The battery of our battery-powered light sources (and a few oil based ones) for which (so far) we have not had to use.

Well, not quite Goodnight, but close. Most of you out there are probably too young to remember the song of the same name. I lifted these two sentences from the lyrics:

You cause me to weep, you cause me to mourn
You cause me to leave my home

We did not have to leave our home like so many others, nor did we do any weeping although there was quite a bit of anxiety involved. Mostly now we are worried about all the huge trees surrounding our house and what the rain saturated ground and now escalating winds will do to them. Hopefully all will be as well as our weathering the storm last night and into this morning.

Yesterday the turkeys were acting very strangely. They all came to feed as they usually do, but then they all starting digging in the mulch under our burning bush hedge in front and laying down as if they were all trying to nest. Trust me, the sight of 18 turkeys (grown plus 13 babies) all doing the same thing was very odd. The dogs were acting strangely too. All on edge and jumpy. I am thinking the huge drop in the barometric pressure was to blame.

As it was getting dark last night Bella was barking from the back yard and looking into the front yard. She was pretty adamant about it and it wasn’t because neighbor Finnbarr was out. Rick went out front to check it out and saw a big black shape in the driveway. By the time he got out there it had gone. More than likely a bear who felt the strange air preceding the storm as well.

Here are a couple of captures from yesterday’s weather report on the television from ABC news with Lee Goldberg. I love the shape of Irene in this photo. She is one awesome and quite beautiful force of nature.

I just had to take this photo which shows the county we live in being dissected by one of the course projection lines. (The furtherest to the left: blue and pink converging on each other.) Now that was scary!

Overall we had right at 7 inches of rain since just before midnight last night. This does not impact us, but further down in places like Wayne (where Rick works) it spells disaster and flooding.

The “little” creek behind our house has overflowed its banks and is more like a river.

Our power went out in a tiny glitch around 11:00 p.m. last night. Not enough to disturb the clocks or anything else. It went off and on again twice close to 4:00 a.m. which was enough to reset the smoke alarms and send everything else in our house into a tizzy. The dogs hate the beep of the smoke alarms, so they all ended upstairs wanting attention with us. The winds were really strong around 2:00 a.m. and wind driven sheets of rain were pelting the windows. Then it all seemed to calm down a bit until later when the rains set in again big time.

Right now the sun is sort of out at 1:20 p.m. and it is very breezy to windy. I would love to go out and explore now that the rain has finally stopped but I am worried about trees falling over. After one man died last spring in our community when a tree landed on the car he was driving and killed him (his wife in the passenger seat was spared), then a few months later a colleague of Rick’s was killed in the same way. Again, his wife survived and he was killed instantly. Since then I have a whole new respect for wind and trees. (Katie, I hope you’re doing well!) I think now it’s become a phobia for me.

Airports closed, public transportation shut down, roads and bridges closed. WOW. Seems hard to believe. But I agree with their choices wholeheartedly. There are always those people who go against the grain and need to be “rescued” from situations they should never have gotten themselves into in the first place. Yet the tax payers always seem to end up paying for their stupidity. What a system. And might I add that it seems no American can be responsible for their own actions anymore. There is always someone else to lay the blame on. Truly sad. I think I’m getting old.

ANYWAY, in honor of my Mom’s birthday yesterday, or should I say what would have been her 85th birthday, I made her spaghetti and meatball recipe. I had never really been a fan before, but after trying various different recipes and having them all taste not so good, I went back to a classic. I miss you so much Mom! I would love now to ask you if this is Nana Monroe’s recipe or if you made it up yourself?

I am happy to report a resounding success! It was delicious! Yummmmm.

So, enough for now. Just wanted to let anyone out there who might be concerned that all is well at the moment. Now we have to decide which things to put back out around the pool before we leave for Colorado. Maybe nothing since we mostly took down the cabana except for the side curtains which we just tied to the structure; the canoe is safely tucked inside the basement (thanks to neighbor Mark for his help!); the deck planter boxes are down and the flowers pretty much done.

Maybe I should thank Ms. Irene for helping us jump start the fall clean up?

Maybe not. She’s been a disruptive little bitch. (Please pardon my language.)

This is Thomas. Thomas is a turkey and named with the utmost originality. He is a tom turkey. Get it?

We have many turkeys that visit but Thomas always comes on his own. He usually arrives in the morning just as I am sitting at the computer with cup of coffee checking email. He stands there and stares at the house. Sometimes he even comes up closer to the window to catch my attention as if to say helloooooo! i’m here for my breakfast! And, it works. I get my bucket and put a few scoops of cracked corn and bird seed mix and head out the door.

