Saturday Snaps

 I totally forgot to put the Trail Cam out this week.  And apparently, I forgot to blog this week, too, so I didn't want to leave this to another day.  Here are some snaps I've taken over the years from various locations.

I call this one 'We Three Squirrels' (taken 1/1/12 in Colorado):

Here's an interesting shot (Colorado 2/19/13) of a hawk and its prey, except the silly, and perhaps young, hawk doesn't notice the prey sitting right behind it:

This is from 2013, too, and it's a shot here if Scarlet and her baby Sammy:

Flash forward to 2018 - the year I hung oranges for the orioles, and wasn't disappointed:

(Every other year I've hung oranges, I didn't get any orioles.  Bummer.)

And with that, I'll let you go.  Here's hoping I get the damn trail camera up this week so you can see new pics.  I hope you still enjoyed the old pics.  Have a great, day.

Saturday Trail Cam Snaps

 I didn't put the camera out at all this week.  Unfortunately, the sheer size of the files is making my computer drag.  I'm deleting a bunch of stuff today, so it's back to working right again, but egads.  Who would've thought that you could fill up a 120GB harddrive so fast??  Okay, I should've but that's beside the point.

Anyway, I did take some snaps with my trusty ol' Nikon, but they're not happy pics.  Here's the story (as posted to FB yesterday)...

Hubs is out mowing the lawn. I was in the kitchen getting ready to spell him when I heard a sound like a huge balloon popping. I walked into the living room to see WTH it was, when suddenly it sounded like it was raining REALLY hard, and the front window looked like it was awash with water.  I looked at the window harder, because there was no way it could've been raining that hard on the front window, which looks out onto a covered porch.  It wasn't raining and that wasn't a balloon popping.  The lawn mower had chucked a rock into our front picture window and the tempered glass was blossoming into a spiderweb pattern like you wouldn't believe.  Thankfully, it's a double pane and only the outside pane is damaged, so no glass will be falling all over the living room floor.  Unthankfully, the nearest glass places might maybe get someone out here today or next week or on the 24th, and glass being delivered is 2-3 weeks out, if we're lucky.  

Addendum:

Local glass guy made it out already - which puts him way ahead of his competitors - and gave us a quote in no time.  It is not good, but I already got a ballpark from the internet, and it's in the middle there, so it could be worse.  Still, if you want to help out, buy an ebook (or two) or a paperback (or two) to help offset the costs.  Or if you have Kindle Unlimited, you could read a bunch of my books without any extra cost to you, but $$ for me.  I'd really appreciate it.  Thanks.

And now for the pics:

Closer up:

It kinda looks like the stained-glass filter in my image editing software, but it's for-realzies.

And now for the artsy shot...

That one kinda looks like birds... or a shot through an electron-microscope of dermatitis. It's through the glass looking up at the wood ceiling of my porch.  

So, we're dealing with that.  Then I go to move the curtains and the damn rod came apart - easily fixed, but irritating.  Then Hubs is making lunch and the top comes off of the mustard while he's squirting it on his sandwich - messy, but annoying.  Derp.  THEN, after I took those pictures and downloaded them, my computer slowed WAY down and kept giving me the 'not responding' message.  It was not a banner day in the Sanderson household.

I spent a hour deleting photos late last night and I've been at it again this morning, so that's getting fixed, but come on...

And that's me this morning.  I hope your day is awesome and nothing harshes your day.  Peace out.

Saturday Trail Cam Snaps

 Here we are again at Saturday, so it's time for some Trail Cam Snaps.  Let's get to it...

I call this one "Racoon Butt":

And here's a better shot of said raccoon:

Incoming squirrel!

Attempted Murder...

Deer Standoff:

We'll see what next week brings.  I'm hoping to catch some fawns.  Fingers crossed.

