Lighted Tulips

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We worked on the property all day yesterday, which included putting in soaker hoses on the rose beds where it’s hard to check the dippers, and to have as backups since we can only get irrigation waster every three weeks now. We finally got all the branches picked up from pruning the fruit trees — I think the branches double when you cut them, I took down the last of the chain-link fence that was now in front of our neighbor’s wood fence, and no longer needed. I pulled up several metal posts we had holding up trellis at one point, but since we are reconfiguring the beds, they needed to come out. I went ahead and set up the swamp cooler, although it might be a little early. Springtime is really difficult on our property because it still freezes almost every night and it was 82 F this afternoon. The new water hose will probably crack a few times before it stops freezing. After I got all the other stuff done, I went down and dug out 75 feet of our main irrigation ditch and built up the bank on the south of the ditch in an attempt to keep the water from running into the access between us and the neighbor. The digging was difficult because there are mostly tree roots under the ditch.

 

Dandelion

 

 

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Turtles

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Between photographing Katarina, Jackie, David and Rudy playing with the kids in Family Promise on Saturday, I photographed the turtles sunning themselves under the partly cloudy sky, and swimming around in the duck pond. Thinking about the turtles, and all the playing and happiness those kids and students were having spending the afternoon together reminded me of The Turtles song “So Happy Together” — www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zv85y08aA2w

 

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The Matrix

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The water droplets on a spider web reminded me of a matrix. Patti came back to my office this afternoon and said there was a good photo op on Gold in front of Cafe Giuseppe. So I grabbed my camera and went to the front of the building and got the photo of the scooter and the police motorcycle. If I worked at the front front desk in the office instead of the “meat locker” in the back, I would get endless photo ops — but then I probably wouldn’t get much else done. I got another drive by with the low sun behind the Old Town sculptured tower landmark at westbound I-40 and Rio Grande Blvd.

 

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Cuatro Gotas

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We got a lot of wind and dust on Monday, and sporadic rain, wind, snow, and hail yesterday, making the light really strange at sunrise and sunset. I think some places in the metro area might of got measurable precipitation, but it didn’t register on our rain gage. “¡Cuatro gotas!”  (not much rain) as the Spaniards would say —  just enough to leave muddy rain drops all over our cars.

 

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New Tulips and a Dirty Cat

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The new tulips I planted last fall are coming up — big yellow, red/yellow and peachy-red tulips. I’ll have to wait and see if there were other colors in the mix, as I’ve forgotten what all I planted. Guildenstern was out rolling in the dirt, and wanted to be held, of course.

 

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Chemtrails, Bikers & Puck

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The “chemtrails” as some people call them, more commonly known as “contrails”, made quite interesting patterns crisscrossing under the sun this morning. As the temperatures continue to warm, I’m seeing a lot more bikers on the road. Laurie left the door open to the study so the cats could be in it with her the other night — Puck was very happy to lay in his favorite spots he missed since I put the door on the study.

 

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Moon Shadow

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I was out at midnight under the full moon — the silence was peaceful and the shadows cast by the moonlight were beautiful, yet somewhat sinister like a dragon or  Scylla ready to rise up out of the serpentine shadows when your back is turned.

The ways of the world, and even more so, the ways of the Internet can be so very puzzling. I participate in market surveys that earn money for charities. The surveys are mostly about technology, automotive products and architecturally related merchandise like doors, windows, flooring, etc. I don’t know what the surveys will be about until I start them. Yesterday, after Stretch died, I received an alert that I had a new survey. The first question was “Do you own a pet?” I answered yes, and the rest of the survey was about if I would be interested in receiving text messages from my pet during the day, how much I’d pay for such a service and if I’d like to get continue to get messages from pet heaven after the pet died. Not only was it one of the weirdest things I’d ever heard of, it really creeped me out coming the day after Stretch died. I answered no to all questions and commented how weird it was when comments were allowed. I guess someone is thinking that people who don’t have time to spend with their pets would like the feeling of having a personal connection by getting text messages throughout the day from their neglected or even their dead pets. Trying to imagine why anyone would consider paying for such a silly service was like the kernel panic in the last photo.

 

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