This evening I took some photos of day lilies that the deer haven’t found…yet. These few are in bloom among many more stalks with the tops chomped off. So I’m going to put these pictures into a gallery and see if I can get them to post here. Really.
COOL! It works! Some of these plants are really tall; the one with several upright lily blossoms creamy yellow is over 6 feet tall. Others are tiny hidden among the shrubs with a better chance of escaping notice of our neighborhood deer.
I’m trying to learn new stuff in relationship to this blog. So it won’t be boring for me, or for you! And I now can upload pictures in a gallery…and maybe give you access to that gallery…hmmm…I have succeeded in uploading three garden pictures to a gallery I called “summer garden” (how creative, ey?) but now I have to figure out how to get that gallery into this blog post. Right. Hang tight…humming elevator music now…well…unsuccessful at figuring out how to add it. But I know someone will let me know!
Meanwhile. I went out to my little herb garden to gather some basil for a tomato and goat cheese soup I made this afternoon. (really good, if you want the recipe, let me know!) I thought I’d check on the young cardinal that was sitting in a nest nearby last time I was out in the garden (see post of July 8). Imagine my surprise to see a snake curled up inside the nest. I hope the youngster flew away before the snake arrived. But I imagine that the snake wouldn’t be there if there had been no bird. Sad story.
So..anyone have help about how to use the gallery feature? Post away! 🙂
[POST EDIT – Spike]
I just watched a movie (that I got free at my local library!) called “The Straight Story” which was based on the 70ish man in Iowa that drove his lawnmower to Wisconsin to visit his estranged brother who had suffered a stroke. At an average speed of 5 miles an hour it took him 5 weeks to get there. It was the sweetest story and played on my emotions about family. He met a young girl who was pregnant and running away and told her a story he had learned growing up about how one stick can be broken, but a bunch of sticks tied together can’t, and those sticks represent family. He told two bickering mechanic brothers a story about how important his brother was to him, how they hung out growing up, and now how many years had been wasted over a senseless argument. “Brothers is brothers.”
If you get a chance to see the movie, do. But I have to wonder, how did he get back home? He certainly didn’t ride his mower back…did he?
Heard on the radio this morning Fergie singing “Big Girls Don’t Cry” which seemed especially relevant as I think of someone I love who has sadly accepted the end of her 21 year marriage. To her I say that it’s OK to recognize the difficulty of giving up the dream of a fairy tale ending, that it’s scary to face a new world alone, hard to figure out where you fit, or what you want to do. The whole thing seems insurmountable, but baby steps can get you through. Like running a marathon, never never think about the whole, just concentrate on what has to happen to get through the mile you’re in. Eventually you’ll have the satisfaction of reaching a goal, one that you set for yourself, rather than one set for you. And that makes it even sweeter.
Meanwhile, partial lyrics from the song, which could be sung from her heart today:
And I’m gonna miss you like a child misses their blanket
But I’ve got to get a move on with my life
It’s time to be a big girl now
And big girls don’t cry
The path that I’m walkin’, I must go alone
I must take the baby steps till I’m full grown.
Fairy tales don’t always have a happy ending, do they?
And I foresee the dark ahead if I stay.
-written by Ferguson, Stacy, Gad, Tobias
Much love to you, you know who you are.
As many of you know, I’m training for a half marathon in the fall. That means I’m getting back out there and attempting to run again. It’s hard to start over. Today I was scheduled to do 6.5 miles. For those of you not runners, this isn’t as horrible as it might sound. We “beginner” runners are doing these training runs one or two minutes at a time. So just about any length should be manageable. Really.
My plan was to get up at 6 a.m. and be out the door by 6:15. It’s good to have a plan. The reality? I woke up at..well I don’t know what time it was, and I went back to sleep. A couple of times. By 8:30 I determined that this morning was going to be cooler than tomorrow morning, so I ate my breakfast and then headed out about 9. I have to say this 6.5 miles kicked my…well you fill in the blank. By mile 5 I was seriously considering calling home and getting a ride. And I’ve never done that. But since I wasn’t carrying a phone I lumbered on. Almost funny today was the fact that whenever I checked my watch it would show 38 seconds after some minute. Almost every time! I’d convince myself that I could run 22 more seconds..right!? And that’s how I got through this run.
