Snow Pareidolia and Posts of the Week

Pareidolia is a tendency to see images in inanimate objects. I tend to do that a lot. I might just be easily amused but I hope that you are as well because along with the Posts of the Week, that's what I've got for you today.


Looking out on the back deck, I noticed that Elmer the Safety Elephant had taken a snowy form and was making himself at home on our barbecue.







Here's a closer look. Do you see him?







A few windy days later, my old blue pal, Huckleberry Hound took his place.







Come a little bit closer, Huck.

Isn't this thrilling?


Out on the uncleared driveway, a little giraffe, covered in a blanket of snow was taking a snooze.







On the front patio, a great big fluffy white creature was also having a good sleep - its face smooshed into the arm of the chair.


All these strange creatures all over the place. There was no place left to look but up...



And that's when I saw this purple little pixie skiing across the sky. Go home, cloud. You're drunk!







I suspect that's pretty much what Benny thought about me.

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And now, without further delay, here are the Posts of the Week. The icon below is yours for the taking if your blog post is named as a POTW.

PHOTOGRAPHY

A Day in Antalya
by DJan
at DJan-ity

Frost on Windows
by Tina
at East Gwillimbury CameraGirl

Our Pileated Guest
by Linda
at The View From Squirrel Ridge

Sunburst
by Fiona
at Lady Fi

Once in a Lifetime
by Scott
at Just Used Pixels

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A GOOD READ

The Ugly Tattoo
by Sandi
at Holding Patterns

Our Dog Loves Shoes
by Rick
at Life 101

Ambulance Story ~ We Lost Dear John
by Eddie
at Clouds and Silvery Linings

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YOU'LL SAY "AWWW"

It's Frozen Outside But My Heart is Melting
by YaYa
at Whispering Pines

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INTERESTING HUMAN BEHAVIOUR

Etiquette
by Daryl
at Out and About in New York City

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JUST PLAIN ALL AROUND GOOD

Some Heat
by Solarity
at Living With the Sun

Are We Weather Obsessed
by Linda
at Crafty Gardener
 
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INSPIRING

Radiant Threads
by Michelle
at House of Lime
 

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YOU'LL LEARN SOMETHING
 
The Canadian Flag Went Up Fifty Years Ago
by Red
at Hiawatha House

  

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CREATIVE FUN (Participation Requested)

Farts
by Jim
at Suldog

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READERS' CHOICE

Recommended by: Joeh
The Mourning Dove
by OldAFSarge
at Chant du Départ
 

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Please drop by their blogs for a visit and leave a kind comment if you have the time. Also, please feel free to add your own choices (for any blog except this one) for a specific blog post in the comments section below, where others can see them.
 

Thank you

Winter is Nature's Way…

Winter is nature's way of saying, "Up yours." ~ Robert Byrne

The morning always has a way of creeping up on me and peeking in my bedroom windows. The sunrise is such a pervert.

~ Jarod Kintz

The sunrise peeking through the branches of a pine tree on the edge of our property, as seen through my bedroom window.

Some people walk into our lives and leave footprints on our hearts. Others walk into our lives and we want to leave footprints on their face.

~ Unknown

As the morning sunlight falls across the snow, it reveals tracks of the human, deer and dog variety. And possibly others.

When I found the skull in the woods, the first thing I did was call the police. But then I got curious about it. I picked it up, and started wondering who this person was, and why he had deer horns.

~ Jack Handy

This is one of our frequent track makers. Frank calls him Notchy. I call him Notcho. He doesn't really care who calls him what as long as he can get in on some bird seed action.

I ask people why they have deer heads on their walls. They always say because it's such a beautiful animal. There you go. I think my mother is attractive, but I have photographs of her.

~ Ellen DeGeneres

This is Opie. He stands out to us.. or rather, his ears do. He's one of the few who like to nibble on carrots and that's exactly what he's doing right there.

Beer nuts are $1.50 and deer nuts are under a buck.

~ Unknown

For a while, we thought that this one was Opie. Their ears stick out the same way but this ones are notched. At one point, we hadn't seen Opie around for a while, and we figured that something might have happened to his ears because we'd never seen another deer with such a T-shaped head. Then, one day they both came around at the same time and we realized that this one needed to be named Fauxpie - to rhyme with his twin-like pal.

Nature has no mercy at all. Nature says, "I'm going to snow. If you have on a bikini and no snowshoes, that's tough. I am going to snow anyway." ~ Maya Angelou

These two are way on the other side of the bay - walking on water.

I read about a guy in Michigan this winter who was cruising along on his snow mobile. "Whoo hoo!" Didn't see a barbed wire fence. FOOM - cut his head right off. And I'll be honest with you, my first thought was... That's how I want to go. Having the time of your life, "Whoo hoo!" FOOM. I want the last thought in my head to be, "Hey, check out that headless snow mobile driver. He's got a jacket just like mine."

~ David Crowe

Also across the bay, these guys zipped by in a hurry.

There is an art to flying. The knack lies in learning how to throw yourself at the ground and miss.

