Saturday. Bench Day.
Megatron VS Optimus Prime. Right? I looked it up on the internet. This one seemed fitting for today. I don’t know why. I’m not going to speculate or reflect. No time. I’m on call for work and I have been up pretty much all night with issues. Bound to the computer, I might as well make the most of my time and try to accomplish something with the occasional break for fun. This bench is deceiving because up close and in person it didn’t look all that great. But after I stepped back and took the pics, it really pops as an outstanding and artistic design. One of my favorites. Ever. And I have a lot of bench pictures from the years gone by that I never did get around to fully posting. Maybe this is the year! I’ll try and do more throughout the day as I get tired of work work work. I consider this fun. Hopefully you do to! Later.
Oh! One more thing as FYI. Since I was up so early, and outside, I got to see the elusive giant Blue Jay swoop into the yard and try to attack all the other birds away from the feeder! Really exciting stuff for me since I feel neglected by the really big birds of prey lately. No pictures though. He was really blue and big and beautiful. But I’ve become a lazy birdwatcher. Literally. I just sit there and watch the birds. Maybe tomorrow I’ll catch the photo fever. Until then, happy Sat! Toodles.
This Is Your Lucky Spring
I literally took only 2 pictures of my daffodils that bloomed this year. This is the better one. It’s not that the flowers weren’t there. They all came up on schedule and died on schedule but my opportunity to capture hundreds and hundreds of photos was not available to me this spring. Plus, I was super lazy. Sometimes one is all you really need anyhow. I’ll try not to let you down with the bird pictures. Someone (me) got a new birdfeeder for Mother’s Day, and the birds are plentiful and practically close enough to touch. Can you just imagine what you you are about to see? No. You can’t. That’s why I’m going to take a million pictures and post them all summer. Lucky you! Later.
Argh! Two More Months Of Life Slipped On By
And it’s summer again. Almost. We are still undecided here in the Midwest. But the calendar says June 14. And the temps don’t lie. Well, they do, but we ignore that flaw because we love it so. I don’t want to bog this day down with a lot of past dwelling so let me update fast and we can carry on from this moment. I’m only hitting the highlights, so to speak, and moving on. First, the darkness.
Death has touched ground too much this year and I have had 6 opportunities to say goodbye to some lovely family and friends in the last 6 months. That’s really all I’m going to post about it. No disrespect to anyone, but I can’t trust my wordiness, and I don’t like carrying a heavy heart very far. All were loved, and all will be missed.
On a lighter note, I have a new vehicle! If you have visited here before you may know that I kind of loved my Maxima.
In a comfy, stable, but still kind of fast and sexy, way. Well, 200,000 thousand miles just wasn’t in the cards for the old girl and she decided to give me a random Wednesday off of work when she pooped out in the middle of the road while I was driving her in to the job. Too much to fix this time and we had to let her go. Cursed and blessed. Because I found my dream machine. Catch me I’m falling, swooning and flushing, batting my eyelashes, getting all hot and sweaty, because I am in love love love with this mere automobile. Meet my new main squeeze, the 2012 Jeep Wrangler Rubicon. Used, but so sweet, and only 18000 miles.
Isn’t she beautiful? I hesitated at the edge for a split second and then jumped in anyway to the Jeep pool. The dealer said I would love it. He was right right right. I have been driving it for a month and it feels like it has been mine forever. When I walk out of work and see it in the parking lot, my heart skips a little beat, I swear. Typed, that looks, and sounds, sad, I realize, but I don’t care. My heart for a Jeep.
I still waste entirely too much time playing these stupid stupid phone games that I get absolutely nothing for in the real world except satisfaction of reaching the maximum level possible and the knowledge that I did not spend even ONE cent of my own money to get here. Level 70. Tiny Village. You kill me. But I love you so. I have a job. I have money to pay my bills. I’m fairly healthy with a birthday coming up that I’m not exactly jumping for joy about, but I’m alive right? I lost 10 pounds since I saw my doc in April! That alone makes me happy. My clothes fit! And my B/P is going down number by number with each little weight loss. My skin still turns into kind of a mess every few weeks but these are the things we live with. Stay out of the sun, don’t drink alcohol, (don’t drink a lot of alcohol), eat as healthy as you can, exercise, get some sleep. That’s pretty much the whole trick of it.
