Open Thread – Nature Walk on the Driveway
Before we begin, may I be the first to wish you all a Happy Alaskan Independence Day. Yes, it was on July 3, 2009 that Sarah Palin announced she’d be stepping down from the job that she hated for the good of the state. I thought about writing something up about that, and then decided I’d much rather take a walk and remind myself of the things I like about Alaska, and not the Quitter, nor her successor who is even worse.
So, I grabbed my camera and thought I’d take you on a little nature walk with me. Don’t worry, we don’t have to go far. As a matter of fact, I decided I’d only take shots that I could get from my driveway, just to make it interesting. So, tonight we’ll walk down the driveway, and tomorrow night we’ll walk back.
Just to set the stage, the evening is cool with just a little hint of breeze. Warblers and sparrows and chickadees are chirping and twittering their little hearts out – calling to one another, and answering back. The creek is running and if you didn’t know any better you might at first think it was highway noise, a steady shhhhhhh in the background. Last night it poured buckets all night long, so everything is sparkling clean and dust-free.
The air is pungent and fresh with the smell of more green and growing things than you could name. I don’t know what it is, or whether it’s a combination of things that gives the mountains around Anchorage their signature smell, but it’s like nothing else I know. Other than those sounds, the only thing to hear is the crunching of our feet in the gravel. The mist is rolling over the tops of the mountains, grey and soft.
Ready to go?
This one was right outside the door. I literally step over it every day and never really appreciated the colors or the amazing texture before.
A beautiful fern in the shade, surrounded by rose bushes.
Two cones. If they had a pod, they’d be in it.
The whole sky was filled with clouds like this. They couldn’t make up their mind what kind of cloud they wanted to be, so they were white puffy rain clouds. Covered all the bases.
Wild Sitka roses are everywhere, and smell heavenly.
Columbine. What a complicated flower.
“I am not giving up, and you’re not getting rid of me.”
These bluebells are always the first to bloom, and it seems they’ve hung around a long time this year. They grow in huge patches.
Alpine dogwood grows in blankets on the ground. In the fall, these flowers will have turned into beautiful vermillion berries. The dogwood is one of the earliest bloomers and the latest berry-ers, providing interesting botanical delights from May to October.
Ahhh! Fireweed! This is the thermometer of summer. It starts blooming from the bottom and by the time it gets to the top and turns to puffy white cotton, the snow is soon to fly. That bottom one looks like it’s going to pop. Here we go…
Cranesbill, or wild geranium. To me, it’s so much more beautiful than the kind of geranium you get at the garden store. It lasts a long time too, and is prolific in these parts.
Well, we’ve reached the end of the driveway, so we can sit and relax until tomorrow night’s trip back.
It’s absolutely gorgeous!!!
I spent July 3rd and 4th reading “Blind Allegiance”, now that was good timing! It was a fascinating read. Interesting though that when I dozed off after finishing it up on my new big comfy couch yesterday, that in my dreams (nightmares?) I was Sarah…it was an uncomfortable feeling. Seriously, what a very unhappy person she must be. At any rate, I enjoyed the book so much…and the trip down your driveway as well.
Wonderful idea. Afraid a trip down my driveway would not be interesting at all. Unless you like the color of drought ridden grass.
Lovely photos, AKM! It reminds me of the times that my Camp Fire club took nature walks in my back yard, which isn’t particularly big but is full of all kinds of interesting growing things.
LittleBird’s Daisy and Brownie troops thought that getting me a wheelbarrow load of firewood from the woodpile and stacking it by the door was “…just like little house on the prairie!” (and that was Before we had chickens) 🙂
My best friend (a science teacher with library training and a love for all things percussion and marine biological) and I were troop leaders for our daughters through 4th grade. Our troop got as much science and history as we could expose them to in a weekly meeting and some Special Activities. We participated in Cornell U’s backyard bird count, keyed out trees and other flora, visited the local planetarium, camped at Kolomoki…
Hugs to my daddy, and his sweet mother Grandma Shorty, of blessed memory, who taught me to appreciate our beautiful world and to take care of it as best as I can.
dor v’dor unto the generations
Tikkun Olam Shalom.
