People of the Internet, Meet Norah!

This morning's walk brought an unusual encounter. I was feet away from turning off the road and heading up the driveway when, even over the music from my ipod that I play well louder than the surgeon general recommends, I heard what sounded like a screeching bird. I pulled the buds out of my ears and followed the sound. I knew right off that it was coming from the ground and was sounding less and less like a bird.

There, in the ditch on the side of the road was a little kitten running toward me caterwauling at the top of its lungs. If you have been reading the blog for awhile you might have gathered that we don't really live very near anyone or anything. I got the sense that the little cat had been dumped. At the very least she (as we came to find out) had been fending for herself for a goodly portion of time. She has some nearly healed wounds, one on her lip and one on her toe. She was more burr than fur and we still haven't picked them all out yet. As of this writing she has proven herself to be fearless, almost to a fault, smart, hungry and loving. I hope when we take her to the vet everything checks out OK. Her belly is very distended (could be from near starvation), her ears are a bit scabby and I know she is full of bugs.

So, for those of you keeping track at home, Norah, as we have come to call her, makes us a five cat household.

Norah having a drink after we fed her. Russell is not OK with this. Neither is Una or Lily. I would say they are furious. I had a wee bit of hope that Norah might bring out some nurturing instinct is someone here but, no.

Norah crashed out after spending much of the day out in the Sister House with Tom and Matt. In fact, wherever Tom and loud noises were to be found, so could Norah be found. I checked to see if she could hear because I thought it was strange that she didn't flinch when the air gun was in use. She can hear. She just doesn't care.

I have a bit of video of her first few minutes in the house. The second half of the video is really too dark to see anything but that isn't really the point. I was trying to capture the sounds she was making while she ate. Such sad, mewing, grunting noises. Make sure you watch it with the sound on.

My Morning Walk

Theme song for this walk: An End Has A Start by Editors

My Morning Walk

I am getting caught up on my morning walk posts. Seems like some of you enjoy them. Thank you for your kind comment Kate!

If you are a participant in Christmas your tree might come from my neighborhood. There are tree farms all over the place up here.

There is a reason rabbits are easy pickins for cars, birds of prey and coyotes. This business of going tharn is quite a craptastic defense mechanism.

Theme song for this walk: Burn the Honeysuckle by The Gourds

My Morning Walk and Notes on Friendship

Because I am a packrat I didn't just leave this metal loopy thingy on the side of the road after I snapped that pic. I put it in my pocket and took it home. I am sure it will come in handy someday.

Theme song for this walk: the Soundtrack from Once

Once is a movie about finding a friend who is just the right fit - really it's more complicated than that but, boiled down, that is the gist. I am going to ramble on a bit but just sit tight with me here and I will try to wrap it up into some sort of point. I went to see the Sex and the City movie a few months ago. Spare me the rolled eyes. I understand that it is pure fantasy written by men who don't have any grasp on the real lives of women. That said, I left the movie (alone because I have no girlfriends here and Matt and Drew refused) feeling sad that I don't have any lifelong girlfriends who live nearby. A feebly nomadic lifestyle will do that to a person. We have lifelong friends but they are scattered: Marble and James in Utah (well James soon to be in China), Audrey in NYC, Ward in San Fran, Patrick in San Fran, Sean & Xochitl in Los Angeles, Jenny in the OC, Sarah in Memphis, etc.

I watched Once for the first time back in April when Matt was on one of his never ending business trips. Once is a melancholy little film but it hit a sweet spot in my soul. It made me feel sad, lonely and hopeful, threw into relief the difference between alone and lonely. I felt lonely.

Fast forward a month into May. Matt is gone again. This time to Utah. I take to hanging out in the local bar like a teetotaling floozy. I strike up a friendship with the bartender. I am such a cliche'. I have mentioned Drew in previous posts but I think he deserves his own paragraph. We watch American Idol and talk politics and religion. When I say "you know, I think Barack Obama is a secret xxxxxxx" Drew not only gets what I am saying, he finishes the sentence in unison. Matt returned from the Beehive State and now Matt and Drew geek out to their hearts content discussing obscure movies, rare DVD releases and beer. They throw me a bag of candy to keep me from zoning out in boredom. We go to movies together, watch bad TV together, laugh at offensive jokes together, love/hate the weirdness of small town life together and my lonely frown has now turned upside down. One more friend in our collected family - and this one lives nearby.

Now, Drew, no more grousing about Steph getting her pic posted on the blog before you. Here is a pic plus a thousand words, and lovey, mushy words at that.

My Morning Walk

The theme song for this walk: Lotion by Greens Keepers

My Morning Walk

I have posted these birds before but I couldn't resist another picture with the bright blue sky as background.

Theme song for this walk: The entire Mamma Mia! Sountrack. (The movie version, not the Broadway or pure ABBA versions - which I am sure are both fine - just not what I happened to be listening to.) Comment on the movie: It is an embarrassingly goofy exterior surrounding a candy and chocolate covered heart of gold. I unexpectedly enjoyed it.

