pip

Another beautiful day. It's that time of year in Vermont. I was up doing my usual Saturday wood cutting (yes Doug, I was wearing all the appropriate safety equipment). I've been working on a couple of big oak trees in the back, and have to lug them up into the truck by myself. They are very heavy. Last week Erin was around to help me lift them. She even did a little cutting for the first time, and handled it in her usual confident, unassuming way. Wish she was still here. She said she would write a guest blog. We'll see. No pressure there.

the corn guy

Beautiful summer's day. In our neck of the woods, it snows in January, there is sugaring in March, the leaves turn in October, and in late July the "corn guy" arrives on the same corner in West Rutland, and sells sweet corn until the end of the season. Some of the early morning risers have noticed the Pleiades appearing in the morning sky in the east. These Seven Sisters will become more prominent as summer turns to fall. I haven't figured out if the appearance of the constellation causes the corn guy to turn up, or visa versa. Blackberries ripening in the front yard.

Groucho

from Nobleday on flickr

Sunny & pleasant. The other day I was up in the quarry near here looking for wildflowers. I scared up a couple of killdeer scooting through the gravel beds, trying to lure me away from their nests. Somehow the way they seemed to lean forward when they walked reminded me of Groucho Marx.

fledged

the crossroads

Ira, Vermont

Yesterday was sunny and warm. Temps in the high 70's & low 80's. It was about as nice as it ever gets here in Vermont. Erin and Allyn headed out to Ohio. The 2nd batch of bluebirds has fledged. The nests are pretty empty today. Blueberries on the morning cereal.

heat lightning

70 degrees at 6:00 in the morning. Temps in the 90's yesterday & today. People closing their windows during the day, and opening them again in the evening. Heat lightning in the sky last night. Quarries, gorges, and ponds filled with swimmers. It seems I usually use the AC in my Honda about once every other year. I have enjoyed it when driving the last two days in a row, a new record I think.

crickets

from hart_curt on flickr

Sunny and hot. Thin film of water on the tile floors at work. Moisture in the paper there as well. Spotted an Indigo Bunting, the first one this year. Sound of summer, crickets in the back yard.

The sun, we say, is the cause 

of heat, but the heat is the sun,

here on this window ledge.

Mark Rutherford

Zen page a day calendar

thunder moon

lkjlkj

 

The full moon, the "Thunder" moon took place on Friday night when we were on Martha's Vineyard. Some of us went over to the beach to watch it rise over Vineyard Sound. On the way, we met a group of about a dozen photographers. I asked them what was up, and they said they were there to photograph the rising of the moon. The direction they indicated was about 45 degrees to the west of where I thought it was going to rise. I was disturbed to see that there was a cloud bank directly over that part of the sky.

When the appointed time came (8:24), I kept looking, but didn't see anything promising. Then Doug piped up, "There it is!" It was rising over the Sound where I thought it would be in the first place. I don't know why I had more faith in the photographers than I did in myself. Thanks to Erin for the pictures.