Shame on you!!!

495 Nicol Street, John Pollard(or your landlord or whoever was paid to clear out the house)...Chase River Estuary IS NOT A DUMP!!!! Why do people keep doing this? If By-Laws is still reading this blog, this is yet another dump site along the Chase River Estuary. I believe they are using the BC Hydro Access Road to get in here....there is so much dumping in here. It really should stop. Don't you think so?

Springtime means....

that even though the daffodils in my yard are not blooming yet(soon, very soon), I can buy them for 79 cents per box at Shady Mile Farm Market to plant in my garden later! Little delicious mini daffies, at that. Springtime means that some days, I get to open the doors and windows and air out this old 1923 house. It smells like an old house sometimes. Can't be helped. We even b-b-qued the other night...buffalo tenderloin steak. The first bbq of the season!

Springtime also means this....our trees and shrubs and last years dead stuff has all been cleared to make way for this year's lushness. Come on, come on, come on!!!!! Bloom already!

Springtime means the dog walks are getting greener and greener....

which is just the tiniest bit sad, because all those leaves also means that it becomes more difficult to see all the little shy birds...

Springtime means sitting outdoors with the mutts and my friends at the coffee shop where they keep the crocus corralled. There's a new Serious Coffee in town down by the river walk at Chase River Estuary, Rain. Bonus! When are you booking walkies time with me?

Springtime means after sipping coffees outside at the coffee shop with the mutts, we can head down to the river where the crocus run free and the world is mud-luscious and puddle-wonderful.

Welcome Spring. It is good to see you again, my friend.

by e.e. cummings
in Just-
spring when the world is mud-
luscious the little
lame balloonman
whistles far and wee
and eddieandbill come
running from marbles and
piracies and it's
spring
when the world is puddle-wonderful
the queer
old balloonman whistles
far and wee
and bettyandisbel come dancing
from hop-scotch and jump-rope and
it's
spring
and
the
goat-footed
balloonMan whistles
far
and
wee


CindyDianne got snow for her Spring Photo Challenge! SNOW!!! Tod took us out for a royal stroll at Leed's. Rain is late, but she'll be along shortly with her challenge. How about the rest of you?

Well, Anita beat us all to the punch! She got her challenge photos up a couple posts ago! Now we're all late, Rain! Well, Heidi's not late but apparently Spring is late out there...and Yvonne is seeing the colour purple. Gawilli is seeing signs of Spring sticking to her despite the snow...and Ollie is hanging out her sheets to catch the scents of Spring.

Name that Kitty

Somebody has forced us to make room in our hearts for Kitty...well, two somebodies.... two somebodies who have already forged a very deep and meaningful bond that neither Michael nor I have the heart to tear asunder...so today I will call the SPCA to find out about their low-income pet spay/neuter program... and get on that list. And make sure that she is, and remains, an indoor kitty as long as we live on this road.

And perhaps we will have to finally come up with a name...and we already have some in the running for now. If you want to add your suggestions, then comment away, my friends.

Already suggested: Lucky, Mackerel(because she is a mackeral tabby), Fishbone(for the same reason AND Aethan wants to call her Fish), Seal, Arlo Guthrie, Woody Guthrie...let's see, there was Nano, Tiny, Bitsy...but I don't think this kitten will remain tiny. I think she may be a big one....judging from her feet...and her attitude. Oh, Kitten and Puppy, too. Chase because we found on Chase River Estuary. Duchess because Duke found her. Queenie. Have I forgotten any?

I figure, really, she'll only come to "Kitty" anyway, soon enough....or the sound of a soft food can touching the can opener....

Her eyes are no longer brilliant blue, but a lovely grey with green flecks around the pupils. Maybe they will turn all the way green in time. She is a fiery little rocket when awake, and pretty well coordinated already. Growing daily in a visible way! Fierce with Duke, who found her, and playful with Emma, who dotes on her. Maybe this is Emma's last baby, eh? The only one that won't be taken away from her.

