NEWFAZE

Good evening!

Posted on November 2, 2014 by Jay McLaughlin

2 November, 2014 Good evening!

I promise next week to come up with a catchier title. I hope your week has been great and the week to come is even better.

I wouldn’t say this week has been a “let down” after our excellent cabin adventure, but it certainly has been a “wind down.” The air has been so crisp and pure that both the breathing and the photography have been exceptionally good. Writers sometimes talk about a “tang” or a “snap” in the air and often describe autumn air as “crisp.” It’s tangy and snappy and crisp and more. The early part of autumn still just feels like late summer and humidity lingers. This morning (Sunday) at the river let me assure you, summer was gone without a trace. It was 47º and clear, clear, clear at the edge of the water and the wind was blowing a gale. It felt great but it was cold. This is from this morning; look at Mackey looking at the river:

Mackey gazing up at a cold, windy river

I made it to the river in the afternoon on Monday; this is more of the beautiful autumn light:

The river has a much different look in the afternoon! See the curly tree on the right? That’s quite a contrast.

Summer moons are all beautiful but they never look as crisp as they do in autumn. I took one on Monday (October 27):

4 days old, 17% full, 7:00 PM on Monday, October 27

And another on Thursday (October 30):

Three days later, now 7 days old, 50% full, very beautiful. Taken around 9:30 PM on Thursday, October 30

I took this picture at a friend’s house that Thursday afternoon. A lot of people have already seen this picture because I got such a kick out of it I put it on Facebook plus sent it around to a few people. When we pulled up to my friend’s house this squirrel was gobbling up their pumpkin. I think that’s going to be the Next Big Thing – All Natural Pumpkin Carving. See, a week or two before Halloween you’ll put an uncarved pumpkin on your front porch. Make the shape of a face in peanut butter on the front of the pumpkin. Then let the squirrels eat it and carve the pumpkin for you! Don’t forget to use organically grown non-GMO locally harvested pumpkins plus Reginald’s Homemade Peanut Butter (from right here in Richmond!). To be truly environmentally friendly. Make your orange pumpkin green next year. Here’s the squirrel that started it all:

The squirrel that started the environmentally friendly pumpkin carving revolution

I was at Brown’s Island train watching with my buddy on Wednesday and I looked down and there were Osage Oranges on the ground! Amazing! More amazing still – perhaps – in all my years of seeing Osage Oranges, I have never seen one in a tree! Can you imagine!? Fortunately I looked up and saw this:

Osage Oranges in a tree! Finally!

Ev and I were downtown yesterday and I saw a broken bag of grain on the ground. I enjoyed the way it looked:

That’s what bread looks like before it’s bread.

There were little purple flowers growing near it. Yesterday was November 1. Flowers will disappear for 2014 really soon so I was happy to take this picture:

Still blooming in November! Impressive. This flower was quite petite. And delicate appearing, but tough seeming, since it’s still blooming in November.

Looking forward to next week! All best!

Jay

Posted in Dogs, Flowers, Fun, James River, moon, pumpkins, Rivers, squirrels | Tagged Flowers, fresh bread, james river, osage oranges, pictures of the moon, pumpkins, squirrels | Leave a comment

More fun!

Posted on October 27, 2014 by Jay McLaughlin

26 October, 2014 More fun!

A brief extension of yesterday’s post. I apologize if this is too much email and/or blogging. A few more photographs, a few more words.

We took a drive around (thanks Shane!) on Saturday and went to Shenandoah for a few minutes. And for part of the time watched trains! How could I not enjoy this:

Historic Railroad Town! Fun!

Here’s a picture of the old station:

Shenandoah Yard Office, Norfolk Southern Railway

Cappy took a picture of us:

Kristin, Shane, Aileen and some crazy guy taking pictures of a train.

Cappy has told me before that she prefers being behind the camera to being in front of it. Here she is behind her camera, in front of mine:

Photographee:

We walked down to see our old friend Doug and Doris’s house. Doris died in 1999; she requested years earlier that dad and I be pallbearers at her funeral. Doug doesn’t live there any more but it’s kept up nicely. We went there twice over the weekend and it doesn’t look like anyone is there. But someone is cutting the grass. We spent so many hours there and learned so much I can’t begin to describe it. But I may in a future post. Begin, that is. Here’s a picture of their house:

We learned so much here. It could be its own book.

I put up a blog post in April of this year called Only the beginning. You can click on that link if you want and see a couple pictures of our old cabin. Back when we owned it. They’re near the bottom of the post. In case you don’t look at the post, I’ll reproduce for you here a brief excerpt from it. Briefly describing our relationship with Doug and Doris:

= = = = = = = = = =

[…]And from there [the cabin] we did everything. When you don’t have a television it’s astounding how many other things you find to do. Any time of the year in any weather. We had friends named Doug and Doris. They were native to that area and a little bit older than mom and dad. They lived there year round. If you look again at that finger of the park sticking up, our property was on the north side of it and theirs was on the south. I guess it was fifteen minutes or so walk from the cabin to their house. We visited them whenever we were at the cabin, and we were there frequently. Doug and Doris were in many ways an extra set of grandparents to us. Grandparents who in no way resembled the set who shared our DNA. When we first visited Doug and Doris in 1974 I recall their party line telephone quite clearly. If you picked it up, you might hear a neighbor talking with someone else. There was no paved road in view from their house. I’ve been up there within the last five years; there is still no paved road in view. Only railroad tracks. When we were there it was theNorfolk and Western Railway. Now it’s the Norfolk Southern. And – this is another way they didn’t resemble our parent’s parents – they had a horse. And a cow. They drank milk from the cow and made butter. They had chickens. If the cow had been eating onion grass, the butter tasted like onions. They had chickens, including Araucana chickens, which lay colored eggs. They had pigs. Every autumn they slaughtered one and let us help. And made ham and sausage and bacon and lard and scrapple and ate it all year round. They got their water from a spring. They had dogs and cats but their dogs and cats were dissimilar to the ones my biological grandparents had.

