from Walmart asking me to evaluate my recent shopping experience, or sometimes specific products I purchased there. Occasionally they try to bribe me with a "chance" to win a thousand dollars.

Oh Boy! Me and how many millions of other people? Are the odds as good as the ones from Wheel Of Fortune that I could be a lucky winner of the same thing their top contestants won in the days leading up to Christmas? I actually hoped I didn't win Wheel from home after a while, for a couple reasons. First, I hate their vacations. Too much sunburn, too much hiking, too much spa blah, too many bars and too much gambling. That's supposed to be an incentive? A few destinations might tempt me... if I had a passport. And if I could go wherever the heck I wanted to, with easy transportation, a savvy translator,  and my camera. The other reason is I had no way I could find of contacting them and letting them know I moved and where I really am now. You send that trip prize to the old address, somebody would probably use it, leaving me to pay the taxes on it. No thanks!

Anyway, most of my enthusiasm for giving Walmart a piece of my mind has nothing whatsoever to do with winning something. If I do, fine. If not, and we can assume "not", what other reason do I have to respond? Mischief? Hope for honest change?

Ummm, you do know me, right? Kind of, maybe? Willing to learn, perhaps? You are still reading here, you know.

Let's start with them finally changing something which needed it. Take their pharmacy lines. Please!  OK, I know that line has long  been trademarked, just substitute "wife" for "pharmacy lines". But for a while they took out the zig-zag path they created with posts and straps so more of us could stand in line in a small spot instead of way out blocking main aisles. When they asked me about my experience after that change, I complained about not having them and the difficulties with traffic flow. Then when the zig and zag returned, I complimented them on it. I do hope they keep it.

Other times they ask me about a shopping experience giving only the date I was there.  If it was two weeks ago, what the hell did I buy anyway? And how did it go? If you don't show me thumbnail photos of the merch, I have no comment for you. Life has long since moved on. If I order online and go pick it up, generally all goes well. Sometimes something is out of stock, but I long since learned to not allow substitutions because I'm picky, both by taste and by cost. In summer I also pack a cooler with ice. Otherwise ice cream arrives home as a puddle. It used to be tasty.... 

For so many times when I gave them my two cents that their store brand of raisin bread was never stocked, mentioned that I'd gotten none to bad reactions from employees in the store, and nothing changed, I simply stopped buying any brand of it. Other products go through the same phases. Suddenly they stocked General Tso's chicken in single frozen meals. Just as suddenly they stopped. Or everybody else bought it first. Maybe middle America has developed a palate?  I'm still waiting for them to come back with the healthy version of a frozen single meal of lasagna. I don't need 15 servings at a time, and who needs to put that much strain on their budget when one serving is all that's wanted? Their Pad Thai is good as long as it's Amy's and I add more peanuts to it. Their frozen foods section has vastly improved with the addition of foods that aren't just another pasta.

They do have an ongoing procedure that drives me nuts. They keep moving stuff. Perhaps they believe that it means we shoppers discover new things to buy in the old places we automatically steer to. Perhaps it does work with some folks. It annoys the heck out of me, and I have a lot of heck to be annoyed out of. Most days I don't take a battery shopping cart any more, though there is the occasional exception. However my long-trained mindset is still that shopping shouldn't be painful or too much work. Top shelves are impossible, with the next one down merely just completely miserable to have to reach. Guess where the heavy boxes and bottles are kept? Most day's I'll simply not buy it. Very occasionally one of their blue-smocked shoppers, pulling or pushing their stacks of carts to fill with drive-up orders, will be in the aisle and I can request them to please reach me X number of item Ys because I can't reach it or lift it or whatever. Nearly all of them are both pleasant and helpful.  If I wait for an ordinary but tall shopper to come through the aisle so I can request a bit of help, it's usually given but at the cost of annoying other shoppers waiting to clear that aisle. When it doesn't happen, both Walmart and I are disappointed, though my bank doesn't tend to complain at my savings.

If something has moved several aisles over, I have neither the clue as to where, nor the patience to hunt all over in the store's devious hopes I'll find other stuff to buy on my way. One item in point is Propel, a product of Gatorade, a sugarless beverage with electrolytes and actual flavor. It's nice to have in the car for "just because" times. In the last two months it's had three totally different locations in the same store. The first was at floor level two aisles away from sports drinks, the second on a top shelf, and finally where I could reach it. (Who else complained about it? Let me shake your hand!!!!)  I'm more likely to leave with a royal bad attitude - which I've almost perfected now so that it doesn't include swearing, though not guaranteed - and either not buy it at all or just go elsewhere. But they simply must keep moving stuff. And moving more stuff. And moving other stuff besides.

Hey guys, listen up: Walmart shopping is not my version of sports equipment!

I'd just gone through it with the one thing I needed at a Walmart hours earlier, when I got one of their requests for a "how did it go?" I decided to answer. I'd  needed car oil, 5w20, synthetic, and for high mileage cars. I've been told I should stick with the same brand already in the car if I was just topping it up. Hunting was involved. I'd just bought some a month earlier, wanted more on hand for in case. My car doesn't leak, witnessed by no oil puddles under the car,  but oil does get burned up over time and needs to be topped up before oil change time. So of course I pushed my cart to the exact aisle end cap where it was the last time. It wasn't there, but you already knew that since I'm writing about it.  Now of course those bottles come in a precise color, in a precise shape, and with all their minisculely different varieties stacked together, they take up a lot of shelf space. Of course you have to bend way over and reach way in and pull out each bottle and triple check every precise detail of every bottle. Who knew there's now a ZeroW20 oil? Oops. How did that get in my cart? Or who knew that high mileage oil is somehow different from all-synthetic oil when I use synthetic oil  because my car is high mileage? It won't be the bottle you think you reached for because it was directly behind the one that was correct. At least one of those requirements is bound to be different than the only bottle exactly in front of it was. Somebody else pulled one - or three dozen, who knows? - bottles out, found it wasn't their precise specifications, and simply found a bit of space to set it on before trying the next bottle. 

Who, me? Are you kidding? Of course I'd never tell if it were. But it's not. Or is it?

A store employee came by and asked me what I was looking for. It was a long list of specifications and I'd just located the brand and was combing through individual bottles. She heard part of what I needed and promptly went off, I thought to attend to some other task. Thirty feet down the aisle, well past shouting distance, she grabbed and started loading the huge full plastic bottles into my cart. Each was more than I needed in total. My first reaction was they weren't "X" specification, but before I could get another word in, off she went to return with two more huge ones with that particular specification correct but the next one wrong. She started reaching again into my cart to pull those out and this time I managed to stop her, pointing out I only needed the three small bottles now in my cart. I tried to feel bad for her and grateful for her attempt to be helpful, but this wasn't tee-ball  and she wasn't listening. At least I got to stop her from adding more oil. But where could she have gotten the idea I needed enough oil to fill a barrel?

