Blog Index - July 2017

July 14, 2017	I ripped the ass out of . . .
July 15, 2017	“SPLATT”
July 17, 2017	One of my favorite places – York, Maine
July 19, 2017	The branch that moved

July 19, 2017 –The branch that moved.

        As I mentioned a few days ago, snakes, snakes, every where . . . and the snake saga continues.

        Early in the cool of the morning yesterday I wandered around and picked up 15 minutes’ worth of downed limbs and large twigs to toss on the pickup load of downed limbs I’d loaded two days before.  I pick up the twigs that are too thick to dissolve during a years’ composting.  Due to the high winds with all these rains we seem to have lots of downed limbs.  Every four or five weeks I fill the pickup truck and we haul them off to the landfill and pay for the dumping.

        You would think that hauling off all these downed limbs and not creating “snake piles, i.e., brush piles” where snakes want to hunt or multiply . . . we would not see as many snakes as we have this year.

        But, this was a double snake day.  Possibly due to so much rain they are moving up from the Kudzu patch to find warm wet grass to release their skins so they can shed and get bigger and bigger to scare the wits out of me or they’ve heard that my back yard gardens are extremely beautiful this year due to the rains – who knows.

        My husband was mowing the back lawn and he made a turn on his sit down lawnmower and slowed down to reach down and pick up what he thought was a fallen limb.  Just as he stopped the mower the “limb” moved and he discovered it was his old friend – or what he thought was his old friend the snake that had gotten itself tangled up in the sweet pea netting that he later did the Good Samaritan thing by cutting it free.  Of course, in the process he also chopped all the blooming sweet peas down.  I can’t exactly praise him much about his being so good to all of God’s creatures and killing off my flowers at the same time.

        When the limb – err – snake moved, he ushered it with the lawn mower back to the kudzu property line.  But, it seems to have a run of our yard any time it pleases.

        Less than half hour later I was walking up to my “French” bench under the Bradford pears and knowing I had picked up all the downed limbs from the days of heavy rain and wind just that morning,  I pause a moment to see if what I thought was a limb was a limb, but it was another snake.  Not a black snake but an immature black rat snake coming out of adolescence into adult hood – the white patches still visible, but fading.

        I stopped dead in my tracks – good thing – I was about 4 feet away before I noticed it.  It noticed me too.  A completely different demeanor it had from our often seen black snake. I backed away after I gave it a good study.

        I turned and hailed down the husband, but, alas, it had slithered away before he could scrutinize it.

        Needless to say, I did not go to my “French” bench to jot in my journal.  I camped out in the house instead as my back was still in fright spasms.

        I put my nose back in Patrick Taylor’s book entitled The Wily O’Reilly.  OH, what a treasure.  Essay format of a few pages each of little “stories” or “events” of an Irish Doctor in a village called Ballybuckelbo, Ireland.   Amusing, delightful and a good read.

        It is the back story of the best-selling series starting with Irish Country Doctor followed by Irish Country Village, etc.,

        I found it charming.  If you are looking for an amusing summer read that takes you to another location – try one of Patrick Taylor’s books.  I think you will love it.

July 17, 2017 – One of my favorite places – York, Maine

NOTE:  This is from my July monthly Writer’s Group 

              assignment.

            Close your eyes and envision somewhere you have been before and then ask yourself the following questions:

1.     What got your attention in the scene you saw in your mind’s eye?

2.     Where was your focus, and why?

3.     What smells caught your attention?

4.     What did you hear?

5.     Did you taste anything?

6.     How was your sense of touch involved?

Your prompt for July is to write about this place, fictional or real, so that the reader is drawn into this setting.

This is a factual story:

        We arrived late afternoon and snagged a coveted, upfront parking space at Cape Neddick across from the Nubble light house in York, Maine.

        We spilled out of the car. Mom and I had leftover bread for the sea gulls as was usual for our pilgrimage to the famous light house and we walked out onto the smooth rocks overlooking the ocean gap between the mainland and light house island.

        The sky had a ridge of grey black clouds indicating a storm was brewing out at sea and the ocean breeze on our faces was robust and refreshing for late May.

        The gap, or better described as gully, where the usual tumultuous white capped, cross-cut and dangerous waves normally were, was empty. No ocean waves.  The gully was dry. Only dry rocks, well-worn cobbles, and clumps of sea weed baking in the late afternoon sun could be seen.   It took us a few moments to actually comprehend that one could walk over to the island, to the ‘nubble’ if you were nimble and adventurous.

