If Looks Could Kill ~

There is always that distance you are from me, where you seem more like a spirit
in the wind than a real-life creature of feathers maneuvering like an acrobatic ninja from one clematis bell shaped flower on to the next for an early breakfast this morning with me.  

I am honored.  I do wish you would stay awhile, but we all know you have little time to say hello and less time to say goodbye before off you go…

and where (does one ask?)

Well,

Only the heavens know, and they aren’t telling.

Why is it that this creature can jump start a cold heart into a roaring fire when it is sited?  What unseen tether binds this little soul to mine in a way that only friends may know?

What keeps me anticipating the reappearance of one hovering eye to eye even though year after year it never happens again? 

Perhaps it is a gentle reminder that we might never take even the smallest things for granted.

My garden is a weaving of warp threads, that which was already here, and waft threads, that which I added to create a tapestry uniquely me.  It changed the boredom of my life into happiness, even though it has been wrought with doubts, hopes, triumps, and failures, joy and sadness throughout its existence.  It still gives me pleasure.

While I tend to write using my feelings as far as nature is concerned, I do know it is not true nature.  It is my feelings.  Trying to survive on a planet out to kill you if you let down your guard is true nature.  Sometimes I write about it, but honestly, few ever really want to hear it.  La La Land seems to be preferred.

The ending of mommy's story 

and 

the beginning of my story -

Ms.Charlotte FeatherBender's 

Adventure in La La Land

Not a word, or it's curtains for you, fuzzie cheeks!

Mommy's at an impasse, in that her head can't agree as to what her fingers might type.  In contrast, mommy's been teaching daddy the concept of overwatering and he's becoming exceptionally good at it.

After I pointed out to mommy her only other option for a little time off was to pick daddy to finish her blog post, I got the job.  She did refuse to forego the proofreading, ergo forcing me into bad kitty mode.  The story shall be written.  I'll reprimand myself afterwards.

Mommy asked daddy about the asters and coneflowers that no longer seem to exist in the front garden bed under the windows she looks out of everyday.  Daddy's been weeding there, so he's not talking.

  

He put his foot into his mouth, shoe and all, the other day when mommy tried to stuff the words it's all about you back down his throat.  I didn't think that was humanly possible, but mommy proved me wrong.  You go, girl!

You might be thinking mommy and daddy have been married forever, and you wouldn't be wrong, but the banter keeps things lively for this feline during a boring afternoon, while Austin hids under a bed where he can't sit on my head.  A nice win for me.

Found this meter gadget in daddy's tool cabinet with a glass window on the front, collected probably before he met mommy, encrusted with rust... you know, all that stuff daddy meaninglessly stockpiles just in case it's ever needed.  I wonder if it works?

(shake, shake, shake)

What the...?

(shake, shake, shake)

Good Grief!

I'm beginning to talk like mommy.

(shake, shake, shake!)

I knew it!

Too much rust.

(shake, shake, shake, shake, shake)

Maybe a few more...

(shake, shake, shake)

YIKES!!!

Darn it, dropped it on the floor.

It's history now.

I dropped it into my water bowl to finish it off.

I wonder what else is in daddy's tool cabinet?

~ The Tool Cabinet ~

It stands impressively tall, too heavy for its wheels to be of much use.  It was an agreement between the two – not a necessity for him, but to her it was a way to organize a bit of the chaos that seemed to collect around him.

She wanted to purchase the largest of the brand, but the next one down was the more practical of the two.  She hated always being practical.  It was not her life as she had invisioned.

She brought seven tools into the marriage, as she purchased only when one was needed.  Lovingly used, they looked immaculate compared to his.  He brought in the old metal handled toolboxes, maybe nine in number, packed with rusty dulled edge tools that looked abused and worn out.

She wondered why he had tools.  He was not a handyman.

He filled ten drawers of their toolbox with his tools leaving her a small half size drawer for her tools, and a regular four-inch-deep drawer for purchases down the road to take care of the house and garden.

The largest of the drawers, the bottom one, carried so much weight in tools that the flat metal bulged under pressure and formed a gigantic bowl that scraped across the bottom of the cabinet when it was opened or closed.

Three handheld toolboxes full of tools remained cluttering up the garage.  She told him to get rid of them, so he stuffed even more into the bulging, overburdened tool cabinet before giving up the rest. 