Of course that's when Walmart sent me the feedback request. 

You must know that they only allow so many characters per answer to each question. I gave it some thought, and finally opted for brief sarcasm, saying things highly improbable, congratulating them for obvious flubs, that I could only hope they were so outrageous that somebody had to get the point. One example was their only relocating product X far enough from its usual location that it only took me half an hour to locate it. Now my granddaughter might have added a wonderful story about a pesky racoon, but I was totally beat by that time. I'll keep it in mind, though....

In hindsight though I'm not so sure. Might I have been too subtle? More to the point, does anybody anywhere read those? Or care?

Two-Showers-A-Day Weather

 This is summer in Minnesota. We live in a geographic anomaly, and have for at least part of every year since 1991, barring one no-travel year for covid before immunizations when we stayed in Arizona. It's the high point of the county here. For whatever reason, weather coming from every direction splits and goes around us.  When the sirens go off, we're more likely to stick out heads out to watch the distant action than go hide in a basement or shelter.

Note that we're having a drought locally. Northern Minnesota and southern Minnesota have been getting nailed with heavy weather. It's not always in time to stop a forest fire, like the ones in the BWCA for example. When the TV announcers claim we're likely to get rain here, we politely snicker. (By politely I mean we're so many miles away they'll never hear it in their fancy studios. Mom would almost approve.) It doesn't mean the air isn't humid. Fogs are common enough:

Where is this weird area? Look at a map of Minnesota and note that it looks like somebody tied a belt around it's waist and cinched it tight, leaving just a little bit of the state to poke out either east or west into a neighboring state. Blame the rivers. My dad grew up near the western bump. We live in or near the eastern bump. When the big rain systems roll in, they tend to slide by north of us or south of us. When the winds are governed more by northerlies or southerlies, rain tends to slide by east or west of us. 

I'm not saying we get no weather here. We just get less stormy weather. When the county weather sirens go off, invariably they are sounding for the northern end of our county. We can enjoy watching, maybe trying to capture lightning in photos.( I haven't perfected that yet, but can try for screen grabs of one of my paused videos. Just ignore the extraneous graphics in the lower left corner. The white zig-zag lightning is real. So is the lit cloud around it, though pink wasn't its real color to my eyes. I'll keep working on that technique.)

   Or we can shoot rainbows afterwards, much easier in daylight.

All three of the previous shots are from our main porch - the covered one, thank you  - and over our neighbors roof. Different storms, different times of day.

It's been a particularly dry year here. My grass is turning brown, and "weed" grasses are taking advantage. No, I'm not going to put chemicals down. The lawn is by fiat mowed weekly, need it or not. Anything somebody puts out to kill weeds will kill gardens, and we have the right to refuse them. (Just claim health issues!) 

So when I call this "two showers a day" weather, I'm referring to how fast sweat builds up, requiring two showers a day for the person working outside in the sun and humidity. Of course the option exists to maybe just start the day with one, or end the day that way. My skin insists that salt from my clothes itches unmercifully, does not disappear with indoor fans on, and only changing the wardrobe frequently, paired with rinsing off the skin, can do the trick.

I'm confronting a deadline here. My new plants need homes. Those homes are currently occupied by other plants needing relocation, and occasionally gifting to others. Relocation before frost requires giving them a chance to establish roots in their new homes, as well as plenty of watering in dry hot weather. Watering requires hauling a pair of hoses across the yard and putting them back again, as well as standing around aiming the spray. Even early in the morning, any or all of that work  means I return to the house dripping wet, itchy, and beat.  Mid day it's impossible, and close to sunset hasn't given the muggy air time to cool off. 

I did finally manage to tie the bandana around my head so it actually catches the sweat before it runs in my eyes. That much salt stings! It also coats my glasses lenses. I refuse to look in a mirror until proper showering and grooming have occurred. I'm not saying I'm vain, but really - who needs to see that? Last winter my hair was growing out longer from the previous haircut than I'd let it do for years. The air was dry enough that it didn't frizz. Now just in drying after a shower and being brushed in place after the shirt goes on - emphasis on "after" - it only settles down for half an hour or so. It's supposed to be too short to do that!!!!!

I'm beginning to feel like I'm a toddler again, with that curly hair my mother loved because she could just comb it around a finger, remove the finger, and voila! Ringlets, perfectly formed, all hanging even and in rows around my head. I heard a lot of references to Shirley Temple. Somewhere along the line I decided Mom wished she was raising that perfect little girl instead of me. That's part of why I keep it short enough so many years to just frizz. Even in those spots where it's supposedly too short for frizzing it manages to frizz. I suppose I could try braids, if I had the wherewithal to keep my arms up above my head these days long enough to put them in, but back in those years where I did braid my own hair, mostly twin french braids done either over or under, they still frizzed. Been there, done that, never allowed any photos. 

You're welcome! Really!

When menopause turned my hair white, it also changed the texture of it. Hooray! I thought I was done with the frizz. Those years in Arizona did nothing to disabuse me of that hope. My hair, properly cut, behaved!

Meanwhile, while I typed out this, the ceiling fan has cooled me down enough for me to finally quit sweating. A shower alone wouldn't have done it. My body has to adjust first. So now it's time to go take that first shower of my day.  It's supposed to rain/storm tonight, but we'll see. Either way I'll be out early in the morning again, shovel in hand, digging the last of the iris out, trimming their leaves, setting them in a pail of water to soak wounded roots for a bit. As soon as it's suitable to plant a few of them, in they'll go. The rest I'll pop in the fridge in wet paper towels in a bag. I'm seeing a friend next week who's agreed to plant them in her yard, colors unknown. Meanwhile there will be a space to fill back in with new daylilies, hoping all settle in for winter, living up to their hardy reputation. Winter should bring drier air, straighter hair, and....

      Oh Dammit! Ice and snow! Blast it!

So Why SaveThe Rags?

I'm not talking about the plastic crate on the bathroom floor with old towels and other rags fit only for nasty cleaning jobs, wiping oil off the dip-stick, or slops when painting. Nobody needs to justify keeping and using those, especially when the alternative usually is paper which continuously eats into global resources. (OK, guilty of that too. Not scolding, just trying to conserve when I can.)

What I'm talking about here are the rags I continue to wear, in private and mostly at night. Mostly I hate "official" items designated for sleepwear. Nightgowns don't follow me when I move, so they tug in uncomfortable places, and after several movements could wind up leaving me feeling captive. Did I say "could"?  Try "Do!" Ever been awakened by feelings of being trapped? Anybody try to tell you it must have been something you ate? I can promise you I don't chew on my night clothes!