Saturday Trail Cam Snaps

 First off, I did not have the trail cam out when something ate one of the redbud trees we planted yesterday.  It also wasn't out when the mama deer brought her brand new, teeny-tiny baby past the house this morning.  I swear, I'd need like 5-6 different cameras to catch everything.  

Anyway...

Here's another version of "Is that a camera?":

And here's a shot that's a bit blurry, but it gives an excellent view of a doe's pregnant belly:

This is Mr. Possum:

And Rocky Raccoon:

And a turkey:

Finally, here's the money shot I've been waiting for - a little fox!

Tune in next week to see if I catch any fawns on the Trail Cam!

Memorial Monday

I know I usually market on Monday, and I could today, too, but it's Memorial Day and it just doesn't feel right to be out there pimping books on this day.  

Enjoy your day today and try to take a moment to remember why you're able to celebrate any holiday - the men and women who gave their lives to keep America free.

And while he didn't give his life for his country, here's my dad when he was serving in the USAF.  

Thanks, Dad.

Saturday Trail Cam Snaps

Ack!  I meant to post this way earlier... like this morning... but I got distracted, which is the story of my life.  Anyway...

I took the camera down during the day and then I keep forgetting to put it back out.  To my dismay, as soon as I took the camera down, the foxes started showing up again.  Grrr.

Anyway, here are some shots I got from earlier in the week: 

Rocky Raccoon on my porch, snacking on suet crumbs.

A closeup shot of three generations...

On the left is Sissy. Next to her is her son, Scout.  The butt in the background behind Scout is Lumpy - Sissy's mom.

I'm not sure who this is, but she's pretty interested in the camera.

I hope to have more pics next Saturday, so tune in next time.

Saturday Trail Cam Fun

 Hello again.  I don't know how you feel about it, but this trail cam stuff is fun.  

Anyway, here I am, checking out the placement of the camera...

This one shows pretty much all of the regular deer visitors to the feeding area:

I call this one "Is that a camera?"

You might not be able to see this guy.  He's doing such a good job of hiding behind a tree:

Another instance of 'is that a camera?' but this time it's Scout - son of Sissy and Lumpy's grandbuck.  He's such a good boy, but he got deer snot on my camera.

And from last night, I got a a good one of two raccoons.  If you blow it up, you can see one watching something in the distance while the other one is crouched behind him playing 'Stealth Raccoon'.  

I've also gotten some snaps of opossums, but none of them worth sharing.  Oh, and I got this shot...

...but I have no clue what it is.  I'm speculating that it's an opossum, but for laughs, I'm calling it a chupacabra.

Anyway, I hope you enjoyed seeing some snaps from the trail camera.  Like I said, I know I'M having fun.  

Saturday Trail Cam Snaps

 I finally set up my trail cam yesterday.  I tried putting it a couple places, just as a test.  Here's from the morning:

It's not a super-quality photo, but it does what we need it to do, which is snap pics of critters.  There are a couple squirrels there, a bluejay, and a dove.

Here's one from the afternoon:

That's a pileated woodpecker hanging on the suet.  (The rest of that bunch of photos was pretty much Hubs going back and forth because he was cleaning the gutters... hence the ladder.)

And finally, here's a night shot.  This one was taken after we went to bed.

Baby Raccoon!  Yay!  I also got some primo shots of a neighbor driving home for the night, because between the light in the upper right corner and the tree where the raccoon sits is a road.

The camera itself isn't a top of the line model.  It only cost like $50, so I wasn't expecting super great things from it.  I'm pleased with the photo quality, which is the most important part.  It's not a wifi enabled model, so I have to actually plug the thing into my computer to download photos, and there are some hiccups with that.  Still I give it 4 stars.  Well worth the money.

=o)

Pedro Potato and The Produce Posse

So, I went out yesterday and took pictures of where my garden is at right now. First off:

Pedro Potato!

Next:

The Pepper Quartet

And then there's...

The Carrot Gang

I'll leave the pics of the trees for another day. Needless to say, there are a lot of pots on my deck right now. LOL

Merry Christmas!

