~norma~
Monday, August 31, 2015
Monday, August 24, 2015
Tuesday, August 18, 2015
oh rats...it's a spider!
"Row, row, row your boat,
Gently down the stream.
Merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily,
Life's a spiders dream!"
-Rachel Manak age 4-present day
*Boat = old plastic container
*Stream = pool
*Dream = nightmare
Yes that is a tarantula, albeit a small one, perhaps a baby which makes one think, "where's the mother?"
Yes, that is a baby lizard in the boat with the spider. I guess tarantula's CAN swim, whereas lizards cannot. These two were discovered by Leah when she went out for a mid-morning swim over the weekend. She scooped them into the plastic container with much fan-fare! I was in my room and based on the cacophony of commotion, I knew to grab my camera as I headed out the door. Those dang things are hairy and awful and give me goosebumps!! You may remember this particular tarantula event that left a very permanent spider scar! (click on the highlighted words if you want to relive that fun night). Fortunately, even though the Reptile Spider Wrangler happens to be out of town this time too...I had two trusty, yet not-so-brave, wrangleresque children to scoop it out and toss it over the fence. Leah did the deed while Austin recorded it for his viewing pleasure. I just laughed the whole time...enjoying the comedy of the whole thing and relishing in the fact that I did not have it do it. Laughing, because the love of spiders doesn't fall far from the momma cart!
In other news...and it is now that I will say, I will not post the photo here, to spare you from the extreme grossness that this next story involves.
Disclaimer: Don't read this if you are eating. Don't read this if you gross things give you the creeps.
Yesterday morning I went out the front door to head out for some errands. As soon as I hit the heat of the day, I was also welcomed with a slight foul smell. At first, I thought it smelled of natural gas. But then, I thought perhaps propane. I had grilled the night before so I wondered if I had forgotten to turn off the grill, but I knew it would have run out long before morning. I went back in and asked Austin to check the grill just in case... it was in fact turned off. So, I asked them both to come out and see if they smelled something strange. Foul. They came out and sniffed the hot air but were really not sure. So, I headed out through the garage to get in my car. I could smell it a little more on that side of the garage.
As I was getting into my car, my eyes looked over to the large tubbie that I had set out under the downspout off the garage a couple of weeks ago. We had some rain and I like to capture some of it for later watering of a few plants. With a feeling of dread, I thought...Norma, you let it sit too long and now the water stinks! (Yes, Chuck, when you read this you will say I told you so...and yes I will admit you are right and I shouldn't leave that water sit that long.) But, as I walked up and peered over the edge of that tubbie, I was not prepared for the sight. Two very large, very bloated, very drowned pack rats were floating in what was now...rat soup.
Awful.
I went and got both of the kids to come out and see the source of the smell. I found a big scooped shovel and convinced Austin that he had to help with this horrible project. He managed to get them onto the shovel and I told him to take them down the driveway and fling them out into the open desert area. Some other creature will probably think it was their lucky day to find them. The visual of him running down the driveway, with this big shovel held as far away from his body was funny enough. But then, hearing the inherited Smith-family-gag-reflex retching-sound coming from deep within his lungs had me doing that... nervous-this-isn't-really-funny laugh. I shouted out "fling 'em as far as you can" just before he gave it a big heave-ho! (The contents of the shovel, not his breakfast). I could see those two big rats flying through the air until one smacked straight into a tall saguaro cactus, bouncing off and ricocheting another direction. The sight of that got Austin laughing too, forgetting about the gag which was a good thing. Those pack rats were disgusting. They were huge rats, probably 8-10 inches long. Yes, they were bloated and soggy, but they were long too. I'm hoping they were the rats the mechanic, who did my oil change a few weeks ago, said I had evidence of under the hood of my car. They are known to get under there and chew up the wires. He didn't think that had happened yet as it looked like they had only tucked some seed pods and such up in a corner. Sneaky little buggers.
We laughed about the idea of how long the drowned rat would have hung up on that saguaro if it had been speared by one of the cactus spines! You have to find humor in these situations.
Merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily, life is but dream!
note: Rachel thought the lyrics to that little sing song were the way she sang it for years and years and years. We thought it was so cute, we never told her differently. Well, technically I'm sure she knows now, but it's a bit of childhood Rachelism's I like to hang on to.
Monday, August 17, 2015
quote monday
"In summer, the song sings itself."
-William Carlos Williams
I think it is time for new lyrics don't you?
Sheesh...it was a hot weekend!
Enjoy your Monday!
~norma~
Tuesday, August 11, 2015
when you're not from around these parts
They have introduced Big Horn into the area and on one of our drives past this particular hill, we were lucky enough to spot them. Look closely...can you see them?
Here you go. The zoom on my camera got them this close...but I wanted to see if I could get a better look, so I enlarged the photo a bit on my computer.
It makes it a little fuzzy, but you can see them a bit better.
It was a rainy afternoon which dampened our plans for a hike or fishing. But, rather than sit in the cabin we decided a drive up to the big lake and take a scenic drive around the area. We were glad we did because it was really pretty and we got to see some animals. Most of which were cows. Chuck wanted me to take some photos for possible future paintings. I was only able to get out of the car a few times because of the rain so, most of these I snapped from the open window.
I love this guy.
We would stop along the side of the road while I took pictures of the cows. For the most part we were the only car on the road. A pick-up truck came up behind us at one point, perhaps to see what I was pointing my camera at. Eventually they went around us and moseyed on up the road. After getting a few photos of this cute cow we continued on. Around the curve in the road we saw the truck parked ahead of us. Our eyes spotted what their eyes did and so I pulled up my camera and did a little more snapping.
Hey, there are elk in them thar hills!
Cows and elk and green grass and pine trees and rain. A pretty site. Unfortunately, electrical lines too.
But it was certainly a treat to see and dare I say...remind us of Colorado?! Ahhh...yes.
After a couple of minutes, the gentleman got out of his truck and walked back towards our car. Chuck rolled down his window and we all made our greetings. "Hello."
"My son and I saw you two taking pictures of the cows back there and we just wanted to point something out to you. Do you see the lighter spots beyond the cows back along the tree-line? Those are elk!"
Chuck told him we had in fact spotted them and that I was taking pictures of them as well. In fact, he explained, that I was zooming in, trying to see if there were any bulls amongst them.
A little more pleasant conversation went back and forth until he bid us good-bye and said... "well, we thought maybe you weren't from around these parts and since you were taking pictures of cows we didn't know if you knew those were elk back there!" We thanked him, because it was nice of him to come visit with us and to share in their excitement of spotting elk. We were guessing they were out scouting the area as hunting season is approaching. And then we got a little chuckle that we must surely look like city folk, excited to see cows and excited to take so many pictures of them!
The elk were pretty exciting too.
And to clarify...cow.
Elk.
Equally exciting!
Monday, August 10, 2015
Monday, August 3, 2015
quote monday
Let’s take our hearts for a walk in the woods
and listen to the magic whispers of old trees.
~Author Unknown
We did a little walking in the woods over the weekend.
It was delightful in so many ways.
I'll be sharing some photos here soon.
Happy Monday.
~norma~
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