The kids. The kids are out of school. Again. I have a Junior and a Sophomore now. 16 and 15. Both driving. Both taller than me. Both beautiful. And both not too shabby in the brains department. Healthy and seemingly happy as of this moment. Also, spending the weekend with their dad. Father’s Day and all that. This is the first time I have been totally alone in this house, for a whole weekend, and overnight, for like, a million years. One. Million. Years. It. Is. Wonderful.
But Lisa, you say, don’t you have a boyfriend? Where is he? How can you be totally alone?
Well, let me enlighten. I still have a BF. He’s fine. He’s fabulous. He supports my crazy. And there’s no shortage of that around here. I always find the extra level. I’m blaming it on age. He’s younger (that’s right, that’s how we do it) so I have to blaze the trail. It’s hard, to be sure, but it’s less hard now; now that I got that Jeep! Woop. See what I just did? Turned it into a Jeep commercial. Shameless.
Anyway, the BF just left for another one of his motorcycle trips (hence the alone part) and this time I’m gonna document it. It’s a week long, and I won’t even say where. One, cause I don’t really know exactly, (East towards Pennsylvania and then South to Tennessee/Alabama/etc…I believe), and two, I don’t need to know because he’s going to take pictures every time he stops and I’m going to post them. We are all going on this journey together. Gather round and follow us down. I’ve been up since 5 am so I’m really proud of this day. And it’s only 3:30! I have a shit ton of work to catch up on but I think I can handle it with all this breathing room I have. Even if it is only 48 hours worth. The house is neat and quiet. Most of the laundry is done. The sun is shining. The birds are singing. The flowers are blooming. The air is fresh and clean. It’s like a damn country song over here. I even got a flag in the window. And a Jeep in the driveway. And the boy’s GMC out in the front. If I had a lake in the backyard to skip a stone on, I’d really have it all. Well, ain’t that America? I will do my best to share what the BF sends back to me every day. It’ll be a small vacation for all of us. For free. Let’s go!
Park Forest, Illinois. 6 am. Packing and getting ready. He’s driving alone today. Meeting the rest of the traveler’s in PA later tonight.
Plymouth, Indiana. 7:30 am. Gas, water, food stop. Since there is no picture sent with the message I’ll just use this here map to kind of show the way. (Internet Map CREDIT: Map Of The United States by FreyFox. Thank you!) It’s silly, but it’s meant to be. It’s also a good map! Take a look all around, then look to the East. Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Pennsylvania.
Upper Sandusky, Ohio. 11:30 ish. Fun fact: All you can eat KFC! But it’s more than that! It’s a KFC, Long John Silvers, DQ, and a gas station. I’m at home eating leftover noodles with butter. I do like this picture though. It never seems like other states are as crowded as Illinois. Hmm. Pondering time.
Carrollton, Ohio. 2:30 pm. Not much to see. Let’s flip it around.
Well, it’s a gas station. I just thought I’d showcase the motorcycle since I was so bad about the last trip. The text received with the pic is: Back to the road…next stop will be destination. 3 more hours. I asked about time zones, but it was too late. You can’t keep these motorcycle people still for long. So that’s it for now. I will update as much as possible this week. Work will interfere but I have a late night ahead, to try and get ahead, and some days off in the near future. Maybe I will even get in some extra stuff. Birds and flowers and such. I got benches for the last three years. And some found money that I am about to lump into an all-inclusive-3 year total. I could potentially be up all night! Full moon too. You can stay with me if you like. Come and hang if you happen to be up. Leave a comment or just browse around.
And as a side note to the BF: You might not see this today or anytime soon, but be careful! Stay safe. I love you.
Watch for motorcycles! Later!
Let’s Call This A Lucky Saturday For All My Fans!