 Merry Christmas to you and yours,  

from The Sandersons.

Merry Christmas

From my house to yours, I just want to wish you all a Merry Christmas...

and a Happy Hanukkah, too.  Or Happy whatever you celebrate that makes you happy and brings peace into your world.  

It's quiet at the Sanderson household this morning.  Well, quiet other than Finn playing with the packing paper and his 'rolling ball on a track' thing.  Sawyer's sleeping.  I hope all is quiet and peaceful at your homes today, too.  :hugs:

Thursday This n That

Wow.  It's been over a month since I posted.  

A couple days ago, I got back from a trip to Michigan - not a month worth, only a few days.  It was great seeing Mom and the sibs.  We did nothing but sit around, chat, watch TV, order in... like I said, it was great.  Here's me on my vacay...

Yes, I feel the need to curl my toes.

The Boyz are getting big.  Sawyer is a giant among kittens.  He's my chunky boi.  Just kidding.  He's not fat, he's all muscle.  And Finn's no slouch either.  My super-sleek house panthers.

Speaking of Finn, he's been distracting me from writing this post.  He's such a cuddle bug.

It's been super hot and dry here.  I guess while I was gone, the heat let up a bit, but it's come back in full force.  Blerg.

I was screwing around on Etsy last night and I saw a candle that you can buy in various interesting (good but different) scents - including maple bourbon, pumpkin souffle, and Fruity Pebbles.  The store had all sorts of sayings you could get on the glass the candle comes in.  I liked "I'd shank a bitch in the kidney for you." but I'm demented.

Mom watches a lot of those court shows - Couples Court, Paternity Court, People's Court, Judge Judy - so that was watch I watched while I was there.  It was fun.  Man, people have messed up lives.  

I also noted that up in Liberalia (aka Michigan) the commercials inundate people with social justice messages.  No wonder the populace up there is so messed up. It's a blitzkrieg of brainwashing.  Mom's got pretty good armor - I just feel bad that she has to sit through that crap to get to the shows she wants to watch.  

Yesterday, I was back to work.  Eh, it wasn't that bad.  Only like 26 emails and I had picked a slow time of the month to go anyway, so I wouldn't have to come back to a pile of anything vile.  Yay.  I had warned several of my customers I was leaving, so they wouldn't call to talk to me.  =o)

Speaking of work, I should probably start moving in a workerly direction.  Have a great day, everyone, and don't be such a stranger.  ;o)

Thursday This n That

 I'm trying to take more pictures of Finn and Sawyer.  They don't make it easy.  They're so damn active a lot of the pics I take have to be tossed because they're blurry.  Anyway, here's a mash up of pics I took of each of them...

Such an attractive pair and so refined.  You'd never know by looking at this that they are devil babies.  But I must say that shutting them in the office at night is making a difference in our sleep.  Sure, we never were champion sleepers, but we were getting even less sleep than we were usually able to glean.  Last night was actually restful.  One in a row... yay!

I got kudos at work yesterday.  They did their weekly meeting (which I am rarely invited to... yay... I'm not a fan of meetings) and I guess they were talking about me because afterward, the boss told me that they were all saying what a good job I'm doing.  Yay.  I try, but I don't always know... ya know?

I'm not spending an awful lot of time online these days.  The boys are giving me ADD (no H... I can never be described as hyperactive.)  I try to focus and then I hear them up on the table, trying to eat my sunglasses and hide my keys, and I'm off.  Then I get back to my chair to find one of them sleeping.  Not sure how they do that.  

Because Half-Pint left the office, I now do the later shift - 9 to 5:30 - for the foreseeable future.  I enjoy having more time in the morning, but not having less time at night.  Derp.

Anyway, the boys are demanding attention, which makes it hard to type this post.  So, I'm going to let you go.  Have a great day, everyone!

