Nature: the Sequel (animals, birds, fish, the weather, and other stuff)

Welcome to Nature: the Sequel. Prose, poetry, photos, cartoons, music, and mention of books even, welcome. Geography, pronunciation, environmental studies (self and society), sports, flora and fauna, recipes (please!), and whatever else I might have forgotten to mention.

Trees, breeze, sunlight.

Robert

A wiseguy, huh? From Cornell, no less. I once ate in an Indian restaurant in Ithaca. It wasn't bad.

Those Iroquois could be pesky though.

I am sitting on my back porch right now, and those three elements of nature are impinging comfortably on me. There are some spotted doves who come for the cat food who are less comforting; they weren't here when I wrote my original post.

Robert

And were you making these observations from the Finger Lakes region, Robert (that might well sound lewd to some of our distant naturalists) or some other unidentified locale?

Beautiful day! Spent most of the day sitting outside. Very frisky doves and starlings.

Hey, Jane: the recipes (please!) in message #1 was intended for you, since I read somewhere that you like to cook. There are five dishes I'm good at:

free range chicken cutlet milanese, with a tomato sauce using Marzano (the best) canned tomatoes
spaghetti and free range turkey meat balls (!), breaded to stay soft and with a secret ingredient
matzoh ball soup, with free range chicken, made with a not so secret ingredient
salad Nicoise, with French green beans (not the nasty American kind), capers and anchovies
free range chicken in a clay pot, with all sorts of things thrown in, and cooked nearly forever

I'm weak on everything else, including and especially cajun. You got something in that realm?

Many, many...looking for anything in particular?

I would like one or more or all of the following in it (whatever it is): chicken, a spicy sausage (andouille would be okay), maybe okra, shrimp, with a tomato base, served with or on rice, and some kind of flavorful hot sauce that you know of and I don't (aka the secret ingredient). Or something else entirely different that you're particularly fond of, so long as it doesn't include steak or beef.

In re message 5: I am at "some other unidentified locale." I was not so much observing as being immersed in.

Robert

Where I walk each Saturday morning:

Well, good morning, zenomax. Nice to meet you here on our young thread.

Sometimes, the places people live, or walk on a Saturday morning, fit our impression of them. In the virtual world, guys like me--of a sensory sort--do a lot of imagining about this. And here you are, kinda where I thought you'd be.

On the sports front, this just in:

The San Diego high school basketball team our friend Porius coaches won its first round playoff game yesterday, 59-52, and will be moving on to the next round, possibly against a team from Bakersfield.

Still a swoop of ever receding snow in the backyard. The red ceramic buddha, shaded by the bare branches of a forsythia bush, will be the last to see the ground; but he don't care.

We need a book on this new thread, so I offer The Heart of the Catskills, written by a friend of mine, Bob Steuding, poet laureate of Ulster County. (Yes, our county has an official poet laureate.) The book is replete with nature, with mentions of Frederic Church, of the Hudson River school of painters; and the naturalist John Borroughs, who lived in Roxbury (in Delaware County), and climbed the highest of the gentle and wooded Catskills, Slide Mountain, to mourn the death of his friend, Walt Whitman.

>11 zenomax:

That hood's poppin'. It is off the hook, Zeno-dawg

As for books, I'm not necessarily reading about the serenity of nature. Jaguars Ripped my Flesh is more like a series of exciting Outdoors Magazine travel articles.

So this is where everybody is! I go away for a day or two and everybody moves. It was so sunny and warm (well, warmish) yesterday that I couldn't stand the thought of sitting inside. Same today, so I'll say hello and check in tonight or tomorrow. Yea, spring!

Zeno, that's a lovely place to walk. Many congrats to Porius. And finally, thanks to Peter for overseeing the thread.

I was going to visit a friend in Peru but he's off somewhere unreachable in the rain forest. So instead of a picture of where I am, have some pictures of where I wish to be, taken at about this time last year...

>16 theaelizabet:. Thank you, Teresa. It's been a great pleasure emceeing the thread. And there's more to come: mud season in Vermont in April-May, unbearable hell in Texas in July, hurricanes in Florida and up the Atlantic coast in August-September, the malevolent Santa Ana wind in California (in October, I believe) ... a lot to look forward to.

And as emcee: Good to see some fresh blood on Nature: the Sequel. (Not that the old blood was bad.) Welcome, amaranthic, and thanks for the lovely pix. Welcome to you too, Mr. Durick, aka Robert (or maybe it should be Robert, aka Mr. Durick), wherever you live. (Don't think I didn't notice that you finessed my query.) And, again, zenomax, who, judging from the photos above, is either royalty or knows how to cadge a good locale.

Yes, one does one's best with what one has in the way of surroundings.

I came across Thoreau's Walden in a bookshop today, but didn't purchase. Is it worth investing in?

I have a real interest in British landscape, nature, the concept of the pastoral. But I have not transferred that to the USA yet. And I know that Thoreau built up a whole philosophy too which still influences thought today.

Oh, Zeno. Walden. Now.

ETA to recommend the 2004 Yale University Press edition. It's fully annotated.

By the way, it's 58 degrees and sunny here in northern New Jersey. I just got back from a long, long walk with my dog.

If you're in to the outdoors at all, zeno, that's an essential acquisition, imo. Poetic language and philosophy and introspection and delightful outdoorsy descriptions too.

"I went to the woods because I wanted to live deeply and suck out all the marrow of life."
~HDT

quoted from memory; apologies if I slightly misquoted.

Oh, and ditto 21

;-)

Up to 68 degrees in Guy, Arkansas. Beginning to see a bit of green at our place



and have started to break up ground.

My gosh, I love this thread! But then, spring seems to be here. The dour guy in the convenience store where I bought my Sunday Times said, "Everyone's getting carried away today. It isn't over yet." Shut the fuck up, you curmudgeon.

And yet, while all of you've been out there enjoying the weather, I've spent the weekend inside, reworking the first two chapters of Digging Deeper: "Rehabilitation," and today, "The Letter that Changed My Life."

When I'm editing manuscripts I get paid to do, I usually find that it's best to go back and redo the first few chapters, since I don't get into the flow of a book until the third or fourth chapter, a knowledge I can then apply to the earlier chapters. And, damn it, it's that way with my own writing too. I couldn't believe how bad they were! And now, I think they're the best I've ever done.

God, it ain't easy being me.

>17 amaranthic:
What an amazing coincidence, Amaranthic. I just finished reading about Tim Cahill's expedition to map unknown (ie, unknown to the gringos) Peruvian ruins.

>20 zenomax:
As I recall, Zeno, Walden had to do with beans...

Time for a run through the woods with Sandy. We'll try not to disturb the deer too much.

LEAVES COMPARED WITH FLOWERS

A tree's leaves may be ever so good,
So may its bark, so may its wood;
But unless you put the right thing to its root
It never will show much flower or fruit.

But I may be one who does not care
Ever to have tree bloom or bear.
Leaves for smooth and bark for rough,
Leaves and bark may be tree enough.

Some giant trees have bloom so small
They might as well have none at all.
Late in life I have come on fern.
Now lichens are due to have their turn.

I bade men tell me which in brief,
Which is fairer, flower or leaf.
They did not have the wit to say,
Leaves by night and flowers by day.

Leaves and bark, leaves and bark,
To lean against and hear in the dark.
Petals I may have once pursued.
Leaves are all my darker mood.

Robert Frost
from A FURTHER RANGE 1936

Old Frost was as intimate with Nature as Theophrastus Phillipus Aureolus Bombastus von Hohenheim was.

Oh yes, another fine day in the making. I might walk across the lawn and the moss--the snow having receded and left large patches of green--to St. Francis, listing badly on the edge of the forest, and straighten him out. I don't mind the moss, btw, since it means less lawn to mow when the time for that comes. Maybe the whole lawn will eventually be moss; I hope.

Managed to put the chapters aside yesterday afternoon and take a walk up the road, to the sheep farm a quarter mile away, inspired no doubt by the walks taken by teresa and sandy, though of course without the dog I don't have. The flock was not about, but one wool-fattened ewe stood there staring as I passed, as if he'd never seen a human bean before.

Wonderful pictures everyone...I'm quite jealous.

9 - I'm thinking you mean jambalaya?



I actually don't know this one from memory so I'll have to look at my book tonight. It's pretty easy though. Interesting note on tomatos in Cajun and Creole cooking is that they are primarily used in New Orleans style Creole cooking and not so much in bayou country Cajun cooking. Not totally sure why. However, there is also a Jambalaya song.

ETA: Could also mean gumbo since I see you also mention okra -it's more soupy.

And that's a wonderful picture too: looks like paella.

On Cajun vs. Creole, tomato and okra: it's not that I've got a particular style or dish in mind, Jane. I'm open to all Lousiane (is that a word?) possibilities. I say tomatoes because I--and my body--crave aciditic things; citrus, for instance.

Anyway, you certainly sound like you know what you're talking about, so feed me a recipe and I'll try it out.

I had some shrimp and chicken jambalaya yesterday at the Elephant Bar & Grill...I'm salivating as I write...

The latest from our South American correspondent:

Today was our first day in Chile, Puerto Madera, the southernmost city in the country. Took a boat to an island with hundreds of nesting penguins.They are endlessly enjoyable to watch, although much of the time they just lay around, like cats do. Had some time after to walk around the central square, with lots of craftspeople, but like a lot of tourist places, much of it the same. The wind here will suddenly be fierce, and then completely calm. Tomorrow we cruise through all the little channels, which should be very nice. No evidence yet of anything earthquake related.

Here we go:

Jambalaya

1 lb chicken or pork, cut to 1-2 inch cubes or 1 lb shrimp
1 lb smoke sausage, sliced
1 cup chopped onions
½ cup chopped bell pepper
1 stalk chopped celery
1 clove garlic
1 tsp salt
1 tbsp Worchester sauce
Pepper to taste
1 cup white rice (raw)
Hot sauce to taste

Brown sausage in a Dutch oven* and discard excess grease. Add seasoned chicken, pork, or shirmp to pot and brown this as well. Add onion, bell pepper, celery, and garlic and cook for 15 minutes, stirring often. Add salt, Worchester sauce, 2 cups water, and rice. Bring to boil, stir, and reduce heat to low. Cover and cook for 15-20 minutes until rice is cooked without stirring. Add hot sauce if desired.

It's actually a pretty easy recipe and very flexible. You can use pretty much any combination of meat and sausage and add any other vegetables or seasoning you like.

I think there was a hot sauce question earlier in the thread as well. I tend to use Tabasco for cooking (more vinegary) and Louisiana Hot Sauce (little sweeter with less kick) for topping. The best cajun seasoning is hands down Tony Chachere's, but it's one I always have trouble finding.

*Best if you have a cast iron

Thanks, Jane. I forgot to mention that I'm not a recipe kinda guy, but rather the kind who uses recipes as an outline. That's the way I write too, though here at least I'll know where I'm headed before I begin. I might double the amount of garlic--I love garlic--and add 1/2 cup of a mildly hot pepper and see how it works.

34 - I'm the same way. All of my recipes are a base on which I add, subtract, etc. And I agree about the garlic. :)

NEITHER OUT FAR OR IN DEEP

The people along the sand
All turn and look one way.
They turn their back on the land.
They look at the sea all day.

As long as it takes to pass
A ship keeps raising its hull;
The wetter ground like glass
Reflects a standing gull.

The land may vary more;
But wherever the truth may be -
The water comes ashore,
And the people look at the sea.

They cannot look out far.
They cannot look in deep.
But when was that ever a bar
To any watch they keep.

Robert Frost
from A FURTHER RANGE 1936

Porius's Robert Frost offerings are drawn from A Further Range, as indicated above--it had me recalling living at summer rooming houses in Rockaway Beach when I was a boy--and, from the old nature thread, A Witness Tree and North of Boston.

Human Nature.
You could have looked all night through scraps of bodies, ditches of blood, hacked off heads, torn-out innards, whole hillocks of corpses slung together awaiting the cart to Dead Men's Dump, that night at Shrewsbury, the vigil of St. Mary Magdalene, and if you'd found one man - or part of a man - that died or was killed for such a principle or towards such an object, then may I never spit white again.
ESPERANCE! PERCY! HONOR!
Give me life!

from FALSTAFF by David Nye

oh the clip.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qfvCjLgbpy0

A day at sea, or on a coast. I'm bursting with optimism, imagining the horizon. Before I get carried away, tell us, Marian: what fish do those fisherman catch in the great lake?

Have been quietly lurking, enjoying the descriptions and the poetry, but >39 copyedit52:, you made me jump in. Winter in Chicago has been particularly dreary, but recently there have been a few bright, sunny days and warmer temperatures. I look out my window at ice-free Lake Michigan daydreaming about getting the boat in the water and summer days. I live in the concrete jungle because I like it, but we are blessed with a beautiful lakefront and wonderful lakefront parks where the flowers will soon be blooming.

Welcome to the thread, Lisa. Nice to have a Chicagoan show up. I've been in your city when it was summertime hot--and hung out down by that pier you have--and in the winter, when the chill wind coming off that same great lake made me forgot about how cold New York and Boston are in January.

"Getting the boat in the water" sounds dreamy. (I'm not puttin' anyone on here. I go to Maine whenever I can.) Was it water and coastlines--the themes of the day--that brought you here? We can reprise that theme, if you like. Or maybe move on to flowers. Except for sandydog (who likened himself to a skunk cabbage), I don't think anyone has gotten into flowers yet.