She ignored it all.  He was so unchangeable.

He used her tools without asking, and put them back, not in her drawer, but his.  Sometimes she would hunt through his drawers to reclaim her tools, but the day came when she moved her tools into two drawers in the kitchen and never looked back.

I’m not sure the moral, if any, this poignant tale encompasses.   Perhaps this little saying says it all –

“Life isn’t about waiting for the storm to pass; it is about learning to dance in the rain.”

People!  We felines embrace life head on.  So does mommy.

I guess the heat put mommy in pooped out mode, as her first photo looks simply weedy.   Poor mommy.  I'll put my magical toes to work and see what I can do with it.

Crap!  Uh... right, people are reading this.  Drats!  Mommy left notes.  This beauty is Fatoua villosa, translates to densely hairy and is part of the Mulberry Tree family in Asia.  Well...la te da.  A weed is a weed.

Lovely Spicebush berries

An omnivore, in the front garden, hiding from carnivores.

Cottontail Rabbit

yummy yum!

Pesty Austin at his lovable best.

 Broadleaf Plantain (Plantago major)

Ekking out a living in the cracks.

Bumblebee feeding on the Joe Pye Weed.

Stunning against the orange edged violet leaf.

Maybe a Zabulon Skipper Butterfly

Chelone lyonii, Turtlehead 

Maybe a leaf from a Tulip Tree (Liriodendron tulipifera)

Lonicera sempervirens, Coral Honeysuckle

Mommy has it cut down every year,

so it doesn't grow up into the blackhaw viburnum

and drag the limbs down to the ground.

Tiny Spicebush Caterpillars

hiding for the day.

These caterpillars are very small, 

but they already have the two dots on their thorax

used to mimic a snake when larger.

Looks like appetizers rolled in a leaf

Mommy says I have that 

tired, 

disgusted, 

would rather be somewhere else look 

that could kill in a heartbeat.

Dang it.

She knows me so well.

I have no ending for this post,

as I live in the suburbs 

where dogs are loved 

and cats are hated.

I am never allowed outdoors.

  

I live in prison for my own protection.  

I'm returning to one of the cell blocks 

down the hallway to take a snooze.

Charlotte

This Post is Linked to:

Saturday's Critters

Spuds Roasting in the Hot Coals

Ligated Furrow Bees (Halictus ligatus), on Rudbeckia hirta, 

are a common species of sweat bee 

known for burrowing into the ground to create their nests.

Black Eyed Susans among the seed heads of Clematis viorna

We all are spuds roasting in the hot coals,

on any given southern summer day.

Midsummer noontide in a sky of brass:
The sun like flame licks at the blistered earth,
And shrivels up the blades of withering grass...
~John Gould Fletcher, "Midsummer Love"

It's so hot I put everything off. 

Hot weather is the mother of procrastination. 

My energy is at ebb tide. I'm getting caloricly stupid. 

Tried to read... 

Mind stumbled on a ponderous perioration 

and fell in between two paragraphs 

and lay unconscious for

 ten minutes. 

~Thomas Edison

There is a time when each life on this planet dies.

Neotibicen tibicen, swamp or morning cicadas

Often times called an annual cicada, 

but all cicadas need multiple years to develop underground, 

so their annual reappearance is presumably due to overlapping generations.  

Hosta 'Halcyon'

Hibiscus Sawfly, Atomacera decepta

Only about 1/4 to 1/3 the size of the larva.

Green Planthopper, Siphanta acuta, a true bug.

Swamp Mallow seed pods opening up to drop seed.

Hibiscus moscheutos

The original swamp-rose mallows grown were a very pale pink, 

but seeds falling onto the ground inside the container 

and sprouting vary in color.  

This is biodiversity, 

in that instead of cloning a plant to make a duplicate, 

one plants the seed, 

and gets an individual seedling with it's own personality.  

Here I am; not out on my lovely deck being needled to death by mosquitoes, but indoors in the quiet of husband with headphones on watching television, and I, listening to the moans and groans of a new refrigerator that sounds more and more everyday like my husband’s stomach after a questionable meal.

I just finished off a bowl of egg salad shoveled into my mouth by Milton’s Original Multi-grain Gourmet Crackers. I’m chasing that awful taste down with an almond butter and blueberry topped cracker for dessert, along with a cup of steaming hot Irish Breakfast Tea with a scant teaspoon of orange blossom honey stirred in.  A beautiful dinner made possible by a husband who does all of the grocery shopping.