Any sleepwear with long sleeves and/or legs winds up bunching up next to my torso, another form of imprisonment and discomfort. Few if any of the above choices actually are made in comfortable fabrics. If you think the alternative is wearing nothing, then all the sweat and miscellaneous dirt winds up on the sheets much faster, and those are usually more strain to peel off the bed, wash and dry without tangling in everything else, impeding both dirt removal and proper drying. Afterwards there's lifting all four corners of a heavy mattress to tuck fitted corners back under. A queen bed adds the experience of guessing which corner of the sheet goes on which corner of the bed. I used to take a black marker and point arrows on the corners so wherever one pointed was the long way of the bed, i.e.,  head or foot. The latest batch of markers aren't so permanent. All in all, the less need for laundering, the better.

Thus we're back to needing something to cover as much of my torso as possible,  suitable for the temperatures, and still comfortable. What's the most comfortable? Well-worn total cotton clothing, no to short sleeves, stretched out everywhere including now wide necks, patterns likely faded and full of holes. You know, stuff I'd never be caught dead wearing out of doors.  Or maybe only caught dead. You know: cotton rags now. But soft ones.

My arms and legs are already tucked under whatever bedding house temperatures require, something between not even a sheet on top to a sheet/blanket/quilt combo. Their very size tends to keep them where they belong, as the unconscious me seems perfectly capable of arm movements moving them to suit temperature regulation. OK, full disclosure, I can wander all over the bed in my sleep, another reason to avoid nightgowns.

When rags are totally suitable for another year or two, why go out and buy an expensive experiment? You don't know how it feels on your body, how much it will entangle you over the course of hours. Those rags must have had enough comfort in them for you to wear long enough to turn them into a rag. Your body already knows how soft they feel. If they aren't, then the crate on the floor beckons. Those scratchy bits can still scrub.

There is one caveat however. Sometimes those seams pick up tiny somethings, or have a non-cotton thread, and become an irritation. Most times they're still just fine worn inside-out, seams on the outside. My only exception to that is a series of summer shirts I bought a dozen years ago, with printed decorations all over the front and bits of fine glitter added. There are so many that they still look great for the most part just for their time between rotations of wardrobe. Traces of  glitter still remain, enough that those I still wear as regular shirts have to be removed before an x-ray! I don't notice them any longer, but the X-ray techs sure do. If they do, my body will likely notice if I'm skin-to-glitter all night. Oh well. They're still good regular shirts, and there are a lot of baggy tees in the wardrobe for sleeping in, or something strappier for summer.

Oversize cotton knit shorts with drawstrings are perfect for the same reasons for the rest of me. With all my pants these days, I'm only buying new knits with drawstrings, except for when I need jeans, because elastic never lasts. I do like my pants to stay up on the way to the bathroom! Decades ago I learned the art of pulling a drawstring through after it got pulled out. It involves a large safety pin (or diaper pin) and then knotting the ends together loosely before putting the pants in the laundry to avoid having to repeat the pull-through part, because frankly it's a bitch!  

At least it's a soft, comfortable bitch.

When The Weather And I Disagree

 My ambition has been peaking. So has my need to dig into a job and get it done for the year. 

When I say "digging", I mean it literally. Perhaps half of my iris have been relocated. There's an easy path out to the rest of them, right through the middle of my round raised garden. I made that when I dug out the first batches of iris to move. It was lumpy and totally unsafe for this set of wobbly legs, trying to find flat spots big enough for a foot at a time, avoiding the raised blocks which weren't doing a good job of being stepping stones due to elevation above dirt level, find a spot to start the shovel going down, hoping to stand on the edge of it to force it further in the dirt than arms alone could manage and do all that without losing my balance and falling. In desperation I managed to grab clumps of the tallest of the daylily leaves to keep myself stable.

They didn't seem appreciative. I decided not to mind, counting on their reputation for hardiness, especially this late in the year, nearly all blooming done.

Despite never really getting injured when falling, I have developed an actual deep dread of doing so. It can take me a minute - an actual minute, not just the expression - to work up to lifting one leg and placing the foot in the next desired spot to get close where I need to dig next. It's complicated by the other plants in the way, which I don't want to step on, even though they are daylilies and virtually indestructible even if I manage to sprawl over the totality of them. Those same impediments assist my safe passage so I consider it an even exchange. They haven't tried to argue where I could hear  it. I do apologize mentally to them. Hey, show me an ear and I'll do it out loud... quietly of course so the neighbors don't think I'm completely crazy.

The part of the garden which got dug and trampled and guided me safely to my goal, once the desired plants had been removed and all the broken daylily leaves cut back, is now mostly bare, smooth, and safe. More iris wait at the end of it to get dug, after which new daylilies go in those spaces. I'm itching to get back out there and dig.  Then soak the iris, cut leaves back, and plant them in the area of their new home which had a lovely new layer of top soil spread across it waiting. The next stage should be much easier.

Except...

During those days of the first move it was cool. The air was dry. And I still had salty sweat running down my face. I'd put a folded bandana over my head and knotted it so it would stay put and soak up the sweat. Within two minutes it didn't matter. I pulled some paper towels out of my pocket and wiped my face over and over to clear my vision, keep my eyes from stinging, and myself from being so ungodly uncomfortable. I wanted to keep working, get the job done, pat myself on the back for a mission accomplished after months of planning and shopping and drawing out a layout and researching depth for various species. It was miserable joyous work, and it ended too soon. 

Note I didn't claim it was finished. That's why it ended too soon.

The rest of the job still waits. The new dirt for most of the remainder of the new bed has been spread and broken up from large clods to much smaller ones. I found a way that didn't put too much weight on either shoulder, once my son dug the remaining rhubarb plants out of the bed. I drove one of those to its new home, and he took some fresh topsoil home with him to make his own new rhubarb patch out of the remaining plants. I learned to start planting at one end of the new iris strip, free to walk over the new dirt as I backed over it to make space for the next row, and so forth, never needing to reach across on my knees but bend down from the hips, a much better point of balance for me, until I ran out of dug iris. 

There is an intimidating amount of them left in their original patch, though new space is prepared for them. But the heat and humidity are back, without bringing rain, my energy first thing in the morning when it's pretending to be cool leaves something to be desired, and my hopes still rest with the morning weather report. It's still too warm for me, not too warm for the iris, nor too cool, leaving my dilemma as a weight like concrete shoes keeping me inside the house until it really is too cool in late fall to get them settled in properly.