Your photos never disappoint. I really love the dandelion…..amazingly beautiful. I have never seen a pink columbine. I’m originally from Colorado and they grow abundantly in the mountains in the summer and are blue with yellow and white highlights. No matter what color, they are delicate, intricate and beautiful.
Looking forward to your tour back up the driveway!
Lovely photos, thanks for taking us down the driveway. So, you call them Sitka roses? We call them beach roses. There are lots of them by the boardwalk/park here in Yonkers. After the beautiful, aromatic petals fall off, wait for the rose hips to ripen. They’re a great source of vitamin C. The dandelion photo is one of the most beautiful specimens ever.
My dear friend Ray, who was the owner of the neighborhood bar d.b.a. in the East Village and in NOLA, died this afternoon. He was on a bicycle without a helmet 6 days ago, and got into an accident with a car. He never regained consciousness. Rest in peace, Ray.
For those of you who have friended me on Facebook, there’s video from about 27 years ago of me & Ray doing an improvised routine. Russell C. posted it on my fb page.
p.s. Happy Alaskan Independence Day!! Word salad for everyone!
very sorry to hear this sad news Zyx.
{{{{{Zyxomma}}}}}
Here is my favorite feel-good story ever:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/07/03/woman-catches-toddler-10-stories_n_889417.html
Hope everyone is having as much fun as I am this weekend.
To help celebrate the holidays,an oil pipeline under the Tellowstone River in Montana has ruptured(yesterday) and people say as much as 42,000 gals of crude oil have been dumped in the flooded river. Oil was reported forty to possibly 100 miles downstream from the spill today.Since the river is flooding,oil is getting washed into pasture land far from the riverbed. Heavy rains and record snow melt continue to cause problems. Exxon is minimilizing damages already. Happy 4th Mother Nature.
That is actually the Yellowstone River. My keyboard took a stoopid pill again. You didn’t really think I spelled that badly,now did you?
They dumped gals in the water?
Women are always getting the short end of the stick!
But truly, how many spills do we have to have before we decide that wind and solar can’t be that bad?
Evil Exxon gremlins wrestling for your keyboard, no doubt, mike.
arrrrrrrrrggggggghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh
also
too
“Teams of federal and state workers fanned out Sunday along Montana’s famed Yellowstone River to gauge the environmental damage from a ruptured Exxon Mobil pipeline that spewed tens of thousands of gallons of crude oil into the waterway.”
The first line on the CNN story about the spill. I bet all those (union) state and federal workers would like to be at home, celebrating the holiday with their families.
Oy, vey.
It just keeps coming.
I’m thinking it’s time for a new New Deal Public Works program:
jobs rebuilding our infrastructure, taking care of our environment
with liberty and justice for all.
Time for a swim! Nothing but magnolia drippings in my pool, and pool skimming and maintenance is a good little work out. Mother Nature has been kindly keeping the pool and pond filled up with afternoon showers lately, no hose necessary.
I spotted at least 4 generations of goldfish yesterday, from the original 5 itty-bitties we loosed in the pond. I saw 2 of the first generation, one gold, one white with an orange spot, that are almost as big as my hand now! The littlest are the size of my thumbnail, schooling amongst the tadpoles, while dragonflies kiss the surface to drink
then rest among the butterfly bushes and cattails…
l’chaim
to life
l’shalom
peace be with us all
Absolutely outstanding photos! Thanks for taking us on the walk w/you!
Alaskan wildflowers are magical. It’s hard to believe that such beauty can pop up out of a ground that is frozen and buried in snow for most of the year. If anyone is interested in seeing more wildflower photos (and others), I just published a post about the monkshood flower (http://ryanmarquis.com/).
I’m looking forward to the trip back up the driveway. Nice shots!
Exquisite, and so tenderly beautiful. Thanks for taking me along with you on the nature walk. When I first came to Alaska I was taken aback by the panoramic majesty of the mountains and everything so big, big, big. But I started looking at the small things and decided that was where my photographic interest was. Thanks, too, for reminding us to “take time and smell the flowers.”
Gorgeous! Thanks for bringing the great outdoors to my desktop!
well of course she wasn’t stuffed into two cruisers. NYPD can be mean sometimes but not usually that mean. LOL
Hey, Bubbs! There for a minute I thought they had cut her in half, stuffed her in the 2 cruisers, and that was why the ambulance wa there!