Thomas trusts me and stands and waits for me to scatter the food. I tap the bucket lightly as a signal he’s going to be fed. He waits patiently. Sometimes he starts eating with me still standing there and sometimes he waits until I leave.

Now I am not saying that I have trained Thomas the Turkey because no wild animal can be tamed, but Thomas has learned over time that tapping the bucket means food. The other turkeys know that signal too and sometimes even when not one turkey is in sight and I tap the bucket, I get a swarm of them coming out of the woods running towards me. It is a sight for sure to see all 13 babies and three or four adults heading right for me! They are smart birds.

Lately our little group has included a few toms, one that is quite large. I didn’t know that toms could be persuaded to be babysitters, but just look at this proof.

They are fun to have around except for when they make their way into the back yard and I unknowingly let the dogs out. The dogs love to chase the turkeys and the poor things squawk and gobble their way out of harm’s way, either by flying into the trees or taking off over the fence. Hailey can sit for hours under a tree with a turkey sitting in it. They amuse everyone in our household.

It’s hot! Temperatures in the 90’s with heat indexes well into the 100’s. Whew! Here are just a few ways some of us are coping.

Sam’s idea is to stretch out his body as far as he can for maximum cooling.

Alex’s advice is to stick your head under the tablecloth while eating outside to shield your face from the sun. Also lay with your back legs spread in frog-style to keep the belly cool.

And here is the best way to cope that I know of. Stay inside in the air conditioning until the sun goes down. Jump in.

Really, I do. I need something or someone to kick start me back to blogging on a more regular basis. Every time I sit down to compose the entry on the Panama Canal I end up staring at my brand new HD computer screen. No words come. I end up playing one of my “hidden object” games instead and zone out for an hour or so. What is wrong with me? Summertime blues? Sheer laziness? Maybe a little of both. To quote one of the blogs I read every now and then, her excuse for not blogging was that “I guess I am living the life instead of blogging about it.” That about sums it up for me, but mine is pretty boring.

My camera is gathering dust. I did go to the Botanical Gardens a week or so ago and what you see in this entry is the result of that visit. But there wasn’t much to aim the camera at and I threw away all but a few of the photos that I did take. I am in a rut there too.

Yesterday I read a book. One whole book in one whole day. (It was a light read.)

Let’s see ... what else have I done?

Last week Rick and I went to a “gala” reception at the Lincoln Center in New York City. We got dressed up, had a nice dinner and then went to the event. A lovely night! Going in to the city is always exciting and fun. Such energy in those sidewalks filled with people!

At home we’ve been enjoying the pool which is now above 80 degrees and very comfortable. It’s not even the weather that is making me lazy as the days have been sunny and warm. Delightful. Our last rain/thunderstorm was a week ago.

The fireflies are far and few between now but the cicadas have started up ever so slowly. In fact, as I type there are two going out there now. Ah, the sound of summer.

We have at least three bats in our winnowed-down bat population. They swoop and dip over our heads when we take our nighttime swims. It’s good to see them.

The turkeys bring their cute little babies around almost every day—the end result of all that turkey sex in my front yard this spring. Sometimes just one of the hens with her brood will show up, while other times it looks more like a turkey day care center and all ten or so of the babies.

I also went with neighbor Kim this week to see a litter of six week old Irish Terrier puppies that they will getting a new puppy from. The breeder was halfway out on Long Island and I have to tell you that it’s a nasty drive! Yikes, I won’t be going out there again anytime soon. The traffic! The puppies were adorable though and it was nice to breathe in puppy breath and talk dogs again.

We also had a six o’clock a.m. visitor yesterday. We were still asleep when Alex started barking downstairs. It is not his norm to bark for no reason, so I got out of bed and looked out the front window. Nothing. Rick got up and took a look around too but he also didn’t see anything. After laying there for a fitful twenty minutes more I got up and went down to feed the dogs and cats. I looked out on the back deck and saw that one of the planter boxes that was on our deck railing had been knocked down and the poor petunias were out of their pots, the nearly indestructible Squirrel Buster Plus bird feeder pulled around in an abnormal position, the iron hanger it was on slightly bent. Okay, a bear for sure. A pretty brazen one too to come onto our high deck. It’s only happened twice before in our five years here that we’ve had bears on the deck. It’s not a good feeling. I have to say that I am more than impressed with this bird feeder. Not only do the squirrels not bother it but it held up to the bear mauling with not a scratch!