We just don't want to mention the fear of falling in the garden which still lingers, despite work and logic. Even with some of the the causes removed, there is still that moment when one foot has to be lifted, the other balanced on while the shovel is properly placed for the lifted foot to descend on it with a very decided and well-aimed stomp, then a tilt, a lift, a further stomp to shove more, another tilt to loosen and lift roots... and then the search for that perfect space to lay the shovel down in the garden full of growing plants without damage where it can not only sit while the freed iris are lifted from their clinging dirt, relieved of enough burden from their former rootball that they can be gently tossed outside the bed wall onto the lawn without any further damage until they soak in a pail of water. 

As long as that takes to read is also as long as it takes to do, adding the burden of making sure where the shovel lands is easily reached again to pick it up again for the next dig without losing balance for that either. Remember that where they have dug in for two years is also where the daylilies have surrounded them and grown close and tall, and are meant to give this growing and blooming duty another crack at their job the next year, and the next. There are also new daylilies meant to be planted in some of the spaces now bereft of iris, once the removal is complete, but not until. They are not to be tromped on again, at least not this year. All need some time to get new roots established in roomier soil. 

I bet most of you gardeners out there read all this, think it's not in need of description because for you it's a simple dig-lift-dig-lift-replace kind of job. I also bet you haven't found that fear of falling when another person or two are required to get you up and vertical again without further damage because your own body no longer does it as simply as it used to before replacement parts had to be placed in. Once that uneasiness is installed along with those new parts and several experiences, then that awareness seeps in of just how many chances there are for something wrong to happen. Fear is invasive as weeds, and grows from just as tiny seeds. One finds a reason bigger than the fear to continue, and gradually conquers a bit here and a bit there... or doesn't. The job is more complex in those circumstances.

I can't be sure there is room for all the current iris. I know I bought some spectacular ones when we moved here but they didn't bloom yet. I never marked them when planted, just remember them as if they were a time on the clock face. If north is 12, they were planted between 7 and 10. That whole area waits to be dug. What other kinds are in there? Who can tell? I did manage to make arrangements with a good friend and dedicated gardener to adopt any I couldn't find room for in their new bed. Over half her yard is flowers. I gifted her with a single one last year. It did well, according to the photo she took. They'd be loved there. If I make a mistake and give away the most spectacular of those, I wrote down the name back when I planted them, and they are still on the market. Check out "Grand Canyon Sunset". I can dig out spaces and split where very plain but hardy iris are, or perhaps some just didn't survive being mailed which were new this year. I do wonder about a couple but only time will decide. I know, for example, I have an abundance of plain light blue bearded iris, lovely enough but easily growing into excess where a riot of colors is preferred. I expect more to thrive now without having to compete with daylilies. There are other gardeners in this neighborhood who don't mind free flowers and the care they need.  But all will have adequate new homes in a week or so, or else.  However.......

Tock tock, tick tock, the calendar is running out. Temperatures should be dropping. The task which calls louder daily should be getting easier daily, with cooler dryer air and less sweat in the eyes.  A day here and then a day a week later would almost do it but somehow other needs fill those days. Doctor's appointments and other obligations still fill the calendar. There are mornings where by the time breakfast and getting dressed are accomplished that it's already too muggy and hot for hard work. The sun is still up plenty early, great for the plants but not for the one planting. One night with an inch of rain almost fools you into thinking the drought is over, which you readily conspire in agreeing with, because watering here HAS TO be followed immediately by hose removal and the hose is long enough in itself, not to mention when filled, to take up half an hour by getting itself moved... in the sun. That has to be figured in. Tools went missing for a few weeks, only to be discovered to have been hiding under the blade of the shovel plus a few plastic bags. I now own double sets. Sigh.....

Maybe tomorrow....

Remember The Movie "Pearl Harbor"?

 I'm talking about the one with Ben Afflek and Kate Beckinsale, if it was the love story you watched it for. It's also the movie with Cuba Gooding Jr. for those who watched for for the heroism and war battles. (Both are OK too. Same movie.)

Steve is former Navy, and he watched it at least in part for the naval history. Now, a very true story of exceptional heroism depicted in the movie is being all but obliterated in history, if Trump has his way. If you remember Cuba Gooding Jr's role, he portrayed a very real hero, Doris "Dorie" Miller, a navy cook as well as the ship's boxing champion. And therein lies a story.

Miller was black, and back then that meant he wasn't allowed to fight. He could cook, and did it honorably. He also was respected for his boxing ability (and all the money his shipmates could win betting on his fights). When his ship was bombed in the attack on Pearl Harbor, he was down in the bowels of the ship in the kitchen. He got his fellow sailors and the wounded captain out of harms way first, up to the deck where they could man the guns or jump into the water to escape the fires. 

Did he jump? No, he saw the unmanned .50 caliber machine gun on the deck, and started firing back at the Japanese airplanes attacking them. Remember, he was never allowed to be trained on the ship's weapons. But he quickly figured out how to work it and  fought back. He was the first African American to be awarded the Navy Cross, presented in person by Admiral Chester Nimitz himself. Unfortunately Miller later died in the war when his ship was torpedoed.

So you ask, if he got the Navy Cross, how his heroism is being obliterated? Currently an aircraft carrier is being built, designated to be named after him. Trump thinks it should be named the "Trump". Nevermind Trump's never done anything heroic, never served in the military after his Daddy found a doctor to sign off on alleged bone spurs, and has publicly referred to our military interred in Arlington as "suckers and loosers". Nevermind that Trump currently is mistreating our current military on the USS Abraham Lincoln by overlong deployment and lack of proper food and other supplies. Nevermind that Trump's ego requires stunts which cost lives when he appoints a fawning TV personality to be Secretary of War (now) who has no experience, no training, and no appreciation of our military leading him to understand that their lives matter.

Also nevermind that ships are not named after living people, just like stamps don't bear their likenesses, nor does US currency. Nevermind that Trump's name on anything rapidly devalues it, like he's done and is still doing to the Kennedy Center. And nevermind that Trump's idiocy has been costing this country all its former allies. We stand alone in the world now, not in a good way.

Oh, and let's not forget that Trump is an outspoken racist, which sure can't help anybody persuade him to keep his mitts off the name of a ship honoring a true African American hero!

When Things Go Wrong At Etsy

 I've been using this site for online shopping for years now. I've bought all kinds of things there, starting with craft supplies. I moved around, checking out various vendors, and finally decided my favorite, as well as the one I most wished to support, was Oliverstar, workers in small hand crafted glass beads. I was drawn mostly to their roses, though there are other flowers and other beads there. I made an effort to keep supporting them, since they are in the Ukraine, once Putin invaded. I never had any kind of issue - except a change in my finances - and patiently waited the extra time to receive my packages. They usually popped an extra something in their packages. I only wish I were still in need of their products, though I've gotten more into gardening in our new home.