Thursday This n That - Late Again

Yep, totally forgot yesterday was Thursday.  That's okay, though, because yesterday morning, I was busy making this...

German chocolate cake.  My first.  My last.  I don't actually like German chocolate cake. But it's not for me anyway, so it's all good.  Next up will be a triple chocolate cake with strawberry frosting.  Cuz that's what mama needs.  LOL

I don't know.  It looks kinda short to me.  9" round pans instead of 8" round.  :shrug;  Eh, it eats the same.  Hey, it was my first layer cake in like 25 years.  Cut me some slack. LOL

I'm still not quite sure how I'm going to transport it.  :shrug:  As long as it doesn't slide around in the car and I don't drop it in the parking lot, it's all good.

Anyhooway... 

It snowed last night.  I haven't looked yet, but Hubs told me, so it must be true.  Blerg.

I'm reading Time of the Hunter's Moon by Victoria Holt.  One of my favorite books from my youth is by Victoria Holt - The King of the Castle - so I snagged this when I saw it at the thrift store.  Do I love it? Not so much.  I mean, it's okay, but it's not thrilling me the way the other book did.  Maybe I'm just older and less likely to be thrilled.  

On my way to work on the other morning, I saw a doe in the road not too far from the house, so I slowed down to a crawl.  She moved and then another doe walked out of the woods into the road.  Still crawled.  She moved off.  Seconds later, a buck popped out of the woods, so I stopped.  He stood on the side of the road staring at me. Finally I started to crawl forward again and he startled like my slowly moving car had spooked him and he raced across the road in front of me.  THIS this is why when you see one deer cross the road, you never assume it's alone.  If I had I would've hit that buck.  

He was magnificent, by the way.

Okay, I think I'll call it.  I've gotta get cleaned up and ready for work now.  Plus, I've run out of things to say and I still have a couple blogs to visit.  Later days, dudes.

Snoozy Squirrel

 In lieu of anything else, here's a snoozy squirrel...

Ah, the wonders of a good digital camera and a sun porch that overlooks the woods.  He's a good ways up in the black oak off the back of the house.  Zoomed in on him through the window after Hubs spotted him.  

As hot as it was for a bit there, I don't blame him for sacking out on a cool dead limb.  (And no, that's not his foot hanging underneath the limb.  It's a bit of branch.)  Usually the squirrels sit on that bit and bark at us.  It was too hot for barking.  

Happy Easter

Happy Easter!  If you don't celebrate, Hoppy Bunny Day.  

Unimpressed Cottontail Rabbit, Colorado 3/20/2012

If you're not into holidays or bunnies, here a picture of some pretty daffodils from the same week:

Either way, have a great day.

(Due to the holiday, Sunday Update will be on Monday this week.)

Spring is Here

 Here's a Spring-y picture for you.  (Taken with my cellphone while out on one of my walks.)

There's nothing quite like a redbud tree to announce Spring.  So pretty.

Thursday This n That

Since the weather is nice, I went out into the garage to move my baby trees out onto the deck.  Elmer, the elm tree I planted from a seed last year, has loads of little leaves.  He's just a stick with green popping out all over it right now, but it looks like he might be trying to make branches in a few spots, too.  Yay.  I was inordinately happy to see Elmer had lived.  Also, the twins - the two tiny cedar transplants - are alive, too.  They have new growth, too!  Yay.  I will move them back in if the weather turns nasty.  

I've been trying to write AND edit on the same days.  Two different books, of course, but yah, it ain't easy.  I think I just need to get into the swing of it again.  I only edited yesterday.  Well, actually proofreading, but I'm still making notes and tweaking things.  My beta readers did most excellent jobs, but I'm finding things we all missed.  This tells me that the book was gripping engaging enough to pull readers past missed words here and there, so it's all good.

After seeing damn near everyone using gripping in their title info, I'm beginning to hate the word.  Not everything is gripping, damn it.