LOL! i reread my post and fell out laughing. it was a lovely moment though. sometimes this city can be ugly but every once in a while a hero rides in the save the day.
dear Pups,
i took a short walk a few minutes ago and i must tell you a bit about something beautiful i just saw.
no not a lovely flower but when you live in a big city you take what you can get.
i saw young woman to my eyes a child get handcuffed and stuffed in the back of two blue and white NYPD cruisers. her mother was crying and pleading with the officers not to do this but since they don’t live here and have no thought or care for the people who do it was no dice.
meanwhile an ambulance drew up in front of the building the girl lives in and parked behind one of the cruisers. suddenly a black car came barreling down the street and pulled up blocking the police cars and a large Black man climbed out of the front passenger seat. he strolled up to the car with the girl in the back seat and although my ears were stretched as far as possible i couldn’t hear a thing. dammit.
but i could see. oh yes pups i could see. i saw those uniforms snap to attention. i saw them open that back door and reach in lift the young one out and escort her to the ambulance. i saw her mommy climb in and i watched that gorgeous man stand there in his Bermuda shorts and his white tee shirt ready to go on to his July 4th celebration. he stood right there until his orders were carried out then he climbed back in his car and his driver drove away,
i whispered “may the Lord bless thee and keep thee my brother. thank you”
I’m picturing Dennis Haysbert from “The Unit” and the Allstate commercials.
http://t2.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcROdzpAxLpDb5I6GAomViJM4f405j2Gf
What a scene to bear witness to, Bubs. I’m so glad for the child and mom to have had a protector.
( and if he didn’t look like Haysbert, don’t tell me differently . I’m liking the image! )
he did! he really did. i ♥ Haysbert!
My gay self has great confusion over Haysbert ! ( and he’s entirely convinced me to switch to Allstate )
BUFF !!! How dem kitties ??? and the debil mama cat ??
Simply gorgeous photos, as usual, AKM.
AKM, all mudpups and visitors – Have a delightful Alaskan Independence Day today and an even more enjoyable regular Independence Day tomorrow! 🙂
Here’s my favorite 4th of July song, performed by my favorite (Boston) pops orchestra. If this doesn’t get you clapping and feeling patriotic, please ask someone nearby to check your pulse!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_GqMT_vbLK4
I watched the Boston Pops Fireworks tonight …… absolutely breathtaking!
gorgeous AKM.
love your dance dear Crow.
happy 4th everyone.
So, will you be eating hot dogs, word salad, and quitter fritters to celebrate? Will you top it off with Tundra Turd tea? Baked Alaskan for desert? I’ll leave that one to your imagination, but let’s just say that it doesn’t involve ice cream.
yep… and if all the quitty vittals takes its toll on your tummy& you find yerself a lil’gassy, no fear, let ‘er rip & blame it on yer nearest neighbor or the lame stream media…also to, be sure to play a few rounds of lawn darts aimed at a dictionary, as well, ya betcha;)
All the photos are beautiful, but I think I like the two adorable cones (some kind of fir?) the best of all. Plus the lone dandelion seed pod. Amazing, peaceful, photos you can lose yourself in, if only for a minute. Thank you!
Spectacularly beautiful pictures! Thank you so much, AKM!
Those wonderful, evocative photographs..capture..what the world..once was. Mankind..has..added-some..and ..taken-away..much more. Those pictures..are seeds for our minds..what will/might..feed the fullbody..of humans. Further..as we each see/experience our own ..lived life experiences..as we relate to the images..there is an area of ..interconnect..not often mentioned. Think of each plant surface..generating a veritable jungle of scents/hormones and ..interspecie-speak. Then..imagine the over lapping colored mists of these complex ..communications..around that walkway. I who use no ampt’audio nor cell phones..am ..hearing..so to speak..the ..Sound Mists..in a great potion..of each day. It feedsme, the deeper me..and so..it once was..for all.
String Theory.
The marriage of General Relativity and Quantum Physics
As seen through the lens of Juneaudream’s intuitive, poetic soul.