Thank you Peter. It is water that always attracts me--especially big bodies of water that create their own weather. Lake Michigan certainly does that! I like sitting near it and sitting on it. For me, it is usually too cold to sit in it. :-)

Visit us again and wander north and south a bit. There is so much more than that pier!

I was at a wedding a few years ago, Lisa. My cousin's daughter, out in Lincolnwood. Is that right? Lord Devon Boulevard. No, that can't be it. That's the name of a cigar. Now that I think about it, it must have been more than ten years ago, since my father was alive, and he and my mother, and uncles and aunts, and a whole host of cousins--who look to me for guidance, since I am the oldest of the next generation--attended, and the next day we took a boat ride with a bunch of other tourists, from the Navy Pier--is that right? is that what you call it?--out on the lake a bit and then back. You get a good view of the downtown buildings from out there. The day after that I convinced a bunch of these cousins to go with me out to Arlington Park Racetrack. Ha! My Chicago cousin had never been there; nor had I, but I'm good at finding racetracks in strange places.

It's a funny thing, having met more than a few Chicagoans--including that cousin, who still lives there, and who I don't talk to anymore--how many of you are so fiercely proud of your city. I mean, New Yorkers aren't proud so much as convinced. L.A. people too. But Chicagoans seem devoted, which is something else altogether.

DESIGN

I found a dimpled spider, fat and white,
On a white heal-all, holding up a moth
Like a white piece of rigid satin cloth -
Assorted characters of death and blight
Mixed ready to begin the morning right,
Like the ingredients of a witches' broth -
A snow-drop spider, a flower like a froth,
And dead wings carried like a paper kite.

What had the flower to do with being white,
The wayside blue and the innocent heal-all?
What brought the kindred spider to that height,
Then steered the white moth thither in the night?
What but design of darkness to appall? -
If design govern in a thing so small.

Robert Frost
from A FURTHER RANGE 1936

Well if not much else I work on my typing skills.

And you liked it so much, you typed it twice.

Guilty as charged.

dag nab it i really love this song and the cd it comes from. it sometimes does take a whole lot of medicine.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PxYTILdWRaU&feature=related

a natural.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4aDy8BqEuyE&feature=related

#39
Mostly Walleye, but perch is the preferred fish. Perch usually don't bite much until late summer/fall when the water is warm. So walleye is the most common catch. LakeErie Whitefish, a relative of walleye was once the big commercial catch, but its numbers have dwindled since 1950's. Now there are limits on catches, but 30 perch a day seems reasonable.

The "great lake" I referred to above, when asking Marian what kind of fish were caught, was of course Lake Erie (Marian lives in Ohio), not to be confused with Lisa from Chicago's great lake: Michigan.

A bunch of years ago some wiseacre congresspeople from New York State claimed that the state was entitled to federal funds earmarked for "the Great Lakes" since Lake Champlain was also a great lake. (It is pretty big.) A howl went up from the Midwest. Turns out it was just a joke, proving that we New Yorkers have a better sense of humor than all of youse.

48 - Petey!! This year was the 40th anniversary of him becoming the NCAA all time scoring leader. Played only 3 years without a 3 point line and he is still the leader - amazing.

Yes, an amazing player, and a sad story. One of those who died too soon. James Dean, Jimi Hendricks, Janis Joplin, Mario Savio, Shirley Chisholm, Jim Morrison, John Lennon, George Harrison, Billie Holliday, Charlie Parker, Bobby Kennedy, Martin Luther King Jr., Warren Zevon, Pete Maravich ...

From our South American correspondent, moving north, off the coast of Chile:

Yesterday and the night before, we sailed through gale force winds and waves. It was quite spectacular.

Woke last night to the thrashing, crashing, and jolts of the ocean. Lying in bed, I could feel the ocean lifting the ship up, over the wave, and unceremoniously crashing it down. It was not a rhythmic rolling. Rather, there'd be a sudden bumping and rolling, rattling, and the unsettling sound of the ship's beams creaking, as though they might burst at any minute.

The storm persisted through the morning. Looking out my balcony, the ocean swirled with white foam and threw up sprays of water that reached the balcony floor. The wind was a steady roar.

When I went to the dining room for lunch, the wind and waves had picked up, and every five minutes there'd be a crashing, and breaking glasses and plates from the serving station. The staff was cheerful and apologetic. Service was slower than usual, but everyone was enjoying the experience together.

When the captain came on for his daily report, he was quite apologetic, as though he was responsible for the weather. The winds had been gale force during the night, he said, but had picked up to hurricane force as we turned northward.

As we entered the fjords, the winds calmed down. Our intense communion with nature was over.

In light of the finally warm weather up here, a cool Creole Tomato Salad.

You need a large tomato, cut top off and scoop out insides into a bowl. Combine with chopped cucumber, onion, bell pepper, celery, and garlic. Mix in with salt, pepper, Italian dressing, and cottage cheese. Stuff back inside tomato and enjoy. Can also add boiled egg if you like, top with your favorite fresh herb or seasoning.

How about adding raw egg and baking it for five minutes, maybe without the cottage cheese and having seeded the tomato scoopings?

Robert

UNHARVESTED

A scent of ripeness from over a wall.
And come to leave the routine road
And look for what had made me stall,
There sure enough was an apple tree
That had eased itself of its summer load,
And of all but its trivial foliage free,
Now breathed as light as a lady's fan.
For there had been an apple fall
As complete as the apple had given man.
The ground was one circle of solid red.

May something go always unharvested!
May much stay out of our stated plan,
Apples or something forgotten and left,
So smelling their sweetness would be no theft.

Robert Frost
from A FURTHER RANGE 1936

Peter: After posting the message, if it doesn't appear, reload the page, or leave the thread and come back, and I think you'll find it will appeared afterward. (I'm assuming it's uncertainty that leads to your double messages). But just in case, make a copy before you post the message, so you won't lose it, and can repost it, if you reload or leave and come back and discover that it still hasn't come up.

Tonight, everyone, Porius's talented adolescents play Paraclete (The Holy Ghost) H.S., with the winner advancing to the next round of the playoffs on Saturday.

>54 janemarieprice:, 55. A word on tomatoes: No one loves them more than I; truly. Sliced, with olive oil, balsamic vinegar, and basil; stewed; as soup, with rice--I frown in disgust when offered clam chowder the New English rather than the Manhattan tomato-based way. But I have by now accepted the fact that, living where I do, for five-sixths of the year (the other sixth is mid-July to mid-September) I cannot find a friggin tomato that's worth a damn (other than those canned San Marzano tomatoes I buy at Arthur Avenue in the Bronx and use in sauce). And not even the best recipes, of course, are worth anything if the ingredients are subpar.

There are definitely more boids out there now. Yesterday, I saw a chickadee dancing on a tree trunk.

When I first came up here twenty-plus years ago--from Greenpernt, Brooklyn, as the natives call it--cold winter nights went down to fifteen below (and now it never drops below five degrees) and spring--which is to say the forsythias blooming--did not occur until the first week in May. Woodstock, New York, btw, is at the same latitude as Providence, Rhode Island, and somewhat north of Hartford, Connecticut.

Then, maybe ten years ago, spring sprung in mid-April, and it has since then, though occasionally it comes in the last week in April. But if this mild weather holds ... well, it would be absolutely unprecedented for spring to arrive in March.

55 - Yes, you could. I would saute the veggies a bit and throw in bread crumbs and parm as well. :) I love stuffed things.

58 - Indeed. My beef is with onions. You cannot get a good onion here.

The first crocus flower appeared in our garden last week. A sure sign that spring is on its way.

To link in with the food theme, let us remember that saffron comes from a variety of crocus. I use saffron in one of my favourite dishes, risotto milanese.

I have heard that the recipe originated from the Jewish and Arab inhabitants of medieval Sicily.

I'm into saffron rice too, zeno, and that's quite a pluck: the Semitic Sicilian connection.

Oh yes. Nice transition. And the song ... well, it brings to mind a bunch of us sitting in a dungeonlike dive (called the Cave) on Avenue A in the East Village, in nineteen-a-long-time ago, smoking dried banana peels because we thought it would get us high.

I think baby goats have stopped arriving. Perhaps I can become an LT regular again. Anyway here is a picture of the goats and the infamous Welsh terrorists. I appear somewhere in the picture; I'm just not sure which one is I. My driver's license is no help in this matter. It was revoked last week because I entered a bank carrying a concealed goat.

Welcome to the thread, Urania. You're the one in the hat, right? Our first Tennessean, and most obviously a naturalist, as we--or rather I, in the guise of we--call ourselves. And now that you've arrived, we need to know about the weather there, the lay of the land (mountains, forests, hills and valleys, rivers and lakes), the animal situation (wild and domestic; you've gotten a start on the latter), flora and fauna, geographic oddities, your favorite recipe (something maybe with goat cheese), and, if you're in the mood, a book or two you might have read recently or once upon a time. A poem or two would also be welcome. These are the initiation requirements.

In sporting news: our friend Porius's high school--Peter, you must tell us the name of your school, so people won't think you're making all this up--won last night over Paraclete H.S., 75-60. The coach has informed us that his no name school will now play Saturday, in the southern California semifinals. It they win, they're in the So. Cal. finals; win again, and they play the northern California winners. To quote him: "It seems like I've been in the gym forever."

In international news: I've been promised an exclusive from a volcano in the Andes this afternoon. Check back later.

Wonderful thread!

I'm in suburbia, not much nature to offer yet, although I will immediately contradict myself and report that while on a walk last week I saw a snowy (gray/white) hawk poking in and around a nest high in a tree.

Otherwise, I can offer one of my favorite web places -- Norfolk Botanical Garden’s eagle nest-cam, where the first of three eggs has just hatched! Lots to enjoy between now and when the eaglets fledge in June.

>20 zenomax:-23 I think I need Walden. Your recommendations make the Yale (annotated) edition a given.

Has anyone seen the 150th anniversary edition? I wonder if its photos/lushness enhance the experience or send this edition over the top?

Sorry-out of commission for a couple of days but I am back!

>43 copyedit52:: Devon Avenue, probably.
Yes, Navy Pier. You can see the view of the end of it from the lake in my current profile picture. Many boats, and a view of the BEST skyline in the world. Now, I must admit I have not seen all of them, but I have seen a few from the water, and Chicago beats all of them, IMHO. Yes, I guess devoted. ;-)

>50 copyedit52:: Us guys got a sense of humor--just not about our lakes. We seem to think the water there belongs to us. Interesting perspective, no?

So jealous of the South American correspondent. Have been there on land, but not by sea and that trip sounds spectacular. Captains always apologize for the weather, BTW. The sense that one is supposed to control it for the passengers seems to come with the license.

Urania, no goats still in hiding? Hooray! Lovely family picture.

ET because I tried to put in a picture but I did not do it right. Will study and try again later!

Let me try the pictures again:

Sunrise on the Illinois River at Beardstown, Illinois



Borrowing from Urania, West Highland Terrorists navigating on the river:

Fabulous pics there Ladies! I love those goats! So serene and comforting images, both of you. Great thing you got going here, Pierre! I'm going to try and hunt down some old hiking/sailing pics. Maybe some Thoreau and Emerson and Muir quotes as well...

And now, for something completely different, from the monthly catalogue I get from Burlington, North Carolina, featuring cigars I can't afford, the following literate offering:

Macanudo Dominican Republic
Shakespeare 25 for 109.95

Arturo Fuente Dominican Republic
Hemingway Masterpiece 10 for 124.95
Hemingway Short Story 25 for 129.95

Chateau Honduras
Lord Tennyson 25 for 124.95

Plasencia Nicaragua
Longfellow 15 for 56.95

Sancho Panza Honduras
Dulcinea 20 for 65.95
Quixote 20 for 46.95

Bolivar Dominican Republic
Library Edition: Wealth of Nations 20 for 75.00

La Gloria Cubana Dominican Republic
Library Edition: A Tale of Two Cities 20 for 49.50

Those Sancho Panza Quixote's look possibly budget-friendly.

Good coffee table book on cigars: http://www.librarything.com/work/2414335/book/45060185

65 & 70 - Great pictures! I'm quite jealous of everyone's beautiful surroundings.

So, vas machster, Henri? Where are those quotes you promised?

Patience, Pierre. Actually I'm glad for the reminder.

John Muir's most famous quote (used to have this on a large poster of Half Dome):

"Climb the mountains and get their good tidings. Nature's peace will flow into you as sunshine flows into trees. The winds will blow their own freshness into you, and the storms their energy, while cares drop off like Autumn leaves."

I highly recommend The Mountains of California or My First Summer in the Sierra. He could've just as easily been writing of the Atlas Mountains of Morocco or the Adirondacks of New York; the writing is, imo, that universal.

John Burroughs, from his Writings, quoted in The Heart of the Catskills, when he reached the summit of Slide Mountain, the "King of the Catskills":

"We saw the world as the hawk or balloonist sees it ... How soft and flowing all the outlines of the hills and mountains beneath us ...!"

HAPPINESS MAKES UP IN HEIGHT FOR WHAT IT LACKS IN LENGTH

O stormy, stormy world,
The days you were not swirled
Around with mist and cloud,
Or wrapped as in a shroud,
And the sun's brilliant ball
Was not in part or all
Obscured from mortal view -
Were days so very few
I can but wonder whence
I get the lasting sense
Of so much warmth and light.
If my mistrust is right
I may be altogether
From one day's perfect weather,
When starting clear at dawn
The day swept clearly on
To finish clear at eve,
I verily believe
My first impression may
Be all from that one day
No shadow crossed but ours
As through its blazing flowers
We went from house to wood
For change of solitude.

