the beauty of decay

 

See if you can guess what these are.

They are wilting hosta leaves.

Aster-like flower, I believe.

Leather? or leaf?

 

J is for Jennifer. (Hi, Jen!)

[Newsflash – I forgot to include my favorite picture from the day!!]

 

Ahhh, much better.

on losing one’s mind, and finding it again

This is how most of this week month has been:

Out of focus. Meaning, the things that are actually deeply important to me? Uhhhhhhhh….

What are they again? I can’t see straight.

Basically, I have spent the past month or so working too hard, and not getting enough bliss time in. Hard to believe, when it’s only a part-time job, which, I do from home. Hard to believe when I have pretty decent self-maintenance habits: I eat pretty well (hardly any crap), I run several times a week, I give myself Reiki every day, and I do at least three to five Reiki treatments on other people every week (not counting Kevin – he gets Reiki every day). I don’t know how much of this is background stress (some pretty major things are up in the air in our lives, plus some loved ones are experiencing health issues), and how much is the changing of the seasons (the onset of fall, as I’ve gotten older, gets harder and harder…), and how much is just not really taking my needs seriously.

All I know is, Tuesday there may have been an episode of brain paralysis, followed by a minor emotional meltdown. There might have been another meltdown yesterday morning, followed by extra bonus meltdown in the afternoon. Two in one day! Excellent! Last night, Kevin gently suggested to me that I – brace yourselves – take breaks more often, and go outside with the camera. Today, I finally did so.

I went from this:

 

To this:

Oh. Okay.

 

Yeah.

I remember this.

Exhale.

 

Bees go all in for what they want.

Bluets don’t give up. September? “Fie!” they say.

Sumacs say, “Hold my beer and watch this shit.”

 

Asters got the memo that fall colors involve orange and red, and responded with an “oh yeah?”

“Sez who?”

 

The tall anemone follows suit, indulging in a little light purple…

…before saying “screw it” and exploding.

 

 

Only one eyeball left on the white baneberry.

And now, for yellow.

Oleander aphids on a milkweed pod…

…and stem.

 

 

As for the tree that fell at the base of our driveway: it’s in the burn pile now. In the background, on the edge of the field, lurks the feral bathtub.

scenes from late summer

oh, the precious golden days are on the way out. I struggle between wearing t-shirts, and flannel shirts. I’ve been crazy-busy at work and haven’t spent much time outdoors – for shame! for shame!

Most thistles are on the way to white puffballs – this one still had purple bits hanging on.

Seems like all that’s left around here is goldenrod.

 

And a few black-eyed susans.

It’s the most wonderful time of the year…

…to do a massive purge of old paperwork! Yes, that is how we spent Labor Day weekend!

Found this guy hanging out by the front door.

The cats hang out on the deck in the afternoons when it’s sunny. Here’s Maggie looking elegant…

 

…and less than elegant.

Oh, who am I kidding, this girl looks great no matter what she’s doing. She has the prettiest little face.

 

Onwards to Charlie.

 

I love how relaxed they are, lounging around in the middle of the yard.

Open wide!

bugs: cute? or scary?

Would you look at the size of his forearms? He’s like the Popeye of little green flies. I have already submitted this to bugguide, and I’ll bet by the time I’m through drafting this post, some bug nerd  afficionado will have provided an ID. GOD, I love the interwebs.  Nearby, another flower had a visitor of its own:

I thank the lord that I am much larger than most insects I come across. They are truly terrifying, if you think about it. But also?

Sometimes kind of cute. I watched this little one groom itself with its back leg. And look at that fuzz! Don’t you just want to hug it? No?

The other day was apparently a spider hatching day. I let three gray-and-black spiders out of the house. I might have accidentally vacuumed others in a frenzy of cleaning. See, there goes my bug ambivalence again.

Annnnd yes, we have someone out there who thinks that Popeye fellow is an ambush bug - Phymata pennsylvanica. A type of assassin bug. I was just reading about assassin bugs. Apparently at least some of them have these long stabby things they use to suck the innards out of their prey. Yeah, I’m back to being scared. At any rate, the overlords of Bugguide will check into it within a few hours – those folks are serious.

What else can I report…I visited a tree I only got properly ID’d this year as a type of non-native dogwood – “cherry dogwood”. Now I know why it’s called that:

That’s a water droplet on the end – it’s been flirting with rain over the past day. I’ve been living here at dave for five years, and this is the first time I’ve noticed the fruit on this tree. Just goes to show – there is ALWAYS something new to see. (By the way, “dave” = the name of this property. That’s why we’re called “musings from dave”. Read about it here.)

Any other news? Oh, a trillium gone to seed.

Last but not least, we went out to a fundraiser tonight to help with long term recovery efforts after That Bitch Irene – today is the one year anniversary of Tropical Storm Irene, which as you may recall, did a number on us here in Vermont. The fundraiser was a by-donation-only showing of “Singin’ in the Rain”. What an awesome movie – long one of my favorites. It’s a movie, within a movie, within a movie – just like “Inception”’s dream within a dream within a dream. Only with better dance numbers.

thistle hurt if you’re not careful

Asters, all done and ready to cook up seeds.

A solo diner.

Don’t.Freaking.Touch.Me.

[I had to prop this thistle flower upright to get this shot – you can see they’re all drooping in the last shot – and that’s my t-shirt wrapped around my finger at the upper left. This thing did NOT want to be fondled.]

Mmmmm…thistles. I think that might be spider webbing between all the spikes. Spiders: nothing if not enterprising.

speaking of naughty bits

Remember the Venetian slippers of the day lilies at the orgy?

Their little feet and legs are covered in pollen these days.

Nearby, the lone pistil.

Glinting mischievously.

A few feet away, a yellow lily.

…and its pistil.

Time for spiders on the black-eyed susans.

Howdy!

Same flower, other side. Someone else.

This here’s a tussock moth. I tried to film it as it scurried back and forth across the table on the deck. That was an artistic disaster – I couldn’t get it to focus. Eventually I took pity on it and carried it out to the shrubbery where I figured it would have better luck finding food.