~ Douglas Adams

The Search and Rescue helicopter can often be heard and then seen over our lake - probably in training.

My father told me all about the birds and the bees, the liar - I went steady with a woodpecker till I was twenty-one. ~ Bob Hope

Another little local flying machine.

Whenever I hear the sparrow chirping, watch the woodpecker chirp, catch a chirping trout, or listen to the sad howl of the chirp rat, I think: Oh boy! I'm going insane again.

~ Jack Handy

He's also quite the eating machine. Doesn't he have a great look with that red spot on his head?

I had a great view of the sunset. At least until father went and changed the channel. Dammit, dad!"

~ Jarod Kintz

The day ends with some more fancy solar artwork - courtesy of the setting sun and clouds.

I Got Ditched on Valentine's Day

It was a Valentine's Day like any other - or so I thought.

It was milder than it had been for a while, bright and sunny and I wanted to go into town for a fresh jar of local honey. The Farmers' Market functions indoors one Saturday a month through the off-season and this was that February Day. Frank decided to come along with me. It turned out that the farm from which I buy my incredibly delicious honey did not have a table at the market that day but we didn't go home empty handed. There were plenty of sweets, canned foods and other things to keep us entertained for a half-hour, and stocked up for a few days.

I never suspected a thing.

On our way back home, Frank remarked at how the snowplow had just been along our road since the time we traveled it on our way to the market. Ours is a twisty-turny stretch of road and though the plow had indeed been by, there was no sand on the freshly cleared and now smooth, slippery road. As we approached a curve in the road, we found out just how icy the road actually was. In an instant we were hurtling to the right instead of following the road. We could feel the drop off of the road and the slight descent into the snowy ditch. There was total whiteout conditions as the fresh snow flew up against the windshield. We continued to propel forward for a few seconds and of course, since we couldn't see, we had no idea if we were going stop with a rude crunch against a tree or not. But there really wasn't much time to think about it. The whole incident probably took about five seconds and at the end of that brief lifetime, we stopped, unharmed with a very gentle ooomph into still deeper snow. I'm very grateful for that.

I couldn't open the door on the passenger side and it was difficult and awkward for us to exit through the driver's side but we managed. I was grateful that we took a membership with CAA last spring, and I made the call to them before getting out of the car and into the bright sunlight. Their estimated time of arrival was one hour. It was a lovely day. We didn't even feel so much as jostled or thrown and so we paced up and down the roadway, assuring drivers who stopped to check on us that we were fine and awaiting help. It's not a very busy road but over the course of the hour, a few dozen cars came through, and while I was present, each and every one of them (except for the eventual snowplow driver) stopped to inquire about our safety. I'm grateful for good people sharing our neighbourhood.

At one point, I hitched a ride home with one of the neighbours so that I could pee, put on comfier boots, grab a hat and a pair of gloves for Frank, and of course, my camera. Our home was only about a kilometre (less than a mile) down the road. Within ten minutes, I was walking back toward Frank and the car. Another reason for gratitude.


As you can see, the side of the road we had been traveling was plowed but not sanded, and the right hand side was still rather snowy. I kept expecting the plow to zoom up behind me while I was walking. It took me about fifteen minutes to get to the car.







Cold hands, now adorned with gloves, Frank demonstrates how he was driving when the road took over and ditched us.







There was no getting out of this without help.







Here comes that plow I was telling you about. Note all the snow it's leaving in its wake? That's exactly what it looked like for a few seconds through our windshield.







Note the sand. What happened to this part of the process on the other side of the road? We might have had better traction if he had sanded while clearing like he's doing here. There's no telling for sure.







Help arrived within the time period promised by CAA via text message. Grateful!







They quickly got to work attaching chains to the near-buried tires.







Once the front tire was similarly secured, it was time to start tugging.







And tug, they did.







What took us mere seconds to do, took them mere minutes to undo.







Just a little bit more and the car was out. Thanks, guys.







They oriented the car onto the road and then hurried off to help the next ditched vehicle which as it happened, occurred in front of our place just moments after I left home to walk back to our car. Thankfully, they too were uninjured.







A glance back shows us where the car had come to rest in the ditch.







Here's a closer look.








It would appear that we made quite an impression.







And that's how I got ditched on Valentine's Day.

Propane and Posts of the Week

Watch him try.

He's so spry.

Brings me my....

Propane.

(With apologies to the late J. J. Cale and to Eric Clapton.)

One morning, earlier this month, Benny started grrruffing - that combination of growls and barks which Jack Russell Terriers do so well. This meant one of the following:
a) someone was at the door
b) someone was snowmobiling across the lake
c) someone was coming down our driveway
d) a deer was wandering the property
e) a squirrel was on the deck
f) a mouse was in the basement
g) a cat was in the litter box
h) something of JRT urgency needed to be expressed
i) an icicle fell into the soft snow within a half mile radius of our place
j) someone was murmuring quietly in their own home, three houses away
k) a snowflake fell within a quarter mile radius of our place
l) it had already been a whole five minutes since the last grrrruffing espisode
... now you're beginning to get the picture of how quirky this dog is.