To help you understand how close we were, Doris asked when we were younger that dad and I be pallbearers at her funeral. We of course accepted that honor, and she died up of natural causes in the valley in 1999. The funeral was at the Rest Haven Cemetery in Shenandoah. She was seventy-four.

I’d planned on keeping this section brief and now it’s not. I’ve stuck to my goal of adding a section at the bottom for two consecutive weeks now – so I’m happy. More next week, hopefully. Until then, all best,

Jay

PS I couldn’t stop so quickly. I’m enjoying this section. I found an old, old picture of Doug and Doris. Mom might know where this was taken, I don’t. Doris smiled a lot. Doug smiled when we were working outdoors but I don’t think he cared much for being indoors. A man after my own heart.

= = = = = = = = = =

If you click on the link (to the blog post, above) you can see a picture of Doug and Doris from many, many years ago.

Ev put together this excellent collage. SHE took all these pictures. Look at these colors. :

Clockwise from top left: The South Fork of the Shenandoah River w/amazing sky, a sycamore leaf, Shane and me hanging out where we used to hang out, autumn colors in the Shenandoah Valley from our deck. Thanks Ev!

Clockwise from top left: The South Fork of the Shenandoah River w/amazing sky, a sycamore leaf, Shane & me hanging out where we used to hang out, autumn colors in the Shenandoah Valley from our deck. Thanks Ev!

I took so many hundreds of pictures. So many beautiful hardwoods, I’d forgotten. Plants, late fall flowers, our little fire where we roasted marshmallows. They could make it into another post. But I’ll let this go for the time being. And I’ll be back Sunday! Have a great day,

Jay

Posted in Fun, People, Rivers, Trains | Tagged clouds, Fun, nature | 5 Comments

We had so much FUN!

Posted on October 26, 2014 by Jay McLaughlin

26 October, 2014 We had so much FUN!

If, like me, you enjoy breathing, I recommend spending an October weekend in Virginia’s Shenandoah Valley. I’ve breathed in many places, but I’ve rarely enjoyed it as much as I did this weekend near the town of Shenandoah, Virginia. Evelyn and my brother Shane and his wife Kristin and my nieces Aileen and Cappy got together early Friday evening at the Bear’s Den Cabin in Page County.

Forgive me for not beginning at the beginning. And for jumping back and forth in time. But. As much as I enjoy dogs and triathlons and trains and hiking and rivers and photography and chocolate and coffee and Subarus and birds and dragonflies, and peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, I like people better. They are way more fun. There were six of us at the cabin this weekend, and the five people who joined me made it the experience it was. So, here is the last picture of the six of us together! Shane set up his camera and used the timer and took it just before we left around lunchtime today, standing in front of the cabin:

Kristin, Shane, me, Ev, Cappy, Aileen – they were the five best weekend-sharing people ever.

Backtracking slightly. To when Evie and I got up there Friday evening. This is so cool, although no pictures. The people who owned the cabin put me in touch with a local guy named Stacy who could drop off firewood for us. He pulled up in his incredibly cool 1972 ¾ ton 4WD Chevy stepside pickup that his granfather had bought new. With manual locking hubs. Which if you went four-wheeling in the 1970’s, the funnest thing you did before the going got really hairy was get out and “lock the hubs.” To put it in real four wheel drive. But Stacy’s truck was not a play truck. This was a serious work truck.

Stacy and I got talking about this and that, Stacy was a year older than Shane, we chatted away. We have a lot in common. We both like to shoot guns and he talked about that and about working in a small firearms retail place in the Valley years ago – and he knew my dad! Described to me how he’d learned to work on revolvers but had just gotten a new gun with a different kind of action and didn’t know how to work on it. So he asked the owner of this shop about it and the guy said “you need to talk to Mike McLaughlin.” And Stacy described dad to a T, both dad’s physical appearance and his teaching style. Which, for those of you who never had the great fortune of learning something from my dad, was the most patient and thorough process you’ve ever known. As a teacher dad never got frustrated. Or anyway if he did, you never knew it. And if he was teaching you to do something, he taught you every step with nothing missing and nothing extra. And he didn’t just teach you the steps – he taught you why you did those steps.

The cabin we rented was about 4/10 of a mile up a gravel road from the cabin we owned during some of the most formative experiences of my upbringing. Where my dad taught me so much of what makes me the person I am today. So try to feel a little bit of this experience. I’m up there in the mountains on a cool October evening, listening to this guy I’d met for the first time in my life about five minutes ago tell me stories I’d never heard about my dad. It’s cooling off and getting dark and you can smell that late-evening mountainy smell and the last crickets of the year are chirping and if you don’t think that was a moving experience, think again.

Think about this too – it just happened. Out of nowhere. A highly statistically improbable event. That was how my weekend started. And it got better. Well, not “better” precisely, but it began at that level and stayed there. And I’m reliving it here in front of my computer so it’s still at this great level. And I can tell this blog post will overflow and I’ll have to do more tomorrow because I also want to sleep tonight at some point.

A family tradition we had from when we first bought the cabin 1974 was dinner at Dan’s Steakhouse. We kept up the tradition throughout our time there, and the six of us visited this weekend. Here we are again:

Carrying on the Dan’s Steakhouse tradition.

If you’re a Facebook person, check out the Dan’s Steakhouse Facebook page. Notice the pink ribbon in the background. The owner’s best friend died of breast cancer in April. She was younger than my sister Sheila. She had cancer for eighteen years. On Saturday nights they donate a portion of each check to a fund to help people with breast cancer. Eighteen years. Younger than my younger sister. I am so sorry. Her name was Robin.