Well, that's it for now.

a gift

We all received a gift yesterday, a reprieve from the rain. A big wind blew in and took the clouds away. While I was waiting for the dust to clear over at Em's apartment(will explain later!), Emma and I took off to Chase River Estuary for one of our final looks at the running salmon. We had come the day before but had to leave the camera at home due to rains. There were eagles everywhere...everywhere. I must have seen 30 eagles, there for the salmon. They were roosting in old snarled tree limbs trying in vain to dry their feathers. It was most fantastic and I was beside myself for a camera. Yesterday, all I found was this one flying directly overhead. The river is fast and high from all the rains. The salmon that remain here at the estuary probably will not make it to the spawning grounds. They are weak and sick and near the end, and the new-found rush of water is too much for them. I tried to photograph some, but though I can see into the water, it seems my camera cannot.
Found this old Datsun pickup dumped here...the same colour as the sky. I would savour an old Datsun myself. 1972 B510, to be exact, just like my first and favourite car, but an old Datsun pickup would be pretty sweet, too.
Here is our path...a little muddy, to be sure, but passable again.
Another view of Nanaimo...
We walk here at least three times a week, sometimes more. I have passed this tree two hundred times if I have passed it once. Look what I found after all the rain and wind...now that I know there is a nest here, I will keep a watch out this spring and summer to see what happens. Exciting, isn't it?
One very late Wooley Bear Caterpillar...I doubt he'll make it this year, but you just never know, do you? At first I nearly deleted this photo since you can barely see the caterpillar, but after I saw all the sun spots and sunbeams, I realized that it might actually become one of my favourites. What do you think?



And one last note: I received a very last minute invitation...I don't know how in the hell they found me or why they thought I would respond.

Capital High School, class of 1986 reunion, Nov. 10, Pellegrino's Tyee Convention Center, Tumwater. Contact Reunions Unlimited at 360-866-8842, e-mail reunions@reunionsunlimited.com or go to www.reunionsunlimited.com.


HA HA HA HA HA oh, to be a fly on the wall... I did consider putting on dark sunglasses, carrying a white cane, a giant hearing aid and shuffling in just so I could gawk(behind my very dark glasses) ...is that very wrong of me? I couldn't possibly talk to anyone there...but I wonder what CM looks like now.....still dreamy?!?

Chase River Estuary Dog Walk

Thought I might take you all along on my dog walk by the river.... this giant steel circle is at the beginning of the walk...I am not sure what it is, but it sure looks cool. It would be a good place to take an album cover shot(CD, album, whatever). Coal mines were here long ago and maybe this is some leftover of that age gone by...they loaded ships with coal here... Foundations of miners' housing or coal mine offices, I will assume. There are numerous old foundations here and the trees growing through them are big...so they were abandoned long ago...
I like this one...
A derelict old piece of rust....
Little white balls of something...I don't know what this bush is....do you? Barb, are you reading this? You must know the name of this.
Rose hips
Emma
and cattails at the end of our walk...thanks for coming along.

not much

Eemer and Duke, her boyfriend...what a lovely couple they make, don't they? Out at Chase River Estuary is one of my dream houses...it looks out over the cattails where the swans nest in the winter, herons are here daily, ducks, eagles, hawks...and, now, in spring? The redwing blackbirds are here, staking out their territories. In fact, there is one in this photo. Can you find him? He is singing a beautiful song, trying to impress a lovely lady.

And on a clear day, you can see all the way to the mainland....

..............and really, I got nothing to talk about today. It's been a quiet around Blogland lately, hasn't it????

Hey you!!!!

Yeah, you! To the OWNER of 54 Gillespie Street, the renters who just moved or the people you hired to clean up your property(which still looks trashed) when you kick someone out!!!!!!! You know it costs only $7.50 to take an entire truckload of garbage to the dump?!? If you took a damage deposit from your renters, you should be able to afford a run to the dump instead of dumping this at Chase River Estuary, you fucking ASSHAT!!!!! You left some mail with the address in the trash, mixed with the empty crack baggies and baby diapers. I don't know what it costs to do a building title search, but I am going to find out...and find out your name, I hope.

Eagles, herons, swans, hawks, bears, rabbits, salamanders, redwing blackbirds, frogs, ducks, Canadian geese and snakes live here AND it is a damn fine dog walking spot. You are an ASSHAT!!!! Repeat ASSHAT. In fact, say it with me ASSHAT!!!!!!!!!!!!

I can't believe the effort you took to drive this load of crap in here on these roads....through paint-removing brush, and chassy-grinding ruts. If you put that much effort into being a decent person, no one could match you! But NO, you put the effort into being a total ASSHAT. $7.50. You should be completely ashamed of yourself.

and now back to regularly scheduled programing....