Robert Frost
from A WITNESS TREE
1942

Coach Porius's Francis Parker H.S. "Lancers" will play today, and if they win, will play again, and then again, and then it will be over. Of course, we're rooting for him and his team to go all the way and become California champions ... for the sake of the boys, and for Porius (the "it will be over" part), so he can rest his weary bones. Apparently, he is a very old man.

There's a little ridge of snow at the end of the driveway resembling styrofoam, encrusted with gravel; the leavings of the snow plow. But otherwise no evidence of winter. The backyard is two shades of green: yellowish lawn, and deep green moss. And, with buckets of rain expected today--it's only, merely, raining now--I expect the usual rivulet on the edge of the forest by evening.

And I'll add, after reading Jane's poetic offering below, that there are lotsa pines here, always green. It's never a barren-looking scene.

Good luck Porius! I shall root for you since both of my basketball teams are dead to me for the season.

Rain, rain, rain all weekend. Yuck. And LSU baseball lost to stupid Kansas!! last night. Unacceptable. They had best sweep the rest of this series.

I cope with a line from Ruben Dario's The Swans:

I am questioning the Sphinx about what it can foresee
with the question mark of your neck, asking the air for me.

and about half of The Song of the Pines

Pine trees! Brothers on land and in the air,
I love you all! You’re sweet, good, and somber.
One might say that you’re trees who think and care,
pampered by sunrises, poets, and birds.

The winged sandal must have grazed your brow.
You’re masts, proscenia, and a curule chair.
Solar pines! Pines from Italy! How
bathed you are in grace and blue glory there.

Without the sun’s gold, you can be gloomy,
covered in glacial mists and dew.
Pines at night in mountains of reverie,
pines from northern climes, you’re beautiful too.

You move like mimes, actors, or a statue,
stretching toward the sweet caress of the sea.
Sacred pines, I will never forget you!
Pines from Naples, loved by flowers and me!

Mick (the dog) and bird (name not given) in back yard

What kind of bird is that? It looks like a crane, or crane-ish. Good action shot, btw.

Heron - great blue perhaps?

Yeah, a blue heron. Prob'ly you would know, Jane. But then this one somehow got from the bayou to Faulkner County, Arkansas, and Paul's town (or is it a village?) of Guy (pop. 202, according to the 2000 census), which isn't far from Little Rock, according to my sources.

Wow, copy, you're good!

I thought maybe it was a Sandhill Crane (grus canadensis), but check out those uniformally dark flight feathers and short but prominently fanned gray tail.

It's definitely a "Big Bluey", Great Blue Heron, (Ardea herodias).

I think Mick is Canis ardeidaecan'tstandus...

Me? What'd I do? I deferred to Jane, and the imprimatur of her geographic familiarity. I said "crane," if you remember. But you ... you sandy dog, you. Ardea herodias indeed.

Good job, Jane. I've submitted Mick's photo to the Rare Records Committee.

Is this a private party or can anyone hop on in? I have a few snapshots that I would like to contribute but not sure how you all are getting them in your posts???

Hey! Here you are! Who'da thunk it? Yes, anyone can jump in.

Everyone--and you too, anna from Portland--welcome Tani from Bend, Oregon. And someone please tell her how to plunk pictures onto these messages. (I'll be reading too, since I don't have a clue.)

tc53591, here are some instructions for posting photographs.

Meanwhile, the bird looked like an egret to me although I think I have paid attention only to white ones. I am, however, not a Victorian novelist because I cannot distinguish the various plants and the various birds (I am not a novelist because I don't have a story to tell).

Robert

Hmmm... Mr.Durick.... um I think you forgot to a) link the instructions or b) link the instructions??? ;-)

She's right, Durick. What're you trying to pull? And btw, I'm a novelist, and I don't know squat about boids.

Whilst we wait for Mr.Durick... We have lots of blue heron around here! It's kind of freaky when they come swooping through your front yard! And damned if I'm just too slow on the draw to get a pic of 'em when they do! The bald eagles last fall were awesome, but alas, again to slow on the draw.

BTW... "Who'da thunk it?" because I like SciFi?

I was taking a bike ride a few years ago and one of them--a bald eagle--landed on the ground about twenty feet ahead of me. An amazing sight. I stopped, of course, to stare at it, and a car coming up the road behind me, and one on the other side, stopped too, and we all just waited there, staring at the magnificent thing.

Seeyit, here.

It was the Victorians who seemed to know all the little pansies and chickadees, maybe a remnant of Romanticism -- I also would not know if I came across a field of daffodils. You're right, one can be a novelist without that, thence my parenthetical demurrer. I do think a novel needs a story.

Robert

I was just in the middle of this when Mr.Durick came to the rescue. That's a great link, here's my similar instructions focused only on inserting pictures in posts.

Step One: right click on whatever photo you want and save it in whatever file you've got handy

Step Two: open a free account with photobucket: http://photobucket.com/ (there's others; but I like photobucket best)

Step Three: Upload your copied picture into your photobucket account (nearly the exact same process as uploading your logo into LT on your profile page)

Step Four: With your uploaded pic before you, click on edit pictures or photos (I forget the exact language) and you'll see 4 lines of urls and whatnot appear; copy the second line (right click copy)

Step Five: open a post (preferably in Le Salon Litteraire) and paste your picture.

Step Six: You'll now need to write some brief "code" on each side of the url you've just copied.

For this example, a "less than" symbol will = { and a "greater than" symbol will = } Were I to use the less than/greater symbols, it would actually create a link to nowhere.

Okay, so you've got what you pasted in your post and just need to slap down some code on each side; here it is:

{img src="your copied url of your picture"} and that's it! Do note there IS a space between img and src.

Hope you'll try it out! I find it to be very fun. Btw, you can't post pics in comments; won't work; but you can post pics on your profile page,

Pandora decides as I draft a message that it is time for me to confirm that I am still here. Messages get confused. Pandora gets confused. I get confused.

I had for about 30 years (my first 30 years) seen eagles only in photographs. There was a time when I got to drive from time to time from Hawaii to El Toro Marine Corps Air Station. When there I liked to go to Lion Country Safari. An eagle there was pointed out to us. It was so quintessentially eagle that I swallowed hard; now as I remember it my eyes water.

In my college days it was a Victorian novelist or quasi-Victorian novelist that I wanted to be.

Robert

It was so quintessentially eagle that I swallowed hard; now as I remember it my eyes water.

Very good, Robert. That's what I was trying to say above, only not near as well. So I forgive you. For what, I can't at the moment recall.

Awesome, could take some time to prepare... to be continued...

thank you both, Mr.Durdick and EnriqueFreeque, for great instructions! Must accomplish a few chores first. Back soon

Feel free to trial and error; no harm no foul if it takes a few tries. Took me several before I got it. And I'd be remiss if I didn't give a shout-out to Medellia who took the time to instruct me how to do this about six months ago.

Guy it is. a city of the second class I will have you know, with a few over 500 folks in it. Our little group have about 10 acres on the outskirts. If you want a peek put 35 18 55 N 92 19 28 W into Google maps. The heron was I believe attracted to the frogs and other small critters in the stock pond on the south east border of the property. Mick is in reality Michael James O'Rourke II named for a personal hero of mine. He is a trial replacement for the mighty Ruckus - the wonder dog.

I assume, Tani, that you withdrew the pix because they were so humongous. But you absolutely must return with the next iteration. They are made for this thread!

My favorite walk in our neighborhood





My Papa at the bridge over Pringle Falls down the street:

It's hard to keep up with this thread today: it's like those rapids I glimpsed in Tani's photos before she-- Oh, there they are again. Spectacular neighborhood, tc53591.

>105 hippypaul:. I don't want to impinge on your privacy, Paul, but since you mentioned it, out of intense curiosity I must ask: "Our little group have about 10 acres on the outskirts." Is this an agglomeration of random people, a bon fide commune(!), or what?

LOL! that first one that worked scared the hell out of me! These were last August... I am going down tomorrow and take some updates. They have not opened the dam yet this year.

mmm mmm... smell ribs, must make rice. Ciao for now!

Well okay, Tani. Enjoy your ... what is it out there, lunchtime? I'm not an expert in these matters, but I'd say, judging from the looks of that roaring stream, you might be wise to move to higher ground before they open the dam. Oh, wait. Last August, you say. I think I should go get something to eat (it's past suppertime here). I'm feeling a bit light-headed, what with all this threadish activity.

Seriously, Peter... Dinner/Supper is between 5 and 6 in our home. Takes at least a half hour to cook rice. None of the instant crap here! ;-)

That tree under the bridge was what scared all of us last summer. There are at least 1-2 boats that either get away or try to go over the falls not realizing their impending trouble or are just stupid (there are signs upriver that tell you to get out). The year before we moved in a young man died and it took them two days and closing the dam to find his remains. Very sad.

Water levels should be less this year... Snow pack was low. must cook rice

Busy then hectic day on the thread. I feel as old as Porius. I think I'm going to lay down and watch a succession of basketball games.

89, tc,

Usually Enrique and the gang reserve formal welcomes for the welcome thread. But why not here?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EKRI10G-MAA

As for nature, it's pouring like hell and I've stopped the car several times tonight, to move the cold, masked Wood Frogs off our local country roads.

Amphibian "migration" is a really facsinating annual event, but it isn't pleasant seeing the carnage from cars.

They are cold and quiet now, but in the next couple of days, they'll be quacking away in our vernal pools:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7kYmB474-3U

Nature. We won tonight. Play Price of LA in the Div 4 finals with the winner to play the No. Cal. finalists. Very exciting to say the least. The old man has renewed vigor. Our young guys are tough as nails; we'll need to be tough as Price has 3 Div. 1 college players, 2 going to Cal. It's a rinkydink school though, our guys have to go to class and actually compete with the rest of the students. One of them will attend Yale Univ. next fall - he's an A student. Almost all of our guys are on the all-academic team -county wide.

Congratulations to the boys, Coach, and to you too. More anon, no doubt.

I suspect a commune would never do in this day and time. We have a group of relatives and old friends who work together on making a large garden and doing some farm type construction. We also do some second hand sales and several of us are medical types who work in the big city. Since the average age is late 40's it is a lot more of a co-op than a commune. (Grin).

That sounds to me more sensible, for people who are no longer what you'd call "young," than a commune; which in retrospect I think of as an education in the vagaries of human nature rather than a viable domestic environment. Not that I'm putting down that yearning for perfection when you and I (and perhaps everyone else) were younger. I still believe that in a perfect world (in which we transcend the nether side of human nature), the commune, and true anarchism (but not anarchy, as in chaos), would be the most creative way to live.

And that's my political discourse for the day ... and it ain't even 8:30 yet, and feels like only 7:30.

Samuel Johnson admitted that he had Latin whipt into him. I am a believer in great sacrifice. Or a relentless Gurdjieffian effort to be 'real' is the way to go. We turn the heat up on our young players each and everyday. There's nowhere to hide. There's no place for that peacelovedove rubbish on this vale of tears, is there?
Am I still awake? P.W., your comment about me being an old man has re-invigorated me - I may never sleep, again.

THE FEAR OF GOD

If you should rise from Nowhere up to Somewhere,
From being No one up to being Someone,
Be sure to keep repeating to yourself
You owe an arbitrary god
Whose mercy to you rather than to others
Won't bear too critical examination.
Stay unassuming. If for lack of license
To wear the uniform of who you are,
You should be tempted to make up for it
In a subordinating look or tone,
Beware of coming too much to the surface
And using for apparel what was meant
To be the curtain of the inmost soul.

Robert Frost
from STEEPLE BUSH 1947

I was just riffing on your own moaning and groaning about how old you are, Peter, at fifty-nine, or sixty, or whatever. And apparently it did some good (in this vale of tears) since you've been reinvigorated.

I've been into Gurdjieff, by the way; or a more accurate way to put it, into him by way of his interlocutor, P.D. Ouspensky. It ain't easy being real, but I'm doing my best ... well, no, actually it is easy being real, if you don't hide.

The Jesuits wouldn't let us hide very easily.

And Nature:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Li5Vpnde5do&feature=related

Between your poetic and musical offerings this morning, Peter, I'd say you're levitating.

Given this heady start to the day, an excerpt from "Digging Deeper," which I am still reworking:

She poured herself more wine, and sloshed more into her plate while trying to hold herself erect, her head wobbling on a slender neck like a wounded swan. Then it snapped up and she said, "So, Peter … when you look at all of us, in this room, what do you see? Do we seem … grotesque? You don’t seem alienated, but … it’s difficult to tell … "

I was about to dismiss her question, out of annoyance, but said instead, "Grotesque? Is that what you meant by 'surreal'?" And before she could formulate a response, added, "Because I don’t think of my writing as surreal, Maggie. I think of it as realistic."

Her chalky cheekbones flushed pink. "Oh, Peter, come on! How can anyone know what’s real?”

"Maybe we can’t, absolutely," I replied, "but we’re capable of seeing things the same way—maybe not objectively, but as Orwell says, we can strive for neutral fact—while observing our associations so our emotions don’t blindly determine our conclusions."