        “Someone’s pulled the plug.”  My Dad said shaking his head in amazement.

        “I thought it was deeper than this.” I exclaimed as I moved forward to get a better look at the deep gully understanding why so many visitors were about this afternoon.  

        “Don’t get too close to the edge,” Called my Mom as she opened the bread wrapper.

        The strong ocean breeze blew my hair from my face and I could smell the aroma of drying sea weed.  The few active sea gulls walked closer now seeing we had bread and cocked their heads.  The lack of crashing ocean waves on the rocks created a mystical hush so foreign to the place. 

        Normally, the gulls would be cawing, squawking, and swirling overhead, but, I saw only a few airborne. Many gulls walked on the dry rocks, and others sat on the grassy island.

        Mom and I tossed up the bread pieces and not one gull caught them on the fly or even when they landed.  As adults we were as disappointed as losing ice cream from a cone.

        “Well, I never . . . .”  My Dad shook his head. His shoulders dropped a bit as he stuck his hands deep in his pants pockets and wandered over to a group nearby.  A man had caught his attention who was lecturing visitors.

        I scrunched the plastic bread wrapper and stuffed it in my pocket as I took one long sweeping study of the dry gully. I then, licked my dry lips and smiled at the salty taste. 

Back at the car, Dad met us saying,

        “That fella over there said that storm brewing out to sea is part of it, but it’s called an extreme low tide of the new moon.”

        “All these years we’ve come here and we’ve never seen it dry.  Isn’t that something?”  Mom answered.

        “And me, I didn’t bring my camera,” I said getting into the car.

        As Dad slowly closed his car door he mused out loud.

“And, uncooperative sea gulls.  Who will believe us?”

For a history, pictures and more of the Cape Neddick, “Nubble” Light house in York, Maine see:

http://www.newenglandlighthouses.net/cape-neddick-nubble-light-history.html

July 15, 2017  - “SPLATT”

        “Hey, wake up.”

        “Why?”

        “I got to tell you what just happened.”

       

        “What?”

        “I was sitting out by the shed and just dozing off when I noticed a flash in front of me and heard “Splatt” like a baseball coming into a leather mitt.   I opened my eyes and looked around and just in front of me on the ground I see a green snake.  

        “Snake?”

        “Green, little fella – kind’a pretty, come out to see him.”

        “How big was it?”

        “Thin, 8 to 12 inches.  He sort of acted stunned for a moment, then lifted his head up and licked the air at me and moved off toward the ivy. He must have fallen out of the tree above me.”  He was like a little boy, all excited with his find.

        “Come on.” He added.

        I was having an old fashioned “lie down” in the cool and here I was being rousted out by my dear husband to see a snake.  Snake, snake, here, there and everywhere – it’s almost as bad as the News – Russians and Russian collusion on every channel.

        “Oh, all right.” I acquiesced.

        I got up from my comfortable spot and I slipped on my garden shoes and headed out towards the shed.  We cautiously go out to where the snake was last seen.  A few moments later my husband spots him draped out of the cement blocks which are the foundation of the big slate table.  I tentatively inch forward and stop in my tracks.

        “It almost doesn’t look real – that lime green.  Not much bigger around than a pencil.” I announce so surprised at the vivid lime green.

        The green snake noticed us and reared back to look at us.  It was the typical standoff – us 3 feet way and it wanting to get away.

        I will admit, I wasn’t as frightened by it compared to the 5 to 6 foot black snake of a week or two ago.  Familiar with paper sizes 8 ½ x 11 and 8 ½ by 14 – I visually calculated him to be about 12 to 14 inches.  I critically examined him – visually of course – noting the long thin tail and the dark eyes.  That lime green, almost the same color as a V-neck sweater I own and the very shade of green of the two-tone Liriope which I have a lot of.  I understood why my husband was so persistent that I come out to look.  I’d never seen one before.

        My husband showed me the spot where it had landed and I looked overhead at the slender arching branch from a nearby tree.

        “How did he get up there?” He asked.

        “That’s simple – the poison ivy growing up that tree gives him a ridge to slither on, or whatever you call their motion – climb?  I wonder what he was eating.” I answered.

        I moved my chair about 12 feet from the overhanging limb and sat down in the shade being able to look up at where he had fallen from and was constantly looking out of the corner of both eyes at every leaf that moved near my feet. I love nature and sitting out, but up-close-and-personal “snake” days are not included in that delight.

