sun + Nikon = happiness

Friday Friday Friday! The day I go put my hands on strangers. Doing Reiki. The signal-to-noise ratio wasn't ideal - a lot of patients not in their rooms, or passed out, or about to be discharged, or visiting with family - but I did have some great conversations, and I put two people to sleep, so I count it a win.

AND AND AND I started the day off with a run, first thing. I have three half marathons in mind for this season - I'll choose two of them and register this week. They're not for a few months, so I'll have plenty of time to build up my base again after a crappy stint of missing too many runs due to the Epic Boomerang Cold of '17, that gift that kept on giving. When I was first starting up again after missing oh my god, like two or three weeks, I could hardly do a tenth of a mile first thing in the morning. Grrr. Summer running requires being able to fall out of bed and into your running shoes; it just gets too hot to wait til consciousness and whatnot.

Coming across foamflower in our woods today was just, the icing on the cake.

And can you believe it, that's an iPhone shot, above. Then I remembered: THE NIKON.

Ahhhhh...o yeah, baby.

Then the dear boy and I went for a walk, where I found ANOTHER jack! So we're up to five now. 

Can you spot the boy? The very top tip of the jack is pointing to him.

Closer to home, let's check in on the magnolia, still going strong:

And I think we're ready now for the saxifrage as seen through the Nikon. Each of these flowers is no more than 1/16th of an inch. For our metric friends, < 2mm.

Last but not least, daffodil exploration.

the nature of the void.

Kev and I went out for a walk this morning. I say "morning", even though it was really early afternoon; such are the wonders of being able to sleep in of a Sunday morn. I foolishly didn't bring either the Mighty Lumix or the Nikon, but being me, I dawdled here and there, snapping crappy close-ups with my phone. And all this rubbed off on the dear boy, because he was looking attentively all around him, and spotted a couple of jack-in-the-pulpits for me.

Not even opened up! Way to go, Kev-o. Later on in our walk, we were headed toward the beaver pond for a status update, and I found my own jack - like the one of the other day, close to the bottom of the driveway.

Each and every one of these is a thrill. 

AND, Solomon's seal abounds as well, along the way to the pond.

She's filling up nicely! 

Hours later, while Kev was off to softball (a double-header, no less) I headed out again, and again, didn't think to bring the 'real' cameras. After all, it was past 6 pm, the light wasn't that great, and "what is there to see?"

Silly me.

I found a mess of teeny Golden Alexanders on the north side of the field on the way out to the road. 

Oh, for the Nikon's zoom lens...

And some type of fern encased in... foam wrapping.

or at least that what it looked like to me.

By now I was pretty close to the pussy willows near the mailbox, I wonder what they're up to...

busy, busy, busy...

Next, I bring you - drum roll please - my oldest white baneberry friend. I've known this guy for like, six or seven years now. Kevin spotted it first, on our walk together earlier, but the best picture of the several I took was from my solo walk:  heaven forfend I arrange pictures out of order. It would violate the... journalistic integrity of this project.

Check out the way the flower buds look like they're being clasped by a hand...I guess that's a leaf, wrapped around them. "Journalistic integrity" indeed... I suspect you need actual readers for your writing to count as anything vaguely journalistic, and I'm pretty sure I'm typing merrily into a void. Who has the time/patience to read this? 

"If a tree falls in the forest, and nobody hears it, does it make a sound?" comes to mind.

Where was I? Oh. Flowers and whatnot. We're just inundated with trillium. Trillia?

This one was up in the mystery woodland. It pleases me to find 'em under the trees, regardless of whether anyone is there to see them. 

The saxifrage, on the other hand, I knew to expect. I promised The Void that I'd get to this with the Nikon: first sunny day! First sunny day!

Blurry because they're friggin' TINY.

I leave off with a magnolia queen upon her throne. 

when in doubt, fetchez la caméra la plus proche

Happy Saturday...here's where we're at here in West West, Vermont...all of these courtesy of the phone, because the Mighty Lumix (the little guy good for macros, particularly in awkward shots like underneath a flower two inches from the ground) is in Kevin's car in an airport parking lot. And the Nikon with its awesomeness is...oh, it's on my desk, but I'm lazy, so without further ado...

Maple leaves unfurling...

ahhh, the beaver pond, gradually getting bigger and bigger...

New discovery! Those fuscia party hats the gray birch wears? Turns out they're packed with leaves as well...

Must retrieve Mighty Lumix from the boy's car..

Today Today Today was the day the magnolia in the back yard went *boom*.

Saxifrage! This one deserves the Nikon. Stay tuned.

How many back-lit pictures of trillium can I take? 

A lot.

And now for the side view...

Not bad for the phone...

words fail me

I went for a three hour walk with a friend in some nearby woods that are famed for their wildflowers.

The stream in this bed was sometimes above ground, and sometimes below ground. A mystery for another day.

That green haze on the forest floor is a veritable carpet of flowers. Without further ado:


Dutchman’s breeches.

Squirrel corn.

In the above shot alone, there is dutchman’s breeches (lacy leaves at far left, and all over), squirrel corn (flowers at lower right), blue cohosh (tall stem on the left), trillium (self-evident, right?), wild ramp (fat narrow leaves), spring beauty (one eensy flower, right).
There was so much blue cohosh, I didn’t even bother to try to do it justice. The ones here were much further along than those at home, and I’ve found trying to capture cohosh is hard – the lightest, slightest breeze sets them to dancing.

But here’s a nice shot at a cool stage – the structure of the plant is opened up, but the leaves have yet to fully unfold.


The trillium were simply epic. A ton of them. And huge. Oh, and there’s trout lily in the background, and blue cohosh. Sick.

Gaaaaggghhhhh!

Jack-in-the-pulpit – these are the only ones we saw, perched on a rock ledge.

Weep-inducing Columbine.

Heart-stopping wild bleeding heart.

Crowfoot, a miniature early variety. As you can see, this is going to seed at a decent clip.

Trout lily up the wazoo. And a token spring beauty.

False ginseng.

Early saxifrage.

Miterwort.

Wild ginger’s freaky flower – I’ve always pegged this for a carnivore.

Red baneberry.

Multiple flavors of violet. You know you’re on system overload when you can’t even manage to take down enough detail to key out your violet species.
I was wearing chaco sandals, and after having done my 13 mile run yesterday, I’m not sure who got tired first: the soles of my feet, or my wonder-intake-capacity valve. I may need to eat an entire garlic pizza and soak up five episodes of “Eureka” just to recalibrate back to something approaching normal.