Fear THIS!

 
My toothless 
German Shepherd!  

Okay, you might not bleed --- 

but his jaws could break an arm.

More Uninvited Visitors

It’s the heat of the day. My husband, who’s deathly allergic to bee venom, is out mowing the meadow.

I’m pottering around in the afternoon shade by the greenhouse, and my eyes are scanning (as they always do) the edges of the woods that surround the meadow. I have to be on the look-out for deer, because my dog loses every shred of intelligence when he sees a deer, and the chase is on.  And this time of year, I’ve seen little spotted-fawns scamper out of the woods, right into our back yard --- then stand there, dumbfounded, “where am I?”  It would have a short life if my dog saw it first.

I’m scanning the woods and I see something that doesn’t belong: this thing looks like a remnant of somebody’s dark brown shag carpet hanging in a high branch of a tree. But we haven’t had any high winds to leave debris in a tree, so I ran and got the binoculars out of the truck.  Turns out, it’s a swarm of bees!

I hollered for Rich to stop and showed him the bees in a tree that he had just mowed under. Bees are supposed to be real sensitive to loud noises, like lawn mowers. I came in the house and did a quick internet search on bee swarms and found out that they're not that aggressive when they swarm. They're just out searching for a new place for their queen to set up her royal nursery.  So I got my camera and took some pictures.

A little later we came in the house for a break.  When we went back out, the bees were gone --- moved on. In the 25 years we’ve lived here, I’ve only seen a swarm of bees once, and it was just passing over.

A swarm of bees in May is worth a load of hay;

A swarm of bees in June is worth a silver spoon;

A swarm of bees in July, let them fly.

  ~old English rhyme

My Arachniphobia

I don't like spiders. Snakes I can handle, literally, but insects (especially spiders) just creep me out to the max! My fear goes back to my childhood in California. I was only 5 years old when my family was returning home after dark from next door, after an evening spent with our neighbors. I skipped on ahead, and as I rounded the corner onto our patio, there it was! 

A huge tarantula was positioned between the porch light and the patio wall, so it threw this monstrous spider shadow onto the wall. I immediately went into screaming hysterics. I've never been the same.

This morning, when I got up and staggered out of my room to make coffee, I almost stepped on our latest wild visitor! He was right outside my door, on the floor. What if I'd squished him with my bare foot when I made my way (twice) in the dark last night to use the bathroom? Or worse, what if he'd crawled into bed with me in the night?

Okay, so he's no tarantula, 

but in my opinion, 

he's far bigger than he oughtta be!

A Vet Proves a Deadly Point!

Please check out this video. 

A veterinarian sits in a closed-up car for 30 minutes on a hot sunny day to demonstrate what a poor, helpless dog suffers in such a situation:

http://www.ebaumsworld.com/video/watch/82689781/

Besides a stiff fine for this cruel treatment of an animal, the perp should be forced to endure 60 minutes in a hot car like this, with a paramedic standing by to bring him/her back from the brink of death as they succumb to heat stroke!

Most people just don't think! They love their dogs and want to take them everywhere they go. Tragically, a lot of dogs that die in overheated cars were beloved pets. Their owners would NEVER have done anything intentionally to hurt them! But they made a stupid mistake about something so obvious:

HOT CARS ARE 

TORTURE CHAMBERS 

FOR INNOCENT PETS!

HOT CAR FACTS --- PET PARENTS!

According to the ASPCA website:

"Automobile temperatures can very quickly rise to dangerous levels; the average temperature increase in a parked car is 40 degrees, and the majority of this increase occurs in the first 15 to 30 minutes," says Dr. Louise Murray, Vice President of ASPCA Bergh Memorial Animal Hospital. When it’s 80 degrees outside, your car will be a staggering 114 degrees after 30 minutes!

IF YOU SEE A DOG (OR A CHILD) LEFT ALONE IN A HOT CAR:

DO THE RIGHT THING!  GET INVOLVED!  CALL 911!

14 states (AZ, CA, IL, ME, MD, MN, NV, NH, NJ, NY, ND, SD, VT, and WV) have statutes that specifically prohibit leaving an animal in confined vehicle under conditions that pose a threat to the life of said animal.

What is WRONG with People???

Q: What is WRONG with people? Are they just clueless?

I went to the library today, then stopped at Steak N Shake for a bite, before going to get groceries at Walmart (directly across the street from St/Sh).

So I eat, come out to go to my car, and right there in front of the door, in a handicapped space, was a big white car with tinted black windows, and a poor little fluffy white dog inside howling like a banshee. I was just so upset, but what to do? I called 411 for St/Sh's phone number, then called them. I told the girl who answered what was going on and she said she'd tell the manager. I said to be sure and do it NOW because I'm sitting out here in the parking lot and I'm getting ready to call the police.