The next morning -

Lost in sleep this morning, I came too late to dawn’s early party filled with bird songs and cicadas outrageous.  The sun in all its glory has already blanketed me in this insufferable heat, and while warm afternoons bring in a bountiful amount of rainstorms, they usually last but a short time and then are gone.

The Liatris standing tall with blooms in the deck flowerpot are visited regularly by bumblebees and those smaller bees impossible to identify with the naked eye.  Worried, after losing three potted Spicebushes last year, that I no longer had a male one to pollinate the others; I am happy to announce that three bushes are with berries, and one is all leaves and therefore the male.

I can see that the old Blackhaw Viburnums near the back fence are laden with green berries that are already in their creamy white stage, before turning blue, and then dark blue.  Birds and small mammals visiting will begin eating them way before the small trees are graced with dark blue.

It’s to be expected when surrounded with human activity, that any day of the week will contain its share of annoying noises and today is no exception.  My husband says a tree is being cut down several houses over, and what I hear is most likely the chipper.  Maybe an Ash Tree… we have lost so many in the neighborhood these past several years.

And now the garbage truck makes its Friday rounds, and of course the cars that are always on the road one house over… back and forth, back and forth, back and… well you know the drill.  One never escapes human created noise until way past midnight.

I was thinking about this very topic as I got into my bed last night; well, to be truthful, this morning is more accurate.  I know, I should get a more meaningful life, but it is what it is.  Anyway, as the crow flies, I could hear a freight train clickety clacking on the tracks about five miles away, and it felt like it was only a few houses down the block.

My husband is graciously watering the patio potted plants, while my nemesis, tiny flies at the breakfast table, are out in full force.  I have found something just as annoying as those blood sucking mosquitoes.  Isn’t nature devine?

The beautyberry, planted by some unknown entity, most likely a bird; is in its happy place.  It has grown tremendously into a beast of a bush, probably fueled on by the dirty water of the bird bath when hosed out each day.  It is a formidable creature to be reckoned with when trying to enter the space.

Its neighbor, the Brown-eyed Susans that have escaped our pruners, are blooming profusely, and fill the green space with loveliness.

Tall towering clouds are beginning to encroach into the mellow blueness of the summer sky, and beyond the south corner of the garden, one sees a sheet of grey at play.  I think this is my signal, that I have been waiting for, to end this journal of today, and leave it as is.

I have yet to see the mosquitoes, but perhaps they are a bit smarter than me and are waiting for nightfall for that lovely first drink of blood.  Since the flies require three sets of hands to keep at bay, and alas I have only two hands to enter into this game of a losing situation, I’ll throw in the towel and vamoose.

Wouldn’t you know it.  A Bluejay later to the party than me.  His bad.

Above - Heuchera americana, American Alumroot

in planters on the deck, since the garden ones don't last long.

Species Camponotus chromaiodes - Ferruginous Carpenter Ant

The larger ant on the left is about 1/2 inch long.

It looked huge compared to the other ant, and I believe it is a worker ant.

These ants are common in the eastern part of the states.

These two were on the Dogwood Tree near the White Ash tree stump.

Away from the home in a natural setting, 

carpenter ants can be seen as part of the natural balance.

In a landscaped native garden close to a home,

a cautious approach is needed to manage their populations.

Look at those jaws!  Amazing!

This rather large Tiger Bee Fly (Xenos tigrinus)

looks menacing by its fast erratic behaviour when flying.

It is harmless. 

Bee flies are known as parasitoids, 

meaning their larvae develop by feeding on the larvae of other insects, 

including bees and wasps.

Blazing Star, Liatris Spicata, with friend

Fowler's Toad (Anaxyrus fowleri)

Eating ants living in the rain garden area.

We spotted a smaller one on the deck steps.

It jumped under the steps when I moved close to it.

Bumblebees on Wild Bergamot

 

Bumblebees with long tongues drinking all that nectar from the 

trumpet shaped flowers on the Monarda fistulosa, Wild Bergamot

Is that dang lady with the camera gone yet?

I need to go!

Charlotte & Austin

Bored, bored, bored...

Sleeping with this big guy is like sleeping under a sack of potatoes.

Umpf...

This Post is Linked To:

Saturday's Critters