Oh yeah. It’s the first bird picture of the Spring 2014 edition of “This Website Sucks Now Because It’s Always A Picture Of A Damn Bird Or Some Clouds Or Some Flowers.”
Obviously that’s a cardinal. Don’t be fooled by the grey sky behind this happy little fellow. It was warm that day. It was warm yesterday. 71 degrees. It’s supposed to be warm today. I filled the bird feeder lighthouse and the birds have found it again. So get ready internet world! More bird pictures are this close for scrolling down this website after a long cold winter of just snow and icicle pictures. And not to disappoint, below is the first picture of my daffodils, also making their debut Spring 2014 appearance. Enjoy.
101 Birds
101 visible birds. I counted them. At least I tried to count them. I may not be exact, because if you click it and enlarge it, there are a lot of spots and smudgy parts that look like birds but could be part of another bird or a camera flaw or a picture defect. I used my best judgement. Plus, they were already pretty far away when I had the genius idea to take the picture. There were SO many I couldn’t believe it. This is just one shot that I finally thought to take. I just stood there in awe of nature and the flight of the weather bound. They were loud too. Geese ya know. Flying south. And truthfully I was thinking that with so many flying over my head, what if one, or 10, pooped on me? Would that still be considered good luck? I was paralyzed by the sound and sheer numbers. I was doomed until I shook myself out of the bird haze to grab my phone. Anyway that’s my rough count of what I captured in the frame. Feel free to waste just as much time as I did counting them over if you feel strongly about this number issue and send me your best estimate. There’s no wrong answer. Here’s the small wave that flew by right after. Late to the party, but just as loud. 18 more. Later.
More Random Wild Life. For My Mom.
Chipmunks.
Rabbits. This is the mom I believe. She looks kind of beat.
Those ears kill me. They are gigantic. Is this technically a “hare”? Or a jackrabbit? Or just a plain, old, midwest rabbit? Probably doesn’t matter. I have a few more:
This was before babies. She (?) would be sitting out there in the rocks every day when we would leave and sometimes when we would come home. I can only assume it was a nice warm spot by the house. Our walls are literally brick and drywall thin. And our crappy metal windows basically blow air in all year round. It only makes sense that the hot air was coming through just as well. On the upside, I tell my family that we will never die of accidental carbon monoxide poisoning. Too many leaks in the infrastructure. One less thing ya know?
The nest of babies. We found it by mistake. The one closest to the front obviously did not make it. But the other two were squirming around. There may have been three at one time but we have only seen two in the yard on a regular basis. Here’s one:
Isn’t that precious?
This is like one of those “find-the-rabbit-in-this-picture” pictures. Highlights magazine. Or am I the only one out here old enough to know about this?
Frog.
Another frog.
Let’s keep working this water theme. Ducks. And baby ducks.
Mom and dad ducks.
City ducks. Chicago Lock Ducks. That’s prob a good name for some kind of team. The Chicago Lock Ducks! Swimming into stadiums near you! Eh. Let’s just post the pics.
To wrap up this very long segment, I will end with the fish and turtles inside of our house. The time is ticking away and my daughter wants to go out. Here is the old stuff and current stuff. Oscars, from young to old. Then the turtles, in order of growth.
When you come up to the tank, they swim to the glass to see you. So friendly like. We had 4. Now we only have 2. Sad. What’s really sad is that we are kind of waiting for the other two, to, ummm, perish, if you will. They live forever and you can’t put anything new into the tank with them because they will attack and kill it. Not all, Great White shark attack killing, or gnashing teeth piranha swarming blood bath, no, they just head butt and try to clamp down with their giant mouths and take pieces out of the other fish until the poor sucker cowers into a corner, sinks to the bottom of the tank and die. Nice fish huh?
Awwwww. So cute.
Turtle as art. This is how they look now.
All awkward and on top of each other. Their tank is really too small now.
Just as an extra note to anyone that has turtles and a turtle tank that gets really dirty: Spend the 8 dollars on this moss ball thing. It really works. It looks ridiculous, and you are basically paying for something you could scoop out of a creek at the Forest Preserve, but hey, nature isn’t always pretty.