Nothing happened. Granted, this was the lunch rush and the place was packed. So I got out my little spy-girl notebook and my cell phone and marched over to the car, took down the license plate number, and went over and stuck my hand in the open-cracked window to see just how hot it really was in there. HOT! The little dog is going bananas, which only makes him hotter.

I went in and asked for the manager. I apologized for disturbing him at such a busy time, then explained the situation. He went out, looked at the dog, came back in and shrugged. So I said, "well, I'm not going to let this little dog suffer. I'm calling the police."

"Oh, no, don't do that! I'll go ask around." He wandered around the restaurant asking everyone if it was their car with the dog in it. Finally, it was the last couple he asked and he told them "This young lady is concerned about your dog out in the hot car." (I wanted to smack him. Young lady! Dude, I'm old enough to be your granny. Don't condescend to me!)

The woman says "Oh, we cracked the windows and he has water. He'll be ok." So, I very gently but urgently explained that "it's 80 degrees outside right now, and I stuck my hand inside your window and I can guarantee it's at least 90 or 95 in your car. Your dog is close to heat stroke." She just gave me this sour smile and said, "We're about done here. He'll be ok." I said, "OK, I'm calling 911." And I marched outside and faked like I was dialing right in front of her car and then walked up and down gesturing like I was talking on the phone.

She came flying out there and unlocked the back door and crawled halfway in to soothe her howling doggie, and she was saying, "Oh, my goodness, Honey! It IS hot out here! Oh, no! I didn't know! Oh, Honey, I'm sooooo sorry. I'm so sorry!" 

So she tries to make excuses: "it wasn't that hot when we went in" (DUUUUUHHHH! Did you happen to drive up with your A/C on, do you think?), etc. etc. I put on my best teacher voice and educated her about how much smaller dogs are than people, so they succumb to the heat quicker, and those black-tinted windows soak up the sun and heat the car up like the inside of an oven. Etc. etc. I'm proud of myself for handling all this as calmly as I did, because I can get really nasty when I'm upset.

So she said she'd stay outside with the dog while her husband finished eating. I offered to walk her dog for her, so she could go back in and finish her meal. But no, she said that wasn't necessary. I think she just wanted me gone! I told her she could trust me, and she said she's sure she could, but her dog isn't good with strangers. So I wandered off and went across the street to Walmart where I sat watching her walk her dog up and down the street for the next half hour! I wanted to make sure she didn't just put him back in the hot car. 

Finally her husband came out --- all-in-all that dog would have been broiling in that car for almost an hour if I hadn't caused such a ruckus and ruined their meal.

And don't it feel good  
to be so mean  
to them that deserves it!

Hello, Little Darlin'

I woke up this morning and stumbled into the kitchen to make coffee --- and I just about jumped outta my skin!  Scared the living daylights outta me! There was this cute little froggy sitting in a puddle on a plate in the sink looking up at me. Where did he come from???

See, this is a bad habit I picked up from my Auntie Almeda many years ago when I was a kid. She loved to have big feasts for the family, but she refused to do the dishes afterwards and wouldn't allow anyone else in her kitchen to clean up either. She said she had all day tomorrow to do the dishes. We'd just clear the table and sit back and drink beer and visit. (Miss you, Auntie!)

I'm the same way.  Fixing supper is hard enough work. I can always do the dishes in the morning when I'm feeling more energetic. So I usually stack them in the sink for an overnight soak.

We had spaghetti last night. Wonder how our little friend liked the sauce! (I know, this is kinda gross!)

Sick of 'Em!

Morels! You gotta love 'em.  But you can also get sick of them when you eat them night after night.  I have bags of them in my refrigerator. Bags ready to fry. Bags of mushrooms that need to be cleaned yet. I hope they hold til Friday --- we'll take them over to our son's and cook them up for him and his friends.

 I can't tromp around in the hills and hollers any more to hunt them like I used to. But maybe that's for the best: I hate getting ticks on me. But my husband is a 'shroom-nut, and he has plenty of woods to hunt in, because he works for a farmer. 

When we first moved here, this was a morel paradise. But the last 3 or 4 years, we haven't found many on our 35 acres. Rich probably hunted them to extinction here.

People go CRAZY over these little fungi! They drive out in the country, see a woodlot that looks promising, hop out of their cars and tramp all over private property, trying to catch 'em a mess of mushrooms. They're going for $30 a pound (a pound being about enough for two people to make a meal of)! We saw people asking $45 a pound on E-Bay. We could go into any bar and sell out in a matter of minutes. We used to pull into the Kmart parking lot, let down the tailgate and set out our bags of mushrooms --- they'd be sold almost instantly, before Kmart even knew we were out there peddling them.