Nature Calling

Thinking back on the weekend and my evening walk to the beach with Patrick, I can't believe that we stopped to slip our noses into any variety of rosebuds along the way and came away with disappointing results nearly every time...but never thought to stop for a sniff at the pink roses in the front yard here at the Nest, which are quite fragrant.

Java and Birdie have both posted about insects recently, and they reminded me that I've had a few encounters of the bug and insect variety in the past week or so, which I've been remiss about sharing with you. I've uploaded each one of the following to BugGuide.net in hopes of learning more about each of these...and as always, I'll try to update as information warrants.

As we began the painting project in the dining room on Saturday, we discovered two of three of this kind of spider. This one, I'd say was maybe almost the size of a quarter...but it's possible it's grown larger in my memory, too.

Each one I managed to coax into a plastic cup for transport outside, where they were tossed gently off the deck, once I'd checked to be sure no Miss Muffet sat below.




This nasty lookin' little buggy is, of course, an earwig. They always give me the creeps, though they are, apparently, mostly harmless.



This jumpy little spider dude lives in my car, or at least that's where we recently encountered one another. He seems to enjoy running around on the ceiling in my Saturn.

I'm wondering how jumpy I should feel about him being in there, since he seems to be good at hopping and jumping, himself, darting back and forth overhead.


I'm not sure what this gangly thing is. Of course, I see them every year, are they some kind of mayfly or midge or something. It was a couple inches in length, at least, and we crossed paths a while back, the night I painted the bedroom Cape Cod Gray.

I was a little concerned for its welfare, as I hadn't discovered it until after I'd begun painting, but it managed to stay clear of the wet paint, but was never far away from wherever I was working as I made my way around the room.

Of course, these encounters with Mother Nature are all pretty harmless. My friend Heidi writes me this evening from Texas:

"you know we had a little dust up here right? Ike? Or did the news not cover it so much because Bush is from here and it wasn’t Katrina? Or was it? Have a look. We are about 80 miles away from Galveston and we still have neighbors waiting for power. Some did get flooding and some more got trees though their houses...the mosquitoes down there are the size of your hand and outnumber the people about a thousand to one!"

And it occurred to me that I really haven't been hearing very much about the wrath of Hurricane Ike. I mean, I watched the CNN coverage when the storm hit, but I haven't been in the loop about much of the aftermath...and I'm not sure if that's just me being off the grid as far as TV what with the unsettled nature of Life just lately...or if it really isn't getting much coverage because of the idiocy of Sarah Palin as a Vice Presidential candidate or the bail-out of the collapsing Wall Street...which I certainly HAVE been hearing enough about.

And so in case I'm not the only person out of the loop on this one, here's the link Heidi sent along to some of the absolutely amazing and awesome photos coming from Galveston and Houston in the wake of this powerful storm.

Kinda makes an itsy-bitsy spider not seem like such a big deal, you know?

Weekend Garden Update

Saturday morning was nice and sunny, with temper atures quickly rising into the 80s, as I listened to reports on the Weather Channel of big storms approaching Manhattan and also sliding across the state in our general direction.

As you can see, the corn in the Three Sisters garden is doing quite nicely, even tho it is shaded in the very earliest part of the day. I've never had such success with as I have this year and it's lots of fun to watch as it grows taller all the time.

The pole beans are merrily twining up the vines, according to plan and at the feet of all that, the zucchini plants are blooming heartily. So that's all working out pretty nicely.


Couldn't resist a few more morning glory shots for you, as I know much you enjoy them. These two, with a few drops on them from the morning watering were especially sweet looking.


More cherry tomatoes are ripening every day and they are a nice addition to my morning breakfast routine.


There must be twenty or more house sparrows (and a few catbirds) who call the great mass of tree and shrubs next to the Three Sisters garden home. Some mornings, I don't see a single one, but can hear a great chattering and tweeting from inside. Other times, I walk near and they all fly off at once...which is a little startling, but pretty cool.



Here's another one of those evening primrose blossoms. Every morning, I see a few new ones, freshly opened from the previous night's dusk. Every now and then, I come out in the morning to find they are sparkling bright yellow all up and down the plant stalks.


Similarly, a few more sulphur cosmos are blooming every morning. With the evening primrose, they are working together to levitate the colors of the various marigolds which are blooming down below.


And the Queen Anne's lace is delightfully out of hand.

By evening, the storms had arrived for us and we saw some nice heavy rains, which had tapered off by the time I was leaving work.


This morning, this little bunny was munching in the grass when I came out the front door. He turned to move away and stopped for a moment, surveying the garden to see if he could find a way through the border. Eventually, he opted to dash off to the side yard, instead.


Today, we attended the birthday celebration of our friend Sebastian's eighth birthday. I forgot to take a photo of the birthday boy, but I did capture this shot of the delightfully big and squishy ugly rubber bugs I found as a gift for him. (That's a standard sized highlighter included in the shot for perspective.) He was thrilled.

I was a little concerned that his Mom and Grandma might not share his enthusiasm, but by the time the party was over, they both had designs on using them to have some fun with unsuspecting friends and co-workers.

On the way home, I spotted these wonderful clouds over the bay, and stopped briefly at Rock Harbor to capture this shot of the cloud-obscured sunset.