Mystery Flower #5

Posted on 06/30/2008 by chick

It’s time for another mystery flower!

Mystery Flower #5

Mystery Flower #5 Close-Up

The first picture is not the best shot from an aesthetic standpoint, but I like it because it shows how the plant creates homes for different types of insects. The center flower cluster has at least two bugs on it (see close-up) and there’s another on the stem. The lowest flower cluster also has some sort of fly, just barely discernible at this resolution. And look at the left edge of the picture. There’s a tantalizing glimpse of something brown hiding behind that cluster of leaves. Maybe it’s a dead flower. Or maybe it’s some beautiful winged insect. I wish I knew!

Can you guess the identity of Mystery Flower #5?

P.S. There is a sad story that goes with this mystery flower and also Mystery Thing #3, both of which lived in a sunny area alongside the walking path. They were recently taken by the Great Mower. I guess it was necessary, because the path needs to be open and safe for walkers like me, but it is still sad.

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Books, Books, Books

Posted on 06/28/2008 by chick

Faithful Reader is back! And with him came a house guest—his friend, V. The three of us jumped in the car on Thursday and went to the big annual book sale in Westerly (the same one I went to last year).

I got 14 books and a CD for just $12!

  • Death in the Andamans by M.M. Kaye (on my list of books to read someday)
  • The Murder of Roger Ackroyd by Agatha Christie
  • The Seven Dials Mystery by Agatha Christie
  • Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator by Roald Dahl
  • The Zaniest Riddle Book in the World by Joseph Rosenbloom
  • The Best Book of Puns by Art. Moger
  • World’s Best Riddles by Joseph Rosenbloom
  • The Twenty-One Balloons by William Pene Dubois (also on my list of books to read someday)
  • Mary Poppins from A to Z by P.L. Travers
  • Mary Poppins and the House Next Door by P.L. Travers
  • Get That Novel Started (and Keep It Going ‘Til You Finish) by Donna Levin
  • Laughing Stock edited by Bennett Cerf
  • The Lost Continent: Travels in Small-Town America by Bill Bryson
  • Pippi Longstocking by Astrid Lindgren
  • The Freedom Sessions by Sarah McLachlan

I was not the biggest spender. Here I am, such an avid reader and collector of books, and yet they both outdid me! How the heck did that happen?

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Make Love, Not War

Posted on 06/28/2008 by chick

People can surprise you. At any time, words may come out of their mouths that you never could have anticipated. This happened to me just a couple of weeks ago during lunch with Faithful Reader’s parents, when his mother shared her philosophy on marital arguments—

The sheets make the peace.

It wasn’t something I expected to hear from my future mother-in-law! It was funny, so I laughed, but how much do you want to bet that I also blushed?

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Stupid Cat!

Posted on 06/22/2008 by chick

Z, just 6 days from having her paw permanently freed, ripped the splint off this weekend while I was away. Now she is limping. I wonder how many extra weeks she’ll need to spend in the splint because of this?

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But Is It Beautiful?

Posted on 06/20/2008 by chick

Beauty by Sheri S. Tepper

Grade: C+

I had said I would read it, and so I did.

Beauty (as in Sleeping Beauty) is cursed by her fairy godmother. You’ve heard this story before, right? She pricks her finger on a spindle, everyone in the castle falls into an enchanted sleep, a wall of thorn bushes grows around the castle, and so it goes until Prince Charming arrives to kiss her awake. In this version, there’s a twist that allows Beauty to leave the castle and wander in Time. Her first stop is the distant future, where the human race is coming to its justly earned end. It is a bleak time, completely devoid of beauty. It becomes a focus of the story, and the hope is that through Beauty (the character) beauty can be preserved. There’s more time travel and there are visits to such places as Faerie and Hell, and as the story progresses, Beauty’s tale becomes entwined with other famous fairy tales (Tam Lin, Cinderella, Snow White, and Rapunzel).