"Emotions," she countered angrily, "are not merely an impediment to what we conclude! They’re at the heart of it!"

"But they can also get in the way."

"In the way of what?"

"What we see, what we think."

"But surely what we feel is as significant as what we think … "

"I don’t disagree with that."

"Oh, Peter!" she blurted, falling back in her chair and flapping a hand at me. "You’re such a sophist!"

Surrealism, sophistry … it bothered me that I had only a vague notion what some of the terms she used meant. I’d come across them in college but hadn’t paid much attention. Only recently—reading books on my own, rather than because they’d been assigned, and less dismissive of what I didn't know—had I begun to challenge the lockjaw mind-set that what I knew was all I needed. But my self-education had been haphazard, which left me feeling obtuse around people like Maggie, who even drunk seemed to know more about what she was talking about than I did.

Ok, forgive me for the diversion from the pastoral and philosophical and instead, boring you with more Connecticut Yankee Bird lore.

Connecticut birders are crazy. This morning, they got up at the crack of dawn and drove down to Long Island Sound. Or, they jumped on one of the Long Island Ferries and froze their asses off in the wind, rain and quarter mile visibility of a good ol' NE nor'easter.

Long Island blocks us from the Ocean and turns our coast into an Oxygen-deprived, quiet cesspool. We need some dramatic events to get birds that those in MA, RI and SE Long Island take for granted. Who in CT wouldn't risk sleeplessness, seasickness and hypothermia for a fuzzy, fleeting and rare glimpse of an exceedingly abundant oceanic bird such as a kitiwake or dovekie?

I wouldn't. I slept in and listened to the wind, from my bed. Birders are crazy.

Where, exactly, do you live, sandy? From mention of the ferries, I assume not far from Bridgeport. I lived in Westport for a while, actually on the sound, at the estate of my former father-in-law (president of a chemical company headquartered in Stamford, if you can believe it)--it's all satirically in this book I'm still working on--where I was the friggin gardener, mowing the humongous lawn, trimming the hedges ... which accounts for my intimate knowledge of redwing blackbirds.

rw blackbirds don't enjoy sharing breakfast, smaller birds will get not much or nothing when they are feeding or on the puff.

copy,

I live in tiny Bethany. Your question reminds me of some Bill Bryson comments about traveling in England. Everything is such a long haul. A drive to New London or Bridgeport Ferry slips, is nothing in terms of mileage. But because we live in such a small state, these trips are percieved as huge journeys.

We don't run to eagles in England. The best we have are these boyos. Red Kites - disappeared a generation back but have recently been re introduced to the Chilterns (a range of hills to the north west of London) - and are now thriving, in fact undergoing a population explosion.

Buenos Dias, everyone! I really hate that springing forward thing... it hurts us night owls. Although waking up to Mama watching Flying Down to Rio is a crack up! Man they were risque for the 30s! Some of the costumes are amazing, especially the first one of Ginger Rogers and the Carioca dancers. The dance moves were amazing.

>114 Sandydog1: Sandydog1... Why thank you for that amusing welcome! Gotta love those stooges!

I also woke up to our songbirds who have started to come back. I even heard a few woodpeckers and rock doves. I do love spring! It's 11:25am and only 36 degrees, so my walk will have to wait. Looking forward to updating the river pics.

>129 Sandydog1:. That is certainly true, sandy, the smallness of a little state. As a press secretary for a bozo running for Congress, I used to travel from Westport up to Trumbull and then the Naugatuck Valley--Shelton, Derby, Ansonia, Seymour; depressed industrial towns (Bethany was there somewhere,), Beacon Falls, then the grapevine, Naugatuck, and finally Waterbury (with its cross on a hill, indicating Holyland)--and back again just about every other day. And it was no big deal, except to my digestive system, eating typical processed food along the way.

Naugatuck! How eerie! I used to work for a company based in Naugatuck. Spent one of the sickest nights of my life in a hotel at the Hartford airport. I was supposed to be there for a meeting that was canceled and they couldn't find me in St Louis to turn me back. I had a double ear infection and taking off and landing was horrendous! Thus my 1st cross country trip was a bust.

Yes, welcome to le salon tc53591! Enjoying your contributions greatly. Wish I lived close to a crik.

Chilly and damp out there today, and gray. Is this what I can expect, Northwest naturalists, when I make my yearly visit to Seattle in mid-April?

;-) Thanks, EnriqueFreeque! Too funny hearing the Deschutes described as a "crik"...

This just in:

Our South American correspondent has docked in Santiago, sees no evidence of the earthquake, says she'll send a full dispatch tomorrow.

I'm late to the party but welcome to Tania from Bend! It's so beautiful up there! And the Deschutes is one of Oregon's most beautiful rivers though it's #2 in my book because the Rogue is #1. Wait, the Columbia has to be up there somewhere too... Gosh we are lucky to live in such a great state aren't we?

Loved the great blue heron Hippypaul. We see a lot of them here - the Portland Rhododendron Garden which is a couple of blocks from where I live is on a lake with tons of waterfowl and I never get tired of seeing those huge beautiful birds.

Peter, glad to hear about your wife's travel updates! Porius, thanks for the Frost.

There you have it, folks. Three people ID'd Paul's boid in message #81 as a Great Blue Heron, and one idiot called it a crane. The heron wins, 3-1.

Sad but it's true.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KiNSCKtfVos&feature=related

I think I know whose woods these are.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XyOnK-L19TM&feature=related

POD OF THE MILKWEED

Calling all butterflies of every race
From source unknown but from no special place
They ever will return to all their lives,
Because unlike the bees they have no hives,
The milkweed brings up to my very door
The theme of wanton waste in piece and war
As it has never been to me before.
And so it seems a flower's coming out
That should if not be talked then sung about.
The countless wings that from the infinite
Make such a noiseless tumult over it
Do no doubt with their color compensate
For what the drab weed lacks of the ornate.
For drab it is its fondest must admit.
And yes, although it is a flower that flows
With milk and honey, it is bitter milk,
As anyone who ever broke its stem
And dared to taste the wound a little knows.
It tastes as if it might be opiate.
But whatsoever else it may secrete,
Its flowers' distilled honey is so sweet
It makes the butterflies intemperate.
There is no slumber in its juice for them.
One knocks another off from where he clings.
They knock the dyestuff off each other's wings -
With thirst on hunger to the point of lust.
They raise in their intemperance a cloud
Of mingled butterfly and flower dust
That hangs perceptibly above the scene.
In being sweet to these ephemerals
The sober weed has managed to contrive
In our three hundred days and sixty-five
One day too sweet for beings to survive.
Many shall come away as struggle-worn
And spent and dusted off of their regalia,
To which at daybreak they were freshly born,
As after one-of-them's proverbial failure
From having beaten all day long in vain
Against the wrong side of a windowpane.

But waste was of the essence of the scheme.
And all the good they did for man or god
To all those flowers they passionately trod
Was leave as their posterity one pod
With an inheritance of restless dream.
He hangs on upside down with talon feet
In an inquisitive position odd
As any Guatemalan parakeet.
Something eludes him. It is food to eat?
Of some dim secret of the good of waste?
He almost has it in his talon clutch.
Where have those flowers and butterflies all gone
That science may have staked the future on?
He seems to say the reason why so much
Should come to nothing must be fairly faced.

Robert Frost
from STEEPLE BUSH 1947

Distant pines are swooshing, catching the wind, and two birds are calling to each other.

Twirp-twirp-twirp-twirp.
Twirp-twirp-twirp.
Twirp-twirp-twirp. Twirp.
Twirp-twirp.

Or maybe not. Maybe just twirping to themselves.

What lovely prose to wake to... and then there's the twirp-twirp-twirpping. ;-)

Mornin', Gents... It is 24 degrees and dawn is breaking... The woodpeckers are pecking, the doves are cooing and the skunk has left his scent. Achhh!

Monday Monday, can't trust that day,
Monday Monday, sometimes it just turns out that way...

Good morning, Tani. While waiting for less intrepid people like yourself (and me) to wake up, drink their coffee, and maybe come by to be inspired, you might check out where we've already been on this thread and its predecessor. To bone up, so to speak, on the virtual personalities of the salon's naturalist, ever-changing community. Here's the link to the old thread:

http://www.librarything.com/topic/82276

Hi all. Have been away for a bit. First, to enjoy the sunny 60 degree days, then because the brutal nor'easter that ripped through the northeast over the weekend knocked out our internet, phones and water. We have all back now and are lucky because most of those around us also lost power and had major damage to their property. Tomorrow the sun and warmer weather are supposed to be back and I'll be outside trying to clean up the mess left behind.

Welcome Tani, glad to have you here! Hi Peter! Glad you've kept the thread alive.

Welcome back, teresa. I wondered where you went, figured your disappearance might've been weather related. It is a drag being without water, isn't it? But better days, or at least warmer ones, are ahead: tomorrow in fact, and the next day.

They were talking about it in the bread and soup bistro in town, and also that the local bookstore, The Golden Notebook, a Woodstock fixture forever, is for sale. I hadn't heard, and it came as a shock.

I walked up there after lunch to say hello to the owner, Barry Samuels, also a town fixture; a stoic man, not unfriendly, just matter-of-fact. He told me he had no choice but to sell the store, but was looking for a buyer who would run it the same way, though he said it in a tone that told me it was unlikely, or that it would even be a bookstore. This, amidst a clearly diminished scene, half the previous displays and piles of books gone, and less of them on shelves that were usually full.

There was a sadness in his eyes, and I had trouble looking directly at him. And when I told him I'd take my books "off his hands"--he had four copies left, of those he'd taken on consignment--and he went upstairs to get them, I felt bad, as if picking at a corpse.

From our South American correspondent:

Spent yesterday touring Valparaiso, a somewhat crumbling but charming city perched precariously on hills reached by funiculars. No real evidence of the earthquake either there or in Santaigo.

However, last night as we were enjoying a drink in a lovely candlelit courtyard in Santiago, the lights suddenly went out everywhere. No one seemed particularly upset, continued their conversations. I asked the bartender if this was normal, and he said no, and didn´t know when the lights would go back on. We were fairly nervous about getting back to the hotel in a blackout, but I said let´s just relax, like everyone else, and see what happens.

After about a half hour the lights went back on and everything went back to normal. We learned this morning that the electricity went off in ninety percent of Chile.

Well, waiting on Apria to show up before I can walk down to the bridge for new pics. Papa found out this morning that he will be needing to use oxygen during sleep and when walking or exerting himself. Just one more thing to add to his already frustrating situation with Parkinson's. He's in the early stages (has been for 3 years that we know about) and we think his meds are dialed in, but shit just keeps hittin' the fan in his life. He used to be an avid golfer and has no hobbies to speak of. I have gotten him back into Tom Clancy and his favorite character, Jack Ryan. He has already read them all but found that his memory is just as shot as the rest of his body is becoming. So a re-read is good for him. Personally, I Love to re-read old series.

Any suggestions on where I can direct him when he finishes Clancy? I tried to get him to read Greg Iles (why is the touchstone for Iles not working?) but he couldn't get into them. He also loved the Joel C. Rosenberg novels. He needs something fast paced and thrilling I suppose. Something to suck him in. Mom loves the hystericals, so no hope there.

Trouble is... when he does get sucked in, He reads all day and most of the evening and I can't keep him books. Some suggestions would help get him to the library, I hope.

Come on Apria! I wanna go walk!!!!

As promised here are the updates of the river...

The bridge today (compare with pic above @107)


The view from the bridge upriver


Same view last summer


Downstream looking towards bridge


Last summer


I love this place

The Frost stuff reminded me of one of my favorite poems, which seemed apropos: GM Hopkins' "The Windhover"

I caught this morning morning’s minion, king-
dom of daylight’s dauphin, dapple-dawn-drawn Falcon, in his riding
Of the rolling level underneath him steady air, and striding
High there, how he rung upon the rein of a wimpling wing
In his ecstasy! then off, off forth on swing,
As a skate’s heel sweeps smooth on a bow-bend: the hurl and gliding
Rebuffed the big wind. My heart in hiding
Stirred for a bird,—the achieve of; the mastery of the thing!

Brute beauty and valour and act, oh, air, pride, plume, here
Buckle! And the fire that breaks from thee then, a billion
Times told lovelier, more dangerous, O my chevalier!

No wonder of it: shéer plód makes plough down sillion
Shine, and blue-bleak embers, ah my dear,
Fall, gall themselves, and gash gold-vermillion.

Frost and GMH both were keen observers of Nature.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qSgv5panhKc
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YKjy7YrT2vs&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bP_ulOQ5ivU&feature=related
SPRING AND FALL
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6pybod5nNGM&feature=related
THE WINDHOVER
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vMlwqpy4dk0&feature=related

> tc53591 re: Tom Clancy types - you might check out Larry Bond , Frederick Forsyth or Harold Coyle . There are variations between the authors but they are all thrillers with a military slant.

You're a good man, Paul, stepping up with those suggestions for Tani. I edit action adventure stories all the time, and a good deal of military stuff, but my mind went blank when I tried to come up with a name.

As for nature: what with Tani's pix and the Gerard Manley Hopkins offerings from Sutpen and Porius, it seemed superfluous to add anything this morning. And I'm still mourning the demise of The Golden Notebook.

FREE GIVEAWAY !!!!