I’ve written in earlier posts about “The Tunnel.” Leaving Richmond for the cabin or leaving DC for the cabin, you start out on large paved roads (interstates) that get progressively smaller as you near the cabin. You end up on Virginia Rte. 650, a.k.a. River Rd., the last paved road of the trip. The river (the South Fork of the Shenandoah river) is on your left (as you come from Richmond) and you turn right off 650 onto Cold Spring Drive, leading in to Shenandoah Gap. The first thing you do is pass through “The Tunnel,” under what is now the Norfolk Southern Railroad train tracks. This is what you see as you turn onto the gravel road:

This is what you see when you pull off the paved road:

If you walk through and look to your left on the other end of the tunnel, you see this block:

Check that out. 7 May, 1901. So cool.

It’s a hundred thirteen years old. Showing no obvious signs of decay. Crazy.

Speaking of what that tunnel has supported for the past century-plus. Just as Ev and I were leaving this morning, we stopped for a last look around. Sure enough we heard a rumble and I got out my camera and I wasn’t quick enough for a great picture. But I got a moderately good one of three Norfolk Southern locomotives pulling a long intermodal freight train led by #9139, a C44-9W. Next time I go I’ll get a better picture:

Norfolk Southern locomotive #9139, a GE C44-9W

Sorry for the unstructured writing. Dad would discourage this. But dad was never one to let perfection be the enemy of the good so I’ll carry on. And do another post tomorrow. The picture of the entrance to the tunnel (a couple of pictures back) is what you see when you turn right off Rte. 650. If you turn left (or stop and park and get out, which is what Evie and I did, you see this:

The South Fork of the Shenandoah River.

That is the South Fork of the Shenandoah River.

I could stay up all night and write and put pictures together and believe me I’m tempted. But it’s late and I have to be up early. So I’m going to sign off here and put together another post tomorrow around this time, give or take an hour or three. I hope you’ve enjoyed it so far!

All best,

Jay

Posted in Fun, People, Rivers, Smiles (including "dog smiles"!), Trains | Tagged clouds, Fun, nature | 5 Comments

There’s an echo in here!

Posted on October 19, 2014 by Jay McLaughlin

19 October, 2014 There’s an echo in here!

An echo of a few previous posts, that is. This post is full of echoes from previous posts. Plus a few new pictures and some info. To begin at the beginning – my most recent post (I cheated! 12 October, 2014). That post began with two pictures of Osage Oranges and one of an Osage Orange tree. I immediately got responses from two friends specifically about Osage Oranges! I mean, who even knew? It’s funny what turns up.

My friend Lou mentioned a trip to Osage Co., KS many years ago. And my friend Kim looked at the Osage Orange pictures and asked if I knew “…the story about them and wooly mammoths?” I didn’t, but she sent me a link this article: The Trees That Miss The Mammoths on the American Forests web site. Amazing. Osage Oranges. How much other crazy stuff is out there that I don’t know anything about but my friends know a ton of stuff about? Stay tuned to this space! Maybe we’ll learn new things together! Or – more likely still – maybe you’re one of those people who know tons of stuff I don’t know anything about! Don’t be shy – keep me informed. But those were the I cheated! echoes.

For those who do not recall what an Osage Orange looks like.

Then if you scroll down to the post before that one (Music on 5 October, 2014), you’ll see a couple of nice osprey pictures I was fortunate to take during the week. I got a strong echo from that post (indirectly) on the following Monday (13 October) in RichmondOutside.com, “Central Virginia’s Gateway to the Outdoors.” Because – get this – on Saturday morning, there was an osprey stuck in a tree at Pony Pasture! Here’s a link to the article: Pony Pasture neighbors, arborists combine on dramatic osprey rescue by Andy Thompson. I highly recommend clicking on that link. There is a 52 second video of the rescue that is fantastic. It’s just somebody’s cell phone video and it’s perfect. And the article is wonderful – please read it. Happy endings are so excellent.

There’s a good chance this is the bird that’s in the video. Remarkable.

So here’s even another echo of a previous post. Although it’s another one from I cheated. Because there’s an unidentified damselfly picture on that post (sixth picture down) and I posted it to bugguide.net and it was immediately identified as a “female American rubyspot” (Hetaerina americana). What a resource.

Female American rubyspot (Hetaerina americana)

Final echo, and at this point if you don’t like spiders, you need to skip past, because this is where the new pictures begin, and they begin with a spider. Which I have not yet identified from bugguide.net but maybe next week. The echo – another indirect echo, but all echoes are indirect – is from the popular post Guest photographer! (and MUCH more!) 27 April, 2014). That post has a picture of snake in it. This post has a picture of a spider in it. So I’ll put a link here to Jim Stafford’s 1974 song Spiders and Snakes. That’s worth watching too, he performs it live on The Smothers Brothers and I recommend taking a couple of minutes to watch. Also here’s the spider picture:

This spider has opened the breakfast buffet and is waiting for guests to arrive.

I suspect some readers skip over the text and go straight to the pictures. Which I mean why not, I do that often myself. I was riding my bike at West Creek earlier this week. As soon as I arrived in my car I saw unusual ducks on the lake. In central Virginia, every large body of water has Mallards and Canada Geese. Even an amateur birder (me) can look at a lake and immediately notice a shape that’s not one of those two. I saw some right away. I wanted pictures right then but I always ride first. They were so close to the shore the pictures would have been fantastic. While riding I heard a noise coming from the lake’s edge – I’m not making this up – and looked up and saw this hovering near the shore:

A drone flying over the lake at West Creek. I’m seeing more all the time. But the lake at West Creek is man made too, so it works both ways.

I saw the guys operating it too, it looked like they were having fun. The ducks didn’t get anxious enough to leave the lake but they moved way out of reasonable camera range. It’s too bad; they’re neat ducks. I’ve seen them a time or two at Pony Pasture but never at West Creek. Here are three males and a female Ring-necked Ducks (Aythya collaris). These long range shots are un-crisp. But I always like pictures of unusual birds. Have a look:

Four Ring-necked ducks. A female in the background and four males in the foreground.

Four Ring-necked ducks. A female in the background and three males in the foreground.