So, yeah, like I was saying the other day...before Mayor Korpan(of the "Free Nanaimo From Koruption" bumper sticker hall of fame...or shame, whatever) so rudely interrupted me, I finally found my chocolate lilies. They're late this year, probably due to the La Nina weather this spring. That just means it is colder here this year than most ....everything is slow to bloom. D-Cakes(Yuko's mom) and I headed out to Piper's Lagoon this past week for a walk. We didn't really expect to see any because we have been keeping our eyes open for them, but to no avail. They are usually out just before the fawn lilies or about the same time....the fawn lilies, however, are just about over and done with. At least at Piper's Lagoon.

This is Miner's Lettuce...it is edible. Whacks of vitamin C in it. We transplanted some to our back yard a while back and harvest it for salad greens when it is in season. No, we didn't steal it from a Provincial park, either. It grows everywhere...but I am not going to eat if from just anywhere! Sheesh.

And lo and behold....my lily....I love it so. Isn't she gorgeous?!? Divine? Breathtaking? Sigh.

It grows in somewhat ecologically fragile places so in order to get these photos from beneath, we had to find a flower that was not surrounded by other lilies or wildflowers. It wasn't easy, but we perservered until we found this one surrounded only by grass.

First D-Cakes, and then I, lay in the same spot for some photos....careful not to squash anything and then we fluffed the grass back up behind us.

There were quite a few and I could bore you all to pieces I took so many photos of them.

I did mention that I love these guys, right?

When we finish our "indigenous" garden out back of the house this year, hopefully we can fill it with local ferns, trillium, huckleberry, fawn lilies and these little beauties. Of course, we have to find them somewhere other than a Provincial Park, and carefully dig them out and outside of Piper's Lagoon, I have only ever seen one...one lonely chocolate lily out at Chase River Estuary.

It will be like a treasure hunt.

Finally, I got a photo of a towhee, too. They are normally quite shy but this boy is looking for a girl. He was just singing away...I wish the colours had turned out better, and the details, but I am still quite pleased. I have been trying to get a decent photo of one of these for months and months.

I don't know what these are. Do you?

But we all know what this is by now, right? Okay, I better let you all go. I can feel your eyes rolling. I don't blame you.

Bye.

Talk at you all later, k?

Welcome to Nanaimo

Holy schmokes, folks....it was a busy weekend. Two full days of blue skies and warm weather. Despite my dreamland dreams that Vincent D'Onofrio was going to come and lay the new brick walkway beside my house, he has yet to arrive, so Michael and I put it in this past weekend...most of it. It's not brick and we ran out of the concrete pavers about eight feet short of our goal, but it looks good. And the kitty litter, er, bark mulch, that lined the side of our house is gone. Thank goodness. I didn't take before pictures...what was I thinking? Or not thinking?

We laid in six more feet of garden space, made a couple of dump runs, shoveled 2/3 yards of rock and 2/3 yards of topsoil in and shoveled 48 feet of kitty litter, er, bark mulch, out. I thinned my raspberries out to avoid yellow rust. As soon as I am done here, I am off to plant 48 feet of strawberries along the new walkway, and some more asparagus....some Alyssum to combat the aphids on the rose bushes and two flowers that a friend gave us that we don't know what they are. Michael and I still squeezed in a walk...a new walk, in fact. Another view of Nanaimo....from a different trail on the Chase River Estuary.

Michael and Eemer.....

Look what you find in Nanaimo....the whole town was established to dig coal. In fact, there are mines beneath all the houses in our neighbourhood that neither the Minister of Mines nor the City of Nanaimo will take responsibility for. But let's not rant today, ok?

We'll put up a sign and a flimsy fence instead!

It was a pretty walk...this tree is nearly done for. It grew out of the coal slag left behind from the mines and the loading of ships. It picked the exact wrong place to grow but made a valiant effort.

And toadstools covered in slag and coal dust.

And trillium in abundance.....in white.

.....and purple, magenta and striped.......

There is treasure anywhere. Keep your eyes open.

I found this little piece of drift wood. It looks sculpted by a steady and thoughtful hand. Do you like it better in colour?

Or in black and white?

Either way you like it, it is in my garden now! Anyhoo, I am rambling....there is much to talk about but the strawberries are awaiting transplant and the end of the day is approaching....I'm not going to be around for the next couple of days. Don't worry about me, though, because I will be having a good time.

Talk to you soon!!!!!