Sundogs

How I managed to live (mumble, mumble) years being unaware of sundogs, I'm not sure.

It's been two years since I first saw one (and wrote about it), and I've seen dozens since.

But I still haven't managed to get a good photo of one.
I see them more often in winter, especially when driving south late in the afternoon. (AL-75S gives great sundog.)
No use trying to race them home, though. They're slithery, and don't hang around for portraits.
Here's a nice, simple page with a good sundog photo, as well as other atmospheric phenomena. Here is the definitive page on the science behind the "why" of all the optics.
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The latest I and the Bird is up over at The Birder's Report. Go see!

Loretto Chapel

My plans for today was to head to Santa Fe, visit with a friend there, and tour by bicycle. First stop the CGHiggins Candy Shoppe. Plan was to park the car and bike from there.
Weather was being a bit "iffy" this morning. While mt visit at the candy shop, it was sunny/cloudy and calm/breezy. Walking to the car for a calendar, I was breating pretty hard (guess the added altitude was getting to me).
After a cup of coffee and candy purchases, I drove into the plaza area of Santa Fe. Abandoned the plans pf cycling around town. Temp was 37 - a little chilly. The one thing I wanted to see was the spiral staircase at the Loretto Chapel.
I found the chapel and spent the $3 to see the staircase. I will not be able to post a photo for sale as they only allow photos for personal use. Today's photo is the staircase and the read of the chapel.
When I got back to Albuquerque, it was 52 and sunny. A little tired today, so stayed in the room(clouded off again in the afternoon) and rested.

A Look Back At

Can we take an over-the-shoulder glance at last year's posts before diving into ..? January .. began with a tribute to those Stubborn Irish People From Chicago who keep the decorations up and the lights turned on until January 6th - Epiphany or Feast of Three Kings. When affirmative comments came from other gardeners who celebrated the 12 Days of Christmas, they warmed me like a cozy quilt around my shoulders. Yolanda Elizabet from Holland, Entangled from Virginia, Leslie from California, Barbara from Switzerland, MSS from Austin, TX, Therese from Louisiana, Kate from Saskatchewan, Kerri from New York State, Mr McGregor's Daughter from Chicago, Lisa at Greenbow, Indiana, Red Dirt Dee from Oklahoma, Nicole in the Caribbean, Josie in Vancouver and Dawn from Austin also had traditions of leaving the light glow a little longer. A few weeks later May Dreams Carol made up the acronym GADS, for Gardeners Attention Distraction Syndrome. My answer to her was to Embrace The GADS! I'm a bee, not an ant - so buzzing from project to project is my nature. Carol not only took my advice and tried hard to "Embrace the GADS", she decided to Embrace "Embracing"! That label on her blog pulls up a whole subset of Embrace posts.
Installing our Disappearing Fountain changed the way the garden looks and sounds. We now see birds sip and splash just a few feet from the breakfast room window. Who knew we had orioles and goldfinches? The secret garden was touched by a little magic when A Fairy Garden Consultant arrived from the Pacific Northwest.
I recorded a couple of songs last spring - one was "Salvia, Salvia, Save Me" (from the deer), which has turned out to be my biggest 'hit'.
The lyrics to "May Dreams in Indiana" were written in .., when Carol was an online friend with a great garden blog. But last spring, the very real Carol and MSS of Zanthan Gardens sat next to my piano and listened to preview the song before Philo & I made it into a YouTube.
Everyone who was part of Spring Fling was touched by a little magic! We Austin Garden bloggers had been meeting off and on since July .. -but last winter Pam/Digging had the idea to go national and Diana, MSS and Bonnie helped her make it a reality. It was wonderful to meet Susan Albert and see Cold Climate Kathy again!

