On A Country Road

I guess I'm officially in spring/summer mode. Lately I've been scrambling to get blog posts out, I am often remiss about responding to your comments and I tend to be visiting your blogs less frequently. I sometimes catch up only to find myself way behind again just two days later.

The good weather means I'm enjoying the outdoors more, clicking the camera more and will have more photos to share. The downside is that I have less time to visit and comment on your own fine posts. Posts of the week will continue as long as I have at least a few to share. That too may suffer through this season of fine weather, outings and time spent away from home. I hope you understand my sporadic visits.

Below are a few scenes which caught my eye when I took a stroll down a country road, leaving the fishing to Frank and his son.

Throw your heart over the fence and the rest will follow. ~ Norman Vincent Peale

I like fences of all shapes and sizes. This simple wire fence beside a knotted tree just caught my attention. It just seemed right on a lazy, hazy country day.

A good neighbor is a fellow who smiles at you over the back fence, but doesn't climb over it. ~ Arthur Baer

Another roadside fence, with a canoe ready for portage to the waters just across the road. You can see that a young artist lives at this home - a bright red chalkboard at the ready for some colourful creations.

Give me a fruitful error anytime, full of seeds, bursting with its own corrections. ~ Vilfredo Pareto

An interesting seed pod in the middle of a vine-like growth. I have no idea what it might be but I liked its swirls and colours.

If you can look into the seeds of time, and say which grain will grow and which will not, speak then unto me. ~ William Shakespeare

A pair of milkweed pods, complete with feathery seeds willing to perpetuate this plant's life.

Always write angry letters to your enemies. Never mail them. ~ James Fallows

A bright red mailbox, reflected in a puddled country road. I wonder if there was happy news within, or did they just get bills like the rest of us?

A warm smile is the universal language of kindness. ~ William Arthur Ward

There were at least two dozen cut trees close to the edge of the road along the half-mile or so stretch where I walked. I'm not sure why. This stump stood out because it appeared to be winking and smiling at me - kind of like a typed smiley, like this... ;)

Let everyone sweep in front of his own door, and the whole world will be clean. ~ Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

This was a drive-by shooting, on our way home. There was a car behind us and Frank couldn't stop. You can see part of the back, side window at the bottom of the image. The door leads to a tiny, over-packed shop, filled with yard sale-like items. I know that because we've stopped by for a visit in the past.

Happy Mother's Day to all Moms who celebrate this day, here in North America. I'll have more photos for you in a few days.

Always Greener

I've decided to continue this colour theme for a little while. Partly because it's easy while I have other things on the go and partly because I have photos which many of you might never have seen before. A few long-time blog pals will likely recognize at least some of these, if not all and I thank you for you patience while I'm in this "double exposure" mode of sorts.

The posts themselves are original, and the photos are from various times and places. The last colour up was blue. Today I combed through my photo archives and came up feeling a little green. Please remember to click on them to enlarge each image.

This is one of those fly-by shootings, taken from the passenger window on our way home from the cottage one day. I just liked the way these fences hugged the gentle green slopes of this pasture.

These folks had an unusual collection of items amid the greenery of their yard. A dolphin-riding baby, a lamp post, a park bench and a grass-filled potty. Rather eclectic.

My favourite man in green - my son Jeffrey in his fatigues. We were visiting him where he attends university at Royal Military College in Kingston, Ontario.

One of my favrourite green spots within three minutes from home. Each year this narcissistic branch grows a little closer to the water's edge, gazing lovingly at its own reflection.

A bit of rain can add a bit a sparkle to an otherwise dull surface. After the downpour, these water droplets glistened on a blade of green grass.

A couple of drops were still clinging to the hairy edges of these green seed pods.

Light filtered through a spring green fern, revealed a sun-warmed rock behind it.

The animal kingdom enjoys the comfort and safety of their green environment. This little grasshopper-like insect may have been trying to blend in and hide, but I saw him anyway.

This unusual green insect followed us fishing one summer afternoon. We looked out into the water beside the boat and saw it flailing about. Frank fished it out of the water with this oar and it stayed long enough to dry out before flying off. It was actually the second such insect that day.

One afternoon, up at the cottage, this little green snake popped his head out to warm himself in the sun. He was super quick to disappear again when I got a bit too close with the camera.

I love the wispy net-like wings on this beautiful, green dragonfly. It was one of many which hatched during our June 2008 visit to the cottage. It was still drying off before taking its first flight. Notice the water droplet at the end of the tail.

