this explains everything -- really!

an earwig whose life
led it into my kitchen
and onto my counter
lay dead in some honey
left in a small glass
overnight on the counter
from soothing my throat
that was sore from my coughing
to dislodge the cheerio
drunk from my tea.
the cheerio was on
the spoonful of milk 
from my cereal i add 
to my tea every morning
but this time a cheerio
got in and choked me
and made my throat sore
and the honey that soothed it
has killed this small earwig
and there you have karma
in case you had wondered

.

washing machines

one of my friends has to get a new washing machine, so i've been surveying other friends to see what they have and how they like it. of all the choices, it seems my Second Life washer is the best!

it's attractive, easy to operate, never breaks, 
plus it does your clothes, your hair, you, even your shoes

it uses very little water, and is LOADS OF FUN WHIRLING YOU AROUND
until it spits you out along with some bubbles

all clean and refreshed.

the brand seems to be Surprising Laundry, and on top of all that, it was FREE!
 

no no no not the crickets!!!

WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

heard the first one yesterday. you know what it means...summer is coming to an end. my heart always sinks when i hear the first cricket, just when i am getting warmed up finally!
i can't help but remember Charlotte's Web:

The crickets sang in the grasses. They sang the song of summer's ending, a sad, monotonous song. "Summer is over and gone," they sang. "Over and gone, over and gone. Summer is dying, dying."
The crickets felt it was their duty to warn everybody that summertime cannot last forever. Even on the most beautiful days in the whole year--the days when summer is changing into fall--the crickets spread the rumor of sadness and change.

postcard from the vacationing blog

i am like a god! a carelessly destructive one, as most seem to be, whose purposes are unfathomable to the creatures whose lives i disturb.
six cords of firewood for the winter were delivered and dumped in our driveway a month ago.
most years i would be stacking it in the garage, whenever so moved, not rushing, enjoying the process, but not this year.
john has promised the job to the kid (the one who mows our lawn) and arranged to pay him by the job. is it my bit of scottish DNA playing up that keeps me therefore from moving so much as one piece? perhaps i could divide the number of pieces into the quoted price and subtract each one i move?
today i had to relocate a few pieces to weigh down the tarp over the lawn mower. (i've learned not to say tarpaulin, as i have gone into stores to ask for this and been told they never heard of such an item).
as i said, the wood has been there a month now. i picked up the first piece, at the edge of the pile, and there, curled under it, was a red eft, surely one of nature's most sweetly innocent and vulnerable looking creatures. i carefully replaced the wood feeling like i had done something bad.
as i went on choosing and removing pieces, i caused monstrous upheavals in critter land. entire nations of earwigs... mothers, fathers, babies... were sent screaming in panic in every direction!
ants of course live and store their eggs everywhere, and can hardly be avoided being disturbed with every step. it doesn't help to know that ants will die if lost from their family of sisters, and that earwig mothers actually watch over their young until they grow big enough to fend for themselves.
the slugs...well i'm not sure if they were male, female, both, child or adult, and i'm not even sure they noticed that the log was moved. i have read that slime mold is quite intelligent, but i don't know of any research involving slugs.

avatars?

for his children to play with, he carved 3,500 individual pieces from scrap wood and hand painted them in his spare time over 40 years. that's the Kirk Bros Circus by Edward Kirk. this includes the animals, the aerialists, the pop-corn vendors, wagons, tent poles, and the audience, and more, each individual...and the arms are attached, not clothes-pin style! the Shelburne Museum has this on display - it's huge!

 the museum also has the most amazing collection of over 500 old circus posters, too!

and if that's not enough, it has Roy Arnold's miniature carved circus parade, scaled 1' = 1 foot, and it is 525 feet in length. Shelburne Museum has a special building dedicated to it so that you walk through a curved narrow building unable to see ahead too far, as if the circus were coming along past you. there are 400 horses, each individually carved. and very ornate wagons for each performer or animal! one wagon, based on a real one, has 40 horses pulling it. the real one had reins that weighed 72 lbs!
 
i wish i could find an online in-color picture of a particularly ornate colorful poster with a great deal of captions using all the literary devices known to circus, (hyperbole, aliteration, testimonials) to entice the customer -- it's Minting the Marvel who rode his unicycle up and down a steep high spiral in the Adam Forepaugh and Sells Bros circus...the MOST HAZARDOUS JOURNEY EVER TAKEN BY MAN! hah...he wasn't even knitting!