Ethan and I were hiking at Bryan Park this week (a favorite spot) and there was a Praying Mantis perched on a bridge:

Praying mantis (Mantis religiosa)

I get up around five o’clock in the morning most weekdays and the sun doesn’t come up this time of year until around 7:15. So when it’s cold and clear like it’s been, I get to see gorgeous spectacular moonrises, like this waning crescent (23 day old) moon from Friday morning:

Waning crescent moon from ~6:00 Friday (10/17/2014) morning.

Have a great week,

Jay

Posted in Rivers | Tagged bryan park, Dogs, Endurance, Fun, james river, nature, outdoors, pictures of the moon | 7 Comments

I cheated!

Posted on October 12, 2014 by Jay McLaughlin

12 October, 2014 I cheated!

I’ve been waiting all Fall for Osage Oranges (a.k.a. “Hedge Apples”) to appear at Pony Pasture. I see them every fall in the same spot. But they never appeared. Just this tiny one in the parking lot; I have no idea how it got there:

Smallest Osage Orange I’ve ever seen. In the parking lot at Pony Pasture.

But are some Osage orange trees on River Road that drop Osage oranges reliably every year. This week I finally gave up on the Pony Pasture Osage oranges. And I pulled off on a side street from River Road jumped out and took this picture and left. I would have used my keys for scale on this one but my car was running!:

Much more the size I’m used to.

It’s “cheating” because it’s sort of like photographing animals in the zoo. I like to get them at Pony Pasture where they live “in the wild” but oh well. Hopefully in 2015. Here is what their bark looks like:

The bark of an Osage Orange tree. Now perhaps I can locate the tree itself at Pony Pasture. Stay tuned.

Interestingly (if this is the sort of thing that interests you), the largest Osage Orange tree in the US is here in Virginia, in Alexandria at a place called River Farm, owned by the American Horticultural Society. If you clicked the Osage Orange link earlier in this post, you would read that they are native to southern Oklahoma and northern Texas. They grew thorny and dense and people used them for fencing. It’s unusual that the largest one in the US is here in Virginia. It is less surprising – to me – now – that there is a patch of Osage Oranges at Pony Pasture. Because probably someone was using them for a natural, dense hedge there fifty or seventy-five years ago.

I never knew any of this before I began this post. I knew the wood was good for making bows. Fun.

PS If you’re curious and you’ve never held one, they’re dense. Solid. If one fell of a tree and hit you on the head it would hurt. They’re not edible to humans although not poisonous. I read in my research for this post that squirrels are fond of them. But we had them around the cabin when we were younger and I saw lots of them, and lots of squirrels, but never saw a squirrel eating one or a sign of it. Who knows. It’s a neat plant.

Earlier that day – while the dogs and I were still at Pony Pasture – I heard and saw a Carolina Wren (Thryothorus ludovicianus) going through the trees. It only stopped for an instant so this shot is rushed. My Birds of North America online guide describes them as “an energetic, generalist species.” It goes on to say that in this area they’re a “nervous, often shy permanent resident.” You have to be quick on the draw. But they’re cute birds:

Glimpse through the trees of a “nervous, energetic, shy, generalist.”

I’ve also been waiting all Fall to have my first fire; last night it had finally been cold enough and damp enough for long enough that I gave in. Dash had also been waiting for our first fire. It occurred to me as I went to post this that Dash is neither nervous, energetic or shy; I’ve never considered whether he’s a generalist or not:

Seriously – that cat is not nervous, energetic or shy. Zero.

Anyway, this post is a bit thin – I apologize. I’ll close with a picture of an unidentified late season damselfly; nice looking insect:

Attractive late season damselfly.

Ah – it just occurred to me – part of the reason I didn’t get any pictures this morning. I was fortunate to get a quick dog-sitting gig and when you have four dogs, carrying a “real” camera is next to impossible. I did get one picture of the pack:

The Fab Four (choose your own names). Although the black one in the back is Mackey, just closer is Turner, the black and white one is Luna, the nearest one is Lola.

I’ll close with a picture of the river from this week. It’s beginning to get a nice early autumn look:

Not the angle I normally choose. But no less lovely.

Have a great week,

Jay

Posted in Dogs, Flowers, Fun, People, Rivers, Smiles (including "dog smiles"!) | Tagged Fun, james river, nature, outdoors, Pony Pasture | 4 Comments

Music on

Posted on October 5, 2014 by Jay McLaughlin

5 October, 2014 Music on

Happy Birthday Aileen! I have, as I may have mentioned, five lovely nieces. Today is Aileen’s birthday. Happy Birthday Aileen! She lives in MD and I live in VA so we don’t get to see each other as much any more. Although we’ll be getting together soon, yay.

Since I haven’t even started this blog post I guess that doesn’t actually count as a digression. I was cutting the grass Friday and Ev took a picture and put it on fb. The caption: “Singing with gusto while cutting grass, and whistling too!” I have always loved cutting grass. (Mine, but not yours). I love washing dishes too. I’m not overenthusiastic about cutting grass in e.g. mid-August but this time of year it’s nice. I’ll get to the singing/whistling part later – it’s how I named this post. Enjoying the day:

Whistling and singing Paul Simon and enjoying the smell of freshly mown grass

I haven’t put up a train picture in a long time. When Clark and I were at Brown’s Island on Wednesday, we were expecting to see a CSX coal train. Or a mixed freight or nothing. But there was a train parked there with mostly tank cars – probably all tank cars, that was all we could see – with NON-CSX engines! Both engines were BNSF, formerly known as Burlington Northern and Santa Fe. Which is owned by Berkshire Hathaway! Which is owned by Warren Buffett! BNSF operates mainly in the western US, along with Union Pacific. CSX and Norfolk Southern are the two big railroads east of the Mississippi. I don’t know what those locomotives were doing here. This front locomotive (#5912) is a GE ES44AC, which is the same locomotive CSX operates there. BNSF locomotive #5148 was behind it, you can’t see it in the picture. #5148 is a GE C44-9W, another 4,400 HP heavy hauler. Nice to see fall colors in October:

Autumn colors on the railroad tracks:

This flower was growing right beside the railroad tracks. A friend who is a florist told me it’s from the buttercup group, a ranunculus. When I googled it, the first hit, even before wikipedia, said “Prolific and Terrific: Ranunculus.” Which that’s a good enough reason to put up a picture of it, for that reason alone: “Prolific and Terrific.” And such a bright flower:

Ranunculus: prolific and terrific

The autumn bird migration is going on right now; a lot of birds have headed south and more are passing through. We’re having some bright clear days that are great for photography. These mourning doves (in central Virginia) probably don’t migrate a lot. They’re always graceful birds and this one posed well:

This one is better with fewer words.

