Category Archives: Uncategorized

What Have You Got in Your Mouth???

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Morrie, what do you have in your mouth?

Oh, okay. Good boy. Fetch!

Diego, what did you have in your mouth?

Oh No! Bad boy! Um. Good boy?

Much as I hate to kill anything—even cockroaches and ants—sometimes your own interests have to win out. After suffering an infestation of rats in my laundry room a few years ago, I guess I can’t object too much to Diego’s efforts to protect his house and property. A few more yards and that rat would have been invading the dog or catfood or worse. They ate through a lidded very durable garbage can before to get to the catfood. R.I.P. little rat.

The Political Extinction of the White American Dinosaur

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Don’t miss this excellent and hopeful analysis of the contemporary state of the union! And don’t we hope he is right? Click on link below:

https://johnpavlovitz.com/2019/01/04/the-extinction-of-the-white-american-dinosaur/

Mystery Bird: Sapsucker or Woodpecker?

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Please click on photos for larger views.

They are golden-fronted woodpeckers!  V.J., who identified them, is my hero. A twenty-year-old mystery is solved.

These two birds (or two like them) have been visiting the top of my very tall palm trees every morning for years. I always thought they were red-breasted woodpeckers, but only one has a pinkish spot on its head and the other is more golden-headed. Their markings look exactly like a red-breasted woodpecker or a sapsucker, but I can’t find any sapsucker with that colored head. Can anyone tell me what they are?

Stories Told by Silence

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Stories Told by Silence

Silence has a language unique to every ear.
Anyone can hear it if they choose to hear.
Do you listen to your silences? The various tales they tell?
I’ve listened to them my whole life. I know them very well.
Their insistent voices burrow through my thoughts,
trail their separate stories and tie them into knots.

Some seek out yarns in chaos: carnivals and bars,
rodeos and festivals, parades and speeding cars.
But there’s drama in the silence as it gathers round—
stories waiting patiently for you to hear the sound
of voices in the quiet. Hush now. Do you hear?
They’ll settle on your shoulder and whisper in your ear.

Silence owns no copyrights. It’s there for you to steal.
Unsort its separate strands and then spin them on your wheel.
The fiber of your silence can be woven into tomes.
Weave them into novels, storybooks and poems.
Stories are out there waiting. Hush and you might hear them.
Reach out and grab one for yourself when you venture near them.

 

Prompt words today are silence, tell and insistent.

Your Own Backyard

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Click on photos to enlarge and view as slideshow.

Both of the flowers that were emerging 24 hours ago have matured into their full glory and now shriveled up and fallen off the bush.
The agave from my garden has accepted its new place and decided to bloom and the palm tree whose leaves were cropped off by marauding cows before the fence went up, has put out new branches.
I found this perfect little succulent “flower” lying on the brick sidewalk
This is my present view of the lot from my studio.
and sneezes.

Stasis and Flux

Laughter is the flux of life, aiding in the flow
as we face gloomy prospects everywhere we go.
Better just to stay at home and enjoy what we’re given
It does no good to cry about the way our life’s been riven
into “then” and “now.” Whereas the world was once a race,
now we walk on tiptoe, remaining in our place,
observing what is close at hand—the blessings that surround us—
looking for the beauty in the space that lies around us.
Flowers, birds and family. Sunset skies, the trees.
Life may end where it began, here with the birds and bees.

The whole world is a miracle, and we are just a part of it.
Remember, there was no mankind way back at the start of it.
If we pass to oblivion and all our buildings crumble,
nature will go on again, our history just a mumble
that beings of the future will stumble on and wonder
why we chose to pillage and why we chose to plunder
when we could have just sat back to wonder at this world
where everything we ever needed lay securely curled.
Breathe her air, enjoy her fruits, enjoy simple things.
Open your eyes and ears and heart to all that nature brings.

Prompts for today are tiptoe, given, gloomy and flux.

Entry Blues: Thursday Doors, Feb 4, 2021

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Blue Portals
Separation Blues

Click on Photos to enlarge

For Thursday Doors.

Up Close and Personal: Cee’s Midweek Madness Challenge

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Click on photos to enlarge.

Shredding the handmade basket Mom made

 

 

For Cee’s Midweek Madness Prompt: Closeup Photos

Reblog: Little Duck’s Current Status (By Request)

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I am so happy to get to see both Big and Little Duck again!!! And so glad they’re staying safe, although I must say they look like they are closer to each other than six feet!!! (Click “View original post” to see the photos.)

okcForgottenMan's avatarserial monography: forgottenman's ruminations

Judy/Remi/LifeLessons cajoled me into taking a couple updated photos of Little Duck & Big Duck after she posted some of LD’s past adventures tonight. She further cajoled me into posting them on my blog here rather than on hers. Ok, I’ve had just enough rum to accommodate. We’re being safe. Wash yer hands, wear a mask, avoid crowds, love a duck, vote liberal. (Click the thumbnails below to enlarge, if you dare.)

(For Cee’s Fun Foto Challenge: Non-Alive Animals)

View original post

Last on the Card, Jan 2021

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For Bushboy’s Last of the Card Prompt: https://bushboy.blog/2021/02/01/last-on-the-card-january-2021/

The rules are simple:
1. Post the last photo on your SD card or last photo on your phone for the 31st January.
2. No editing – who cares if it is out of focus, not framed as you would like or the subject matter didn’t cooperate.
3. You don’t have to have any explanations, just the photo will do
4. Create a Pingback to this post or link in the comments
5. Tag “The Last Photo”

Okay, now can anyone tell me how to install this smart plug so I can use Echo’s Alexa to turn on my light? I bought 4 of them and so far Google hasn’t managed to teach me how to use them.

A REASON FOR THE SEASON

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Jane’s message is vital at this time when the importance of nature should be clear to us all. When we wage war against Mother Nature, she fights back. Just a close observation and enjoyment of the world around us can bring us back to what is important. Our very lives depend upon it. Please read her lovely celebration of the beauty and peace of nature below:

ladynyo's avatarLady Nyo's Weblog

I saw the Cooper’s hawk this morning. She landed on the chimney pot, probably looking for my miniature hen, Grayson. Eight years ago she was a starving fledgling who mantled over while I fed her cold chicken. She’s back this holiday, my spirits lifting. A good Christmas present.

In the middle of the commercialization of Christmas, Nature closes the gap. I have noticed squirrels with pecans leaping the trees, hawks hunting low over now-bare woods, unknown song birds sitting on fences, heard the migration of Sandhill cranes as they honk in formation. You hear their cacophony well before they appear. Their chiding cries float down to our upturned faces.

There is brightness to the holly, washed by our late autumn rains and the orange of the nandina berries has turned crimson. Smell of wood smoke in the air and the crispness of mornings means the earth is going to sleep…

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