A Hundred Thousand Fruit Flies

Okay, maybe just a hundred but when I went out to tie up the garage garbage bag to put it out for pick-up tomorrow a huge cloud of fruit flies rose up out of the bag and engulfed me. Yuk. That explains the fruit flies that are buzzing around in the house lately. I consistently put food garbage out in the garage bag so that I don't have an infestation in the house but I guess I should have put the bag full of apple cores and banana peels out for pick-up sooner. Maybe it'll freeze soon and kill all the little pests off.

A quartet of Sparrows landed on the birdbath and it looked like they were discussing whether to all jump in for a communal bath but by the time I got the camera up these two were all that were left and the one is about to fly away. I don't have much luck photographing wildlife these days. I looked up from a yoga pose this morning to find the cat standing at the edge of the patio staring at me then it sauntered over to the birdbath and stood on its hind legs for a drink. Naturally I was in the middle of my yoga practice so I couldn't grab the camera. Drat.

Last week I was at The Clearing and they served the biggest breakfasts ever. Each morning there'd be a bowl of oatmeal with dried fruit, brown sugar, and cream, a bowl of fruit, some sort of egg thing, sausage or bacon, AND a muffin or coffee cake. Gluttony ensued on Monday and I ate it all then proceeded to feel sick all morning. After that I skipped the oatmeal and just ate the "good stuff." This is my normal breakfast--yogurt, granola, fruit, and coffee--a more reasonable amount of food to start the day. Although I do miss the homemade breads and the camaraderie of my excellent roommates and the writing women. I sat working on a manuscript this afternoon and missed having cda to bounce ideas and questions off of.

This evening I went downstairs to wind up a hank of sock yarn into a cake so I could cast on another sock. I started winding it and it broke, so I found the end, tied it on, and started winding again. It broke again. I eventually had eight ends and realized that the yarn was defective and not a good candidate for knitting a sock since I don't want to put in all that work only to have the darned yarn break and destroy all my work. I threw it away. It broke my heart but I threw it away.

I took a walk this afternoon and when I rounded the second corner from home I saw these trees had suddenly burst into color. It was a gorgeous afternoon, warm and sunny, so the colored leaves were a pleasant surprise.

The sedum up on the retaining wall is still blooming. The pink variety is just about done but these burgundy ones are still going strong.

The next page in the 3-D drawing book was the first "R" page so I drew the letter five different ways but then I pulled out my favorite 10-Steps: Nature book and drew this feather. I wasn't at all sure that I'd have much luck drawing it but I like the way it turned out. My colored pencil-ing seems to be improving.

I forgot to find something to toss today. Oh, wait a minute, I tossed out that broken yarn so I didn't forget. Yay, me!

--Barbara