I haven't visited Etsy much recently, though I do look at my daughter's site there, called SkuldsStitches, for those who love scandinavian needlework, every so often. I'm not a customer because she gifts me directly, and I merely have to look in the right direction to see her work.

Birthdays in the family are coming up again - everybody's a fall baby - and I just placed a couple orders for presents, their nature not to be disclosed in this post. But going back there hit a nerve I'd been trying to forget about.

Weeks ago I'd ordered a pair of daylilies, Earlybird Cardinals, red with a thin white rim on the petals. They were expensive, but unique, and appealed to me. I'm pulling the iris out of the daylily bed to a new location, and there will be vacancies to fill. I checked other sources for the plants and only found that name one other place. The picture on the Etsy site was prettier with more clear white rims. I decided to order through Etsy. 

The reply was prompt, just over a week to get what were supposed to be my two bare root plants. Instead it was a small bag of red asiatic lily bulbs. The receipt with them informed me they cost under $15, a small fraction of what I'd paid the vendor. I immediately contacted them, a semi-polite version of WTF?  I offered to return the bulbs since I had no place for them. My asiatec lily bed is full and making more bulbs as you read this. The only thing the order got right aside from my address was the color red. I just don't want red except in tulips (done!) and daylilies (waiting). I asked what they wanted to do to make it right, and should I send the bulbs back?

I was informed I could keep the bulbs. Well, I found a willing neighbor who would plant them in her yard.  Then they informed me they were working on getting the right plants to me.  In a week or so I got a notice that they'd fixed my issue. Seriously? Nothing was in the mail coming my way - I get a notice from the Post Office with a tracking number, and pay strict attention since living plants need TLC as soon as  they get here. I sent comments correcting their  misinformation. After two of those I got a reply acknowledging I was still owed my two plants, and I should have patience.

Is three weeks enough patience? I looked in at their Etsy website which listed the plant as out of stock. I hoped that meant their last plants had been set aside for me. I tried for patience. No further communication came, and I need to get back to the gardens now that it's cooler and I have the proper hose nozzle to spray our gardens to keep things alive. (120 feet of total hose does the job.) 

Today I was again shopping on Etsy for something else and decided to pop over to see if anything was happening. Most of the previous discussions had been erased. I noted the "tab" to hit to contact Etsy directly, and did so. It warned me I had just a few days left if I wished to make a complaint about this order. Boy did I! I was allowed 300 characters, so practiced being very brief  but to the point. My preferred resolution had been the plants, but after this time I changed it to a full refund. I got a quick note that if it were approved, which could take days, a refund should be issued and could take 5 days to reach  where it was initially paid from. Etsy had those records. I didn't need to go dig them out.

By the time I logged off Etsy and went over to my email, I noticed 4 new communications from Etsy. I'd expected one, an acknowledgment that they had noticed my complaint and were starting to investigate it. I continued reading the successive ones, an acknowledgment that I was wronged, an acknowledgment I would be paid as requested, and confirmation of where they were sending it. It could take up to 5 days to land in that account. In total, it took them about five minutes to send all that information to me!

Anybody aside from me think that Etsy has had issues with these guys before? What they showed me is they do stick behind their shoppers and do it well.

Of course I'd still like those daylilies of that particular variety. I might check for some next spring. Or by then find new colors to please me. Or find something else somewhere. Who can tell by then?

Anyway, thanks, Etsy!

(NOTE: the deposit was here first thing the next morning!!!!)

Another Mystery Sighting

It was a day for odd things, or at least out of the usual. The all happened within a short period of time on a day that was itself rare, but very welcomed. Steve got to go fishing again, down on his favorite river bank on the St. Croix, the sandbar that forms in low water levels around the boat ramp called Franconia Landing. I can drive down, turn and park, unload Steve, his fishing gear, his chair and the platform that goes under it preventing his chair from tipping in the loose sand. It had been over a year since he'd gone fishing, and he was finally feeling well enough to go. 

I had promised to take him, but one of his sons with his wife met him there. They usually pick him up from our place but today was a doctor visit with a doc who always takes a long time with each patient, something I appreciate, but which leaves Steve waiting in the lobby long enough that he can get irritated, especially when fishing awaits. I dropped him off afterwards, and left after taking my mandatory pictures. Like a red wild flower perfectly framed in front of a weirdly shaped hollow in a still living tree on the bank.

Sure, it's tilted, but still stood long after all kinds of rain and ice storms that took out more healthy looking trees in all kinds of nearby locations over the last few years.

Fish were biting well, enough that a second trip had to be taken for live bait later. While I was there however, the fish were already biting. Steve's son was getting ready to toss this one back in.

It's all catch-and-release. Much as the family loves fishing, nobody cares for cleaning. And while I was there, nothing worth eating was caught anyway. Later I heard tales of bigger fish, because of course, and this shot is included  even though the topic is about odd things. These are not odd. Nor are the smallmouth bass and red horse suckers which started biting later. But hey, bragging rights, right? Some days any fish is worth noting.

For the neighborhood, these are not unknown, but I scratch my head at anybody who lets their chickens run wild where cars, dogs, or foxes could eliminate their flock. They did have interesting colors however.

Uphill on the same road coming downhill from the highway, a farmer occasionally has horses out in their field. Previously, if we saw any, there were only two, a white and a brown. Recently we saw either one horse or none at all. Today there were four, close to the road and making a good horse shot impossible. None of these are unidentifiable, or even much worthy of a photo if the day hadn't been so ho-hum so far. I had no idea what was to come.

Meanwhile I headed home to wait for the phone call informing us that Steve's new prescription was ready. I promised to drop back on my way to pick it up, along with some groceries,  and leave the second house key with Steve. While his fishing supplies were in the car before we left for the doc's, the thought he might need to get back in before I did was nowhere in our thoughts.  Eventually the call came, I ran all my errands, and headed home. So of course, because that's how it happens, I was on a busy highway, no opportunity to pull out the camera, when my mystery critters ran across the road.

I slowed a bit when the first ran out from the shoulder. I slowed more when the next one followed, then the next, and I realized I had no idea exactly what they were. I just kept watching, noting details. And while doing that, I did what one does, I suppose: I counted them.

