![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
tinhuvielWe got rain overnight and this morning. The wind blew and wet the porch thoroughly. Everything was wet and the rain continued in earnest when I got up and bade the dogs go outside for their morning constitutional. It only stands to reason that none of them want to go outside when it's that nasty, but they have to go. Using the bathroom is a necessity and it's imperative that the dogs do their business out of doors. I finally got them all to go, but Chester never left the porch. When he came back in, he proceeded to do something he's done since puppyhood, despite my efforts to steer him away from it; he pooped on the floor. We cleaned it up, like we always do, then gave Chester the hair eyeball. He already poops on the front porch when the grass is a little too wet from dew or it's a little too high to suit him. The dog is a collection of bad habits on four feet. It's like he thinks his cuteness automatically excuses anything untoward he might do. Yet another reason why I will never have another Yorkie if I have any say about it. It's Beagles for me, or no dogs at all.
I had to run an errand over to Diane's. When I got in the car to leave, I spied an animal lying in front of the out building. It didn't move, so it had to be dead. I made a mental note to check it out when I got home from Diane's house. Upon returning, I walked out to the building to inspect the animal that was still there when I got home. It was a small opossum, young, just into adulthood, so it was probably Loki. One of his ears was torn pretty badly, but that was the only indication of injury I could see. I didn't turn him over to see if there were any wounds on his other side, though. It hurt my heart to see him so. I love the opossums who've taken up residence here and I don't want anything to bring them harm or woe, even though the other opossums are probably responsible for Loki's death; they do have a habit of brawling amongst themselves. I took a picture of Loki to document his passing.
Aggrieved, I made my way back to the house. On my way, I spied a snail shell, half buried in the wet earth. The spiral the shell spoke to me, reminding me of the natural cycles of life that, although they may seem cruel or unjust to us, create the fragile balance that allows all of us to exist.
The spiral shell lay approximately 50 yards away from Loki's body. Finding it heartened me in a very profound way. I usually take shells like this and keep them in my stone and shell back or the wooden candle holder that's full of shells and crystals that date back to the 70s. But I left this one alone. It's part of the Earth, literally, and something compelled me to leave it right where it belonged. So I did.
My contorted filbert has gone berserk. When I bought the plant, it was pretty much a twisted stick with about 5 or 6 sickly leaves barely clinging to it. Its original price was $39.95, but I got it for $19.95 because the garden folks at Lowes believed it was pretty much done for. I brought it home and planted it at the corner of my front porch. The information card that came with the plant said that it would grow approximately 7 feet tall and 10 in diameter. As you can see in the picture, that's clearly not true of the tree I brought home. Obviously, the contorted filbert did not die.
Aunt Tudi complains about the contorted filbert every Summer. She can't stand the fact that it blocks her from seeing anything, it blocks air getting to the porch, and it harbours June bugs every year. They flock to the contorted filbert to engage in their annual mating ritual.
When the sap begins to settle in the tree, I should cut some of the more interesting younger branches and send them to anyone who may be interested in having an unusual ritual wand. Any fellow Witches who read this can let me know if you're interested. Hopefully by the time that season arrives, I'll be in better enough shape to be able to mail things to people.
People are beginning to stress the benefits of buying and eating local foods. That's something that I've been wanting to do for a long time. Now that it's being shown on news channels how important it is to go local, Aunt Tudi is beginning to warm up to the idea. This will hopefully mean that we'll start buying more fruits and vegetables at the farmers market and getting more dairy products and perhaps even free range eggs from Kelsey's Dairy. I'm going to look into local meat markets as well. We have an abattoir in Duncan, but it's not very well known for its cleanliness. I'm certain there are others in the area. It's just a matter of doing some investigation. I'll ask around and see what I find. I believe we'll get off a lot cheaper by buying local and we'll be eating a lot healthier.
I really need to get my tiller to running. Llew doesn't seem to be very eager to help me in this matter. I think he believe he'll end up being the one to have to till up the earth so we can have a garden. It's a hell of a job, but something I don't mind doing. I'd rather till any day than mow grass. Maybe I should make that clear to him and then he'll be on board in the Revive the Tiller project. He's taking a nap right now but, when he wakes up, I'll bring up the tiller issue once again.
If I could get the garden spot tilled, we'd have an abundance of tomatoes, pepper, cantaloupes (or ass melon as I call them), potatoes, corn, and heaven knows what else. I'd be the gardening fool and our veggie issues would be solved for some time. If I know Aunt Tudi, they'd be solved well into the Winter, because she'd be processing and freezing a lot of what we couldn't currently eat. Given our country's piteous state, it's wise to grow as much food as you can, if you're able and you have any spot of earth at all. It may mean not starving when our society irrevocably collapses.