I apologize (I think I’ve done that a lot) if these river pictures all look the same. I never get tired of them. I promise (if you’re still viewing) to post some later in the season when the leaves are gone. And hopefully also with some snow and ice. But that won’t be for a while. Meanwhile – and I mean this literally and figuratively – enjoy today:

If it’s boring, sorry. I don’t get bored of it.

This blog post was coming together slowly when I got to the river this morning. It was clear and bright and really cold. The coldest it’s been (I learned) since late April or early May. It was in the upper forties when I got up and 52º when I pulled into the parking lot. And so incredibly clear. And we got down to the rocks – we were three minutes walk from the parking lot – and I was looking around to see what was visiting the river this fine morning. And an osprey landed in a tree right in front of us! I think this is a female and I think it’s a juvenile. But I’m not an osprey expert. Yet.

Look at those eyes. What a magnificent animal.

I’d already written this whole post and was ready to put it up. But I took twenty-three pictures of that bird. I deleted about twenty but still had a couple of beauties. This one isn’t a lot different from the one above. But this gaze in my opinion is really what defines a raptor. Check this out:

That is what alpha predators ALL look like. Fish wake up having nightmares when they see that look.

= = = = = = = = = =

I’ll just close up with a blurb about why I called this “Music on.” Because when Evelyn took that picture at the top I was cutting the grass and singing (and whistling) a selection from my large repertoire of Paul Simon songs. Because I spend a lot of the day Friday with my old buddy KD. You may recall him from a blog post I wrote in January called smile. He loves Paul Simon. To the exclusion (at least in my car) of nearly any other music. I have eighty-five Paul Simon songs on my iPhone and that’s what we listen to whenever we’re together. KD doesn’t talk a lot. He uses an economy of words (unlike yours truly) and gets his point across clearly. If I’m listening to anything in the car – anything you have ever heard anywhere in your life – and it’s not Paul Simon, KD says two words: “music on.” If I’m listening to classical or jazz or opera or the Grateful Dead or hip hop or country or bluegrass, KD says “music on.” He means “Put on some Paul Simon.” The unavoidable implication is that the rest of it is not music – only Paul Simon is. It’s great grass cutting music. Excellent for washing dishes too. Which I have to do right now! Until next week,

Jay

Posted in Rivers | 2 Comments

Cleaning windows

Posted on September 28, 2014 by Jay McLaughlin

29 September, 2014 Cleaning windows

When I woke up this morning I knew I was going to write a blog post and I had a few pictures. But no title and/or theme. Even after we returned from a superlative hike at Pony Pasture this morning I remained title and/or themeless. I have a big picture front window with a bird feeder on it and the window was filthy. So I took out my ladder (after LOTS of procrastination) and began cleaning. I don’t clean windows often – trust me – and when I did I recalled a 1982 Van Morrison song called Cleaning Windows. If you’re unfamiliar (or if you’re familiar) and interested, click this link; it’s just under five minutes long: Van Morrison – Cleaning Windows

Here are the lyrics to Cleaning Windows:

Oh, the smell of the bakery from across the street

Got in my nose

As we carried our ladders down the street

With the wrought-iron gate rows

I went home and listened to Jimmie Rodgers in my lunch-break

Bought five Woodbines at the shop on the corner

And went straight back to work.

Oh, Sam was up on top

And I was on the bottom with the v

We went for lemonade and Paris buns

At the shop and broke for tea

I collected from the lady

And I cleaned the fanlight inside-out

I was blowing saxophone on the weekend

In that down joint.

What’s my line?

I’m happy cleaning windows

Take my time

I’ll see you when my love grows

Baby don’t let it slide

I’m a working man in my prime

Cleaning windows (number a hundred and thirty-six)

I heard Leadbelly and Blind Lemon

On the street where I was born

Sonny Terry, Brownie McGhee,

Muddy Waters singin’ “I’m A Rolling Stone”

I went home and read my Christmas Humphreys’ book on Zen

Curiosity killed the cat

Kerouac’s “Dharma Bums” and “On The Road”

What’s my line?

I’m happy cleaning windows

Take my time

I’ll see you when my love grows

Baby don’t let it slide

I’m a working man in my prime

Cleaning windows…

Anyway, it evolved from there. I was standing at the foot of the ladder – this is a true story – and I pulled out my phone and googled the song and found that video and posted it on Facebook. A while later I saw a “comment” with the picture and my friend Justin had posted a video of the song The Window Cleaner by George Formby from 1936 movie called Keep Your Seats, Please. Even if you skipped the Van Morrison video, you owe it to yourself to watch this 1936 ukulele classic: George Formby – The Window Cleaner.

THAT song – this is all just too much fun – contains these lyrics:

“To overcrowded flats I’ve been,

Sixteen in one bed I’ve seen,

With the lodger tucked up in between,

When I’m cleaning windows!

Now lots of girls I’ve had to jilt,

For they admire the way I’m built,

It’s a good job I don’t wear a kilt,

When I’m cleaning windows!”