My view had the late afternoon sun on the opposite side, so all I saw was black shapes. My first impression, with their backs arched up in a perfect curve, was they were toys. I've seen toy wooden cars with that shape. I presumed that was wrong, that these were living. I saw no fur spikes, but again, assumed they most likely had some. They weren't fish, nor birds, nor any appearance of any reptile I've ever seen. Think of taking a circle and cutting it in half, with a straight flat cut across for the belly, then adding tiny feet front and back. No bend indicated any knees. There was nothing except direction of travel to indicate head, the curve was so perfect. I made the assumption that they were presumably mammals, were going in the direction their (also presumed) heads were pointed at. Tiny sets of feet, one set on each end perfectly continuing the curve down to the road on both sides, were taking rapid fire steps without spoiling those lines, occasionally enough distance between the feet as to show light between, indicating their speed. They also served to elevate the totally straight horizontal body about two inches above the pavement. The body lines didn't change a bit the whole time, same back arch to the pavement, same flat stomach.They didn't bounce with those rapid steps, just seemed to glide across, maintaining the illusion of toys the entire time.

Right behind the first, possibly two feet back or a bit more, was number two. Everything identical: shape, size, speed. Next came number three, again everything identical, but add noting that the distance between two and three matched that of one and two. Same between three and four, then between four and five, and finally between five and six.  I recalled my initial idea of toys: these could easily have been pull toys with identical - but invisible - strings. By the time number six was running on the highway inside the right shoulder paint strip, number one was just hitting the left shoulder paint strip, then down into the ditch and hiding. Each followed in military precision.The parade took perhaps half a minute, possible a few seconds more. No other cars, in either direction, were close.

One other thing bothered me. Shouldn't they have had tails? I was busy looking at every detail I could note while they crossed, and could not see one tail. Not a stub, not a paddle, nothing pointing away from that smooth curve except tiny running feet. Not up. Not back. Not tucked under. I mused about "what-the-hell?" on the way home, then got busy hauling groceries. That image returned several times, but other things were happening, until it was bedtime.

The image of the parade of six returned in the morning, a clear silhouette. When time allowed, I started hunting online, working out key words to describe what they looked like and how they weren't like other animals.

Eventually I put in North American mammal, back arched when running. I figured wrong answers would point me to better narrowing it down. I was right. It gave me a mouse. I gave it back foot long. It was a start anyway. I couldn't define it more perfectly since I never got that close and only had highway to estimate measurements  by.

This time it came up with muskrat. Hmmm, OK, I know we have those in the area, but usually in the local lakes, a couple miles further west of my location. I had more questions, of course. Do they stray that far from water? Do they move in groups like that? Can they hide their tails that well? I'm going to defer to family members who might have those answers AND read this.

And thanks in advance!

Drought

I love visiting Crex Meadows. If you follow me, by now you know that and have seen enough photos to understand it as a place filled with lakes.  Anyway, it was. Steve and I went there this afternoon. The plan was for him to do much of the driving through the area, so I had hands free to shoot, especially since most of the photo ops seem to happen on the passenger side of the car.

The drought didn't stop me from shooting. But I'll help you "see" what isn't there that used to be and needs to be again.

Our first stop was an area south of Grantsburg that used to be a huge lake with a few scattered shallow places where cattails grew. Hundreds of trumpeter swans, plus assorted other birds would nest there, and the population would temporarily more than double. The lake went from huge body of water to huge pasture... sort of, if lots of muddy berms define a pasture. This photo proves it wasn't completely dry, and in fact had a small handful of geese in addition to this family of swans with two grey cygnets, the most we found in a swan family anywhere. Previous years a family with five young was not rare. Many places still held an adult or two, few had any young.

My apologies for a terrible photo. We hadn't planned a stop in this spot, across the gravel road from the south end of Phantom Lake. I trust you recognize the doe as the subject, and perhaps have had the experience of tall roadside grasses being blown back and forth in front of your lens. BLUR! What you may not recognize is the background behind her of dying water lilies. Some are still green, most not. But it is still edible food and bits of water still go through through it. I don't know if she can still produce milk. The fawn we saw behind her mostly had its head buried in lilypads chomping way. It should soon learn the need to raise its head enough to scout for danger, like Mom was doing. An arm adjustment from inside the car , an attempt to get a shot of more than part of a fawn's rump, was enough to startle mom back into the woods away from the road. The fawn followed promptly, and only as the pair disappeared into the woods and cameras were set down was the fawn's twin finally bolting from where it had been hiding, presumably eating, to follow the others. So far, two still surviving, an amazing sighting. The picture just rubs in the miss of not getting a good picture. It's here to show the quality level of remaining food supply.

The  cormorants on the floating platform tell another story one has to be informed to understand. I had stopped in at the visitor center to discuss wildlife. The same fellow I'd talked with the week before was again at the counter.  I passed on what I'd learned from the earlier visit  so far, and mentioned the platform. This week his comment changed from not being aware of it, to imparting knowledge about one way of managing the grounds (and lakes) was much akin to sinking a ship in the ocean so it can become habitat for what lives there, like the start of a coral reef. Low water levels revealed its presence to passers by. (Hmmm, somebody had done some research since my last visit.) He was going to check in with some staffers who were to arrive next week and ask them if this raft was such a contrivance. I'm sure we'll chat again after he finds out and then we'll both know. This time the cormorant count - not shown well in this photo - had climbed from  6 to 7. Life is getting crowded here in select places as water levels drop. At least some of this lake remains. For now anyway.

This mated pair of trumpeter swans did not raise young this year. The water around them offers one patch of black mud to stand on, as long as they get along. It's next to the old abandoned beaver lodge where they usually nest, then one minds the eggs and young while the other swims around the greater area marking territory and defending it from intruders.  I've followed them for several years now as the beavers built their home next to the road. By now swan feathers should all be snowy white, with a possible exception for their necks, but most years their bodies shine brilliant white and a little yellow is all that's tinting their necks. These guys can't get a proper bath, usually a benefit to them  from taking a completely vertical dive in place to pull weeds up off the bottom. Their food is usually under the surface. Now there's nowhere to get clean while feeding. 

 

 

There was a short spot of more water - or should I call it "hope"? A pair of trumpeters were watching over their  cygnets while they slept. These were still as dirty as the others around this lake, but there was actual water here. Several other birds joined them, ones I've not seen  around before, much less in the company of swans without bothering the parents. Somebody was willing to share, leaving me with a small bit of optimism for some of them getting through migration to a friendlier location. I guess questions  will be answered next year, both from seeing how much water is back where it's needed, and how many were strong enough to complete migration.

 

 

Another lake usually making a great nesting and feeding place of both great egrets and great blue herons is having its problems as well. When a car drives around the corner, the occupants see a large cloud of the combined birds startling up and outta-there! But where to this year? A trickle runs through what used to be a nice sized lake. The birds perch on dead logs and stumps either left or placed for that purpose while in repose. Last week all startled as a unit, the first one alerting all the others, both herons and egrets.
Today the herons seemed to have little energy to do more than move back from the road, land, and stop and watch to see if they absolutely had to move again... or not. No egrets were even here this day, where a week before a couple dozen scattered spectacularly, adding their white to the blues amid the herons and all retreated to the other end of bare lake bed, paralleling the road.