We have a red-shouldered hawk that's been hanging out in our woods.  Here's a photo of it.

I believe I shall call him Rufus.  No, I don't know for sure it's a dude hawk.  Not sure how to differentiate gender on that species.

Hey.  Wanna see a picture of my naked buns?

I call it my gratuitous bun pic.  :gigglesnort:  I need to make more of those.  They're pretty tasty.  I'm also thinking I can take that dough and use half for buns and the other half for cinnamon rolls.  We'll see.

I need to get a fishing license for this year.

Someone came walking up the hill yesterday.  He went straight up my across-the-road neighbor's driveway, up onto their porch, and stood there.  I never saw him knock.  Then he left.  Not sure what was going on there.  I think I might know who he was - his property butts up to that neighbor's on one side - but I'm not 100% sure.  I've only seen the dude with his wife and alone he doesn't quite look the same.

Isn't it weird how sometimes you can see someone out of their usual context and you don't recognize them?  Or it that just me?  In Colorado, I used to hit the thrift store regularly and I got chatty with the owner.  Once day a gal comes up to me in the store and starts talking to me like she knows me, and I had no idea who she was.  Basically, I made small talk with her for like ten minutes without knowing how she knew me.  After she walked away, Owl whispered in my ear that she was the owner of the thrift store.  ROFL

If I ever ran into any of you, I would be totally clueless - mainly because I've only seen pictures and have never met any of you in real life.  

And on that note, I'll let you go.  Feel free to drop your this-n-thats in the comments.  The more the merrier.

Sunday Update - Week?

Sorry I'm late.  I forgot it was Sunday until just now.  Derp.

Anyway, it was a week.  I managed to get 88 pages edited and I'm through pg 137.  Out of 371 pages, of course.  Everything is getting more fleshed out.  Deeper and richer.  Ditching crutch words and lame phrases left and right.  Since I started this phase of editing on 1/25, I've only missed one day.  And I'm still only a third through.  Blerg.

No marketing.  No reading.

When I wasn't editing, I was doing a lot of cooking.  I made a chocolate oil cake with super-fudgy frosting, a batch of zucchini bread, pizza, snack mix, and I roasted a whole chicken in the crock pot.  LOL, you should've seen that bird.  It just barely fit in the crock pot.  I sprinkled it with pepper, salt, and paprika.  Jammed a couple tablespoons of butter inside it, and then dotted more butter all over around it.  Jammed the lid on and let it cook for 5 hours on high.  So tender and juicy.  And we have tons left for other meals.  Plus, the bones and broth for making soup.  This morning, I should probably make a batch of granola bars.  Or maybe oatmeal fruit squares.  Or maybe both.  

I didn't get a lot done in the activity realm.  One day, Hubs and I took a short walk from our house to where the snow hadn't melted off the road yet.  Maybe a half mile round trip.  Other than that, nada.  But I weighed myself and I'm back down to 182.2.  :shrug:

Yesterday afternoon, I took a loaf of my freshly baked zucchini bread next door as a kind of housewarming gift.  We stood and chatted a bit.  It was nice.  They're nice people.  And they have a cute dog.  Copper is a red-bone coonhound.  Since they've lived here - in another house - for longer than we've been here, I actually met the dog years ago.  (And the husband, but not the wife or the kids until recently.)  When he was a puppy, he got loose and decided to visit us on one of our walks.  All floppy ears.  Awww.  They also have a nice little girl.  I think she's 9.  And a little boy who's like 2, so I haven't really interacted with him much.

Oh, and I almost forgot.  Yesterday, Hubs was getting ready to go outside and there was a downy woodpecker on the suet.  When he opened the door, the bird didn't move and he had to almost get within touching distance before it flew into the redbud tree.  I saw it land and crouch way down, like it was laying on the branch.  Then I saw a flash of brown as another bird swooped down on the woodpecker.  The downy darted off and the flash followed it.  I jumped up to ask if Hubs saw what I saw and he was pointing into one of the trees.  It was a merlin, which is what I thought might've been after the downy.  I ran to get my camera and got some really awesome shots of it.  Here's one:

To give you some perspective on the size, those oak leaves are actually past it by a few feet, and they might be 6-8 inches long.  Merlins are little as far as birds of prey go, but they're fierce.