– Banned by the BBC: “The Window Cleaner“, second recorded version[5

This is a quote from a book about Mr. Formby: “The film contained the song “The Window Cleaner“…, which was soon banned by the BBC. The corporation’s director John Reith stated that “if the public wants to listen to Formby singing his disgusting little ditty, they’ll have to be content to hear it in the cinemas, not over the nation’s airwaves”…

Have fun comparing the banning of that “disgusting little ditty” in 1936 to the songs that are banned currently. Obviously the language has changed but people were banning music seventy or eighty years ago. They’ll still be doing it seventy or eighty years from now.

When I was showing the draft of this post to Evelyn she commented that there’s a song for everything. I concurred. And since the window is clean: I Can See Clearly Now, Johnny Nash/Jimmy Cliff

Blog posts like this one just evolve. Because I was reading the lyrics to the Van Morrison song and this line caught my eye: “I went home and read my Christmas Humphreys’ book on Zen.” I’m familiar with eastern thought, primarily Thich Nhat Hanh, Eknath Easwaran and of course HH The Dalai Lama. And Peter Matthiessen and Robert Thurman but I’d never heard of Christmas Humphreys so I googled him. And found a book (found a bunch of books, but settled on one) called Essays in Zen Buddhism. I bought it for my Kindle and I’ve already begun reading it. Think about this string of events – because my front window was filthy.

Now – for a few pictures from this week. Snake-o-phobes – I know there are a few of you out there – be forewarned: a little ways down this page, there will be a picture of a Northern Water Snake. Not as great as the one Ethan took earlier this year – that one was amazing – but very unmistakably a snake. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.

I was hiking next to the canal behind Starbucks this week and was startled to see another Longnose gar:

Longnose gar swimming in the canal behind Starbucks River Road

It was earlier that day when I saw the snake (thanks for the ID Kim!). When I first saw it, it was swimming in a creek – fully submerged. I watched it crawl out of the water and go up the bank. I took about a million pictures and some are kind of cool. But out of deference to my snake-o-phobic viewers, I’m using a “tame” image, although I think you true phobics might just skip over it anyway. But here it is, a nice looking Northern Water Snake:

Northern Water Snake, climbing out of the creek

This isn’t my favorite cormorant picture ever (I think I say that about every cormorant picture) but it’s neat to see them perching with their wings spread. This is an extremely common behavior for cormorants; they all do it often. I’ve read that it’s for drying their wings but I’ve also read articles that question that assumption. Sorry its back’s to the camera:

Cormorant drying its wings (maybe)

If you’re at all interested in bird behavior, I became aware earlier this week of a very impressive book that I’m around half way through. It’s called What the Robin Knows – How Birds Reveal the Secrets of the Natural World by Jon Young. It’s not just about robins but it is mostly about songbirds (passerines) and I doubt it has anything about cormorants. But it’s a fascinating read.

I’ll close with two pictures from Pony Pasture this morning. The first is looking upriver from a rock about three minutes walk from the parking lot. I’m telling you – you owe it to yourself to go see this. Every nice morning it looks like this. It takes three minutes to drive there from the Huguenot Bridge and another three minutes to walk from the parking lot. And you get to see this. Some people don’t know how fortunate we are to live in Richmond. This is priceless:

Sunday morning looking upriver:

I hiked a bit longer – probably twenty minutes – downstream with the dogs before I took this one. Looking across the river. Look at this reflection. And have a great week,

Jay

Reflect on this for just a moment:

Posted in Birds, Fun, Rivers | Tagged Fun, james river, nature, outdoors, Pony Pasture, Rivers | 2 Comments

Fifty-one weeks

Posted on September 21, 2014 by Jay McLaughlin

21 September, 2014 Fifty-one weeks

Fifty one weeks from now I am entered for my first “double” triathlon – two triathlons in two days. So far my long-time triathlete buddy/brother Andrew is also going to do it. And perhaps his actual brother Peter. On Saturday we’ll do an “Olympic” distance triathlon. In this case, that’s a 1,500 meter swim, a 24.5 mile bike ride and a 10k run. I did a race approximately that long in May of this year and it took around four hours to complete. Then – this will be the fun part – we wake up the following morning and complete a “Sprint” distance triathlon. The swim will be precisely half as long (750 meters or not quite half a mile). The bike will be just over half as long at 13.5 miles. And the run will also be precisely half as long, a 5k. 3.1 miles. So probably two hours-ish. I did my first triathlon (a sprint) in 1987. And I’ve done over a hundred, including many long races, but this will be the first time I’ve ever done two in two days. It’s going to be a blast.

The race is called the SAGA Outer Banks Triathlon and it’s going to be in Manteo, NC. I did a sprint race down there about twenty years ago. I’m looking forward to this one. I’m negotiating the change from doing a long distance race each year to doing shorter races and having satisfying experiences. I know this one will fill the bill.

It’s been a nice week here and I was happy to spend some time with my old buddy Kent earlier in the week. He used to live only a mile away and we spent a lot of time together at the Y plus countless games of miniature golf. Or bowling if the weather pushed us indoors. We were pretty evenly matched as golfers but he was a lifelong bowler and he was good at it. I cannot say the same for myself. So naturally I pushed for miniature golf whenever we could. Including more than one time in the snow. Kent moved back home to Seattle a few years ago so it was nice to spend time with him again.

Pictures haven’t been spectacular this week but I’ve gotten a few I enjoy and I hope you do too. I’ll put them up in just a moment. But first this public service announcement. After a fashion. Most of us are aware of this but here in central Virginia, autumn officially begins tomorrow evening at 10:29. South of the equator that’s the beginning of spring. Although I knew this was when the season changed, I didn’t know precisely what that meant. And I am interested so I looked it up. Forgive me if you already know this and/or are uninterested. But in the six months that comprise spring and summer here in the northern hemisphere, the sun stays north of the equator. It’s warmer because the sun’s rays are hitting us more directly. For the next six months, the sun will be south of the equator (below it) and the sun’s rays will be hitting us at more of an angle. So it will be cooler. So the precise instant of the end of summer is the instant the sun passes from north of the equator to south of it.

I never knew that. I’m glad I know it now.