        “Earlier I was down on all fours working on that project and if it had landed while I was down there -” He didn’t finish the sentence only shook his head.

       

I was thinking, if I had been sitting out here with you this afternoon it would have been my luck that it would have fallen on me and I would have probably had a heart attack right then and there.  Just the thought of the possibility made me shudder.

“I wonder what kind he is.” I pondered out loud.

Moments later my husband got up to check on him where we had seen him last.

“Grass snake I think . . . he’s gone.”

“Well, I had a really good look at him; I’ll look him up in my snake book.”

Later I did look him up and he is a rough greensnake (Opheodrys aestiuvs) which is nonvenomous.  Usually 14 to 16 inches in length for an adult. Slender and graceful with keeled scales. Excellent climbers and spend most of their time above ground. [Well that is just peachy  . . . one day I may be sitting under a tree and have one drop on me . . .]   Eats insects and spiders, . . . and slugs.  YIPEE, eats slugs!!

The greensnake kills with a strike instead of constriction.  That is what he was doing; he was curling back his upper body in a striking pose.  I guess we were too close.    And, the snake book advises that the cousin, the “smooth” greensnake (Opheodrys vernalis) is sometimes seen in North Carolina and it is hard to tell the difference.

I guess I don’t need to know the difference between the rough and the smooth.  I will just call it a greensnake that hangs out in trees and occasionally “Splats” to the ground.

        

July 14, 2017 – I ripped the ass out of . . .

        . . . a pair of garden pants this morning.  I must say, I do get lots of mileage [or my money’s worth] out of my casual clothes.  The cotton, navy blue long pants in question were purchased at the OLD Wal Mart and that was years ago.

        Of course, being 100% cotton they shrunk one whole size and I could barely squeeze into them after the first wash.  Then, I lost weight and wore the daylights out of them.  Getting faded and worn by the 4^th or 5^th summer, I bought the same brand, but a size larger and those pants never shrunk and were always my “Helen-Balloon-DAH” pants. [I wonder where I got that phrase?  I remember it as a teenager so it must be a family saying.  I do have an Aunt Helen and all the St. John clan is ‘large’. - I wonder? Sorry I digress.]

        I don’t remember exactly what I was doing in these casual pants, but they were still in the “can-wear-out-in-public” category.  I got the inside right pant leg, about six inches north of the hem, caught on something and ended up with a three corner tear.  The first three corner tear I’d experienced in my lifetime and it was at that point these pants got shifted into the role of garden pants and quickly became my “gardening uniform.”

        Prior to them I would wear old shorts out in the garden and got plenty of bug bites, poison ivy, scratches, and scrapes on my legs.  Once I shifted into long pants – so easily identified by the three corner tear – which for some foolish reason I have an affinity for that ‘tear’ - I discovered I no longer needed the kneeling pad for under my knees.  I could walk on my knees from one 3-foot weeding section to another.  It made weeding easier, simpler, and quicker.  I just stayed down and I didn’t have to get up and get down moving the kneeling pad.

        Funny thing that . . . when my husband sees me get up from weeding to move, his assumption is ‘Good, she’s done.  I can carry out a few cold beers for us and we can sit and just gaze at our nice gardens. . .’  He constantly interrupted me when I wore shorts and was doing the up and down bit.

        Now he knows when I get up it is to empty the rolling wheel barrow filled with weeds that I pull along behind me.  It means I am taking it to the compost pile which is a more natural break in my garden weeding session and a more welcome break.

        Yes, those long garden pants have seen up-close-and-personal many new gardens, spring plantings, fall clean up, and my famous mudding sessions. [We’ll discuss mudding session in a future blog.  Those sessions end up with me literally peeling off mud caked pants at the back door mud room, aptly named for the washer and dryer, and my streaking through the house to the shower and fresh clothes.]

        But, alas, in this wicked heat and humidity, these gardening pants literally stuck to me; the fabric did not shift but was ‘glued to me’ and I took one too many deep knee bends and I blew out the fabric in the butt. HUGE TEAR! It was not the actual rear end seam, but the left buttock.  Is it a coincidence that it, too, is a three corner tear which is big enough that I could feel the breeze?

        I guess scooting around often on my butt weeding wore the fabric paper thin, and as my husband has often called my butt - “The ass on my Lass” - in the end, did them in.