DNR

a perfect day for the company summer outing! we spent the afternoon at the lake with burgers and hotdogs and potluck salads and desserts. a bright warm sun, the sky blue with those fluffy decorative clouds, and the breeze was cool and steady. we had horseshoes and vollyeball, and some of us went out in the park's pedal boats. willie's wife didn't want to pedal, so i went with him. after a tour around the lake looking at some of the houses, we pedaled out to the middle and sat in the sun for awhile. something reminded me...willie has a pacemaker and a heart condition.

"Willie" i said "should you be doing this? you could have a heart attack."

"i could!!" he said brightly.

"well what should i do if you have one?" i said.

"nothing." he replied.

"do you have a DNR?"

"yep."

"well, ok then."

best movie ever? could be!

still the greatest movie ever made...EVERYONE is in it! and great music too!
who better to watch with than a drive-in full of tinies!


and Makepeace!
it's
THE MUPPET MOVIE!!!

madeleine sighting!

"i saw madeleine!" said john.
i was amazed and very happy!
last year our new next door neighbor was clearly pregnant, and sometime in the winter, when neighbors don't get much of a look at each other, she became coat-won't-button size and then apparently had her baby.
we didn't see baby, but john talked briefly with mr. neighbor one day and asked what they named their baby.
"madeleine" was the reply. they aren't the talkative sort.
usually people walk up and down the street with their offspring on their back in the winter, but they didn't.
then spring came and we listened for baby sounds from next door, but heard none. we saw them in their back yard, chatted with them across the poison ivy patch that makes good neighbors, but never saw a baby. and they never mentioned one!
we began to wonder if perhaps ... something bad... had happened?
they'd had a baby and given her a name, but didn't seem to have one? not something you can ask about after 6 months!
then finally today summer came, and after about 8 months, there was madeleine being strollered up the street for all the world to see, and cute as could be!
whew. we are sooo happy!

Raglan Shire vs Elf Clan

a few snaps on the Tiny World Cup match referred to on my previous blog
it turns out Osprey was a ref! sorry i mean she was a goalie!

here's a detailed description by Elf Clan's Erin Padar
http://elfclan.ning.com/profiles/blogs/da-greatest-soccer-game-ever

it's a tie!

i did it!  i went to a second life event and remembered to take pictures! it wasn't hard because whenever i am at events with tinies, i just reach for my camera cause they are SOOOO CUTE!  today after the Tiny World Cup game with the Elf Clan (it was a tie) the celebration was mostly tinies, who love any reason to celebrate!  here are some snaps. i forgot to get names, altho the debonair warthog in the tux and top hat is my friend Monty. oh and i am the gerbil in the pith helmet with goldfish swimming round me.

Eshqua Bog June 15

1700 miles from my everglades walk, another kind of orchid is in full bloom.
the Showy Lady's Slipper, threatened or endangered in most states, is alive and well in Vermont's 2 acre fen called Eshqua Bog.               my pictures don't do it justice!

just a few miles from my office, on a dirt road off a dirt road off a back road. the show goes on for one rainy week each year. you walk on muddy trails or some boardwalks with orchids on every side, in amongst the ferns and cattails and all manner of bog plants.

there are some informational signs near the ground. at one spot if you push away a pretty 3-some of green leaves, you can read a sign that says "poison ivy" and gives its latin name.

and best of all -- there are no alligators.

bumper cars!

when i get involved in something fun in Second Life, i forget to take pictures! what kind of blogger is that! on Sunday at Show & Tell, Lorin showed the cutest funniest little bumper car that you wear as an avatar, with the funniest sound effects and crazy physics. 
he blamed it on Madcow, altho Lorin did the sounds of course. then he gave them out free to the audience and we started changing into bumper cars and it was a free-for-all! so much fun, but i never took a single snapshot! 
oh and then Blood showed a tiny flying pirate ship he's made, that you wear and you become the captain behind the wheel as you fly around...he wasn't giving them away, but they will surely be available in Raglan.  again...no picture to paste here! i vow to do better by my blog in the future.
here's a picture of me as a bumper car, taken later

 

singing!

what's that?
some kids.
oh it sounded like music.
it is -- they are singing.
outside?
yes two girls going down back street.

my mouth and eyes open round in astonishment
i thought that went out with hula hoops!
my friends and i used to sing all the time
walking all over town
even in college walking to get our mail we'd sing.

we did too -- even guys did
we sang top 40's songs
walking around, boys and girls,
or in the gym.

we sang on the playground too
do kids still do that?