So there ya go mom! I saved all the squirrel pictures and the skulking black cat that prowls around our backyard for their own separate posts. And there is A LOT. The squirrels we have in our yard are very crazy, so they need their own special column here. And the cat is just a cat, but I have various pictures of it doing predator-like things that I feel make it worthy of its own posting too. Plus, this is like 3 pages long. It’s enough. And I found more birds and flowers. And inanimate animals. I really like taking pictures of statues and fake animals too apparently. It’s a disease. It’s also 85 degrees and Saturday afternoon, and my day off. I need to get up out of this house and hit the streets. There is shopping to be shopped, dinner to be gotten, and drinks to be drank. Everyone have a safe night and I will post more. Later.
When Was The Last Time I Posted Flower Pics?
Today! These were taken with the phone camera. Over the summer. Still cleaning out the picture folders. Aren’t you lucky?
That’s pretty good for a phone camera, as I continue to brag about the Galaxy S4. You can see the little cobwebs on the flower. It’s ridiculous!
I think that’s all for today. The oven timer that marks the movement of my life and death is beeping away, reminding me that I need to go. One more shift to get through and then I am off for the weekend. Shew. These long weeks kill me. FYI, you can always click on the image when you are viewing it to make it larger. It will open nice and big and you can see all that beautiful detail that I keep bragging about. It’s especially nice with those Hawk pictures below. You can really see into that birds soul. Not really. But try it. More birds to come. Later!
Hawk.
And two for some size reference, zoomed out a bit. He/she was prob the size of a cat maybe. Very impressive I thought. Work calls. Later.
Monday Was A Good Day
Two quick pics to keep this site interesting and I am going to get ready for work. Monday was a good day for my viewing numbers–Thank you all for following me!–and it was good for life in general. I felt very good and healthy. Very glad to be alive and thankful for life and family and a job that allows me to have days off during the week. Living the dream, for realz. Haha. Anyhoo, I also managed to accomplish most of my list goals, including shop for food for the fam for the rest of the week while I am at work, and laundry. Sort of. It’s not piled up on the floor, so it counts. I had a hawk in the backyard, first thing, yesterday morning, 7 AM. A hawk. Just sitting there, on the ground, under the bird feeder, scaring away every other species of wildlife in the area. No joke. Not one other animal-like creature, be it bird, squirrel, butterfly, chipmunk, rabbit, etc…, was in my yard the entire time the hawk sat there. And it was very quiet too. No sounds. Not even bugs and insects dare make a peep when the top-of-the-food-chain predator for our little suburb decides to pop a squat after a long night of hunting or whatever it was doing. Of course I got pictures. About 100. Wait until you see them! This is the enticing, hanging story line, that I am using to bring you back tomorrow. I have to sort the pics and pick out the non-blurry ones. And I truly do not have time. As usual, I am pushing my “wasting” time into my actual “need to go” time. If it’s a good night tonight at the old general store, I will post them later, if not, then in the AM when I crawl out of bed. This is the nice time of year for weather around here so everyone enjoy and I will be back. Later.
For The Birds
Hummingbird. Perched. I have more but I can’t find them. Sad face.
The Hawk we had hanging out in the backyard earlier in the spring.
Blue Jay.
Red Winged Blackbird.
Cardinal. Male.
Cardinal. Male. Another one? The same one? Not sure, we had several pairs flying around, yelling all spring.
Cardinals are my favorite bird.
Cardinal. Female. Pretty sure. She’s so scraggly looking. Women of the wild. Not fair.
Yellow Goldfinch. If you look in the middle of the picture. These birds hardly ever come and pose right in front of me. So annoying.
Nuthatch. Thought it was a woodpecker for a very long time.
Don’t know what kind but I like the picture.
Last shot for the morning. Can’t tell what bird this was, I took this picture mostly for that “arty” effect. I have more birds but I really need to go now. Have a fab afternoon. Later.
just shy of pretty 