One flew over the hornet's nest

Cosmos No sign of the hummingbirds since I returned. Did they fly south already?

Hornet's nest hidden behind our basketball backboard a few years ago. Dontae and his brother pissed them off by playing basketball. We have also gotten rid of the wild grapes that were attacking our house

Recently on the news they featured a horrific story about Giant Chinese Hornets. These things have always existed but this year, they have a bumper crop of the thumb sized hornets who live in enormous nests five times of the basketball nest we had above. So far, 42 people have died. No they didn't die of anaphylactic shock but from the enormous amount of toxins these creatures inject. As little as five stings can kill a human. A few more can kill cattle. Survivors have bullet sized holes on their bodies as the venom is flesh dissolving.

Everyone there is hoping for a killing frost soon. In the meantime, well protected crews are burning the known nests with blow torches.

I am not a fan of stinging creatures. Each year features different ones. Although we don't have hornets, paper wasps and the worst, yellow jackets this year, we have a sizeable nest of small, mean wasps in my rock garden, the very same variety that I had stupidly locked our bikes to a pole containing a nest of them a few months ago. These nasty things love sugar and have been harassing my hummingbirds. On one of my feeders, I have wasp guards but they are smaller than the yellow jackets the guards were built for and can get through the holes. I have found out the hard way that there is little correlation between the size of the creature and how awful the venom is. A few years ago, I was stung by an enormous carpenter bee, which probably weighs just as much as a Chinese hornet. However, it didn't hurt nearly as much as a yellow jacket. Fortunately carpenter bees work alone. Thousands of individuals don't form a stinging swarm after you.

On the day Julie was in labor, one of the small evil wasps stung me. I immediately put on a paste of baking soda meant to denature the venom but the stuff was injected well below the surface. By the time I got to the hospital (to see the baby)my wrist felt like it was broken. A small pit formed on my arm where the toxin dissolved my flesh. A very small pit especially compared to the poor Chinese victims.

One of my favorite hornet stories was in Norman Mailer's The Naked and the Dead about his WW2 service in the Pacific. His company was a recon mission to check out the Japanese that had probably infiltrated behind their lines. However his men stumbled upon a hornet's nest (not clear if they were the massive Chinese variety) which scattered the men screaming in all directions. Not good if stealth is your prime objective. The commander radioed to ask what was going on.
We ran into a hornet's nest sir.
Literally or figuratively?

Naomi is especially phobic about stinging creatures. Somehow wasps have been getting into her condo and usually end up on her window trying to escape. On one of the days she called me 4 times insisting that we drive from wherever we were to kill these things IMMEDIATELY!!! I told her just to swat it with a magazine. What happens if I miss? It will come after me looking for revenge? Will Windex kill it? Only if you get close enough to drown it, you are better off swatting it. Steve did make a special trip there last week for wasp killing.

Home again

A scan of the houses surrounding the park near Shanna's. Lot sizes are small, porches are big to encourage interaction between neighbors. Houses can't be the same color as the one next to them. Garages are mainly accessed through alleys though Shanna has one of the few front facing ones

chalk artists

Tessa at home taking a nap. I took the kids to the park to burn off some of their energy.

We are home again from our 5 day stay on Shanna's. They had a good time on their honeymoon.

This is Day 7 of Indian Summer. Temps reach almost 80 during the day but then drop down at night. The park pictured above was covered with frost on Friday morning.

We had gotten into a routine: get the boys up a bit past 7, make lunch for Oliver, select clothes for them. I thought they would be capable of dressing themselves but they are easily distracted and usually I'd end up doing it. Make breakfast, walk Oliver to the bus stop to await the bus, go home and drive Daniel for his 3 hour long preschool session. Tess would get up sometime while I was dealing with the boys but she was Steve's responsibility. While Daniel was in school, I took an hour or so to run through the cornfields. Only once did I see a deer. No other wildlife.

The witching hour (or more) would begin when the boys were reunited. I tried to keep them active riding bikes but sooner or later they would clash. Also on my agenda was to convince them to pick up after themselves. They will dump a box of toys out, play with them a bit, then on to the next box to dump. Soon we are knee deep in toys. Yesterday I turned off the TV and said none of that until the floor is completely toy free. Tessa and Oliver agreed to clean up but Daniel said that he didn't want to. Well I don't want to clean up after you. Well I am too tired to pick things up.Well then you can't be with us. You have to lie down in another room.

He cried piteously in the other room for 10 minutes before he was allowed back in. At one point I threatened to call the mamma to say that she could stay another week in Vegas (as if).

Shanna did call while I was in the midst of changing a diaper that had exploded everywhere. All 3 kids were crying (boys were fighting over some toy). I had the kids to myself. Are we having fun yet? Finally I did pick up after 3 tries on her part. Everyone was calmed down by then.

