Nothing Much
More thunderstorms tonight.
I’ve come to the realization that folks that successfully photograph lightening have one or more of the following:
1: really good luck
2: really really good reaction speed
3: extra (expensive) equipment
got some cool looking shots, but no actual lightening. I know what’ll be going on my wishlist for christmas/birthday/whatever!!
Apollo thinks its really odd how I sit in the dark with the camera in my hand trying to photograph lightening, he just doesn’t get it!
Storm pictures
Had major thunderstorms rolling through all evening, some hail:
nickel and quarter sizes mostly.
Then after dark I decided to try for some shots of lightening. Didn’t get the shots I wanted, but had a couple cool looking ones anyway:
And a car passing by made for a cool shot:
Husband says….
….the scope looks normal to him when he looks through it. So either I’m somehow holding the rifle weird, or I was even shakier than I thought I was that I couldn’t hold it still enough to look through straight. My one and only other experience with a scope was on the air-rifle at the Reserves booth a few years ago, and I don’t recall having any issues looking through that one. Oh well. Now if only mother nature will stop trying to see if we can grow gills so I can have a sunny afternoon to shoot on!
Weather.com
Is it just me or is the weather.com site unfriendly to any browser but IE? I’ve not tried Safari (though now that I think about it, the site does appear normal when viewed on the iPad), but when I attempt to use the site with either Firefox OR Chrome its screwy as heck. Is it just me or does anyone else have the same problem?
General update
Lets see.
Broken tooth: has a temporary crown on, while we wait to see what the insurance says they’ll cover. The dentist is of the opinion that there’s some life left in that nerve afterall so we’ll see.
The rest of the plants have arrived, but mother nature is attempting to see if we can grow gills and so they haven’t been planted yet. Hopefully tomorrow.
Apollo has continued to grow at the same insane rate, unfortunetly his leash skills aren’t keeping pace. The more excited he gets the more likely he is to pull, and the more he pulls the more likely he is to end up choking himself against the collar in his excitement. To the point where I worry he’s doing damage. After discussion with the breeder we’re taking a multi-sided approach. More exercise to wear him out, more dog interaction with appropriate dogs (she feels he is possibly lonely, and considering how much he LOVES playing with other dogs she probly has a point), and we’ll be adding a prong collar to his closet this week. Its very difficult to get him enough exercise and interaction when he’s attempting to pull me down the street cause there’s a “PERSON who might PET ME”, so the prong collar will hopefully teach him that pulling is not pleasant, which in turn will make it easier for all of the above to get done. On the other hand we’ve had fun coming up with games to wear him out at home. I’m trying to get video I promise.
Arg
I broke a molar last night. About half the visible portion of the tooth, all the way down to the gum line. And the dentist can’t see me till tomorrow (of course, its the way the week is going). Odd thing is it doesn’t hurt at ALL. Not even hot/cold sensitive (which probly says bad things for the state of the nerve, oh well). But it makes eating interesting……
Plants
All the plants that have arrived are planted.
4 baby pine trees:
3 of them are Acrocona Norway Spruce (a dwarf variety that will only reach about 15ft, and has red pine cones) and they’ve been planted as the start to a privacy screen across the front of the yard. They grow about a foot a year so although they’re only 1ft tall now it won’t take them long to start being effective.
The fourth is a Korean Fir. Should reach about 50ft, and is one of the bluer varieties, to the point of having blue pine cones. It went in the front corner next to the driveway. We took down a pair of arborvitaes from about the same spot. The big difference in location is that the fir is about 6 feet further into the yard so as to avoid the power lines above. The arborvitaes have already had their tops cut off once because they were planted directly under the wires. I understand WHY, they were an effective screen to block the view of the house across from the driveway, but still badly placed, and frankly not pretty in the winter when the green leaves turn brown. Again the fir will take a few years to start being effective, but is less likely to impact the wires.
3 different types of berry canes:
3 canes of the Apache blackberry, a thornless variety
3 canes of a traditional raspberry
3 canes of a golden raspberry.
3 Northern Blueberry plants
3 rubarb plants
All in the ground and sprouting. Still to come are two Pink Lemonade blueberry plants, and 3 jalapeno plants, all of which should be arriving shortly as I got a shipping notice on Friday. I’d wanted to do more, but decided to take it easy the first year. None of the berry plants are likely to produce their first year which made it imperitive to me to get them into the ground this year, especialy since I expect to have to fight for my share of the berries they produce!
Next year we hope to put in a couple more lilac bushes (there’s already a few in the landscaping), and some butterfly bushes, all in the front run to add to the privacy screen. And would like to put in some tulips (ok, they’ll hopefully be this fall not next year), and some other flowers in odd spots, though the former owners did a nice job on the flowers in the landscaping. We also want do some sweet bell peppers as well as the hots, as well as some other odds and ends in a bigger garden, and (probly overly ambitious here) possibly even some corn (sweet, and popcorn varieties).
There’s still lots to do. There’s a battered and dying old pine in the other front corner that frankly is more dead than alive at this point. It needs to come down before it blows down on the wires. We’re thinking we might replace it with a Japanese red maple, and there’s a few more arborvitaes scattered around the yard. I really don’t LIKE them at all and they’ll all come down too eventually, to be replaced by something else.
And I still have to get up some basic fencing around the garden area, I read somewhere that fishing line will deter deer as they won’t jump over something they can’t see. I intend to give it a try anyway.
Language…….
……….as in the following quote has some that isn’t considered appropriate in all circles. I don’t care though, its perfect!