The only good thing I can say about this training run is that it is OVER. I can already tell I’m going to be sore tomorrow. And it was taking me 13 and 14 minutes to do a mile! That’s not much faster than walking it for heavens sake. Good thing I’m not running for the US in the Olympics.
This is all testament to being a middle aged woman, slightly overweight and out of shape. I can’t do anything about the middle aged part, but I’m working on the weight thing, and the exercise. So it can only get better. Right? RIGHT??!
On a happier note: We finished moving the last of the ten yards of wood chips yesterday! Bye-bye wood chips!
So somehow I am registered for the 10 mile Crim run and the Brooksie Way half marathon. The Crim is the 30th of August, the half marathon is Oct 5. I’m now officially in training, and I have to say it’s the weirdest sensation. Again. At night when I wake up before a scheduled running day I’m all excited. Today I was scheduled to get out there and keep moving forward for 30 minutes. I’ve been doing 1/1’s and 2/1’s mostly, a minute of running, a minute of walking, or two minutes of running to a minute of walking. Last night at 1 a.m. I really thought that I could just run the first mile like I used to. I was fairly confident, and in fact, excited to get going. This morning I was a reluctant riser and as usual it took me over an hour to get out the door. Moving slowly and accessing how I was feeling, I recognized that I had a tight hamstring, two sore knees, and a kink in one ankle. Great. All my aspirations of running freely in the morning sunshine evaporated, but that’s about all that evaporated in the heavy damp air.
I walked the first three minutes but the rest of the time it was mostly 2/1’s with some 3/1’s thrown in. At one point I was checking my watch, hoping it was time to walk, when I noticed below me a bloody messy dirty something or other. Some recent road kill. The old running days kicked in and I stayed in the air with a sudden outstretch of leg, striding over the..well..whatever it was…and never looked back. Today, not having a specific number of miles to do, I ran wherever there was shade, which meant uphill more than my normal distance marked, but sun filled route. It was a nice change.
Coming home I figured that when I got back to my street I’d walk the last three minutes, sort of to balance the beginning of my trip. But as I crested the muddy hill and turned onto the pavement of my subdivision our neighborhood black fly attacked and chased me all the way home. I ended up in my driveway with six seconds to spare on my 30 minute goal. Not bad. Guess I should thank the black fly. But I won’t.
Just another day in the life of a middle aged athlete in training.
Once when we were kids, getting ready to carve our Halloween pumpkin, Dad told us he was going to show us something no one had ever seen before. We waited in anticipation as he sliced the top off the pumpkin, wondering what he was talking about. “Here,” he exclaimed, “no one has ever seen this before!” “But it’s just the inside of a pumpkin,” we whined. “Yes,” he said, “but no one has ever seen the inside of this pumpkin before!” This morning I remembered that day as I was peeling my banana for breakfast. Dad’s voice was in my head; “No one has seen the inside of this banana before!”
Good morning Dad!
Morning Sunshine.
This evening I found a turtle laying eggs in my berm.
Of course when I came too close to take her picture she pulled her head in. But I’ve been watching her from inside the house, and she’s very busy laying eggs. I’m trying to keep track of her as it gets dark. When she’s finished and heading back to the pond across the street I want to make sure she gets across the road safely. Plus I”ll have to watch for the babies. I see this turtle (or one like it!) around the house every year. I hope she gets finished before it’s totally dark out.
Life in the country, something interesting every day!
Once Katie and I got settled back in after the rabbit and the rainbow we got another evening visitor:
Which of course caused more commotion. It’s going to be a long night.
If Katie hadn’t been barking at a rabbit this evening I would have missed the fact that it was raining while the sun was shining. So I would have missed this:
The rainbow was over my neighbor’s house, across the street. It only lasted a little while before it began to fade.
Thanks Katie! Now stop barking at the deer in the yard. Please?
