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Does anyone else, when they spot one of these Jeep Renegade models on the street, get a sudden urge to sneak up behind it carrying a ginormous phillips head screwdriver . . . and nonchalantly unscrew its tail lights?
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Archive for the ‘Uncategorized’ Category
Secret Urge (Involving a Jeep)
Tuesday, April 3rd, 2018Flowers of the Year 2017
Sunday, December 31st, 2017I can’t think of better material to post on this final — and brutally sub-freezing — day of 2017 than a bunch of photos of flowers and other flora found in the Glover Park neighborhood of Washington, DC. The presentation will begin with Spring, of course.
APRIL
Here’s a bit of nature I found while hiking a trail in Glover-Archbold Park. It came from a majestic tree commonly known as the tulip tree or tulip poplar for its tulip-shaped flowers painted in a brilliant orange, green and yellow. In fully mature trees these spring flowers remain high up in the tree’s canopy, out of sight to those of us below. So I was surprised, one day in April, when I came across this specimen resting on the forest floor. I wondered whether it was a storm that brought it down from on high. But then I noticed the twig that not long ago had connected it to the tall tree above. This stalk was cut cleanly, on an angle. Who would do such a thing? The best answer: a squirrel.
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April 29, 2017, Glover Park, DC
April 29, 2017, Glover Park DC
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MAY
May 21, 2917, Glover Park DC, sedum in bloom
May 21, 2017, Glover Park DC, an unmowed front yard with wildflowers and grasses. In the lower right you’ll find the left-behind shell (exuvia) of a cicada.
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JUNE
June 5, 2017, Glover Park DC
June 5, 2017, Glover Park DC
June 5, 2017, Glover Park DC, one lily wants to roam free
JULY
July 9, 2017, Glover Park DC, puzzle pieces of sycamore tree bark
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AUGUST
August 4, 2017, Glover Park DC
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August 4, 2017, Glover Park DC, drooping hydrangea
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August 25, 2017, Glover Park DC, liriope‘s late-summer flowers
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DECEMBER
December 24, 2017, Glover Park DC, fallen leaves from a Japanese Red Maple on moss-covered pavers
Ginkgo Leaf Drop
Sunday, November 19th, 2017Cold weather was overdue in Washington, DC, and so it was no surprise to us when an overnight freeze on November 11th hit the ginkgo trees in the neighborhood. A day before the youngest specimens still sported bright summer green. And so the freeze, and the ginkgo specie’s traditional all-at-once leaf dump that followed immediately, created a pile of leaves not of the usual autumn gold, but of this hue:
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A few days later, though, when the oldest trees shed their final bits of raiment, the natural order of things was righted. A tradition was restored.
Sidewalks paved with gold:
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Halloween in Glover Park – Tombstones that name names
Sunday, November 1st, 2015.
For Halloween 2015 in Glover Park, grave markers were on front lawns everywhere. The most original group of tombstone R.I.P.’s:
(Note: That’s “hillary@gmail.com” in the center background, “Bipartisanship” on the right.)
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Did the Tusken Raiders have pet dogs?
Monday, February 16th, 2015.
While looking through some old photos this morning, one snapshot from June, 2008, of my golden retriever Jesse, made me pause and reminisce. The location was the Calvert Cliffs formation on the western shore of Chesapeake Bay. Jesse had climbed up into the debris of a fallen section of the cliff, and I snapped him when he worked his way around to this position:
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It looks like Jesse wanted to reenact a scene from Star Wars — the scene on the planet Tatooine when the Tusken Raiders (less formally referred to as Sand People) make their scary appearance:
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Jesse found a similar protective position, and he even managed to emit a low-voltage eerie glow from his otherwise dark eyes, just like the yellow-eyed Jawas below.
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But as for creating just as threatening a look as those two native species of Tatooine? Bah! Earth-bound Jesse totally fails it.
Halloween 2014
Saturday, November 1st, 2014.
Round about my neighborhood big spiders on walls and facades were very big this year.
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Some homeowners went all out to stage elaborate scenes of thrills and chills.
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The Endless Summer of Shakespeare’s Sonnet 18
Sunday, October 26th, 2014.
Well, this blew me away. A begetter named Adam Bertocci has seized a single generative poem — Shakespeare’s Sonnet 18 — and fractured and refashioned it into a brilliant series of 22 poetic exercises. Reading these pieces is like listening to an eclectic jazz performer spin variations on a theme, or like viewing a roomful of works by a disciplined cubist painter.
Yet again, Shakespeare’s “this” gives life to thee.
The one piece of Bertocci’s I’d like someone to press into further adaptation — into song — is this ditty:
Rondelet
Like summer,
But more so, your temperate way,
Like summer.
You will not fade nor discolor,
In lines that your beauty convey
You shine like the fires of day,
Like summer.
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Leaving on a Jet Plane
Saturday, October 25th, 2014.
Glover Park in Washington, DC, October 24, 2014 at 6:20:46 PM.
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The Common Joyfulness of Golden Retrievers
Saturday, May 31st, 2014The other day a catalog arrived in the mail. On its cover was the 2014 Orvis Cover Dog, a golden retriever named Hunni. Though we see only a profile, the look on her face is the unmistakable mien of Goldens: happiness rising to delighted contentment. The picture prompted me to dig out two photos of my own dog Jesse, from nine years ago.
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(I think I see in Jesse’s eye a silhouette of the head of the photographer, me.)
What Were They Thinking?
Thursday, March 20th, 2014The other day a shipment from Amazon arrived at my house. Among the ordered items in the box were two pairs of wool-blend thermal socks, packaged in a plastic bag. I was about to throw the bag away when I spotted the suffocation warning label:
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Huh?
I thought of those SAT-type questions that listed four items and ask you to check the one that doesn’t belong with the rest. So: (A) Babies, (B) Children, (C) Family Pets, (D) Cheese.
Would you be scratching your head for the correct answer?
The reference to le fromage is a really silly addition to a warning required by many state and local governments who’ve addressed the subject of suffocation deaths. Accidental asphyxiation by smothering is what this is all about. The altered label doesn’t follow the advice of the plastic industry trade association recommending use of the template Massachusetts implemented. A Google search found no match for this odd-ball sticker among commercially-available labels. The silly label I came across is still under the radar.
Who might be the wisenheimer author of this?
A rogue roquefort-fiend?
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Notes:
1. A study of the effectiveness of suffocation warning labels (their wording, design, placement), can be found here.
2. As far as I can tell, there is no federal requirement for warning labels.
3. The bad effect plastic wrap can have on cheese is described here.
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