In the previous post, there was a photo of a blue caterpillar, and in the fuzzy out-of-focus background you could see a green dragonfly. This was that insect. I did a full post about him back in June 2008. It was either injured or malformed and was unable to fly or hunt. In this image, you can see it checking out the mosquito which we brought to it for feeding. There are some neat closeups of this and other dragonflies in the aforementioned and linked post. There are also a couple of videos. One of them appears below.

This is the standoff between the blue caterpillar and the green dragonfly to which I referred in my previous post. The dragonfly was not doing well but when confronted by the caterpillar, it defended itself and its territory quite valiantly.

Back soonish with yet another colour.

Doggone It!

Last week, I visited my cousin and good friend, Marcy for dinner. Sadly, someone in her family is a kleptomaniac.

Marcy and I had our usual evening of chatting, laughing, eating and drinking - enjoyable as always. Her daughter was out for the evening so it was just the two of us and her three critters.

Ziggy, the oldest, is a cat who is a tad ornery, and has been known to hiss at company for no apparent reason. He's never treated me with anything better or worse than bored disinterest. Mostly he keeps to himself.

JJ is her large, goofy English Pointer. That's his photo up above. He's not the brightest bulb in the chandelier (his dimmer switch is perpetually set to low-lighting) but he loves everyone and everything on two legs or four. And he loves attention. JJ can sit in front of me for hours trading off paws. When I'm doing anything other than giving him my undivided attention, he'll lift a large, clumsy paw and rest it heavily on my forearm. Once this gets to be tiring (after 3 seconds), I'll remove his paw and plant it securely on the floor. He'll immediately lift his other paw and replace the first one with that. He can go on like this for as long as I can endure it, never tiring of this activity before I do. Eventually, he'll realize that I've had enough (when I'm curled up in the fetal position in the corner), and he'll wander off to chase Waffle.

Waffle is the newest member of the household - a fluffy orange kitten who thinks she owns the joint. Playful and rambunctious, as a feline should be, she torments Ziggy and keeps in step with JJ. It's a tad chaotic when JJ gallops through the house in hot pursuit of this little fur ball, but it's fun and endearing to see them play, while Ziggy watches from beneath the table, hoping that they'll just leave him alone.

At one point in the evening, I asked Marcy for a particular phone number and she wrote it down for me on a small slip of paper. I have a tendency to misplace small items like that, so I decided I'd best put it in my wallet immediately. We continued chatting and enjoying our Cuzzie time for a while, but eventually it was time to go. I grabbed my purse and found it to be unusually lightweight. Hmmm. a quick look inside confirmed that I didn't appear to have replaced my wallet. I began looking for it in the kitchen, which was where I accepted that phone number. It wasn't there. Marcy has an average-sized home. It's neat and uncluttered, and I hadn't been in too many rooms, so my wallet shouldn't have been hard to find. A first, second and third check of the dining room, living room, kitchen and bathroom did not reveal my misplaced wallet.

I began to wonder if I had even brought it with me. Perhaps I'd left it out at home, and I never even put that phone number into it. I didn't actually recall handling it, and neither did my cousin remember seeing it. In that case, the phone number would mostly likely be in one of my pockets, but they were empty. No, I had my wallet - it was just missing. Eventually, it occurred to Marcy that however unlikely, maybe JJ stuck his nose into my purse and took it. As a last resort, we went upstairs to where she keeps his crate and looked inside. There, along with a tissue and a small stuffed animal, was my missing wallet.

It turns out that JJ is a lot smarter than I thought, and Marcy has him trained well. Imagine what she could do with a pet monkey.

Below are a few photos taken from the last couple of weeks. Please remember to click on them to enlarge.



Mid-morning, the sun was hazy as it peeked through the branches of the trees. The surrounding grey-blue sky gave it an eerie glow. (please click to enlarge)




I was having a bit of fun with the macro setting. I found this string of dried out seed pods beside the pond and thought it made an interesting shot. (please click to enlarge)





There's a lovely old willow tree which grows across the dock and suspends over the pond. A few of its branches are in the foreground of this image which shows some unusual crack-like shapes on the surface of the snow-covered pond. (please click to enlarge)





A hanging willow branch as seen from directly below. (please click to enlarge)




This wayward branch reaches out over the lake and away from its surrounding brush to find sunlight. (please click to enlarge)





Cardinals and Sumac seem to add a splash of natural red to the winter landscape. Last week I posted Cardinals. Today the Sumac proudly flashes its colour against the backdrop of the icy pond. (please click to enlarge)




That hazy orb of golden sunlight rays reflects in the duck pond. (please click to enlarge)





Zoomed in a little closer, you can see one of the ducks having a good wing-flap in the water. (please click to enlarge)





Back on the macro setting, you can see the little barbs at the end of these spiky burrs. No wonder they stick to clothes like Velcro. (please click to enlarge)