Spring has returned. The Earth is like a child that knows poems. ~Rainer Maria Rilke

Saturday, January 8, 2011

It's One of Those days.... again.

I have no "purpose" today, but there's some consolation in the fact that Shakespeare might have had the same problem if he had been blogging.
So I will kind of do a collage of things for you, starting with a bit of guilt at complaints about the weather. It's foggy and cold today. REALLY FOGGY AND COLD....
The sun tried to shine and did for a while yesterday. The fog backed away and we had sunshine even though it was very cold.
and then, in the afternoon, it came back with the wind and settled into the river canyon for good.

This morning the thermometer read:
And it froze last night, breaking the hose that goes to the goat house for water.  But, it's OK, because then I get pictures from my friend Dawn, the "charming baglady", who lives in Michigan and I feel like a whiny baby for complaining about a 36 degree high and the 28 degree low.
Dawn talks about blizzards, wind chill factors, lake effect snow, loss of electricity and how she can't get to the store for days on end. She says that they do come and remove the snow from the street but it piles up at the edge of the driveway and freezes into ice that can't be driven over so if they are home.... they are stuck.
This is the view from her house. She loves the Michigan winters. She's always been tough.
This is her street and that is her neighbor's house in the distance.
And this is Mugs, her dog, after a romp outside....
Isn't that the cutest dog with snow on face. Wanna kiss?
Anyway, I know that I live in California and part of me is glad that I do. I don't live were it's always below 0 in the winter. I know I'm complaining about nothing compared to other places in the world but .... I'm sorry. It's cold for the California Foothills above Sacramento.  There.... I said it. I'm a wimp. An old wimp. If the rain and the cold would get together and snow for a day then I might be so delighted that I wouldn't feel like this... like Brownie, but it hasn't and, well..... Brownie isn't even talking about it today. Maybe he will have something to say tomorrow.
So, I feel like Seinfeld today. I have a Blog and I really don't have a lot to say, but I'm finding things to talk about the longer I sit in front of this computer. Maybe that's what Shakespeare did. Sat at his desk and dipped his pen in the ink well long enough that he finally came up with "a rose by any another name.." and " How sharper than a serpent's tooth...." etc. Genius is just hiding under this pile of notes on top of my desk. It's going to happen any moment now.....
Maybe not...
 
When I was at my sister's house during Christmas they were feeding the birds in their front yard. Sis, her son Ben and I watched the little Chickadees and Sparrows eating the birdseed from the livingroom window and I was taking pictures.
You know how they say that Opportunity knocks? Well, I have photographic evidence that, even in nature, there are opportunist. This rat was on that birdseed. He was darting in and out of the Star Jasmine grabbing all the seed he could get. 
Now I don't know how you feel about Rats. I have fairly good feelings about them. I don't want one in bed with me or biting me but I think they are very interesting creatures. My Dad use to talk about the huge river rats up on the Russian River when he was young. He said one crawled into his sleeping bag one night and, luckily, didn't bite him but he never slept outside again that I can remember. 
We had a white pet Rat in our 6th grade classroom in Pine Grove school when I was working for a living and he was the cutest little guy (rat) I had ever seen. He would wait for the kids to come and play with him. He would sit on their shoulders and laps. He was part of the classroom. He was cool.
So I don't get all hysterical when I see a rat and it appears that birds don't either. My sister pointed out that they all seemed to be OK with the rat taking some of the seed. She said that she wished all beings could live in harmony like this... sharing and coexisting together. And in a perfect world... she's right. It would be wonderful. I agreed, but I think it had more to do with the size of their brains   and the fact that there was a lot of birdseed to go around. 
In other parts of the world it's more like this....
...and that's just scary.

10 comments:

  1. eewww... I do not like any kind of rodents! That last pic is scary, indeed... I haven't had anything to blog about. Have been too busy cleaning and organizing. The weather is yukky, it's cold and blustery, and all I want to do is stay warm and drink hot coffee or tea. Oh, and eat, too! My diet sucks these last few days. I blame the weather.... Ha Ha
    We all have our trials, I guess. :-) Sue

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  2. The last picture is a little scary. It is cold here in central Alabama. They are predicating snow Sunday evening and Monday. I know all the kids are looking forward to the snow but we older people do not like being stuck in the house and not being able to get out. I try not to complain about the weather because we have to have winter before spring can bring us the beautiful flowers. Have a blessed evening. Madeline

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  3. Well, this was quite the entertaining post from beginning to end farmlady! As for the end, I had a pet white rat (or 10) when I was a kid. Very smart. My favorite was Ben (so original) and he followed me everywhere and sat on my shoulder as I walked the neighborhood. I actually have a picture. Not sure if I'll post it tho!! hahahaha
    Yeah that last picture was a little bit freaky!!!

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  4. You should fell much better after writing all this good stuff. Snow is petty, but I like here where we get it very little. We all have our days, but sometimes just making an effort to move, gets you to going.

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  5. Oh how I chuckled when I read, “Shakespeare . . . sat at his desk and dipped his pen in the ink well long enough that he finally came up with . . . ‘How sharper than a serpent's tooth...’ Do you remember Walt Kelly’s POGO comic strip? I am a big fan; especially of his books. There was a plot where one of the 3 bats lands in the mama Grackle’s nest and is adopted and is taught Grackling from Cap'n Wimby's Bird Atlas. He then proceeds to torment her, to which she responds, "ef you don't stop bein' sharper than a serpents tooth, you ain't gonna be a spankless chile"!!! Makes me wanna dig out some of my Pogo books and re-read for the um-teenth time.
    ~Dawn

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    Replies
    1. I know this is from several years ago, but I came across it looking for that very quote from Pogo. My sister and I grew up with my Uncle Andrew's Pogo books, much to my very proper grandmother's horror (because we would talk like that). My other favorite is "How much ground round could a hound dog hog if a ground hog was round ground?"

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  6. Ooh, ooh, ooh. I’m in Farmlady’s blog. Whoooppeee!!
    Now little black Mugs has a little white mug (that’s a quote from Farmlady).
    I love you Farmlady; thanks for thinking I'm cute enough to include me in your blog. I’ve never been “in print” before!
    Licks to you ~ Mugs

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  7. On that last picture...EEWWWWW!!! We always have rats around the barn and henhouse and truth be told they kind of creep me out. When you've had one run up your arm while dipping your container into a feed bag, they don't seem so cute. Now we have stainless steel cans to keep them out. I do miss a good snowy winter too but I'm glad we don't have the ones that last for 4 months! Stay warm o fragile one!

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  8. AAAAAARRRRGGGGHHH, sorry Farmlady, rats freak me out! And PTL my Button will protect me because she is on a mission to rid the planet of rodents! We'll never have any around as long as she is around!

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    have book-marked it. Money and freedom is the greatest way to change, may you be rich and continue to guide others.

    ReplyDelete

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