So, I go to feed the cats and eBay is nowhere to be found. I call her, searching high and low but I can’t find her. She is always ready to to eat so I figure something must be wrong. Finally I hear a tiny mew coming from the laundry room. When I pull out the washer, there she is. She ventures out very tentatively into the kitchen. She peeks around the corner into the sun room and out to the deck where the bear was with her eyes wide and her tail all puffed up. Aha! She saw the bear too and it scared her so badly she was hiding from it. Poor kitty! So, the bird feeder comes in at night and when I am not at home.

One of my daily routines is to water all the outside plants before taking a shower, check on the pool temperature and add chlorine every other day. I slip on a pair of shorts and t-shirt and head out with the watering can. It’s a nice way to start the day, especially with the weather we’ve been having. I don’t even mind if the humidity is high that time of the day. Bella usually helps me with this particular job. Every other day or so I’ll tip all the water out of her wading pool and refresh it. She loves this! The minute I start adding fresh water she’s in there wading around, scooping up mouthfuls of the cold water straight from the well.  I’ve also gotten into the habit of letting one of the dogs come with me out in the front as a special treat for them. No leash, just hanging out with mom while she waters. I check on the progress of the figs daily and I have to say I can’t wait until we can eat them.

You never know what you might see while watering. The little clearwing hummingbird moths have started hovering around as I water. I just love them! While I was watering the deck flowers the other day I found this moth clinging to the petunias. Isn’t it pretty? I have never seen this particular kind of moth before so I looked him up. I think it’s some kind of Sphinx moth—possibly a Virginia (hog) Creeper Sphinx Moth. No matter what it’s name is, it’s beautiful.

For those of you that I’ve talked to over the past week, I apologize for re-hashing all this boring, trivial stuff about my life again. Ho hum. Which brings me to another topic of conversation. I have no idea who is reading this blog anymore other than family members and a few close friends and those of you that comment from time to time (thank you Debra, Maggie & Joyce!). I get numerous “junk” comments every single day that I have to delete which is very disheartening. You should read some of them! They always include a link to whatever website selling some garbage. I am so very tired of them. It’s long been in my mind to make this blog private and if Rick can figure out how to do that without too much trouble on the part of anyone then we will do so. If you still want to read all you will have to do is sign up to be a member. You don’t have to comment, you can still continue to read as you’ve always done. The only change will be that not all those crazies out there will be able to read things about my private life anymore. Because this blog really is about my daily life. But, that’s all in the future and hopefully we can make it happen.

Okay, so I’ve sat here long enough this morning filling this entry up with boring tidbits, neglecting my watering duties which are calling me, so I will close this entry now. If you are still awake after reading this, bless you. Hopefully this will kick start me to finish my vacation blogging. Check back in a day or so to find out!

Spring is taking its sweet time this year. Everything is lagging behind thanks to our cooler than normal rainy weather. The trees are just afraid to leaf out! Some progress is being made however.

The daffodils were pretty as usual but are fading a bit now.

The forsythia is really lovely this year. You may remember that last year we had our large front hedge of forsythia taken out. I miss it, but Rick says he doesn’t. Now we just have three pretty bushes scattered throughout the yards.

I cut some branches and brought them inside to light up my day. Sam likes them too!

I wish the lilac would hurry up and bloom! It’s looked like this for two weeks now. If it waits until we are gone on our trip late next week I’ll be really disappointed! This shot was taken with the forsythia bush behind.

The periwinkle is blooming nicely in the front yard.

A row of hostas have broken ground and are growing daily.

We’ve had plenty of birds visiting the feeder. Normally we don’t have purple finches but right now we have several pairs. I think they are prettier than the house finch. You can tell the difference by their coloring which is more a rosy pink than the red of the house finch, the streaking and their slightly different body shape and size.

Lots of these cute little chipping sparrows too. Doesn’t he look like he’s wearing a toupee on his head?

Of course we have lots of bright yellow gold finches. I love these little birds!

The white-throated sparrows don’t come to the feeder but they do come to the front where I spread seed on the ground for the squirrels and chippies. They have a distinctive yellow streak by their eye, and a lovely easy to identify song.

At times there are so many different bird songs riding on the air that it’s hard to hear yourself think! I am not complaining though! I love them all.

And here is Alex just because I think he’s so darned cute. He was laying on the front porch while Rick washed Mia yesterday and found this tiny little stick that he’s holding between his paws.

More rain expected today but at least this week we’re supposed to have temperatures in the 70’s. That just might lure the trees into really popping those leaves!

Bird Addendum added late afternoon: My first rose-breasted grosbeak arrived this morning! I hope to get a better photo of him if he sticks around long enough. They usually just pass through. I think it looks like it has a bleeding heart on its chest. Beautiful birds, but then again, grosbeaks are one of my all-time favorite bird families.

And a house finch for comparison to Mr. Purple Finch.