Other than that, not much going on here.  Stuff.  Now that the snow is gone, I should probably get off my buns and go in the woods again.  Meh.  One thing I know is I should take my buns into the living room and get some more edit notes made.

How was your week?

Sunday Update - Week 5

Welcome to Sunday.  For some reason, I keep waking up at 4am.  Which makes me want to go to bed extra early, which makes me want to wake up early... Blerg.

Anyhooways...

I'm making progress on Song of Storm and Shroud.  This third round of editing is not going any faster than the second, though.  Still, I'm at the part where I make notes and then enter them right away, instead of the part where I make all the notes and enter them when I reach THE END.  So, what I have now is pretty close to what's going to be there when it goes out to the world.  (Unless I go totally nuts and decide to make this one book into several by fleshing out shorter scenes and delving deep into the characters and the world.  Which would be kind of cool.  But if I do that, I'll never get this book done.  Except it might be better for it.  GAH!)  Anyway, I'm 49 pages into what is currently a 370 page Word file.

No marketing this week.  I'm too busy.  

No reading for the same reason.

I did do some baking, though.  I made white bread.  It turned out pretty good.  It could be better.  I screwed something up early on and I also probably should've kneaded it more.  Hubs likes it, so it's all good.  I also made no-bake cookies and added tiny pretzel sticks to them.  Those are tasty, but gargantuan, so eating one is like eating three or four.  

I also got some log work done.  That was 3 out of my 4 active days this week - sawing logs and working on restacking the stacks.  We've pulled out a fourth pallet and we're putting all the smaller wood pieces on that, which means taking the smaller wood pieces out of the other three pallets and restacking those.  

The fourth day was shoveling snow.  We got about 8 inches.  It looks pretty, but it also looks like the reason I left Michigan.  Derp.  

In other news, Beauregard the Broad-winged Hawk took down what I think was a Brewer's blackbird.  I got some awesome pics of him eating it in the snow.  

We've been having flocks of blackbirds (I think they're Brewer's) pass through over the last week or so.  Easy pickin's for a hawk like Beau.  

We're also having larger numbers of deer stop by.  The snow draws them in because they know they can get food here without having to dig through the white stuff.  I think we counted 24 at one point yesterday.  

Okay, we've been watching the Olympics.  I know, I know.  They shouldn't be holding an Olympics in China in the first place.  Here's my thinking on the subject:  The time to boycott this crap was when the Olympics committee was thinking about awarding China with the prize of holding this winter's games there.  When there was still time to change the location.  It's not like any of China's crap hasn't been going on for years.  So, the games are there now and our athletes - the ones who've been working for years to get to this point - are there now.  So, I'm watching.  If you want to hurt China, beat the crap out of their athletes by winning.  Win everything.  And highlight the dirty, rotten, nasty things China has done and is doing while celebrating the achievements of all the other athletes.  Not watching and not cheering on the good people who had no part in China's abuses doesn't hurt China.  It hurts the good people.  

And besides, I'm already boycotting so many things.  It's tiring.  I want to watch people achieving their goals and winning awards.  I want to get excited when they do something awesome.  The world is a shitty enough place.  Leave me alone with my little bright spots.  =op

Not much else going on here.  They still haven't plowed my road.  But I have nowhere to go, so I'm not that twicked about it.  (Twicked... it's something I used in my book, so I'm trying it out here.  On a personal note, I need to cut down on my swearing.  New neighbors have little ears and I swear a lot when I'm working outside.  It's not an easy task, lemme tell ya.)

Okay, your turn.  How was your week?