Abracadabra!

 

Sometimes you just want to go somewhere that's pretty! I have photos here for you from a small restaurant that is only a few miles from our house, but it feels like you are in a faraway place. It is attached to a bookstore which makes it all the nicer for us. This is in a very old house that was once a fair size restaurant. Back when they filmed "Dukes of Hazzard" in the next county over, Carroll O'Connor was here almost every evening to dine. It was called "Michaelangelo's" then and he had good taste because they had very good food. (Once, he was behind me at a stop light. When I recognized him in my rear-view mirror, I mouthed the words, "I love you!"  He did a deep bow even while seated in his car! That's a nice memory.  Probably told you this story before but I don't see stars every day of the week!)

Abracadabra!  Did you instantly think of a magician pulling a rabbit out of a hat?  I just learned that the word has been around for many centuries. It somehow means the equivalent of "I will create as I speak" or "I create like the word". It all seems a bit misty to me as the exact origin of it, but it seems that people felt a certain power to it and would write the word in a triangular shape (like I have shown you above) and have it above their doorways so as to ward off diseases.   They did this during the Great Plague of London which was in 1665.  Daniel Defoe (the same author who wrote "Robinson Crusoe") wrote dismissively of them doing so.  If you get the chance, I wish you could read a bit about Daniel Defoe, I think his life story would make a very good film!  One of his books, "The Storm" was about a hurricane that hit Britain in 1704.  It is considered one of the first works of modern journalism as he gave first-hand accounts of those who had survived the storm.  Florida has just now had another hurricane and I have been watching the news thinking of all those affected. Here is what Daniel Defoe had to say about the hurricane in 1704...

"No pen could describe it, nor tongue express it, nor thought conceive it unless by one in the extremity of it".

There, doesn't that sound exactly true?  And perfectly expressed?

There has been such bad news recently but one piece of good news.... did you see the story of the children that were rescued from the cable car in Pakistan? It took them a while to figure out how to attempt the rescue, but they were successful, and all were saved! They showed a photo of the cable car itself and I remarked that it reminded me of a tin of Spam, it was very small, and it only had a metal gate at either end. (I am not criticizing in any way, just observing how small and open it would have been for them, dangling like that above those mountains!)  

I have had this video on here before, but I really like it, I hope you do as well! Such a peaceful tune. It is the theme song from the movie "Up"....it is called "Married Life". (Thinking of our dear son and darling daughter in law who just married in the Spring.) xx

Hope you are all doing well, my friends.  So many people are getting Covid! I bet we will have to start wearing masks again, you know I still have some!

Flipping Caterpillars!

 

The above butterfly is a Red Spotted Purple. (I didn't name it, folks! Just telling you that is what it is! Limenitis arthemis.) Butterflies are so amazing, their whole life cycle! Now, I must tell you about something (and you might have a clue from my post title)....

Yesterday, I was astonished to witness something on the small sassafras tree beside our walkway.  It was a spicebush swallowtail caterpillar.  As I was watching it, it began moving on the leaf. It would appear that something was moving out of its mouth...but I have told you before that the false "eyes" are really at the BACK END of the caterpillar....so what I was seeing was the caterpillar sending out the sticky substance to enclose itself inside the leaf. Now, here is the thing...the caterpillar completely turned itself around in a blink of an eye! Truly, it was just like that! One micro-second it was turned with the fake eyes on the top and then, the fake eyes were at the bottom! Flipping caterpillars, Batman!  (Sorry, watched too much TV as a kid.) 

If you came across a children's play area beside a hiking trail and there were no children around, would you play?  You know I did! I left this table with the blocks neatly stacked this way.  It looked much better than seeing it with the blocks all scattered!

"Summer Lightning" by Ralph McTell. 

Hope you like this song as much as I do! Richard can play this on the guitar and he is just as good as Ralph McTell! I promise he is!

Take care, everyone!  August has been a crazy month! (I just typed "moth" instead of "month", but for me and my research on moths and butterflies, maybe I got that right the first time!)

Nate Bargatze and A Donkey's Head in Fairyland

 

Don't know about anyone else, but I could surely do with something to make me laugh! What about you?  I watched a comedian on TV last night and I am hoping I can find a video for you....

There, hope you can see him!  The show we watched was called "The Tennessee Kid" because the comedian is Nate Bargatze and he is from Nashville, TN.  In his show, he talks about various things from his life and one of the things that he mentioned is that his father is a clown who later became a magician! (How could he NOT get into comedy, he asks us! LOL!)  I just looked up that special "The Tennessee Kid" and it was filmed in Duluth, Georgia in 2019. Gee, if only I had known about it, I could have been at that filming!  I don't know why I am just now hearing about him, ya'll probably know all about this comedian, but hey, I don't get out much! If you are able to see this special, I thought it was very funny.... I tried to find the bit where he talked about the film "The Sixth Sense" but couldn't find a clip, so now, you all will JUST have to see it!  The clip that I did give you above is about the airport, and I think is pretty funny also.