Anyway, in this particular instance, someone was indeed making their way down our driveway - the local propane delivery guy - here to help keep us warm through the winter.

He is amazingly adept at getting himself and a heavy hose through fairly deep snow, across our yard and around the side of the house where the tank is located. I thought you needed to see that so I snapped a few photos on this grrrruffable day. Hopefully you can handle all the excitement.


After the truck backed up and "eep, eep, eep"ed its way into position, the Kelly's Fuel guy made his way out of the driver's seat to start the process.




He approached the back of the truck and he opened the latch to gain access to the hose. Can you feel the tension mounting? That big blob of snow in the foreground of the image is the accumulation on the table out on our front deck.





Here's where we begin to feel sorry for our hero. He has to clomp and trudge his way up over the snowbank in order to begin his pilgrimage across the yard. He did assure Frank that this was just par for the course for him and that it's not an especially difficult trek. That helps to alleviate any guilt we might have been feeling about not shoveling a path for him - which would take a pretty long time - every time it snowed. We further assuaged our guilt but not allowing the crazy Benny out there with him, lest he bark incessantly at him and try to eat the hose. Still, I think we've just established that since the delivery guy is the hero in this story, surely all this snow on our yard must make us the villains. Feel free to boo and hiss, if it pleases you.





Did I mention that he's a nice guy who surely must love his work? Just look at that smile on his face. Okay, maybe it's a grimace.






Are you still with me on this thrilling journey through propane delivery day?





Oh yeah, it's a grimace, alright. And he's not even halfway to the tank yet.




He was directly outside my kitchen window at this point and only had a few more kilometres to go until he reached the propane tank and filled it up before making the long trip back to his truck. He was probably thinking that he just doesn't get paid enough for this. You're probably thinking that this is the most exciting blog post you've ever seen!



Well he might not get paid enough but the fuel company sure does - just about every winter month.

Life out here in the country is thrilling. Now you know at least one of the reasons why.

She don't lie. She don't lie. She don't lie... Propane.

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And now, without further delay, here are the Posts of the Week. The icon below is yours for the taking if your blog post is named as a POTW.

PHOTOGRAPHY

Lonesome Tree
by Andy
at Eye Candy

Cold, Cloudy Sky
by Linda
at The View From Squirrel Ridge

A Sky-featuring Tree
by Theresa
at The Run-A-Round Ranch Report

One Last Look Back in Time
by Jake via Ruth
at Ruth's Photo Blog
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A GOOD READ

Separation of Church & State // This ain't on the standardized test but---
by Brian
at waystationone

Just Last Spring
by Tabor
at Room Without Walls

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JUST PLAIN ALL AROUND GOOD

America's Best Neighbours
by Michael
at Michael Manning.TV™
 
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INSPIRING

How Blogging Changed My Lifeby Birdie
at Ditching the Black Dog
 

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IT TOUCHES THE HEART
 
Hope
by MessyMimi
at MessyMimi's Meanderings

One Night in December
by Bone
at If You Only Read One Blog...

  

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THE RIGHT PLACE AT THE RIGHT TIME

Snow Angel
by Jim
at Suldog

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READERS' CHOICE

Recommended by: TexWisGirl
Sundog
by Brk Trt (I'm guessing it means Brook Trout)
at Small Stream Reflections.

***

Please drop by their blogs for a visit and leave a kind comment if you have the time. Also, please feel free to add your own choices (for any blog except this one) for a specific blog post in the comments section below, where others can see them.
 

Thank you

Old Autumn

I saw old Autumn in the misty morn stand shadowless like silence, listening to silence.

~ Thomas Hood

Every now and then, I have a few photos which kind of get lost on my hard drive. Time goes by, seasons change and before I know it some images are left behind and are in need of rescuing if they're ever going to see the light of day - or the pages of my blog. It just so happens - like in the previous post (and quite possibly the next),  the following images are among those stragglers. These are from October. I hope you enjoy them.


I know this looks like the dead of winter but I assure you that the water is completely liquid. It just appears icy because of the lovely fog surrounding the area across the bay. Every day, there's a new view outside our window. Fog offers some of the most interesting, evolving landscapes around here.






My older son and I took a drive north to Barry's Bay during one of his visits. Autumn was still doing her thing in the hills.






But she wasn't going to be able to hang onto her fiery colours once the wind picked up.






Here's a view as seen by boat. The seagulls seemed to be occupied with a meeting of sorts, and congregated on the roof of this boathouse.






Another boat tour allowed us a colourful look at Blueberry Island as the sun was beginning to set. As you can see, we weren't the only ones out there enjoying this day.







On another day, both of my boys were up for a visit. We snapped this photo atop Eagle's Nest, overlooking the town of Bancroft.






This Black-eyed Susan was one of our last holdouts from summer. It glistened in late day sunlight after a rain.






And where there's rain and sun, there's often a rainbow (different day than the one in the previous post). This day didn't disappoint.






And neither did the setting sun.