Their neighborhood is still being built. While I was there, construction would begin noisily at 7. Next door siding was being put on involving a buzz saw and a staple gun. A few doors down had an especially noisy, obnoxious crew who listened to heavy metal music all day pumped up to full volume swearing at each other loudly, oblivious to all the small children near them. Do they have kids? Do they talk that way in front of them?

Yesterday I took Oliver to soccer through the dense fog. Kindergarten soccer consists of 4 kids from each team running after the ball. There are no goalies or no rules such as offsides. The other team scored in the first few seconds when his team had a goalkick (usually an advantage over a corner kick) but the little boy could only kick a few feet in front of himself and the other team was lined up (all offsides but they don't call it) ready to attack. During  Naomi's first year of play, the goalie (they had goalies) could run to the corner of the box and throw it. At that age, a kid can usually throw farther than they can kick. A player is in the game only half of the time. A ball needed to be cleared from his team's end. Oliver ran onto the field to clear it. Too bad he was on the bench at that moment.

We did enjoy the kids but we do have a greater appreciation for what Shanna does every day by herself.

Venus or Spacelab. 

The Spacelab is making its rounds. The sky was clear and we have a full view of the southern sky (back here, objects better be high in the sky for us to see them due to all the mature trees). According to the website, Spacelab was supposed to be over the cornfields Thursday and Friday night. Steve insisted that the bright object there was Venus. Who knows? I didn't see it move so maybe he is right.

Happy Valley

Not happy for UM fans. How could they lose? Michigan was well ahead with only minutes to go when we drove home last night. I check the web upon my return...OT. And it just got worse.

Back to bicycling

I did nada yesterday besides a walk with the kids. But on a beautiful sunny day this morning back to bicycling. I almost became a speed bump when some silly woman on a dirt sideroad came barrelling right in front of me. I wear bright clothes but she didn't even look. Lots of bicyclists (and bikers too) out. Way more than usual. I see new markings on the road. TDL. I spent a few miles pondering what that could stand for until I found their rest stop (the place I buy my cheddar cauliflower) Tour de Livingston. Livingston is the county 8 miles northwest of us. But it seems like they were touring in our county instead.

Later a visit from Maya (or rather a changing of the parents that takes place at our house every Friday and Sunday) and then a brief visit to see Allie (and her parents).

Dreamscapes

You'd think that here in the absolute quiet of The Flatlands (the name of her community has the word Hill in it..ha!)I would sleep well. No such luck. Instead I wake from numerous dreams. I must not be too imaginative as I keep having variations of the same dream over and over. I am back in college to earn my degree for real this time (for the record, I do have a degree). What is apparently keeping me from finishing is that I can't remember my schedule. In the last dream, I write it down numerous times in a notebook. But I have trouble getting to my first class as I don't know the train's schedule (no such train in real life) I decide to run through the snow to class running between blackened snow drifts. I make it in time but don't know where to go next? Where is that notebook?

Always frantic in my dreams and full of anxiety. Rarely do I dream about my current life or even in my life past college. Why haven't I had a date in years? I wake up wondering this. Oh I am married.

I did have a dream about an old friend. I have dreamed about him before. He is dead in real life from a brain tumor but in my dream, I am upset because he defriended me on Facebook. Even if he were alive, he would have nothing to do with Facebook. He would find it an inane time waster. I did like him a lot but I didn't have a crush on him. Still I dream about him.

When I first was diagnosed with cancer, I asked  Why me? What did I do to deserve this? Is this Karma of sorts? He was a partial answer. I didn't visit him as often as I should have while he was dying. I did go to his funeral while I was in treatment.

Day 4 of grandchildren.  Oliver is having the most problems missing his mom. On Wednesday, he fell off his bike scraping his knee. He insisted he could not walk or put on his soccer stuff for practice later. When I mentioned we would go to McDonald's first if he could walk, then he did. I thought the practice was at  6:30. There were a couple of kids there earlier and Steve said he read it was 6, can't I get anything right. I was right but Oliver had an extra 20 minutes of practice. He was running just fine. Daniel and Tess played on the playground as the sun set. The bats were fluttering above. Fortunately we have been having Indian summer. No trouble getting them to sleep that night.

Oliver refused to speak to his mom and do much of anything the next day. Giving the three baths energized them and they didn't want to go to sleep. Even the usual angelic Tess didn't want to cooperate. We kept her in our room for a while. I noticed the light on in the boys' room and asked Steve to shut it off. He came back after a while saying that Daniel was missing. Not downstairs, not anywhere. Back in the room, I noticed a heap of bedding next to the sleeping Oliver. Yep there was Daniel.  Oliver does like to hide from me but not Daniel. This morning Oliver had an especially difficult time getting ready. And then he accidentally stepped on an older kid's craft set at the bus stop. She called him a stupid kindergartener and he burst into tears. He spent the rest of the time huddled under my coat until the bus came.

Sue in Exile

Here I am driving a minivan with 3 child seats.  One of my charges forgot to take his underwear down this morning before using the bathroom. Another insisted on no syrup on his waffle after we already put it on. Then when we made a new syrupless waffle, he asked why wasn't it cut up and where is the syrup?