Philo & I went to the movies in June, partly to enjoy the film, and partly to see if our scene extras in the Austin Indie film Baghead made it to the screen. The DVD of Baghead has just been released - it's on Netflix, too. Since we're visible for a few seconds, I guess we need to buy a copy!
Warm, dry Spring turned to sweltering Summer in Austin but it was a lovely, peachy summer in the faraway gardens of our family . Our grand dog Penny was already helping out in Lily's garden. We mourned George Carlin and enjoyed a few great tomatoes. There were plenty of flowers here in spite of the heat and drought - for eleven months of .. the 15th was celebrated with a bloom day post - but intermittent camera problems meant July's entry was a simple list at Annie's Addendum rather than a post with flower portraits. Philo and I were delighted to have the company of MSS of Zanthan on the annual Austin Pond Society Tour. In mid-tour, my old Kodak EasyShare camera stopped working completely but we had such a good time that I was inspired to write more music. At the same time that Philo and I were putting together the video of The Pond Song, our son and daughter-in-law in Illinois were uploading our co-written love song to Lilac Time in Lombard, 'I Don't Want to Live In Texas When It's May". We tried two cameras before settling on a Canon PowerShot A590. It was fun to see what it could do after a little rain fell on the garden. The new camera helped me share the visits of unusual critters like the Bird Poop Caterpillar, decollate snails and a mantidfly. Inspired by inspired by fellow bloggers Vertie and Iris and by the website of genuine Austin entomologist Wizzie Brown, I wrote a comedy song called My Austin Entomologist. One final song for .. needed the scanner, rather than the camera - images from old albums filled the screen for the nostalgic and wistful "Can I Recover Christmas"
This year was not exactly a great gardening year - too hot, too dry, too many other things going on. But it was a great year for meeting and talking to gardeners! Some of these friends were part of my real-world, including my beloved friends the Divas of the Dirtalso in the real world were the bloggers who came to Spring Fling, friends and gardeners on the Conservancy Tour with Pam/Digging all those at the fun October meet-up- Renee and RockRose Jenny and Good & Evil Lori at Eastside Patch and The Grackle. It's always seemed as if we are friends when we read and comment on each other's blogs. Joining Twitter in September meant immediate conversations - some with people known in person. When reading tweets, I can sort of hear them saying the words in my mind. There are no goals or resolutions for this blog in .., no plans for more frequent posting or better photos or higher numbers on the stat counters or more income from the ads. There are no counters and there are no ads. Just words and pictures from one slow bumblebee of a blogger who likes to visit y'all and hum to you once in awhile. May .. be good to all of you.

Of Course the Sun Came Out

It was time to leave the campground at Pohick Bay Regional Park today, and of course the sun came out.  This was the case for our two other visits to PBRP, so I shouldn’t be surprised that the pattern held true this time as well.

Would love to have stayed to take advantage of the nice day, but site 71 is very popular and it is near impossible to get late check-out.  There is always some other rig anxiously waiting in the wings to get in and get set up.  So, we tucked our tail between our tires and headed out at 10:15a (check out is at 11:00a).

After an uneventful 32-mile (51 km) drive, we pulled into storage and put the Phaeton to bed for the next 10 days.  Yes, she gets to rest up next weekend as we have no plans to go camping.  That doesn’t mean we won’t go out and do something fun, but we’ll just have to wait and see.  After all, we were out more days  gallivanting in the Phaeton this month than we were at the stix & brix, and there are chores that need tending.

On the way home, we detoured over to Bull Run Regional Park, found a quiet shelter not far from the entrance, and had a quick bite to eat.  I guess you could say that we wanted to make sure we had at least one al fresco meal this weekend.  Afterwards, we went for a long walk — got to get my 10,000 steps in ;-)

That’s it for today.  No photos, I’m afraid; just a wrap up post.  If all stays quiet on the “work front” I hope to finish posting our Smokies vacation.  So, stay tuned.

Trying to find something to express my sentiments this New Year morning. This does a pretty good job. Happy New Year to my family, friends, acquaintances, and fellow cyclists.

Old Sheldon Church Ruins...Yet Again

Yes, I'm obsessed by this place. I know I've posted pics of this church many times, but you haven't seen these, because I only took them last Saturday. My daughter had a horse show about five miles away, so I couldn't resist running over the trying, once again, to get better shots. I'm pretty happy with these.





The mosquitos about ate me up! Goodness gracious, little bitty ones with a big buzz and a bigger bite. I was slappin' with one hand and tossing my hair back and forth to keep them off my face and neck and snapping photos with the other hand. It would have been quite comical if anyone had been watching, which they weren't. It's a pretty isolated place.
I heard that the church was covered in plaster at one time so that it was white. You can still see patches of it on the interior. I wonder why it wasn't rebuilt after the War of Northern Aggression or the Civil War to you Yankee readers. There wasn't anything 'civil' about it except that it was on native and not foreign soil.
I hope to get over here on the second Sunday after Easter some year and participate in the annual service. I think the St. Helena Episcopal Church in Beaufort, SC does it. I've seen pics of it on their website. How cool would that be?

Wild Mustard

Just don't try spreading it on any food.