With three unexpected copies of I Think, Therefore Who Am I? now in my hands, due to the death of the local bookstore (I gave the fourth copy to a local unknown poet, who tells me he did a reading with Allen Ginsberg in 1956), I would like to honor the deceased store with a wake, of sorts. There are, however, two conditions (so the giveaway is not totally free, after all):

1. Offer not applicable to those who already have a copy of the book.

2. Though there is no requirement that winners have to review or rate the book, but they should enter it in their LT libraries.

First three to accept the offer get the book.

please, please. Peter???? I would love to have a copy of I Think, Therefore Who Am I!

Thanks, Paul for the suggestions. I will definitely try those out for Papa.

Peter, I am truly sorry about your local bookstore, that would crush me. In another life (when I was gainfully employed) I lived in my local bookstore... spent most of my spending money there. What a sad state of things.

Thanks for the condolences, Tani. There's no need to plead: you're a bona fide winner, one of the first three to respond. Tell me your address in a private message and I'll send a copy pronto.

Two copies left ...

.

My condolences about the bookstore, Peter. There have been far too many independent stores disappear.

During my last trip to LA I lived for a bit in an apartment above a sort of Bodega. It was a wonderful store that had a fair selection of food, beer, and three racks of second hand books. It was also open 7/24. A wonderful one stop shop after a rough shift at the hospital. I realize that it fulfills no ones definition of an independent local bookstore but it was what came to mind while reading the above.

Happy Day!

The sun is shining... the birds chirping... the golden mantles are flitting about, the gray squirrels are throwing pine cones down from the very tippy tops of the ponderosa pines... the crocus and a few daffodils are peaking out, the snow is almost gone... Spring is so very close! (At 4.2kish feet these are all very good signs!)

Wishing you a rainbow
For sunlight after showers—
Miles and miles of Irish smiles
For golden happy hours—
Shamrocks at your doorway
For luck and laughter too,
And a host of friends that never ends
Each day your whole life through!

Erin Go Braugh! Get yer Green on!

"You're a good man, Paul, stepping up with those suggestions" Full disclosure requires that I confess that I used Barnes & Noble's 'people who read this would like that' feature to generate the selections.

You're still a good man, Paul, just one who needs help ... as do we all. Women too.

Just back from JFK (sometimes it seems I run a limousine service around here) to pick up our South American corespondent.

On the two hour ride back north, she told me that the cruise company charged 75 cents a minute to use the computer, which was why her dispatches were so few and spare: she left out the adjectives that would have better conveyed the gorgeousness of the glaciers and volcanoes, and she did not mention the funky city of Valparaiso at all, with its houses perched on hills not unlike those in the Italian Cinque Terre (where me and the missus have been). Buenos Aires, she said, is cosmopolitan but run down. Santiago, Chile, surprisingly, is in better shape, even after the earthquake.

Flora update from Louisiana:

"The white impatiens that were frozen to mush are sprouting from the roots. They are small but blooming. I think that they will do fine with fertilizer once the ground warms up. The red hibiscus in the rock garden has a few leaves at the base. It may come back but probably not bloom this year. The little lavender lantana growing around the palm trees near the deck are in full bloom. I cut the huge split-leaf philodendron but have not seen any sign of life yet.

The violets are really growing well now. I wish I could get them to grow in a bed. My mother had a spot with nothing but them when I was a kid. Beautiful! The purple and gold violas at the mailbox are still full of blooms. I'll keep them growing until it gets hot, then the daisys will bloom.

Tomorrow I'll look for braided ficus."

Sounds, lovely Jane.

It has been so cold overnight that the soil around the crocus and daffodils rises up to protect them then recedes during the day. I have never seen this happen before. We've only been up here for a year. Our last home was at 1300 feet in the valley below Mt. Hood. The high desert is going to be a challenge albeit a wonderful one. I will take the dry extremes any day over the damp, dank, gray of the valley.

The highs are supposed to be in the mid to upper 60s but being so high up at 4200ish the lows are in the teens still.

It is 10am and 30 degrees with the most amazing blue sky and just the slightest of breezes.

Soil rising and sinking back is called "heaving" and is not good for plants. It dislodges them from their compact home in the soil and can eventually lift them right out of the ground. You need to cover them with several inches of mulch.

I wish I had time to read all posts to this point, but I don't. If I cover territory already covered by others please forgive me.

I'm sitting on my side porch right now. Listening to the wind chimes, the squirrels, and the birds. A little freshet just stirred the branches and my neighbor's coming (at this point I saw my BIL coming down the hill in his Mule. He and I broke out the Ford tractor and took down an ugly old, nineteen eighties style satellite dish that was obstructing my view from this side) and I want him to give me a hand.

When I figure out how, I'll post pictures of the new spread.

P.S. Peter, I'm going to break out your book today and start in on it. I'm so behind in my scheduled reads that I can take some timeout for you. I have a couple of books to find in my library which currently resides in fifty boxes. I intentionally made the decision not to mark the contents of the box on the box itself. That way all boxes will be opened and dealt with over the course of hunting one or two specific items. My wife didn't like this plan, but hey, it's working.

One of the books I need is a how-to on the life of a country squire, or hobby farmer, a name I don't exactly cotton to. I prefer country squire.

Green Acres is the place to be...

167: Gene, you sound "to the manor born"! Looking forward to pics.

Really beautiful day today. Hundreds of people on the bridge right now. Makes me want to skip out on the end of work today.

Hey, Gene: Saw you ranting on another thread so it seems you're already getting acclimated to your new digs; that is, finding your old "self."

Gave a copy of my book to a 79-year-old poet in town, a local character, who told me he used to be a plumber on Bleecker Street, in the so-called West Village (during the time of Gerdie's Folk City), and was working under a sink fixing the pipes of Joan Baez and Dylan while they played in the next room. And that he did a poetry reading with Ginsberg in 1956, which I actually believe.

The book giveaway in honor of my lost local bookstore: only one taker. I gotta admit, it bums me out that I can't even give my book away to you paskunyaks who don't have a copy (except for Tani), which is why I boycotted this thread for two days. And to add insult to annoyance, no one even noticed.

Just got back from my first bike ride of the year, but only went five miles instead of my usual nine. The legs are good, but the lungs need to cut back on smoke.

Gene, if you blog about your surroundings, I'll be a reader for sure. Your new life sound glorious, sorry it came from such a sad event.

Peter, your book is in my reading queue. I should get to it in the next couple of weeks and I can't wait.

We continue to have this amazing weather here in the New York area. It's 73 degrees again today and I'm going back outside to enjoy it.

Peter, I noticed, but figured you were working. I actually thought that maybe I had shewed everyone away! I was having so much fun and then... nada, zip, zilch... except for Jane and her lovely musings on her flora.

And as far as that other thing in that other thread... :-p!

And now I will retire to my 52 degree weather and fill my lungs with smoke.

tani: I am barely literate in emoticon. What does :-p1 mean? Not that what happens on other threads concerns me, or should concern you. I am a very pugnacious character on some of them; a take no prisoners kinda guy. Concerning which: you smoke? Seems I'll have to rethink you now.

gene: It occurs to me you are now the thread's first georgian. My brother became part of the landed gentry a few years ago; bought a spread in Virginia, has a few horses. It amuses me no end, this former kid from Brooklyn, trying to ride a horse.

Yikes! Thank you Gene for the info on "heaving" soil. Will get mulching soonest. I was just glad that they survived our first winter! We had a couple of weeks of subzero temps (-26 degrees on the coldest morning) in Nov/Dec and was not sure they made it. The ice/snow has only melted in the last week around where I planted them. Having lived in the valley most of my life, never really had that happen.

Peter ~ :-p is me sticking my tongue out at you for scolding me in Hobnob when clearly I was not referring to you and your book in any way. I was referencing that at that time none of the authors had started a give-away thread in Hobnob until after I mentioned it.

#73

And yes, I smoke. ;-)

But never in the house. And not around Papa anymore since he just started taking oxygen for walking and when he sleeps.

Although Spring officially starts tomorrow, I am pretty sure we have had our Spring in Chicago. We are wrapping up three beautiful days in the mid-sixties with sunshine. The bases of the rose bushes are green, and the bulbs are pushing up. Tomorrow--when Spring officially starts--our forecast is for up to an inch of snow. March in Chicago! And, we will probably keep on the temperature roller coaster until it goes from 50 to 90 in a couple of days.

Yes indeed: whatever the weather says or doesn't say, today is the Spring Equinox, aka the first day of spring, because the sun is now where it is in the sky.

Also the first day of Aries. Hence a quote from The Astrology of Personality, the Dane Rudhyar astrological classic, published in 1936. From the "Degrees of the Zodiac and the 'Sabian' Symbols."

At one degree of Aries; that is, anyone born on this day should recognize the following metaphor:

A WOMAN HAS RISEN FROM THE OCEAN; A SEAL EMBRACES HER. Potentiality of selfhood; the individual is emerging from the collective and realizes self for the first time.

I suspect, my friend, that this thread is somewhat of a preselected population. Many of the readers might have, as I do, a copy of your fine work.

One other person did come forth, Paul, in a private message to me, so I've now disbursed two books out of the three, which somewhat ameliorates my annoyance.

What a great word, Pierre...ameliorates, and then to use it for alliterative purposes in conjunction with "annoyance." Always the writer, Pierre. I do love it.

Never occurred to me, Henri. I guess my brain is just wired that way.

Porius has been oddlly silent on this thread of late. Is poetry not of the moment? Is he involved in preparations for Francis Parker's upcoming game, or perhaps his team has already played and become the Kansas to a Northern Iowa team from California?

And on that front, will my two upstate teams, Cornell and Syracuse, win today? And health care, which is also in my bracket? And what about my other computer, which lies dormant, having been abandoned by technicians in India or the Philippines?

Lotta questions. And this the second day of spring, when I should be rejoicing.

Wonderful spring! Spent all of yesterday sitting in the park with some friends. Today I shall start my herb garden for the year.

Happy first full day of spring to all. Jane, I'm right behind you on the herb garden.

No planting in Chicago! Yesterday it snowed all day and the wind was out of the northeast blowing the snow sideways. None of it stuck, thank heaven. I had to drive down Lake Shore Drive and the lake was quite "angry" as my young cousin used to say. A northeast wind does that--blows the full length of the lake and by the time it gets to us the water is quite a mess.

Hold on, Lisa. Spring is a'comin'! I know this for sure because I made a salad Nicoise the other day, and I only make that when the weather gets springlike. (When I get a chance, I'll give y'all my secret recipe.)

Wayle, as "Dutch" Reagan would say, we lost in State semi-final. Season is over. I'm headed to the desert for a couple of days. Poetry will resume, not to worry. Springtime in desert is splendidious.

It's Natures' Way.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YsTK2LHZKPQ&feature=related

That's the way to do it, Peter: get out of town. Why not? As we used to say in Brooklyn every time the Dodgers lost to the Yankees in the World Serious (as Ring Lardner put it): Wait till next year.

Nature comes in small sizes also.

Ah, but there was that most fabulous of seasons, culminating in the Johnny Padres 2-0 win over those hated Yankees.

Ah yes, Gene. That most sublime of days. I just wrote a long diathesis on Jonathon's thread about the sixties, in response to your own, but I'd much rather be here, basking in nostalgia. Jackie and Roy and Dook and Gil and Peewee. I choke up even typing the names.

As Odysseus knew, the Siren song is death. I hate that. I've got some top notch, A-1 nostalgia, but living in the past makes it awfully hard to move forward. My present is not nearly as delicious as my past, but as I must constantly remind myself, it's all I've got.

We should set up a sixties nostalgia thread. While the sixties certainly celebrated the new mother nature, I'm not sure they were all that natural.

Yes, I'm for that, and in fact Enrique just said, over at Jonathon's thread, that he would launch it toot sweet.

I should note that spending so much time delving back there to write one book, and now this other, I probably live there more than most. And I'd also cite something George Orwell said, somewhere (he did write a lot), that nostalgia is okay, so long as we remember that it's what it is: nostalgia.

Yeah, I tried from memory to come up with the Yankee and Dodger lineups for 1955. Most of the people I set at various positions played them at some point in the fifties, just not necessarily in 1955. The point being we get the distant past about 80% right in the overall and about 40% in the particular.

You guys reminded me of this:

“So whether we were spray-painting buildings or starting food co-ops, the point was transformation: stopping the war, changing the world, saving something beyond our own skins. The cost of our idealism was the fuel it took; we didn’t know then, couldn’t have borne knowing, that most forms of deliverance carry a caveat of impermanence. A lot of us faltered or crashed when we realized that, when we saw that hope wasn’t infinite or unconditional, and that we would have to save ourselves. Some of what happened was the inevitable breakthrough to adulthood, when you land, unscathed, and see that not everybody made it. Then you must go on, as Beckett’s narrator insists, and so you go on.

We went to softer climes: medical school, motherhood, social advocacy jobs. A few people went to jail, or to alternative meccas hidden in the landscape across the country or to some obscurity more subdued and saner than what we had shared. But then true stories always end with asterisks, with finessed dreams or rag and bone choices that take you somewhere other than where you intended. The trick is to let a time like ours shape you utterly without its becoming the apex of your life. The trick is to relinquish the drama and walk out of the fire, burnished and whole, and hold on to its legacies with out looking back. Otherwise, you fall prey to your own brilliant possibility; you become Updike’s Rabbit Angstrom, muddling along in your melancholia, married first and always to the amber past.”