Last night I was thinking about how a person's favourite cable channel tells a lot about them.
For instance, Aunt Janice's favourite channel is HGTV, Home and Garden Television. Aunt Tudi's is Discovery and the Weather Channel. Llew's is the History Channel. Mine is SciFi, but I'm also a dedicated follower of Discovery.
My theory is very undeveloped, so much so that I can't really verbalise it to my satisfaction. But I think I can tag people I meet with a cable channel after I get to know them a little. Is this stereotyping? Maybe, but stereotyping isn't always a bad thing as long as you don't stop with the initial stereotyping. Having a basic idea about someone, though, can be very useful and helpful as you get to know that person better and build on what you've already learnt.
I'll write more about this when and if I expand on my theory.
I started this post out with words about Chester, so it's only fair that I end it with a picture of Chester. I think this is why we put up with his shenanigans: he exhibits so much love and trust around Aunt Tudi especially, then Llew, when he does something reprehensible, it can be easily overlooked.
Maybe the love shown in this photie is strong enough to hearten those who see it and need a bit of a boost in their lives.
Happy Mothers Day to all you mothers out there
I had to run an errand over to Diane's. When I got in the car to leave, I spied an animal lying in front of the out building. It didn't move, so it had to be dead. I made a mental note to check it out when I got home from Diane's house. Upon returning, I walked out to the building to inspect the animal that was still there when I got home. It was a small opossum, young, just into adulthood, so it was probably Loki. One of his ears was torn pretty badly, but that was the only indication of injury I could see. I didn't turn him over to see if there were any wounds on his other side, though. It hurt my heart to see him so. I love the opossums who've taken up residence here and I don't want anything to bring them harm or woe, even though the other opossums are probably responsible for Loki's death; they do have a habit of brawling amongst themselves. I took a picture of Loki to document his passing.
Aggrieved, I made my way back to the house. On my way, I spied a snail shell, half buried in the wet earth. The spiral the shell spoke to me, reminding me of the natural cycles of life that, although they may seem cruel or unjust to us, create the fragile balance that allows all of us to exist.
The spiral shell lay approximately 50 yards away from Loki's body. Finding it heartened me in a very profound way. I usually take shells like this and keep them in my stone and shell back or the wooden candle holder that's full of shells and crystals that date back to the 70s. But I left this one alone. It's part of the Earth, literally, and something compelled me to leave it right where it belonged. So I did.
My contorted filbert has gone berserk. When I bought the plant, it was pretty much a twisted stick with about 5 or 6 sickly leaves barely clinging to it. Its original price was $39.95, but I got it for $19.95 because the garden folks at Lowes believed it was pretty much done for. I brought it home and planted it at the corner of my front porch. The information card that came with the plant said that it would grow approximately 7 feet tall and 10 in diameter. As you can see in the picture, that's clearly not true of the tree I brought home. Obviously, the contorted filbert did not die.
Aunt Tudi complains about the contorted filbert every Summer. She can't stand the fact that it blocks her from seeing anything, it blocks air getting to the porch, and it harbours June bugs every year. They flock to the contorted filbert to engage in their annual mating ritual.
When the sap begins to settle in the tree, I should cut some of the more interesting younger branches and send them to anyone who may be interested in having an unusual ritual wand. Any fellow Witches who read this can let me know if you're interested. Hopefully by the time that season arrives, I'll be in better enough shape to be able to mail things to people.
People are beginning to stress the benefits of buying and eating local foods. That's something that I've been wanting to do for a long time. Now that it's being shown on news channels how important it is to go local, Aunt Tudi is beginning to warm up to the idea. This will hopefully mean that we'll start buying more fruits and vegetables at the farmers market and getting more dairy products and perhaps even free range eggs from Kelsey's Dairy. I'm going to look into local meat markets as well. We have an abattoir in Duncan, but it's not very well known for its cleanliness. I'm certain there are others in the area. It's just a matter of doing some investigation. I'll ask around and see what I find. I believe we'll get off a lot cheaper by buying local and we'll be eating a lot healthier.
I really need to get my tiller to running. Llew doesn't seem to be very eager to help me in this matter. I think he believe he'll end up being the one to have to till up the earth so we can have a garden. It's a hell of a job, but something I don't mind doing. I'd rather till any day than mow grass. Maybe I should make that clear to him and then he'll be on board in the Revive the Tiller project. He's taking a nap right now but, when he wakes up, I'll bring up the tiller issue once again.