Anyway – on to the few decent pictures I’ve taken this week. I think green herons are around a lot but they just hide. Or lay low. But for some reason they’ve been appearing more recently. Maybe some are migrating through or maybe some young are reaching adulthood, I’m just not certain. But they’re around a lot more right now. I saw this guy squawking on Thursday morning. I took this picture around 11:00 AM:

I took several pictures but he was only “talking” in this one and I enjoyed it.

That was relatively high up (near the parking lot) in Pony Pasture. We were just getting started. Clouds were beginning to pile up in the east an hour later when we were in the field (a.k.a. “pasture”):

Late summer clouds puffing up

Even closer to the parking lot there are hibiscus (some sort of Rose of Sharon) blooming. This one is pointing at the morning sun:

It looks pretty against that dark background

Magnolia flowers are long, long gone. There is a magnolia tree next to my driveway at home. I open my car door right in to it when I get out. It just began to show seeds this week and it’s very eye catching:

This would make an eye-catching centerpiece on a dinner table

Evelyn and Mackey and Turner and I made it to the river again this morning; it was very, very beautiful. Far downstream – almost to the golf course – there is a little cut out in the river bank. When the water is low like it is right now (it’s only about 3’ 6” at the Westham Gauge, at the Huguenot Bridge) a big Marsh Mallow plant spreads out on the river bank there. Marsh Mallow blooms very late. I took this picture this morning:

Marsh Mallow – see that bee coming in from the right? So much fun.

Notice the bee? Bumblebee? They do not make honey. I’d like to see more honeybees around.

We saw one other pretty flower just as we were leaving the park, this jewelweed was growing on the creek bank:

I love seeing all this stuff, but sometimes I’m even MORE amazed when I see the picture.

Also – out of order, I apologize – we came across an unusual (to me) caterpillar on the edge of the pasture. I finally decided to branch out a little bit (“branch out” is a great verb phrase to use when you’re identifying insects) and learn what this is. I submitted (recently) an “ID request” to BugGuide.Net. So perhaps next time I post I’ll be able to enlighten you about this. It’s a nice looking caterpillar:

Fall Webworm – Hyphantria cunea

I’m backtracking all over the place. As a reader I loathe disorganized writing. And here I am being a disorganized writer. But when I began this post, I had no idea what that caterpillar was. So I posted the image on BugGuide.net and went back to work. Thinking I’d post the answer next week. Then I work away, fiddling with images and writing sentences and some paragraphs and took a quick break. And glanced at BugGuide. And someone had ID’d that caterpillar. I’m going to cut-and-paste their answer: “Makes us think Fall Webworm – Hyphantria cunea“. And their name was with it. A couple from I don’t know where. How cool is that? I saw it this afternoon, took a picture, put it on the web and there it is. The two people are “contributing editors” to BugGuide.net and this is their little bio: “City, state, country: Skokie, Cook Co., Il

Biography: Jane is hospital pharmacist, retired. John is high school math and physics teacher, retired. Both are amateur botanist/naturalist(known locally in Chicago Wilderness as citizen scientists), active volunteers in natural area restoration primarily along the North Branch of the Chicago River. Volunteer Master Stewards for the Forest Preserve District of Cook County through the North Branch Restoration Project. Teach classes locally in native wildflowers and trees and dragonflies.”

Very, very fun. Anyway. I digress, yet again.

PS Before I go – Ev and I went out for dinner tonight and we walked there – Pesce and Vino, practically across the street. It was neither forgettable nor unforgettable; I’d recommend it if you want to try someplace new. It was Sunday night and it was calm and low key. The service was superb and the broccoli was the best I have ever had – ever. Anyway, the point of this digression was the clouds were so stunning on the way home, I ran in the house and grabbed my camera and came back out for a few shots. I don’t really know how to photograph clouds. And any photograph that has wires in it like this is strictly sub-amateur quality. But the clouds were gorgeous. See you next week,

Jay

I am loving these clouds. I am painfully embarrassed by the wires but oh well. Those clouds are worth it.

Posted in Birds, Flowers, Fun, Rivers, Smiles (including "dog smiles"!) | Tagged clouds, Endurance, Flowers, Fun, james river, nature, outdoors, Pony Pasture, Rivers | 4 Comments

Working backwards

Posted on September 15, 2014 by Jay McLaughlin

14 September, 2014 Working backwards

Normally I start posts early or mid-week and build it up as the week goes on. This week had a few things pop up and I never got started. Now I’m looking at the week’s pictures – and working backwards. And of course – when in doubt – when working backwards – post dog pictures. Because now I see I only took a few pictures this week.

Mackey and Turner had their annual visit with our excellent vet Dr. Chris Scotti at their superb practice, Springfield Veterinary Center. If you’re in Ashland of course visit Dr. Campbell at Ashland Veterinary Hospital. But here in Richmond I recommend Dr. Scotti and Dr. Escobar and Dr. Kolster at Springfield.

Mackey and Turner’s personalities could not be any more different. Turner is into everything, all the time. Mackey is, as Pat once memorably described him, “not impulsive.” But when the aide took Turner back to get weighed, Mackey kept his eyes glued on the door until Turner came back through it.

Mackey awaiting Turner’s safe return

They brought Turner back to the exam room and took Mackey back to get weighed. Turner’s turn to fixate on the door:

Turner anxiously awaiting Mackey's return:

Turner awaiting Mackey’s safe return:

I don’t put up a lot of movies but this is a cute five second clip of Turner waiting for his buddy:

I took a picture of a Double-crested Cormorant (Phalacrocorax auritus) earlier this week as well. I’m learning something as I take more pictures: some subjects are difficult to photograph well. Or difficult to photograph in such a way that they’re visually appealing. I was bored with cormorants at first. But – this happens a lot – the more I read about them, the more interesting they become. And the more certain I am I’ll at some point take a picture I find pleasing. Cormorants are ungraceful looking birds to all except I imagine their mothers, but I’m convinced there’s an attractive cormorant picture to be had. This isn’t it, but it’s getting closer to the one I want:

Double-crested Cormorant.