A rare break in the action. Oliver is in school; Tessa is taking a nap; Steve returned home for supplies and to water the flowers and Daniel is next to me playing on the beloved iPad, one advantage Gramma has over the missing mom.

I had three kids too but they weren't so close in age. Shanna was almost 12 when I had Naomi. I guess my chaos was more spread out.

This morning Oliver was difficult to wake up. I let him sleep as long as possible but we have to leave for the bus a bit passed 8. Once I returned from the bus stop (kindergarteners need an adult at the stops), time to get Daniel ready and off to his school 5 miles away.We are then left with one child, the easiest one. I go for a run, easy in the flatlands here. Even though east of here is fairly developed, directly west is all farms and dirt roads. My route looks like the opening scene for The Middle; straight as an arrow road going in between fields of corn. Thankfully very little traffic.  Corn fields even abut Shanna's back yard but I suspect, not for long.

Yesterday I did most of this on my own as Steve was dealing with Naomi stuff. Fortunately the weather was nice. After an hour in the park, Tess and I sat on the porch watching the boys bike back and forth. I try to keep them as active as possible because I want them to sleep. Tonight Oliver has soccer which should help him sleep. For homework, he has to read to me. He is a quick learner. He makes good guesses for unfamiliar words and remembers them when he sees them again.

Back when I was in kindergarten, there were only 3 goals to attain: learn the alphabet; count to 20; and tie ones shoes. Although Oliver has trouble with the last skill, he attained the others by 3. When I coached soccer for 7 year old boys, the number of kids able to effectively tie their shoes was about zero. Of course, soccer cleats might have been their first non-Velcro shoe. His school is big on ability grouping both for reading and math. I am guessing he will be in the top groups for both. When I was in ed school, they were very  much against that but I disagree. Even though we had grouping when I was a kid, I remember being impatient listening to kids struggle over words. I'd finish the sentence for them.

Using an unfamiliar computer is always an adventure. For reasons I don't understand, the screen will suddenly switch to an advertisement that is hell to get out of. Can Windows 8 suck any more? Hopefully by the time we need a new computer, they will revert back to 7. I'd use my iPad but can't get the wifi to work.



 

Eight Days

Tess met her cousin this morning

DIY project gone awry. Will embroider some flowers on it to make it more special. It will fit maybe for another 2 weeks

Extreme closeup of those baby blues

Josh returned to work today. Julie is still recovering from the birth so I had the hard job of holding Ms. Allie while Julie took a nap. So far a pretty good baby but she does confuse nights and days. But during the day, she is fun.

Tomorrow Shanna goes on her honeymoon and we move in with her three.

Cranes and frogs

Sandhill cranes

Despite the steady drizzle, out I went on my 22 mile bike ride. I stopped to photograph a flock
 of turkeys right next to the road. Alas they scattered as soon as got the iphone out. So many
 frogs,mainly roadkill, were on the road! Again I saw my 8 sandhill cranes grazing in a plowed
 over corn field but this time I set Steve with his zoom lens to photograph them.

Ah new parenthood. Josh was giving me advice on how to hold a baby yesterday. I said he 
must regard it as a miracle that he and his sisters made it to age one.

Well maybe you forgot. (he didn't think Allie was getting the proper head support, she was
 and she was content)

I just had those four recent refresher courses.

We watched UM retain the little brown jug. At one point, the camera showed some of the
 tailgaters outside of the stadium. There was Josh's ex-wife catching a football on national TV.
 Some photos of Allie yesterday. Note the blanket

Art in the Night

The fire breathing dragon looked especially cool at night with its body covered with zillions of little lights

The glass orchids were in the Top Ten. Alas it didn't win. I got a living version of this for Baby Allie

Orchids from above

Bizarre street scene

Also top ten Made from suspended pieces of bamboo

This quilt is entirely one piece of carved wood. Also Top Ten (didn't win)

Dessicated eggplant slices

Small part of an enormous painting

peanut shell art

At night We had perfect weather despite an earlier forecast of thunder storms

These are preserved leaves Very pretty at night

A friend of mine had not gone to ArtPrize before. When another friend bailed out at the last minute, I happily agreed to take her place. Plus I hadn't been there at night. I was afraid it would be very crowded but the thunderstorm forecast kept some away (never did rain while we were there, perfect weather) and we got an ideal parking spot.

Part of the experience is the Pub Crawl where various bars have speciality drinks on sale. We had the Amway Grand hotel's featured concoction, a Long Beach tea. One more of those and we'd be truly crawling.

It is impossible to see everything unless you went there every day for a week. I tried to show my friend some of the highlights while going to some nearby venues I'd missed. I thought more would be lit up at night but still the stuff that was made the night look magic. Lots of music in the air, an excellent dinner in the BOB (Big Old Building full of art and trendy restaurants) good vibes all around.

On the long way home, the sky was lit with distant lightning most of the way. And it had poured back here.