The book is called Beauty, but is it beautiful? I didn’t find it so. About 1/4 of the way through, I slammed the book down because of a horrific scene. I was not prepared for it, even though I knew there was something in this book that had upset me when I tried to read it previously. Though I did eventually pick the book up again, I never learned to like it. Beauty’s life was ultimately very sad, and I didn’t enjoy being along for the ride.

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Last Week’s Lessons

Posted on 06/18/2008 by chick

Things I learned last week:

  • My cat has toe cheese. No kidding. That’s the term the vet used. But since Z has had her paw wrapped in a splint for over two weeks, a little toe cheese is to be expected.
  • I don’t think a hotel is the right place to get married. Even really good hotels seem to have an institutional feel.
  • I’m not very comfortable with gambling. I bought stock in three different companies. One of the companies seems solid, an excellent long-term investment. The other two are riskier. They have the potential to go up a lot, but they also have the potential to disappear into nothingness. When the market does poorly and everything goes down, my solid stock doesn’t worry me. The other two do, because I don’t know if they’ll ever go back up. I have no faith in them. And that, I guess, is the difference between investing and gambling. Investing requires faith.
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Mystery Flower #4

Posted on 06/17/2008 by chick

I found this Mystery Flower growing next to a fence. I had never seen one of these before. Do you know what it is?

Posted in Mysteries | Tagged , | 3 Comments

Old Stuff

Posted on 06/14/2008 by chick

I’m supposed to be doing other things right now, but I’m so tired as to be nearly useless. I needed an easy task, so I decided to go through some old stuff. Most of it is of the “Why the Hell did I keep this?” variety, but here and there I find something interesting.

For example, I found my vocational interest report from 1989. It says things about me that are probably truer now than they were then. Here are the highlights.

  • Very similar: Musician
  • Similar: Chef, Photographer, Artist (commercial), Artist (fine), Medical illustrator, College professor, Physician, Dentist, Optometrist, Physical therapist, Veterinarian, and Horticultural worker.
  • Very dissimilar: Public administrator, Home economics teacher, Elected public official, Life insurance agent, Restaurant manager, Realtor, Buyer, Accountant, Banker, Credit manager, Business education teacher.
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“Buy Low!”

Posted on 06/14/2008 by chick

On Wall Street the keys are “Buy low!”
And “Pick out a stock that can grow!”
But the sucker who buys
May soon get a surprise
When he finds it has lower to go.

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Bad Mood Friday

Posted on 06/13/2008 by chick

I don’t know what put me in such a bad mood today. Wait. Scratch that. I know exactly what did it.

  • My Faithful Reader has been gone for too long!
  • I had lunch with Faithful Reader’s parents today. They’re nice and it’s always good to talk to them, but it took a serious chunk of time out of my day, putting me even further behind at work. And that means I have to work this weekend.
  • Thanks to the cats (who are determined to keep me up certain nights), the energy-saver feature on the AC (which makes horrible, loud liquid noises at regular intervals), allergy attacks, and screeching 4 a.m. trains, I haven’t gotten a good night’s sleep yet this week.
  • I was late getting out for my walk. I was distracted and needed to get my thoughts organized, so it was a bad day for someone to try to chitchat with me. I wasn’t feeling social, and I just assumed the guy was hitting on me. So not only was I cranky because I didn’t get my solo nature-communing time, but then I also felt bad later for thinking the worst when he may just have been friendly. God forbid that someone be friendly with the woman who doesn’t have a single friend in town!

Clearly I need to decrank. How will I accomplish that? Well, first I’m going to try again to get some sleep. In the morning, I’m going to buy some Coldplay tickets, which will give me something to look forward to. Then I’m going to attempt something that, if I’m successful, will amaze you. Yes, it will amaze! Then, with that trio of successes having put me in a better mood, I will sit down to work and finish up my magazine, and being done with the magazine will put me on top of the world.

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