Before my computer completely freezes on me, I wanted to tell you that I saw the film "A Midsummer Night's Dream" from 1935! I am sure you all have heard of it, written by William Shakespeare, of course but have you read it? I haven't and neither have I seen a movie about it but now that I have.... just wondering, had Shakespeare been eating mushrooms when he wrote that? Oh dear, showing my uneducated self here but see that film and you will get what I mean. (Olivia De Havilland was the best acting done in that film, in my opinion.)  It also reminded me of a poem that had this line:  "Who but our friend Will would put a donkey's head in Fairyland?".  There, I am paraphrasing that since I can't find the exact quote, but I think you see how the poet came up with that!

The photo that I have above was taken in London back in 2019, so maybe that is why I missed that comedian when he was near me! Notice Shakespeare holding the skull, so that should remind you of Hamlet. Did you know that Shakespeare lost a son who was named "Hamnet"?  His son was only eleven years old, and a few years later, Shakespeare wrote "Hamlet".  (You might think that I wrote the son's name as a typo, but his son is "HAMNET", and the play is "HAMLET".)

Hope something here has made you laugh or brought a smile to you!

Richard took the above photo in a men's room and thought it was amusing. I mean, why would you wash your shoes in the sink? This was at the Botanical Gardens that we went to back in June. (This sign was NOT in the Ladies' room, only the Men's!) Anyway, if something makes you laugh, it's all good, I say! As long as it's not offensive or mean that is, and I meant to tell you that Nate Bargatze is considered a really nice guy and very funny without resorting to insults or bad language. So, YAY!

Take care, my friends and keep laughing!

 

The Color Pink

   

Hey! Are we living in a Barbie world right now or what? Wow, the hype over the two movies that were released this past Friday "Barbie" and "Oppenheimer" was really something, wasn't it?  Did anybody see those movies? Some folks saw both films on the same day! What did you think?  I know I told y'all before about the color pink but just in case anybody missed it....

The color pink takes its name from the flowers called "pinks". Now this doesn't mean they are all pink in color, got that? Pinks are members of the genus DIANTHUS.  The dianthus flowers have a "snipped" look on their petals. You know, like someone has been at them with pinking shears! Pink as a color only came about in the late 17th century.  I have fond memories of the "pinks" in my mother-law's garden in England.  I have photos of pink flowers for you here but only the last flower is an actual "pink", it is a wildflower that I have shown you before, it is called a "fire pink" and it is the most beautiful shade of bright red.  (Sorry it is out of focus, but you can still see the "snipped" petals, can't you?)

Hope all of you are in the pink, my friends! Across the Universe! Take care!

Hope you are able to hear the video that I have for you above!

I Can Help

 

"Is that a bag of trash?"

"No, it's a person!"

Recently, Richard and I walked on a trail.  We have to drive our car to the trail and as were leaving, I looked over and in the middle of the road, there was a .... I couldn't quite make it out, it looked like a big garbage bag that might have fallen off a truck but there was an unusual bit sticking up and... I realized that the bit sticking up was a human arm.  I jumped out of the car and went running over, and I saw some other walkers not too far away and shouted that someone had passed out in the road. (My reasoning was that it might be a good idea to have others surrounding the boy in the road, one must always consider cars approaching!) All of them came straight over. This was indeed a young boy, unconscious but with his arm straight up in the air and his other hand clutching a cell phone. What would you do? This is what I did: I was prepared to do CPR on him.  (Hey, I have never done it before and I have only taken one class on it, but I was ready.) Before I even got to him, I was talking to him...."Hey, hey- can you hear me?" I got to him and started to touch his neck but then, he moved his eyes.  He sat up and rather than looking like a big lump of clothes, very suddenly he looked like just what he was: a young teenager who was hot and needed water. Don't worry, Richard was already on it- he supplied him with one of the cool bottles that he always has for us. His mother came running up the trail to us. Turns out, he and his mother had hiked for several miles and in the heat... we asked if we could do anything for them and she told us that we could drive them back to their starting point which is just what we did.

Now, I wondered about telling y'all about this. I didn't really do anything, it was just that I was prepared to help if I could. It was such a scary thing, truly it was, but I really was ready to do CPR if I needed to do so!

Well, thank goodness all was well with that young man but one never knows what can happen!

Okay, let me just try to regroup here and think about some photos and a song....

I am showing you some random photos that Richard has taken over the past months as we were walking on some of our local trails. (Oh, except the turtle photo, that was in our own backyard! What? You didn't know we have a wildlife refuge? We do!) That big black snake was right across our path on a trail, and it crawled up right beside that big log and would you believe it, you would never have known it was there. If you are ever hiking in the woods and feel tired, you might not want to sit down on a log.  If you are in Georgia, there might be a snake sidled alongside it! (Please note, that particular snake is not venomous, but I still don't want to be right beside it.)