It resonates…
(…and kudos to AKM’s flower photos which elegantly echo the possibilities of Calabi-Yau spaces.)
Amen.
*watching the ripples expand as from a stone dropped in a pond*
Yup. Beautifully said.
*in from the yard to fix cool beverage and cool under a fan for a bit*
So our library flash mob in New Orleans turned into a flash Flood mob, but I found a link on youtube:
http://www.youtube.com/user/AmLibraryAssociation?blend=11&ob=5#p/u/0/_oEkvqM1cBs
The guy with the trucker cap, blue jeans, and blue/white checked shirt is our organizer/leader. The jazz funeral drummer was a great touch, eh?
thatcrowwoman at seconds 13-15; black umbrella with red roses, pulling Brian out of READ bag
and here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hslmt9Ilbo8
at 18-30, upper right dancing with Brian under my umbrella
hahahahahaha caw Caw CAW CAW CAW
I suspected ol’ Brian was a regular party animal.but,librarians-who knew? I think all the dancers scared the rain away,too. How does Brian like creole and hot sauce?
Heh heh… good one. Awesome 😉
Soo cool 🙂 big thanks for sharing !
Now THAT looked like fun! Thanks for sharing, TCW!
I just came back from a brisk walk on the road that borders the west side of the East Arm of Grand Traverse Bay in Lake Michigan. A grey-haired lady whizzed by on her bicycle with a smily “hello.” As she went by, I noticed that she had an artificial right leg. Makes my titanium knee feel pretty tame. What wonders can now be done by modern medicine!
For Mike from Iowa: I’d worry some about the nearby pig factories. In Ontario there was a serious e-coli outbreak that killed several people that was finally traced back to industrial hog farms (?) and the run-off from those places. I hesitate to call them “farms”; maybe, factories.
On a better note, have a Happy Quitter’s Day and a very Happy Fourth of July to one and all.
PS The driveway photos are just gorgeous. Nothing quite so beautiful on my walk. The trillium, alas, are gone but there were lots of daisies and buttercups and the birds were busy singing away.
A former athlete of mine from the adapted sports program I used to run, Sarah Reinertsen, was a contestant on The Amazing Race a few seasons ago and she IS truly amazing. She was born with a leg that had not completely developed and the non-functioning part was amputated when she was a little girl to make it easier to fit her with a prosthesis.
She competed for the first time in track at my program and got hooked by the sport. She became an incredible athlete, competing in several sports but specializing in track and, later, triathlon. She won numerous medals in Paralympic competitions and set a couple of world records. She also competed in the Iron Man Triathlon in Hawaii. She didn’t finish the first time in 2004 because she missed the biking time cut-off, but came back the following year to become the first female leg amputee to finish the race.
Watching Sarah grow up and become such an amazing athlete as well as an intelligent and compassionate human being reminds me that my little aches and pains and my insignificant challenges are surely surmountable. It’s always good to have those little reminders every so often!
I just read online that Sarah wrote a book about her life. THAT’S an autobiography I will actually have to purchase since she’s had quite a fascinating life and accomplished a lot by working hard and chasing her dreams…imagine that!
How good are you at motivating comatose couch-potatoes?
Okay-so you take the last two numbers in the year of your birth,add that to the age you will be at the end of this year and you will come up with 111. If not,don’t call me,I just repeat these vicious rumors.
Works well mike not a rumor at all did it with my and my daughters birthdates.Funny how things like that work!!!!
wow, cool! Yeah, it worked.
And to think she actually w.r.o.t.e .. o.u.t. her QuitWordSalad! She physically w.r.o.t.e .. o.u.t things like: *((Gotta put First Things First))*. On paper.
I find it most interesting and amusing to recollect and reminisce on all the speculations she set in motion that day: ‘what did this mean’? ‘will she do this’? ‘will she start that’? ‘how will she’? ‘when will she’? But what I find utterly fascinating and intriguing is, two-years out, seeing what her QuitWordSalad has evolved (devolved?) to actually mean. She is quite a piece of [ ].
I’m heading out for my third walk down the drive to see the gorgeous plants — anyone care to join me? beth.
Full Text Of Palin’s Resignation Speech [3 July 2009]: http://tpmlivewire.talkingpointsmemo.com/2009/07/full-text-of-palins-resignation-speech.php
Spectacular photos. Beautiful walk for this Sunday morning. Thanks!