*shrugs*

why did they stop?

uncanny cat

i was sitting in my gypsy wagon home in second life. i'd stopped in after a few days absence to check messages and clear up notices. some commotion was going on under the wagon...oh it was fussby, my cat, banging around disturbed and frantic.
i know very well he is just a computer program, a very clever one that behaves like a cat! and yet i felt his disturbed state. he wanted to be with me, but has never figured out to go up the stairs and enter the wagon.
i went outside and he ran to me right away. a creepy feeling came over me. he missed me. he was lonely. omg. too creepy.
i sat on the ground and he came over to my lap. i petted him. he purred.
i'd been about to click off, but decided to put a pillow down by the river and lie down. he came over and lay near me, calm now. 

i left my computer on so my avatar would remain with him until i went to bed in real life and left second life.
this morning i checked on him and he was sleeping peacefully in his basket, even as i did a few chores around the wagon.

 
it's the uncanny valley created by my own projections...or is it?

-

bats gone

evenings we sat out late with friends at the picnic table and at dusk the bats appeared.
startling and a little frightening, they'd fly right towards you and then
suddenly
without slowing down
fly up
over
or around you.
we learned not to freak out
they ate the mosquitos, and
they were our bats after all.
sometimes the children danced around as the bats swooped.
bats sleep more than any other mammal, so soon it was dark and they were gone to roost. we never knew where ours lived, never saw them come out of some hole or tree.
we assumed they lived in the old barn two houses up, or maybe even in our garage, altho we never saw one there.
one summer a single lone bat lived in the eaves of our back porch and we had to sweep bat shit off the chairs every day.
probably a male, as we read that they live alone, but we called it Nora Batty after the tv character.
each year we had fewer bats it seemed, until we hit six.
in spring we watch for them and count.
they held steady for a few years
against white nose fungus and upgrading of houses,
but this year
there are none.
the empty dusk feels lonely.

strange doings in town

the phoebe, guarding his nest, is making the cat-alert sound.
eventually an orange stripey one materializes from under the car
and saunters off past our garage leaving momentary silence.
which is when i notice the background noise, actually quite loud,
but so familiar to me from my childhood as to be of no interest - construction/destruction noises. the beep beep beep and crashing and wrenching.
something is being torn down.
oh yes, Jason's house. one block over
right by the brook, the river, the rushing tumbling frenzy
of rocks and ice-cold water cascading down the hills over rocks and ledges,
making waterfalls and swimming holes where generations have bruised their
numb blue feet and learned to swim.
a rich man, a very very very rich man,
has decided this ugly house should not rest beside and in fact own all this natural beauty.
Jason was raised in the house, and now raises his family there,
his parents have moved a few towns over.
he has site preparation experience and the contacts
and equipment needed to destroy his own house.
first he is demolishing the garage ... which was his father's livelihood years ago,
but burned to the ground, and we the neighbors all pitched in so he could rebuild.
sure it was ugly, but the river and falls were beautiful despite it, and they are good people.
happily, Jason and his family will still be in town. 
they're buying 70 acres of woods and meadow
and building themselves a log home.

new hairs in second life

tried to email pics of my new hair -- it moves so well when dancing, doesn't stab me  -- but got nowhere, so i'll just put them here to share! (click to see larger)

porn for candy lovers

a few years ago for a winter project john and i decided to try to rate all the dark chocolate bars we could get our hands on. we wrote up the ratings and emailed it to everyone we knew. it was fun!

now i've found a site that takes it even further with sort of pinup centerfolds for candy lovers!

"Meticulously photographed and documented reviews of candy from around the world."

you can search by country, ingredients, ratings, maker, everything but maybe color!

to sleep....why bother!

the sun pressed down on the fields like bleach.
the temperature rose into the 90s, and people who laughed boldly in the face of 30 below cower in whatever air conditioning they can find.
by 8 pm it was still daylight despite the drop of the sun into the western hills, as
the ginormous moon in the east continued to broadcast the sun's rays.
upstairs under slanted ceilings of the cape, built to stay warm not cool, it was stifling.
the bedroom was bright with light from the windows, wide open to catch any stray coolness rising off the rivers,
by 9 pm non-stop violent flashes crack the crazed sky to the north.
no sound of thunder.
falling asleep despite all this, until quiet thunder wakes me and then -- tock --tock -- clunk ...clunk the rain and hail begin.
soon the cracking thunder rolls truly thunderously, and the hiss clunk tock and rattle accelerate on the metal roof.
no sleep now, until things slow down and ... actual cool air comes in the room!
at last.
but then suddenly come the fire engines, fast as lightning thru the silent village, sirens blaring, outrunning even doppler!  at least the fire is not nearby, or they would not be speeding thru.
i fall asleep and dream of florida.

phoebe disguises self as clothespin

here is the little sneak who built a nest on my porch light fixture (see previous post)

and below is a special SCRATCH AND SNIFF of my lilacs!! click picture for full effect