My Morning Walk

It wasn't a walk this morning. It was a bike ride. Last summer and fall I rode my bike almost every day but I haven't really gotten back into the rhythm of doing that again this season. That is partly the fault of my experiencing hay fever for the first time this year. It is hard to want to go for a bike ride as a mouth breather with itchy eyes and brain obliterating sneezes. I was inspired to get back on the bike (mouth breathing and all) by the STP bike tour that passed through town yesterday and today. It is a 2 day bike ride from Seattle to Portland with 9500 registered riders. About 7000 of the riders do it in 2 days and the remaining riders power through in one.

Winlock is the halfway point so there is a waystation here and bikers often overnight here and in the surrounding towns. The ride affects one main highway on my mail route. Thankfully I am on that road in the southbound direction on the first half of the route so I wasn't too affected by the bikers. At that point in the day there was a smattering of the power riders in ones, twos and groups. I had to jockey in and out between them to get to the boxes. On the northbound portion of the route I was thanking my lucky stars that I didn't have to deliver in the flood of bikers pouring south. It was crazy busy.

But back to my bike ride this morning, I saw some tiny, tiny ponies that were so cute and precious they could have easily been mistaken for My Little Ponies if they had pink manes.

Also, as I crested a hill on the road behind our house I saw a doe and her new fawn standing on the double yellow lines. I guess the clicking of my bike was more quiet than I thought because they didn't hear me. I was getting pretty close and I didn't want to scare the crap out of them so I hollered out "Hello". The mother turned to look at me and then bolted toward the bushes on the roadside. Unfortunately the fawn hadn't yet learned that particular survival tactic and bolted straight on down the road. I swear its legs were no thicker than spider webs and it wobbled and jumped as it fled. The mother, realizing that her fawn was not following her but following its own mad escape route turned and hopped down the road after it. No pics. Biking and photography don't mix for me. I don't have the stamina to get back on the bike once I have stopped to examine something.

My Morning Walk - Beach Version

Tom, Kathy, Andy and Andy's friend Megan spent the 4th of July holiday at the beach. I had a strange work schedule on the route over July 4th so we went down on the evening of the 5th and came back home on the 6th. Here are some pics of our brief sojourn.

A citizen concerned about the welfare of sea birds covered an entire section of the boardwalk railing with pieces of bagels, various flavors. The birds didn't seem to care. Perhaps they were full up on people food, this being the end of a busy holiday weekend. Notice the whale skeleton in the distance.

Seriously, this burn patch has to be the best cautionary illustration ever. I honestly wonder if the local fire department didn't burn it on purpose right by the fire danger sign as a dire warning.

Kathy thinks I hate the flag because I am so glum about the current state of the union. I don't hate it. I am just crushingly disappointed in things right now. Doesn't mean I am without hope or that I am the walking embodiment of anti-patriotism. I just want better from my elected officials on the federal level. And also the flag got abused after 9/11, don't you think? Everyone had flags poking up from their car windows. I saw so many sun bleached and tattered flags for months after that that I wondered why, if people felt so strongly, did they let the symbol of our freedom fly so shabbily. I would truly prefer an angry patriot burning a flag in protest over a lax, lipservicey sheep with a shredded flag flying from his/her car window with a new Jack-in-the-Box head on the antenna. And the car flags came from China. And flag stickers on cars request God to Bless America and tell me that "These Colors Don't Run". It all seems so diluted and commercial now. A real flag, in good repair, taken in or lit at night, folded properly when not in use. Doesn't seem to be asking too much. Am I wrong?

My Morning Walk - Other Stuff

Welcome to Evergreen Meadows. It looks like a subdivision is going in down the street. I don't know how many houses are planned. Here is a question: If they cut down all the evergreens to put in houses should they still call the area "Evergreen Meadows"? I say "Evergreen In Memoriam" would be a better name for the subdivision.See fig. 1 & fig. 2 below.

fig. 1 My first thought was that they cleared out a lovely little nook for a few houses.

fig. 2 But then I looked closer and realized that more clearing was going on beyond what initially looked like the tree line.

Tom and Kathy told us that many immigrants from Finland settled in this area. For that reason, if you are shopping for an existing house, you are likely to find one already tricked out with a sauna.

The long gone "Lewis & Clark: Muzzle Loaders, Black Powder Gun Range". Smell ya later.

I have been meaning to snap a pic of these birds for a few months now. They are sitting atop someone's driveway entrance. I LOVE them. Semi-related:
We saw a buzzard flying around our property 2 days in a row. I wonder what is dead? Please don't tell me it is our house building dreams. And also, I inadvertently saved a chipmonk the other day on the mail route. I turned left onto Awmiller and saw an animal of some sort on the right side of the road. As I got closer I could tell it was a hawk (I assume redtail although it was much more vibrant in color than other redtails I have seen). Anyway, it didn't move until finally I was only yards away. It lifted up off the roadside and hovered a bit. I looked at the road and there was a chipmonk (also pretty vibrant so maybe I licked a stamp w/ LSD on it) looking like it just won the lottery. It waved at me (OK, not really but it's fun to think so) and ran into the bushes.

I know I have posted pics of these guys before but I am not tired of them yet. And neither is my mom so here they are again. The other day I passed another Brahma bull on my route. It was a rainy day and the bull was sitting out in the middle of a field with a large plaid blanket covering every thing but his head and shoulders. His head and shoulders, by the way, were resting flat on the ground and he looked like the definition of miserable.

The theme song for this morning walk was: Valerie Loves Me by Material Issue

My Morning Walk - Plantlife