A Strong West Wind by Gail Caldwell

On a more nature-y note: I saw some forsythia blooming today, always one of the first bushes to arrive and a harbinger of spring. We usually don't see them until early April. I saw them in Newark, just enough south of where I am to make a difference, maybe?

Here, in the Atlanta area, things are late. However, the Forsythia are out in full and gorgeous. In Texas the daffodils are done and gone. Here they are blooming full bore, as are the hyacinths. I have a Japanese Maple off my sitting porch (I only have one porch, but it circumscribes the entire house, so different sections get different names, front porch, back porch, sitting porch and so forth are all the same porch) whose buds are a day or two from being fully opened. The Azaleas are just now budding and dogwoods have yet to show life.

There is no place on the faith of the earth

Here, in the Atlanta area, things are late. However, the Forsythia are out in full and gorgeous. In Texas the daffodils are done and gone. Here they are blooming full bore, as are the hyacinths. I have a Japanese Maple off my sitting porch (I only have one porch, but it circumscribes the entire house, so different sections get different names, front porch, back porch, sitting porch and so forth are all the same porch) whose buds are a day or two from being fully opened. The Azaleas are just now budding and dogwoods have yet to show life.

There is no place on the face of the earth more beautiful than Atlanta in April. An entire city that looks like the links on which the Master's is played.

Excellent passage, teresa. I like to think I held on to the legacy, but how could I write about it without looking back?

I've been meaning to post this all day but got tied up with the deleted expletives at Hewlett-Packard. Anyway, here it is, as promised:

Salad Nicoise
(two meals worth, for two people)

3 modest (not large) cans of light, not chunk white or albacore, tuna
1 pound French (not American) green beans
6 smallish (big enough to grip in five fingers) poatoes (I use red ones)
1 passel of Nicoise olives
4 hardboiled eggs
1 large can kernel (not sweet) corn
lettuce leaves (I like Boston lettuce)
1 passel of capers (if desired)

Dressing:
whatever you prefer, but I go with:
extra virgin olive and balsamic vinegar, especially since it marinates and preserves leftover salad

Dump into a large bowl:
Cans of tuna fish (the light is more flavorful than the white or albacore)
Cooked then refrigerated (French) green beans
Cooked potatoes (till soft, not mushy) then refrigerated (sliced into bowl)
olives and kernel corn
capers (if desired)

Add preferred dressing and toss, then refrigerate

To serve:

Place bed of lettuce on two plates and set equal portion of salad on each
Slice a hardboiled egg atop each salad
(repeat this preparation for leftover salad, which should be enough for another meal)

Eat

>199 copyedit52: The trick is to let a time like ours shape you utterly without its becoming the apex of your life.

Sounds like that's what you did, Peter. And thanks for the salad recipe. Sounds great.

THE THREE HERMITS

Three old hermits took the air
By a cold and desolate sea,
First was muttering a prayer,
Second rummaged for a flea;
On a windy stone, the third,
giddy with his hundredth year,
Sang unnoticed like a bird:
'Though the Door of Death is near
And what waits behind the door,
Three times in a single day
I, though upright on the shore,
Fall asleep when I should pray.'
So the first, but now the second:
'We're but given what we have earned
When all thoughts and deeds are reckoned,
So it's plain to be discerned
That the shades of holy men
Who have failed, being weak of will,
Pass the Door of Birth again,
And are plagued by crowds, until
They've the passion to escape.'
Moaned the other, 'They are thrown
Into some most fearful shape.'
But the second mocked his moan:
'They are not changed to anything,
Having loved God once, but maybe
To a poet or a king
Or a witty lovely lady.'
While he rummaged rags and hair,
Caught and cracked his flea, the third,
Giddy with his hundredth year,
Sang unnoticed like a bird.

W.B. Yeats
from RESPONSIBILITIES 1914

Back on the horse again, I see, Peter. Some more citations for the thread library:

Steeple Bush by Robert Frost
Responsibilities by W.B. Yeats
"The Windhover," Gerard Manley Hopkins
"The Swans," Ruben Dario
"The Song of the Pines," Ruben Dario

And citing another Yeats, in a message below:

The Winding Stair and Other Poems by W.B. Yeats

for any ruffian of the sky
your kingbird doesn’t give a damn—
his royal warcry is I AM
and he’s the soul of chivalry

in terror of whose furious beak
(as sweetly singing creatures know)
cringes the hugest heartless hawk
and veers the vast most crafty crow

your kingbird doesn’t give a damn
for murderers of high estate
whose mongrel creed is Might Makes Right
—his royal warcry is I AM

true to his mate his chicks his friends
he loves because he cannot fear
(you see it in the way he stands
and looks and leaps upon the air)

73 poems
e.e. cummings

Crocuses coming up with early grass.

FOR ANNE GREGORY

'Never shall a young man,
Thrown into despair
By those great honey-coloured
Ramparts at your ear,
Love you for yourself alone
And not your yellow hair.'

'But I can get a hair-dye
And set such colour there,
Brown, or black, or carrot,
That young men in despair
May love me for myself alone
And not my yellow hair.'

'I heard an old religious man
But yesternight declare
That he had found a text to prove
That only God, my dear,
Could love you for yourself alone
And not your yellow hair.'

W.B. Yeats
from THE WINDING STAIR AND OTHER POEMS (1933)

Jane and Teresa working on their herb gardens, Gene seeing the forsythia in full bloom in Georgia, Paul with his pix of the oh so purple crocuses sprouting in Arkansaw, Tani prematurely planting before a frost set in (in the Deschutes Valley, is it called?), Lisa bemoaning snow in Chicago (presumably melted by now) ...

And here upstate it's chilly in the morning, in this in between season, when you know what's coming but it isn't here yet. But that's okay with me--I'm an astological creature of transition, on the cusp, with sun and moon in malleable houses--and this is usually the most productive of times. It's when things are settled that I come apart at the seams.

Awww, Peter! I really liked your ruminations... sorry that you pulled them!

Well, Salonistas, I am home and taking a break from my genealogical questing. *Phew* am I exhausted... I have traced one line back to 1292 Britain, one to 1640ish Britain (though I got distracted with that one) and having a blast! My inspiration was initially from my Mom and when I started reading a thread last Friday here on LT I scrambled over to ancestry.com and a few other sites and have been obsessed since. I feel like a sleuth and have unlocked a few mysteries in my family already.

Had a beautiful drive home from "The Valley" (Willamette valley) and am so very glad to be home up in the high desert next to my favorite Deschutes River. My bulbs (that were planted last fall, Peter) are flourishing even after a 1" snowfall on Monday morning. Came home to many more popping up and I am grateful for that, considering the pain I endured planting them!

Temps in Portland were wonderfully in the high 60s while we were there and a nice 64 up here at 4200ft as we pulled in around 5:30pm.

Am very glad to be home and have a wonderful tale of the 60s to start reading this evening. Who could ask for anything more?

What's to report about Nature here in San Diego. The skies are blue. Room temperature. Things are about as exciting as a town hall meeting with Tom Daschle

WORDS

I had this thought a while ago,
'My darling cannot understand
What I have done, or what would do
In this blind bitter land.'

And I grew weary of the sun
Until my thoughts cleared up again,
Remembering that the best I have done
Was done to make it plain;

That every year I have cried, 'At length
My darling understands it all,
Because I have come into my strength,
And words obey my call';

That had she done so who can say
What would have shaken from the sieve?
I might have thrown poor words away
And been content to live.

1910
from THE GREEN HELMET AND OTHER POEMS

Citation on the above poem:

The Green Helmet, and Other Poems by W. B. Yeats

On the room temperatureness of California weather: Don't mean to start a geographical feud, but it's one reason why I left, came back East to the more changeable spring-summer-fall-winter.

One book left, btw, in the Mourning a Bookstore Giveaway, referred to above as "a wonderful tale of the 60s," sight unseen (whatta girl!). Giveaway expires on Friday.

Alas, spring is so elusive on the high desert... woke to more snow, a dusting really. Blustery now and will wrap myself in a blanket, snuggle up and read.

211> That's "Firecracker" to you, Mr Weissman. ;-)

Took an actual hike today, on a Catskill Mountain trail. The ground was soggy from all the rain we got over the weekend, and perhaps from snowmelt too. And parts of the trail, before it to began to climb, were sprawling ponds. But it was good, to be out there in nature, walking around, listening to the peepers, spotting a hawk or two.

AAACK!! Gale force winds in Chicago today. Looking out of my 28th floor office window at the lake I saw white caps, waves breaking over the breakwalls and grey-green water. Yes, the snow has melted, and despite the nasty feel to the air no more expected right now. I feel very sorry for the crocuses poking up, however, and wonder what my neighbor down the block was thinking when he/she planted pansies already. Just a Chicagoan's nature, I guess. Eternally hoping for an early and lasting spring, and waiting for next year for the Cubs.

A YOUNG BIRCH

The birch begins to crack its outer sheath
Of baby green and show the white beneath,
As whosoever likes the young and slight
May well have noticed. Soon entirely white
To double day and cut in half the dark
It will stand forth, entirely white in bark,
And nothing but the top a leafy green -
The only native tree that dares to lean,
Relying on its beauty, to the air.
(Less brave perhaps than trusting are the fair.)
And someone reminiscent will recall
How once in cutting brush along the wall
He spared it from the number of the slain,
At first to be no bigger than a cane,
And then no bigger than a fishing pole,
But now at last so obvious a bole
The most efficient help you ever hired
Would know that it was there to be admired,
And zeal would not be thanked that cut it down
When you were reading books or out of town.
It was a thing of beauty and was sent
To live its life out as an ornament.

Robert Frost
from STEEPLE BUSH
1947

Today is Robert Frost's birthday.
26 March 1874 (San Fran) - 29 Jan. 1963 Boston, Mass.)

Happy Birthday, Robert Frost

I used to take birch trees for granted because they were a common sight, and then I didn't think much of them because they're too soft to make good firewood--when I used to fire up the woodstove every evening, with hickory, maple, and ash. But now that I rarely see them, and I'm less fire-oriented, I do appreciate its peely white bark with black spotting, resembling a delicate Japanese woodcut.

Jeez! There was a frost last night, and a breezy chill this morning. Thank you, Chicago.

Forty degrees. Snow showers. Gloom. Sigh, where did spring go?

"Aaack!!"

I am totally with you, Lisa... We are now beginning the affects of March going out like a lion.



My poor, poor bulbs!

Yipes! Glad it's still reasonable here...at least no snow.

This morning I awoke to a a little dove pacing and woo-oo-ooing on our air conditioner. Quite a good alarm clock.

Tani,

I hope it melts soon!!! I think your bulbs should be okay if it does.

Our winds have died down, and it is back to "average"--around 50 degrees. I passed the neighbor's pansies on my way home today, and they look a little bent--as if they were still hiding--but I think they survived despite below freezing temps last night. Tonight it should stay above freezing. In the morning, we do hear the birds again. Yes, even in the city!

Yesterday's NCAA college basketball scores: 59-52, 76-73, 72-49, 70-57.

Does anyone still have a horse in this race?

Partial scores 45 - , 32 - , 14 - . Sorry very old joke but it could not be resisted.

Wonderful day yesterday almost 70°. Got out and took a huge number of photos that are yet to be processed. I will restrain myself, however, this is not a photo blog.

I would have to agree on the California weather. I spent my elementary school days in Oakland and returned to the left coast several times as an adult (more or less) to live and work. The sameness works on your head after awhile.

222> Not me man. With UCLAs absence this year, hard to work up much interest in the tourney. I was pulling for No. Iowa since their upset of KA was just phenomenal to behold. Right now I'll pull for anybody who plays Duke, the equivalent to me of the hated Celtics of the NBA.

80 degrees. Santa Anas. Blue sky. Shorts, flip-flops, tanktop. Yeaaaahhhhhh.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BBOQiMxwk1o

I've got the pics of the new digs but don't know how to load them into a post. Help! I don't want to use some public picture site because ... well, just because. Any help?

The hyacinths are in full bloom, as is the Japanese Maple (or so I'm told, it looks like a Tulip Poplar to me, but hey, what does this city boy know). Leaves are busting out on the hydrangea, the edible pears (don't know what variety) are budding, roses are leafing out, azaleas are budding, too, the day-lilies (which don't bloom from what I'm told) are returning and the fish are starting to hit the surface of the pond early in the AM although it's still a bit cool for them. Two Canadian Geese have made the pond their home and have, from time to time, chased away other geese who think they've found a respite on the journey north. All in all it's pretty bucolic.

Spring is springing way down yonder in the paw-paw patch.

See posts 97 & 98 in this thread: full instructions on how to upload pics right there.

I'm not aware of any way of uploading pics into a post w/out using a pic site as part of the process. I prefer photobucket to the others. It's free and a surprisingly simple process (once you do it a couple times), even with the picture site involved.

Give it a shot, Gene! This here proletariat on his miniscule 0.2 acre-plot can't wait to see how the other half lives.

I do love that song, Enrique, more than Billy Joel, and infinitely more than Frank Sinatra, singing about New York. But how the waves rolling in reminds him of the Statue of Liberty: that could have used some serious editing.

Gene: get those pix up! Sounds like you're living amidst a fongooling jungle.

Let's see if this does anything.



The view of the house across the pond from my own private road (well, sort of, my BIL & family, about twenty people use this road as well). Everything you see: house, pond, woods belong to the manor.