Cormorants are described as “prehistoric looking” but I haven’t learned (yet) just how old they are. When I learn more I will post it here. With that excellent picture I’m going to take. Keep your eyes peeled.

Longnose Gar (Lepisosteus osseus) are not just described as prehistoric “looking” – they are prehistoric. The link above (should you choose to click on it) is to the Virginia Department of Game and Inland Fisheries (VDGIF) Wildlife Information page. This is the first two sentences, copied directly from that page: “Living relic of prehistoric past; family dates back 245 million years. Nothing in Virginia is even remotely similar to the gar.” I like the faint shaking-my-head tone of the second sentence.

I’ve gotten a picture of a gar at Pony Pasture a time or two in the past. They’re always up at this late-summer time, lolling around in the warm shallows waiting for something to come in. Water photographs are difficult but this isn’t bad. The thing about gar is, all the ones I see are big. This guy was about a foot and a half long. Great looking fish. They sort of look like the aquatic cousin of a cormorant:

Longnose gar

I’ll leave off here and put this post up – I’m already a day late. More next week!

All best,

Jay

PS I’m just beginning on Instagram and remain clueless. But you can follow me at NEWFAZE1 if you like. Some of these pictures (not all) will turn up there before they turn up here.

Also, I changed my mind about leaving off. A couple more quick pictures. Summer is going away fast. But look at the colors of these flowers (and this wasp) that I’ve photographed w/in the past seven days:

I’ll cease to be amazed. But not soon.

So bright! And it’s SEPTEMBER!!

Feel free to tell me the name! But what a beauty!

Posted in Birds, Dogs, Flowers, Fun, Rivers | Tagged Dogs, Flowers, Fun, Smiles - human AND dog smiles! | 7 Comments

Transition

Posted on September 7, 2014 by Jay McLaughlin

7 September, 2014 Transition

This little mid-August to mid-September gap has always been a slow one for me, except for my birthday on the 23rd. This is the first time since 2002 that I haven’t been training for an Ironman and it’s a bit directionless. Ironman training is very, very structured and highly goal oriented and focused. Every day you know what you have to do and every day you have to do a lot. Now I’m reorienting myself. When I titled this blog post “Transition” I was thinking of the transition between summer and fall. As I sit down to write I’m also feeling the transition of going from the demands of training to different demands. It’s fun and intellect-stretching but takes a little getting used to. It feels good to grow.

The pictures didn’t come in thick and fast this week but I took a handful I enjoyed. I hope you will too. And fortunately Evelyn contributed a couple of beauties. On Monday I unexpectedly found myself with the entire day off. Pat and I rode our bicycles to Owens Creek Corner Store in Louisa, a 45 mile loop. Long rides are my favorite thing about Ironman training and they’re what I miss most. So it was good to start September with a few hours on the bike. Did you know – this is true, you can ask any serious long-distance athlete – that chocolate milk is without parallel as a recovery drink? It’s true. This is all the reward I need for three hours on the bike:

I'll ride any distance to find an ice cold chocolate milk at the end.

I’ll ride any distance to find ice cold chocolate milk at the end.

We made it to the river moderately early the next morning; late summer/early fall is always nice:

Ev says they all look the same. Maybe. I never tire.

Ev had been with friends at the beach for the weekend and didn’t come back until Tuesday morning herself. She took these two pictures just before she headed back here. My personal jury is still out on whether the beach or the river is more beautiful. Look for yourself:

That color and texture I’ll admit are hard to beat

I think the thing with beautiful scenes is, they come in an infinite # of flavors. This is another. Thanks Ev!

That lava colored sky is hard to compete with. Living in Virginia is hard to compete with. One more contestant from here in Richmond, same spectacular morning:

There’s enough beauty to go around. As it turns out.

Once Ev mentioned that those pictures all look the same and they do, in their way, and that’s part of the beauty. Another part of the beauty is that it doesn’t always look that way – that’s just when I get the most pictures. That is a west-facing shot and if I went down there in the evening you’d see a sunset. I just like mornings better. I’ve also been there a number of times when if I stood in the spot where I took that picture, the water would be three feet deep over my head.

I did manage to get Mackey and Turner to stop for a moment one morning:

Mackey and Turner changing up the river view a bit.

I saw a Green Heron mid-river on Thursday just before noon. They’re normally shy birds and in my experience stay in the shadows. But this guy was right out on the rocks. I refer to him as a guy but gender wise they’re difficult to distinguish. Like Canada geese. I took two reasonable pictures but I was not close:

I just like the privilege of even seeing these birds.

This bird is worth two pictures; it’s a treat

I don’t like to reuse pictures on my blog but I put this one up last May (2013) and it’s one of my favorite pictures ever. It’s not crisp but it’s a gorgeous picture. I love how primitive and wild it looks – and it was taken in 2013 inside Richmond city limits. We’re so fortunate to live here. This looks like the Amazon or as if it’s from the Paleolithic era:

It’s hard not to like this picture. For me anyway. Look at that gaze and those feet and that background.

I’ll close with a picture of a zinnia that Ev planted beside our driveway. I took this picture Friday morning but it looks just as beautiful today. Orange was my dad’s favorite color and I think of him whenever I look at this:

Simply wonderful

More next week. I’ve had the great good fortune to begin work on a grant that’s taking up some of my free time now that I’m not training. Helping me find some much-needed balance. I hope you’re finding balance too!

Have a great week,

Jay

Posted in Birds, Dogs, Endurance, Flowers, Fun, Rivers, Smiles (including "dog smiles"!) | Tagged Dogs, Endurance, Flowers, Fun, james river, nature, outdoors, Pony Pasture, Rivers, smile, Smiles - human AND dog smiles! | 2 Comments

NEWFAZE

Good evening!

More fun!

We had so much FUN!

There’s an echo in here!

I cheated!

Music on

Cleaning windows

Fifty-one weeks

Working backwards

Transition

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