If I could get the garden spot tilled, we'd have an abundance of tomatoes, pepper, cantaloupes (or ass melon as I call them), potatoes, corn, and heaven knows what else. I'd be the gardening fool and our veggie issues would be solved for some time. If I know Aunt Tudi, they'd be solved well into the Winter, because she'd be processing and freezing a lot of what we couldn't currently eat. Given our country's piteous state, it's wise to grow as much food as you can, if you're able and you have any spot of earth at all. It may mean not starving when our society irrevocably collapses.
Last night I was thinking about how a person's favourite cable channel tells a lot about them.
For instance, Aunt Janice's favourite channel is HGTV, Home and Garden Television. Aunt Tudi's is Discovery and the Weather Channel. Llew's is the History Channel. Mine is SciFi, but I'm also a dedicated follower of Discovery.
My theory is very undeveloped, so much so that I can't really verbalise it to my satisfaction. But I think I can tag people I meet with a cable channel after I get to know them a little. Is this stereotyping? Maybe, but stereotyping isn't always a bad thing as long as you don't stop with the initial stereotyping. Having a basic idea about someone, though, can be very useful and helpful as you get to know that person better and build on what you've already learnt.
I'll write more about this when and if I expand on my theory.
I started this post out with words about Chester, so it's only fair that I end it with a picture of Chester. I think this is why we put up with his shenanigans: he exhibits so much love and trust around Aunt Tudi especially, then Llew, when he does something reprehensible, it can be easily overlooked.
Maybe the love shown in this photie is strong enough to hearten those who see it and need a bit of a boost in their lives.
Happy Mothers Day to all you mothers out there
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2008-05-11 10:09 pm (UTC)And here's a photo of Max and I!
no subject
Date: 2008-05-11 10:14 pm (UTC)ah-dor-ah-bull!
no subject
Date: 2008-05-11 10:32 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-05-11 10:43 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-05-11 11:11 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-05-11 11:24 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-05-12 01:26 am (UTC)I'm glad you're an opossum lover. We seem to be in the minority.
no subject
Date: 2008-05-12 07:04 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-05-12 02:48 am (UTC)I giggle lots when they smile at people with all their sharp, pointy, teeth. What does that say about me?
I'm also trying to figure out what it says about me that currently, I think my favorite TV channel is MSNBC.
no subject
Date: 2008-05-12 06:47 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-05-12 06:53 pm (UTC)I would never inspire my friends to make icons of him, or say they were sending him to me (dressed in a French Maid's outfit), or any such things.
Honest. *innocent look*
no subject
Date: 2008-05-12 10:06 am (UTC)If not at the very least I have enough in my container garden for a good salad right now.....
no subject
Date: 2008-05-12 11:00 am (UTC)I've also been looking into finding a local farmer's market in our area. It's becoming ridiculous how much it costs to get food and with a 12 yr old that never seems to stop eating, I am being forced to find alternatives.
no subject
Date: 2008-05-12 06:52 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-05-12 11:14 am (UTC)Growing your own veggies and fruits and then storing them for winter is probably the most valuable self preserving tool anyone can know.
When everything in this country freezes up because of all the stupidity in the government comes to a peak, everyone will be wishing they all knew how to plant, harvest and preserve food. We will not be able to buy things cause it will be so danged expensive and all the jobs will be non existant, in my humble O!
Sorry about your friend the possum, life cycles are harsh sometimes.
Blessed Be!
I would appreciate one of those wands from your filbert, please!
Myst
no subject
Date: 2008-05-12 07:00 pm (UTC)You're more than welcome to a contorted filbert wand. Just remind me when the sap begins to fall.
no subject
Date: 2008-05-12 07:42 pm (UTC)Now I help my Daughter with hers.
The only things that really you need to be extra careful with are tomatoes and green beans. They can both make you dead if you don't know what you are doing.
If you need any help, just give me a yell. As always,
I am here to help you.
Myst
no subject
Date: 2008-05-13 08:08 am (UTC)Cable channels... my favs are: Sci-Fi, Discovery, History, Weather, any other primarily medical (Medical Mysteries, House, etc.) shows (rather than drama with a side of medical, such as Gray's Anatomy or that forensics thing) science show that I happen to stumble across... with occasional forays into Food Network and Cartoon Network... and infrequent - purely as "i'm munching something quick" background noise - runs into like the home decorating shows.
We often timeshift stuff, so we don't have to sit through Teh Most Aggravatin' Commercials again and again and again and again... and some Anime finds itself on our harddrives too. Most of that he watches (the boy-meets-girl stuff) but there's stuff I like too (anything with magic, monsters, or odd takes on mechs).
Just so's you know. :)
And yes, I do consider House less drama more medical - What I've seen of things like Gray's show more relationships than information, and I'm an information junkie. :)
no subject
Date: 2008-05-13 08:04 pm (UTC)