The Sitting Porch



How I get around my estate. Transportation.



Heat. As my wife says, Hank Hill would be so proud.



Neighbors. Just up the hill and around the bend and down the road not more than a half mile is Hwy. 92, the main drag through Woodstock with 10 solid miles on either side of upscale strip malls and such. We are absolutely in the heart of suburbia.

To put these shots in perspective--particularly the first photo, which resembles the summer camps I used to go to as a boy--consider the following December 1, 2009, exchange from the first "underappreciated author" thread:

Message 36: copyedit52

Cold and crisp this morning; I like it. But with the leaves all fallen, I can see my neighbor's house. Well, you can't have everything, can you?

Message 37: geneg

Braggart! I can't see anything but neighbors, with or without leaves. The view from my window sucks!

It's changed now! I have been told by the time the trees all leaf out I won't be able to see any neighbors at all. But you know, leaves bring their own problems and lots of leaves bring lots of problems. Most of the hardwoods are Sweet Gum trees and they are just as trashy as can be. For a person buried in pine straw I hate pines and am buried deep in secret plans to take down every one I can find.

So far I'M LOVING IT!! I wake up every morning asking myself how this happened to me. Of course this is all through my wife, so I don't feel too proprietary.

228 - Beautiful!

222 - Since my basketball team is shameful, I decided to go for Kentucky though I'm rooting for Tennessee as well - cousin-in-law went there.

>228 geneg: Very nice photos. Not too different from our place. You have a good bit more water. We have only a small stock pond but it has a spring in it so it stays full, too full after a few days of rain. We also share transportation choices. We have between the whole crowd 2 golf carts and an ATV. The ATV is usually only used if something needs a good pull.

geneg, are you pinching yourself? It looks wonderful!

Saw my first robin today--on the Chicago weather roller coaster.

Yuccas of 2 varieties are in bloom in San Diego county from now through May. Year after year, the Mojave yucca YUCCA SHIDIGERA sends up a blunt flower stalk of white, waxy blossoms from the same base - a rosette of dagger-like leaves. The shimmering white exclamation point that unfolds above "Our Lord's Candle" YUCCA WHIPPLEI on the other hand, is a prelude to the plant's imminent death. Mojave yucca is widely distributed along San Diego county's coastal strip and throughout the higher elevations of the Anza-Borrego Desert. Our Lords Candle prefers the scrubby coastal foothills and the drier slopes of the Palomar, Cuyamaca, and Laguna mountains. The 2 yuccas coexist with each other in a few small areas like Torrey Pines State Reserve and Anza-Borrego's Culp Valley area.

Por-Man, I love Yuccas. With the wet winter we got they should be out in full force this year. Examples of CA Southwest Desert Beauty:

http://diglloyd.com/articles/Recommended/images-lights/YuccasFlowering.jpg

http://www.terragalleria.com/pictures-subjects/yuccas/

SPRING POOLS

These pools that, though in forests , still reflect
The total sky almost without defect,
And like the flowers beside them, chill and shiver,
Will like the flowers beside them soon be gone,
And yet not out by any brook or river,
But up by roots to bring dark foliage on.

The trees that have it in their pent-up buds
To darken nature and be summer woods -
Let them think twice before they use their powers
To blot out and drink up and sweep away
These flowery waters and these watery flowers
From snow that melted only yesterday.

from WEST-RUNNING BROOK 1928
Robert Frost

oh, by the way, great stuff, EF.

The bees have returned to our Bradford Pear in the back lot. Who could resist posting that.

With the time it takes for photobucket to load onto my computer, and the outpouring of photos on this thread, it's clear I need to get more memory for my relatively old computer (eight years old now, which in human time makes it probably about ninety years old). Great stuff, though. I like it that through the meme of "nature," we get a glimpse of each other in a way that occurs only intellectually on other threads.

I really like http://www.flickr.com/ better. I don't know if it is that much faster but they give you the HTML already done to copy. Makes it easy for me. I keep telling myself that I will learn HTML but I stay busy enough trying to get on top of Photoshop that it moves further and further into the future.

Actually, I had absolutely no problem with photobucket. It gave me four urls, one for each potential application. My only problem came in creating the img command and figuring out what the height and width should be so as not to cause scrolling. But once I got that done, no problem.

Peter, it sounds like you really, really need to upgrade to a new PC. If you're a PC guy, decent upgrades are available for @ $400 - $600. If you are a Mac guy, this would be a good time to pick up a PC for about $400 - $500 to tide you over until those thousands of dollars for a new Mac show up.

I know that a new computer would solve the problem, since when I use my wife's newer, more powerful machine (it's in the repair shop at the moment), the thread, and other things, come up quickly. But I can't get a Mac--unless I keep this older one solely for editing, which maybe I should consider--because two out of the three publishers I freelance for (the third sends me old-fashioned paper manuscripts) have templates I attach to Word (to style and do other things), and they're made only for PCs.

I'll figure it out. The money, fortunately, is no problem, what with me being an eccentric millionaire and all.

Buy a new computer, Pierre - and fast!

My Saturday (3-27-10) in a nutshell: Blue sky palm laden sandy seashore bliss....

I totally would, Enrique old buddy, but I think we have enough copies of that guy's books lyin' around. ;D

No star by the name of Wormwood.

78
THE MORE LOVING ONE

Looking up at the stars, I know quite well
That, for all they care, I can go to hell,
But on earth indifference is the least
We have to dread from man or beast.

How should we like it were stars to burn
With a passion for us we could not return?
If equal affection cannot be,
Let the more loving one be me.

Admirer as I think I am
Of stars that do not give a damn,
I cannot, now I see them, say
I missed one terribly all day.

Were all the stars to disappear or die,
I should learn to look at an empty sky
And feel its total dark sublime,
Though this might take me a little time.

Wystan Hugh Auden
? September 1957

>243 absurdeist: Have a copy but cover art was by Don Dixon I do believe.

Today's Weather Summary:

Northeast: rain (updated at noon to "soggy")
Northwest: rain
Arkansas and Texas: somewhat in the seventies
Chicago: chilly
Georgia: nothing special
Cailfornia: room temperature

Yesterday's Sports:

Men's college: 78-71, 71-69
Women's college: Connecticut

Tomorrow we go international, with Champions League soccer scores. The lineups for the next few days:

Manchester United v. Bayern Munich
Arsenal v. Barcelona
Inter Milan v. CSK Moscow
Olympique Lyon v. Girondins Bordeaux

Now you are talking Peter.

But don't expect any expert commentary, zeno. I know only a few words in the universal language, proper nouns, one of which is: Lionel Messi. To which I will append: Barcelona by a goal in the upcoming game.

A Lionel Messi, fellow naturalists, is in fact a force of nature, whose provenance is Argentina.

And I might remind everyone that the World Cup begins in June - the biggest sporting event after the Olympics.

The USA has a team in the finals by the way.

What's this I hear about a nor'easter tomorrow? Can it be true, Teresa? Jane? Sandydog? And maybe you, Mr. Durick aka Robert, if in fact you live in this region at all?

Weather.com shows heavy rains and breezy. I'm living for the sunny days we're supposed to have by Wednesday.

'Rique!!! I am soooo jealous! Especially since we are being blown away in the NW right now and another bloody threat of snow above 2500'. Hopefully, it will stay in the Passes and not rear it's ugly head on the high desert. I am so over snow for the year! I have a code in my dose and bronchitis in my itis... Ugh!

I have taken my 'mycin (since I'm 'lergic to 'cillin) and now I will just sit here in my recliner wrapped up in my robe & fuzzy blanket and watch it hail... :-p

$#$!#$%^T$&^&*%^&!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

)(*&^%#$@!@$%^&U*(^%@#$!$%^&U^#$@!#$%^&U^#$@!#$^$@!#$^&U^#$@!



As my Papa says... I don't care to participate!

Day 2 tomorrow, of an occluded front from Maine to Florida. There are more lows over here than a blues club.

But by Good ol' Friday, it's gonna be beautiful!

Seems to be the overwhelming consensus to stop thinking about tomorrow and focus on the days after that. Eighty degrees on Saturday someone at a b-day party I just came back from said. Eighty degrees? It's a tough concept to grasp.

85 degrees today in SoCal. Supposed to rain some on Wed. & Thursday, which means all the local news outlets will go ballistic with their "STORM WATCH" coverage. A quarter inch of rain = "STORM WATCH". It's pretty funny how excited they get whenever any precipitation looms.

I was out there, in Albany, NoCal, once upon a time when it hadn't rained for five or six months. It was a room temperature day that heated up a bit more than usual, the clouds sprouting thunderheads, followed by thunder, and then a bucketlike downpour lasting all of five minutes.

Guy standing next to me, a native of Iowa or some such place, prob'ly moved there with his family after the Big One, shook his fist at the sky, infuriated, and shouted, "If I knew this would happen I woulda never come out here!"

Arrrrggghhh...

I am so done...

ON GOING UNNOTICED

As vain to raise a voice as a sigh
in the tumult of free leaves on high.
What are you, in the shadow of trees
Engaged up there with the light and breeze?

Less than the coralroot, you know,
That is content with the daylight low,
And has no leaves at all of its own;
Whose spotted flowers hang meanly down.

You grasp the bark by a rugged pleat,
And look up small from the forest's feet.
The only leaf it drops goes wide,
Your name not written on either side.

You linger your little hour and are gone,
And still the woods sweep leafily on,
Not even missing the coralroot flower
You took as a trophy of the hour.

Robert Frost
from WEST-RUNNING BROOK
1928

Hmmmm.... thanks, Porius I think I'm going to make it after all.

Nothing like a little Frost to calm one's spring fever.

only too happy to help. Frost is my N my S my E and my West.

Feeling better today, Tani? You were speaking in tongues last night. Just finished editing the McCaffrey, btw, and will send it out this afternoon, so that you'll have another one of hers to read, eventually: Barque Cats II.

More personally, I have only three more chapters to tweak on the absolutely, positively final edit of "Digging Deeper," my opus self-interruptus.

Late breaking news:

Weather: Good thing the deciduous trees around here are still leafless, what with the wind, or the electricity would be a good bet to go out, again. Limbs might still fall, of course. If I disappear for a while, you'll know why.

Sports: Good chance that Cesc Fabregas might miss the Arsenal v. Barcelona Champions League game, which would make it even tougher for the underdog English team.

Physically..... not so much. must do nebulizer to breathe without hacking...

Mentally..... working on it.

We got 2 inches of snow last night. According to my Google weather gadget it is 25 degrees in La Pine. Kinda pretty, though.?. But I'm done!!!! So very done.

:::::squealing::::: over Barque Cats II!

lmao over the 'final' edit of "Digging Deeper"

BTW... I am not an unintelligent individual, but am finding that I need a dictionary close by while reading lately. My vocabulary is expanding exponentially. ;-)

Good luck with the wind. We had some pretty gnarly gusts over here yesterday. Sun is peaking out for now. Must go nebulize... ugh.

Really, really disgusting rain today. Had to run out to a job site because they are massively leaking down the entire rear of the building. Blah! Making the last gumbo of the season tonight in hopes that this is the last cold snap.

Howling wind, but the electricity is hanging on. The streams are engorged and running chocolate brown with runoff. March isn't supposed to go out like a lion, btw, Tani. It's supposed to come in like a lion and out like a lamb.

On looking up words, from "Digging Deeper," about one-third in:

He broke off there, apologized for talking about himself too much, and I took over, telling him about taking drugs and afterward dealing with a limited attention span, relearning how to talk and make myself understood, then beginning to write again …

Gary sat in a wing chair, which like the table he’d had trouble arranging his legs beneath seemed too small for him. Occasionally he’d take a pen and pad from a chest pocket of his faded flannel shirt, hold up a hand to stop me, apologize for interrupting, and ask me to repeat a word I’d used so he could write it down.

"To broaden my vocabulary," he explained. Having never finished high school, he was educating himself.

Sorry all of you other coasts--Chicago is beautiful and promising to stay that way for three or so days. March out like a lamb here.

The harbor crews are putting the mooring cans in the downtown Monroe Harbor. Boats will start coming in s-l-o-w-l-y in the next couple of weeks. Of course, those people are crazy. I am sure there will be another snowfall before the end of April.

"March isn't supposed to go out like a lion, btw, Tani. It's supposed to come in like a lion and out like a lamb."

Oh that it were true, Peter... I would be very happy. Is this a factoid? Would love to hear the source of that one.

On broadening my vocabulary... I know my recreational activities burnt out way too many brain cells over the years, but I have never had to use a dictionary so often while reading a book. hmmm... What does that say?

Enjoy it whilst you can, Lisa...

It is 38 degrees, the snow is kinda melting, it's sunny and blue out now, but not for long. I think I have a fever again... wishing it was just spring fever. Doh! There goes the sun! ugh...

>267 janemarieprice: "Making the last gumbo of the season tonight in hopes that this is the last cold snap." As I'm just over the Hudson from you, I went with blackeyed peas and corn bread tonight for the same reason. I'm sooo ready for light dishes such as homemade pesto with fresh avocados and tomatoes.

a balmy night here in Southern California. the salty ocean spray has the air as fresh as Maureen O'Sullivan in a Marx brothers movie. mystro, a little musick:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R7ixGAOwCiQ&feature=related

MARCH

Awake to the cold light
of wet wind running
twigs in tremors. Walls
are naked. Twilights raw—
and when the sun taps steeples
their glistenings dwindle
upward …

March
slips along the ground
like a mouse under pussy
willows, a little hungry.