Today as we approached the far end of that lake, this was all that greeted us: mud cracked and a lone dying water lily baking in the sun. I hope the  missing egrets -or swans or everything else usually present have found themselves a haven. The adults have that choice.

I hate to think what will be greeting the usual gathering of up to 17,000 greater sandhill cranes in a couple months if rain doesn't pick up. This is a sanctuary, their staging ground before they migrate down to the southeast US. These 30,000 acres are maintained for that level of wildlife. When they start arriving most of the regional farmers have harvested their crops, and the cranes fly in and clean up loose seeds from the ground, all the insects they can find, even mice and small reptiles  for miles around, before returning to their sanctuary to spend the night, safe from hunters for the night. My guess is this is a bonus year for the local foxes. Those fields are suffering as well. Several are huge fields of sunflowers, heads tracking the sun just two weeks ago. Now they just hang down, leaves yellowed and crinkling. Corn's not looking so great either. If you watch weather radar for the area, rain comes across from the very north of Minnesota and the very south. Promising storms split and go around this area. We'll just have to wait and see what this fall brings... or doesn't. What will our strong El Nino bring this winter?

Fighting With Google

Apparently I ask the impossible. AI almost  helps, last resort, but it's a delusion.

Back up a bit. Yesterday's post had an odd little plant in it, very ordinary looking for a roadside weed, except it was totally white, so white that in the right angle of light seemed to flash silver. I sent a copy of the photo to Crex, letting them know where it is to be found, in case they were interested in seeing it for themselves, asking for identification, as well as letting them know it looked about to bloom, just in case it was invasive and should be pulled.

I actually hope not, or not yet, because I'd love to go back there and shoot the flowers. I want to see them! They have to be very tiny, so there'll be some camera work, but I. Just. Want. To. See. What. They. Look. Like!

I haven't heard back from them yet, but they have their own priorities. I also sent a query off to my sister-in-law, with a degree and profession in those kinds of things, and my usual go-to when I wish to be absolutely correct in an identification. I'm waiting to see what she can come up with as well.

Because Google is a total failure! I type in descriptive terms, the most telling of which ought to be that it is all white. Google seems to "think" I'm shopping, sending me all kinds of pictures of plants I know very well, both from my own plant-keeping as well as having worked in a garden center. The results have white flowers. Yes, I actually do recognize strawberry blossoms! Did you notice the green on the rest of the plant, Google? Or Google picks plants with white spots on their leaves, apparently common in some stores these days as varieties. I know those better as "variegated".  I've grown lots of those, like the '70's favorite fad plant, the spider plant.  Maybe Google can't identify "all" or "completely" when paired with "plant"? But look, if it weren't rare, I wouldn't be online asking what it was, right? I do understand the misdirection of shopping, sources and prices listed with photos, since I have done a fair bit of that online lately, working on variety for my several gardens. GOOGLE DOES REMEMBER YOU, FOLKS!

I finally took off the restriction against letting AI into the hunt. It actually found a couple of WRONG answers for me, though kudos for working on the "all white" part. One is a succulent, and yes, I'm growing one of those and it's not actually white, but more covered with white fuzzy skin. Green underneath though, very plainly.  The other wrong answer was "ghost plant", which actually is white but also more fungus in character than having normal plant structure. It can't do photosynthesis so it gets nutrition from the dirt. Much as I'd get some fun out of shooting one of those, it's not the plant in the photo, repeated here for those who missed yesterday's post and don't want to bother going back for it:

As you can see, typical weedy plant structure, not "shroomy" in nature, and no green anywhere else. I don't do camera editing tricks, as regular followers know, aside from cropping and color changes which affect the entire photo, like adding a bit of red when I had one camera that malfunctioned on it in every single shot. For example the red rocks of the desert southwest were all turned a greyish tan. A quick fix, that I can do. But it's for the entire picture, like brightening or darkening exposure. Can you imaging the hours it would take -if I even knew how - to outline every bit of these plants to perfectly make them white and nothing else?

I can manage to severely crop to show details better. Like the fact that there is no green in this plant, but plenty in the grasses behind it. What is interesting is what now shows up at nearly every leaf 's join to the stem. Seeds? Unopened flowers? I may just have to go back in a couple days to see what changes. So what if it's over 40 miles each way in these gas prices? (Gulp)

Maybe if I could just send a picture to Google and get it to identify what it is. I believe that it takes an actual, well-educated on the topic, human... with a more thorough vocabulary for search terms than I have to tease out the answers.  

Good thing I know one of those. 

And she reads this.

Just Another Roadside Distraction

My eyes are all over the place when I'm driving. Lest you think that's reckless, they are scouting constantly in all directions for any and all hazards in the process. Sometimes there are bonuses of entertainment, or education, or beauty along my way. Do you wonder that I stuck around to put over two million work miles on various cars during that part of my life? And still love driving?

Lately local authorities have been putting up electric signs along the hiway to let drivers know we all  know how fast everybody is driving. No tickets, or none that I've seen being given. But these don't just give a number. They comment as well. When I pass two miles under the limit, they'll flash "GOOD JOB" like we're all kindergartners, or driving is T-ball. I was getting a little complacent and realized I was approaching one of the signs a single mile per hour fast. The sign gave a gentle scold:  "HEY NOW."

Today I was well past being in the house or working on the yard for long enough. Temperatures were finally reasonable, at least for one day. Gotta get out! Steve and I had planned for a break where I drove to and from Crex, but he'd drive inside Crex so I could shoot out the passenger window, which is the side of the car most of the water is on, meaning most of the large birds are outside that  window, and I could steady the camera on the window ledge, or even over the side mirror if the subject were out front instead of trying to shoot through a never pristine tinted windshield. When I have a passenger they always get that side of the car. If I'm lucky, whatever the attraction is they're fascinated with and getting their own shots of is still around and visible when they finally sit back and clear the window for my turn. Mostly, not so much. As it turned out, he was dealing with enough pain that not only did he want to stay home, he needed pain meds that made driving illegal. So with his blessing I left him home to recuperate and I headed up alone.

My goal for the day - for a lot of days actually - was to spot an eagle. A NICE, ADULT, CAMERA - READY ADULT EAGLE. OK, I confess, eaglets would be way cool too. I do dream. Their usual old locations simply don't exist any more. I'd heard the Crex crew had put up a platform for them to nest on ... somewhere out  where I usually don't go, and they only kind of hint at the location if you ask.  I wouldn't have  minded a nest with young, but it's late in the season, and that high in such strong light they'd only be shapes.