This past weekend, I walked out my front door and at the bottom of our steps, there was a big turtle on its back! Oh no! I yelled for Richard, but I couldn't wait for him to see this, I had to help the poor creature! Over on its correct side it went, and is it my imagination, or did he (or she) look grateful? 

Hope you are all doing well, my friends.  Stay cool! And be helpful when you can!

EARTH

 

There is an article in Newsweek magazine that mentions the magnificent monadnocks right here in Georgia!  You can see it just

here.   Even though it pleases me to know that Arabia Mountain is included in this article, I am just a teensy bit annoyed about it.

 

The piece is entitled "The Weirdest, Most Extraterrestrial Spots You Can Visit Here On Earth".  Oh dear, I do wish that we could somehow convey our astonishment at natural beauty without it sounding as if we are on another planet. For one thing, the photo that they give you of Arabia Mountain is at the very top and is therefore the most rock that you will see. (They compare it to a moon scape, I think, and trust me, it is breathtaking to see it!) However, if you care to look back at my blog and see all the posts that I have written about Arabia Mountain, Panola Mountain and Stone Mountain, you will see the amazing wildflowers and trees that grow there! And the rock itself is amazing!  Weird? Oh my goodness, I think not!  Arabia Mountain, Panola Mountain and Stone Mountain are all beautiful, each in their own way and if you ever spend any time at any of them, you will see this!

"The Magnificent Places on Earth that Only Appear Other-Worldly Because We Are Heavily Influenced by TV and Films"- there, could that be a better title for this piece in Newsweek?  

Arabia Mountain

Panola Mountain

Stone Mountain (That's Atlanta on the horizon)

These are all in the Atlanta area. We are not in the mountains! The monadnocks rise up from the surrounding landscape. Stone Mountain is the largest while Arabia Mountain is the oldest. They are millions of years old! 

Funny thing, I was really just going to tell you that the WORDLE today was the word "EARTH". And you will never guess, I got it on the first try!  Was it because I was thinking about this article in Newsweek or because when I asked Richard what should our first word be today, he replied, "No EARTHLY idea"?  Ha ha, we will never know now, I just know that I am pleased that I got Wordle with the first word that I entered and also, that we live near these wondrous rocks of beauty!  Take care everyone and try very hard not to get even the teeniest bit annoyed like me! LOL!

Richard took this video of the yellow daisies at the base of Stone Mountain, years ago.  They will be just this pretty this September also!

Impossible Dream- Spicebush Swallowtail Butterfly

 Hello, my friends! I hope you are all doing well! July is here and I have a few photos to share with you. The following two images are from our back yard, these are "whorled rosinweed" flowers. They are wildflowers that first appeared a few years ago and Richard has encouraged them to grow and now, we have more of them. Now, I must tell you, it took a while to research this one but we believe it to be correctly identified. (A member of the Aster family.) It grows very tall, some of them are almost 5 feet tall!

You see how the leaves are in a kind of "whorl" around the stem? That is how it got its name!

Just to add to the show, we also had a few sunflowers that came up from the bird seed that we put out for the birds! A volunteer is a sweet surprise.

Remember me telling you about the spicebush swallowtail caterpillar on our sassafras tree?  Yesterday, I was so sad when I saw a really scary looking black mass on one of the leaves. I was convinced that the caterpillar had died from some kind of virus that I had read about but today, I saw the caterpillar- big and green and healthy looking!  If you look at the video above, you might guess that I will not be touching the caterpillar.  No, I just observe it...and since it is on a low branch of the tree, I am crouching down and am usually in broiling hot sun with the temp at almost 100 degrees! (If my neighbors wonder what I'm doing, let them wonder!) Oh, I hope so very much that we see the butterfly emerge from this tree! We are both taking out the Japanese beetles, Richard and I are trying our best! 

Another yellow flower to show you! This is the flower that we see blooming at Panola Mountain State Park and we think it is called the "Woodland sunflower".  It is a beauty!

 

Besides flowers, we also are crazy about ferns! Guess what, I found a fern (it was an Autumn fern) on sale for only $4.00.  It was a tiny little thing but we bought it and it is now a very full and frilly fern! (I don't seem to have a photo of it but perhaps I will show it to you on a future post. The photo above was from one of the gardens we visited in June.) Richard is very good in the garden.  In England, they would say that he has green fingers! Isn't it funny that in the USA, we say that someone has a green "thumb"? Can anyone explain to me that no matter what it is...in many cases anyway, we Americans just HAVE to say it a different way? Go look it up on your "cell" or "mobile" phone, depending on what country you are in! LOL!

Just observing the caterpillar in the different "instars", makes me think what an impossible kind of dream it must be to become a butterfly!  That reminded me of one of the BEST tv adverts that featured such a great song....I have had this on here before but it is so very good! Enjoy!