AKM- thank you!
Lovely celebration of Quitter Day!
Your eye behind your camera bring sharp focus my old eyes can’t manage anymore to so many things.
Enjoying these pics- waiting for the stroll back up the drive 🙂
I love a nature walk before breakfast. Thank you, AKM.
It’s a beautiful morning in the forest here, washed clean by yesterday’s thundershowers. I’ll take my camera for a nature walk in a bit. Kiwifruit, pears, peaches, and butterfly weed, rose-colored lilies, yellow water lilies, crape myrtles in a rainbow of colors… and mockingbirds who crow like our crazy old, mean old rooster!
22 years ago, Happy and I were just moving into this forest, with Little Bird on the way, though we hadn’t figured that out quite yet… 🙂
merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily,
we’ve lived our sweet dream.
I’m basking in the dream, and in the afterglow from the library conference,
and in visions of these pre-retirement years
over this long Quitter Independence weekend.
(Shout out to all my brothers and sisters in Chicago for NEA Rep. Assembly; I’m with you in spirit.)
Here’s to open minds and open hearts, and sweet new dreams
by way of Little Bird:
Jack Johnson & Ben Harper – With My Own Two Hands
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yqMWS-wbuss
L’Shalom,
thatcrowwoman
Your lovely little forest sounds like a comer of heaven to me. I’m enjoying my own piece of heaven this morning before I head off to work. Thank the Gods of small things we close at 6:00 today. It’s my youngest son’s birthday today. We will celebrate it tomorrow. Don’t tell him, I got him fireworks for his birthday. Lol
I have birds at the feeders, bees on the Russian sage and butterflies on the cone flowers. Enjoy your Sunday everyone.
BTW, I got your postcard yesterday. It was very sweet of you to think of me while you were gone.
Thanks for the virtual stroll- lovely! I have shrub roses and Cranesbill geraniums in my backyard; once they find a spot they like, they flourish. The Columbine in the front- our state flower, by the way- are yellow and the traditional blue, no pinks.
Happy almost Fourth and very happy Quitters Day to all… 🙂
Happy 3rd! I think that picture of the dandelion is one of the most beautiful botanical photographs I have seen in a very long time.
Grandgirlies spent the night with an Auntie and Uncle. Why? They could go have dinner at a tapas restaurant, and then have crepes for Sunday breakfast. Sounds good to me!
That photo is my favorite. I think I need that framed and on my office wall. I lubb it !
Happy Quitters Day!
May the reign of Sean Parnell be short. May Miss Quittypants stay mostly in Arizona from here on out, bedeviling the McCains.
Happy Quitter’s Day to all, and many thanks for the lovely flowers! I wish we had Alpine Dogwood in Virginia
Oh but you have the wild and domestic Dogwood that fills the mtn drives and yards of the cities. Then you add so many other wild flowers and VA is a bounty too, just missing some great mtns!! (Yes, I KNOW they call them mtns when you live there but once you have seen the mtns of the west and AK, they are just hills …sorry:-))
Beeeyooootiful pictures. Must be one long driveway,not that I mind. Around Northwest-by-god Ioway that peculiar sme…….stench is a compendium of subtle natural fragrances,delicately intertwined by enterprising farmer/landowner groups until they become a crescendo of horrible,maggot-gagging,air-birne nose bombs that would singe the schnozz of a fire breathing dragon. They are medium sized,hog confinement buildings that infest my countryside with flies and laundry curdling smells and disease. I have one that holds about 4 thousand head of hogs a half-mile due North of me. The watered down waste is stored beneath the buildings in huge pits full of methane gas(deadly to breathe),makes good fertilizer when knifed in the ground at recomended rates. Deadly to wildlife and fish if it is runoff in waterways. This is what happens when we,the people,have our rights of local control taken away by Farm Bureau and big agriculture.
…I should have taken some tums before reading:<(
You do have a way with words, dear Mike!
Happy quitter day AKM. I Have the weekend off yaaaay. Will quit mowing the lawn-for a couple days anyway. Thanks for the walk down the drive. B.
Beautiful!