Like whatever this raptor in a tall tree was. I could identify the curved beak for category of bird,  and by size was either a young eagle from the last year or so,  or very large hawk. Against the sky.... everything else by contrast black... who could tell what it was? At best, with the sun coming down on the branch tops, was  it just giving definition to the branches' shapes? Neither helped in giving an ID.

But with a bit of hope, I hit the visitor center first. Among other things, I needed new maps as the old ones disappear, and better clarification of better places to hunt. The fellow behind the counter introduced himself and answered a question of mine. I'd hoped to find out who won the most technically impressive of all the photos submitted for their annual contest, and hoped there might be a badge or ribbon on the winner. One person judges that kind of quality, but they wouldn't be in until next week. I offered my opinion on two photos where there was exquisite detail in the individual feathers and the water surface of each. After a bit more discussion, he asked my name, recognized it, shook my hand and congratulated me on my 3rd place win, indicating subtly that there were differences of opinion among the staff as to who should have won in certain categories. He obviously had a good opinion of some of my work, even my quirky sense of humor in some titles,  congratulating me again as I left to do more shooting. Meanwhile I had more information on the general area where the eagle platform had been built.

I headed that way on the county road as I left. As I cleared the woody surroundings of the visitor center for cleared fields and homes, I noticed crows circling up in the air ahead, occasionally making a half dive before rising again. Something was going on.

I actually passed it before that unmistakable white head caught my attention. Checking no traffic was moving either ahead or behind, I pulled over almost onto the very narrow shoulder, carefully as the ditch could have rolled my compact, and made sure slowly backing up was safe. I winced as a truck approached and passed me, indifferent to my errand, but its passing had no impact on my goal, the bald eagle in the ditch on the other side of the road.

It kept its eye on me, but never indicated a desire to leave its location. It didn't look injured, so I checked out the ditch between us.

Whatever it had been, it now was dinner for whoever could claim rights the most fiercely. Those crows hadn't a chance as long as the eagle was there. I tried to identify more than skinned meat and ribs. I was unsuccessful. That carcass had been feeding a multitude already. From a glimpse of iridescent feathers on the far side, with none of the rest of the carcass resembling anything that could fly, I concluded something feeding on it had itself become another creature's dinner. Well, there are also foxes and wolves in the area, possible future goals for my camera. But here was my eagle!

After continuing to keep an eye on traffic while taking several photos, aware of my own precarious location should two vehicles cross in that spot, I reluctantly put the camera down, gave myself a mental high five, and eased back on the road.

I GOT MY EAGLE PHOTO!!!!  I FINALLY GOT MY EAGLE PHOTO!!!!

Did I turn around and head home, mission accomplished?  Are you kidding? Next year that nesting platform goes on my list. I think this requires winter visits, with the leaf canopy missing and long views revealed. Hope for little ice, eh?

Meanwhile there is always more to shoot here. I'm in the habit of starting with Phantom Lake. I hoped for fauna, but lake levels through out the acreage were very low from severe drought, so I settled for an unusual - to me - bit of flora.

I have no clue yet what is is, but it does qualify as a flower, and I barely had to pull over to get a couple shots. The photo shows white, the reality showed silver to the eye.

A little further down the lake there was a stop for a rare - so far this day -  blue heron.

It was smart enough to stick to the far side of the pond across the road, so my zoom managed this much of a shot. There were a couple others in widely scattered locations, but none willing to pose. It must have been dinner time all around the area. Then again, water levels so low, it probably took all day to find fish.

There was some floating detritus well out from shore, itself collecting more random trash, plus some odd birds. I'm not used to the long highly-bendable necks on local water birds, so I'm going to start a search to identify whatever these are.  These guys were way out there, and I had to zoom past my usual optical zoom to a setting that risks a lot of blurring to get this much of a shot, so I took almost a dozen, just in case. A couple weren't too blurry.

There were a very few scattered trumpeter swans and sandhill cranes, no visible mallards, loons, or geese in the usual locations.  I embarked on a lot of driving and map checking trying to locate that alleged eagle platform. The osprey platform I'd seen occupied by two parents on my last trip here was still in place, and had earlier been raising this year's family. I saw no activity this time and have no idea if drought means harder hunting, or fishing was great until recently and all have already left the nest safely. Compared to the usual numbers I see here, I'm sceptical of a lot of breeding success this year. 

Come to think of it, most summers I can't drive  or sit with windows down or the car fills with  flies and other tiny pests. It hasn't been an issue this summer. It's been so pleasant it took a while to notice the lack.

A lot of driving produced a lot of nothing, with three exceptions. One dried up bowl with a mostly grassy bottom except for that last bit of black mud, the last to completely dry out,  now had several turkey vultures in it, the same place I shot a few photos of a larger flock of them several years ago when it was also this dry. 

Another basin, very large and mostly mud with a couple dribbles of water, held a generous and very shy collection of both egrets and blue herons. No photos were possible as the very tinniest movement of my car set them all in flight. Stopping set more up ahead in flight. Dang!

The third  sighting was on a road I'd never explored yet, along the eastern boundary of Crex. I came around a corner, slowly of course, being the optimist I am, and on the right edge of the road were three sandhill cranes. They started to walk across the road, right to left, and I stopped to grab my camera, wondering if it would be worth the effort , as I'd have to both shoot into the sun and through the windshield, and they were striding steadily out of my view. I got my camera up in time to catch wing curves above tall grass tips as they disappeared. Two sets only. There had been three birds, all adult sized, the first two the red brown from preening dirt through their feathers. The third one was very light in color, and as I watched in in the five seconds or so I had before they also disappeared into tall grasses below a bank holding a pond and even more grasses, showed itself to be white, not brown or cream as I'd first thought, with the outer half of its underwings being black!

WTF? Do sandhills come in that color? If it weren't for the size my initial mental correction of its ID was pelican, like some I'd seen months earlier in a different corner of the refuge. But it wasn't small enough, as the first sight of the three birds together said that all were cranes. I took my mystery back with me to the visitor center, along with my questions, and pointed out on the map specifically were I'd sighted... whatever. I'd been paying careful attention to my location since there is a tangle of roads on that side, and I wanted to be able to return to the eagle platform easily if indeed I was in the right location. As for eagles, I never found the platform. I did exit the tangle of roads smoothly, despite mulling what that third bird had been. 

I'm not too disappointed about that platform, at least not right now. I GOT MY EAGLE SHOTS!  Of course, I believe those are technically outside of the official bounds for where photos have to be taken to be permitted in the photo contest... by a few feet. Sighhhhh.....

At least there's nearly a year before submissions for the next contest. I figure there'll be a couple hundred new shots by then, of whatever.