The vagrant ghost of winter,
is it this that keeps the chimney
busy still? For something still
nudges shingles and windows:

but waveringly,—this ghost,
this slate-eyed saintly wraith
of winter wanes
and knows its waning.

The Complete Poems and Selected Letters and Prose of Hart Crane

No doubt everyone with even a passing interest in le football in Germany, England, and France already knows the following results from yesterday's Champions League matches:

Bayern Munich 2, Manchester United 1
Olympique Lyon 3, Girondins Bordeaux 1

My understanding is limited, but I have two friends who are huge Manchester United fans, so "ouch" on their behalf.

Yes, I heard about that. Poor Man U.

Poorer than you might think. Their top goal scorer, Wayne Rooney, had to be helped off the "pitch," as they call it, at the end of the match, perhaps to miss the next game.

The rules of engagement in such tournaments (including the upcoming World Cup):

Each team plays a game in their stadium and a game in the other team's (though they will merely play twice in South Africa), and the winner of more games moves on (a tie for Munich in Manchester will thus ensure that the German team is in the semifinals).

But if each team wins a game, then total goals in both games (aka aggregate score) determines the winner.

However, if both teams have the same number of total goals, then the team with the most away goals moves on (thus if Munich loses 1-0 in England, Manchester United wins, since the Englischers had one away goal to none for the German team, though the two games will have ended with a 2-2 aggregate score).

But then, if both teams have the same aggregate score and the same number of away goals, that second game goes to an overtime period, and if the score is still tied, to a penalty shootout ...

Perhaps this is why soccer is not as popular in the U.S. as it might be. The permutations can give you a headache.

Well summarised Peter.

And tonight Arsenal came back from 2-0 down to draw 2-2 against the team that has made football into an artform - Barcelona.

It is my suspicion that I am not smart enough for soccer.

I have spent my life looking up words that I was unfamiliar with or hesitant about. The only difference is that I can use a smartphone to do it now.

Lots of buds everywhere and a few of the early plantings in the garden are breaking ground. At 1600 CDT it is 81°.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=92vV3QGagck

...And Marx says it was off side.

Thank you, Anna, for that rare footage of what has to be considered a classic game.

What about Chelsea? How did Chelsea do? Steve Jones fancies them.

Chelsea was eliminated in the last round, by Internazionale Milan, I believe, which today beat CSKA Moscow 1-0. This, in the Champions League. Meanwhile, in the English Premier League, Chelsea is fighting for the championship with Manchester United and Arsenal (just as Lyon is fighting for the French league championship with Bordeaux, whom they beat yesterday in the Champions League, and Marseille, which was also eliminated in the last round of the Champions League), because over there the better teams play in more than one league.

The simple American mind boggles at these European complexities, non, Henri?

'Tis rather baroque. I knew nothing of futbol, besides the aforementioned Steve Jones and his defunct indie radio show, and, until this thread.

Yes, we mean to educate here, as well as have fun. In coming weeks perhaps we'll discuss German bat ball, Iroquois lacrosse, and Pondicherry cricket.

A poet of bare ruined choirs:
http://famouspoetsandpoems.com/poets/r__s__thomas/poems/11309

Spring and All

By the road to the contagious hospital
under the surge of the blue
mottled clouds driven from the
northeast—a cold wind. Beyond, the
waste of broad, muddy fields
brown with dried weeds, standing and fallen
patches of standing water
the scattering of tall trees

All along the road the reddish
purplish, forked, upstanding, twiggy
stuff of bushes and small trees
with dead, brown leaves under them
leafless vines—

Lifeless in appearance, sluggish
dazed spring approaches—

They enter the new world naked,
cold, uncertain of all
save that they enter. All about them
the cold, familiar wind—

Now the grass, tomorrow
the stiff curl of wildcarrot leaf

One by one objects are defined—
It quickens: clarity, outline of leaf

But now the stark dignity of
entrance—Still, the profound change
has come upon them: rooted they
grip down and begin to awaken

William Carlos Williams

Peter, I just read an article in the Atlanta paper that Lacrosse is the fastest growing college sport for both men and women in the NCAA. We live here about fifty miles or so from Ballground, Georgia. It's named for the intra- and inter-tribal matches that regularly took place there.

Yeah, I read that somewhere too, so maybe what was intended as a joke should be looked into.

I know the season is over, but how about curling? Great sport, and we have a couple of Canadians around, don't we?

Put those soup pots away, northeasterners, Louisiane transplants, Georgians, Chicagoans, Arkan- and Tennesseeans and others who haven't needed them for a while! And what's wrong with room temperature, I want to know? (Methinks I've been using this as a putdown far too long.) Take out those salad bowls, short sleeve shirts, maybe even sandals, if tomorrow and the next day are like today, or even more so! Dust off those disused exclamation points--their time has come again! And (sorry Lisa) forget about curling; it's an inappropriate sport when the forsythias bloom.

Update Central Oregon: My Google gadget says it's Sunny and 27 degrees.... My porch agrees. Our high today will be 43. Hardly enough to melt the remaining snow on the north side of the house.

The bulbs are surviving the last 4 days of intermittent snowfall. Well, at least the ones that have breached the surface.

I had a feeling, Tani, when writing the above entry that you'd be in a different weather predicament than others. But unfortunately these posts do not allow for footnotes, which would have read: Except for Tani in the Deschutes Valley.

My daughter in Seattle tells me it's quite nice up there, that the apple blossoms--or some kinda blossoms--are blossoming, though the weather can change from hour to hour. And Anna in Portland seems to be in a good mood (check out her hilarious takedown of soccer in the above video), so she probably isn't dealing with 27 degrees and snow on the ground.

Hang in there. You'll join the rest of us soon.

As an aside... We do not consider our area as the Deschutes "Valley" We are on the High Desert in Central Oregon. Anna is in the "Valley." Anything east of the Cascades is considered high desert. ;-)

Actually, I should have known that, having been to that raptor place just south of Bend. It was high, and it was desert. Maybe I passed your house on the way from there to Eugene.

Yes, Tani is in the high desert and I am in the "valley". Actually Tani being in the actual Bend region is right in the middle of the true "high desert" as opposed to a lot of other parts of E. Oregon.

My weather has been "cold" (in the 40s and 50s) but nothing compared to what she is dealing with. Spring flowers have mostly already been blown off their trees and now the real green is coming out. It's sunny today though we've had lots of rain during the past week.

In general though, Peter, my mood is not totally dependent on nice weather - I could not live in the Pacific NW if so!

Tani, seen many trilliums? They are my favorite spring flower, should be mostly done by now I assume.

No trilliums up here! We had tons of them in Welches on the western slope of Mt. Hood before we moved up here. I miss them. When we first moved to Mt. Hood, Papa was clearing them all out! Ugh! He kind of went crazy with the round up until I put the kibosh on that!

In general though, Peter, my mood is not totally dependent on nice weather - I could not live in the Pacific NW if so!

So totally agree with this statement. 'Tis the main reason I moved up here. 300 days of sunshine per year... but not too sure of that right now. ;-)

The KOIN weather guy is telling us to brace for another "winter" storm tonight and tomorrow. You should expect some fun, Anna. I am bracing for more snow apparently! So done... so done.

Bruce Sussman Hang on to your hats: another powerful winter storm moves in overnight tonight and on Friday. I'll post more details after I look at the latest info this afternoon. But I'm thinking another 1-2 feet of snow for the mountains and maybe even gusts to 40mph for the Valley. With, plenty of rain, of course! Are you ready for some more of this action?

Living on the eastern edge of those mountains, we get about 1/3 of what the passes get.

The "raptor" place that Peter speaks of is The High Desert Museum just south of Bend. Awesome place. Have not been there for about 13 years. Will have to go this summer.

Yes, Peter, you would have passed my area on your way to Eugene. However, we are about 8 miles west of the highway.

Speaking of the waning cold, this magnificant migration never ceases to amaze me:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9dfWzp7rYR4

Ugh! Just got the word... 3-8" of snow above 4k (we are at 4.2k) tomorrow; 10-20" in the Cascades-Blizzards over the passes. High winds and rain in the Valley.

Stocked up the fridge, filled the tank i.c.e. got great reading and genealogy to keep me occupado.

Bring it on!

Now, if I could just use the fireplace without affecting my poor Mama's allergies I would be in heaven.

PS... If you don't see me tomorrow you will know why. ;-) (I might not want to clean off the satellite dish)

Our local mountains got slammed last night and this morning. Ice-warnings over the "Grapevine": elev. 4,400. People will be skiiing and snowboarding in SoCal into May. Pretty unheard of. Some years the ski resorts don't even open down here.

It was a rough year for half of the cascade ski areas in Oregon this year because of the el nino. Ski Bowl, which touts the largest night skiing area in the nation is at pass level at the base of Mt Hood @ 3995. It was almost bare when I went through in late February. They received 2 feet in the last 3 days and are expecting at least another 1-2 feet in the next 24 hours. Timberline (my former employer) usually has skiing through Labor Day on Palmer snow field. They have skiing and snowboard camps all summer long. My Doc was the only one in Welches (about 12 miles from the mountain) and usually has 1-2 kids per day come in with injuries. As I complain about all this spring snow, our snowpack for the year is way down. The following excerpt is from the USDA National Resources Conservation Services:

Oregon State Basin Outlook Report for February, 2010

SNOWPACK.

In an average year, Oregon SNOTEL sites have gathered
approximately 70% of their annual peak snow accumulation by
February 1. This year, the winter has been warmer and drier than
normal in most basins of the state and the statewide snowpack on
February 1 was only 66 percent of average. Southeast Oregon
basins are generally nearer to average as of February 1.

Statewide, Oregon snowpacks range from 100 percent of average in
the Owyhee and Malheur basins to 46 percent of average in the
Willamette Basin. Snow measurements for February 1 were taken at
78 SNOTEL sites, 44 snow courses and 29 aerial markers in Oregon.

And here is a link to what they said on March 1, 2010.

So, for all my whining... 'Tis a good thing. Those beautiful photos above of the Deschutes wouldn't be as beautiful without the @$#$##@ snow. ;-)

2am - 29 degrees & no snow yet... going to bed now. Ciao!

Twenty-two years I've been up here now. Twenty-two winters, each one unique. But spring is nearly always the same, perhaps because I lose the stark outline of things when it comes on. But I can tell you when they come, because like everyone else up here, I anticipate them. And it's spring outside now; the earliest spring ever.

Wow! Oregon sure is a varied place: the Pacific Coast, high desert, year round snow capped mountains. Here in the east mountains aren't tall enough to retain much snow in the summer. Of course there are a few places in the east that represent hell on earth, the swamps of Florida and the coastal South, Mt. Washington in New Hampshire, I believe, with the highest sustained winds ever recorded in North America, regularly.

Even though we're only two weeks into spring, people around here say it's already a week or two late this year. Most things that are coming up now have been up in past years. We'll see.

I've got to get some estimates on removing the pine trees and the sweetgums from my yard. I'm getting an ulcer over spending money. After years of not having any to speak of, it's mighty hard to part with what I have, now. I see how people who've experienced hard times (most of the last twenty years) can become misers when they do get something. It truly is painful to spend large chunks of money!

How quickly perceptions change.

Gene, on March 19th:

One of the books I need is a how-to on the life of a country squire, or hobby farmer, a name I don't exactly cotton to. I prefer country squire.

From country squire to land poor in two weeks.

We do have the best of all worlds, here. I lived in the valley all of my life and was able to reach all of the variations within 1-2 hours any direction. "God's Country" and all that.

I wish my phone had not run off with the parentals... we've accumulated 2 of the 4" we have in the last 2 hours since I have been up. Will update when they get back.

Whilst we wait for the parentals return I have some photos of Hoodie that I acquired when I worked for TLine.

This 1st one is from Trillium Lake @ the base of the mountain



And a starry night...



This one was titled "Deadly Mt Hood" after one of our infamous climbing deaths in recent years. The lift is The Palmer lift where they ski and ride through Labor Day.



This one is from the top of Palmer @ 8500' looking down at PDX



This is one of my favorites: climbing through the "Pearly Gates" just before the summit.



Sorry, Peter about the uploading time for this thread... you really should upgrade. ;-)

My favorite mountain in the whole world - beautiful pictures Tani! I see this mountain every clear day going home from work! It's directly east of Portland and you can see it as you cross bridges such as Hawthorne or Ross Island.

Hey PW, start a Nature, etc. 2. These pictures can gum up the works, lovely as they are.

Sorry, Porius.

Is this inappropriate?

Oh no, it's not inappropriate. Photos, do however, slog down the uploading time to get to the end of the thread. It probably is time for a Part II anyway.

I wonder if we might have a Nature thread (text only), and Nature thread(s) (pics only)? Best of both worlds? What do you guys think?

'Rique I will go where ever you lead me...

BTW - just read inglorious future and I am most happy that you are not giving us all the boot. I just found you after all and have not even scratched the surface of this salon and it's complexities or variants.

Lead on, oh most glorious, fabulous, wise and freeque one!

PS I like your suggestion. ;-)

I just noticed this thread already is a sequel. How 'bout a prequel, Pierre?

Lotta kvetching today. Leave it not be said that I am an insensitive emcee. Hence, we're moving on, to...

Nature III:

http://www.librarything.com/topic/88286