OF MICE AND TORNADOES

Friday Night
It's after 3:00 a.m. and I'm snuggled in bed with my laptop (no sexual implications intended). I feel rotten and can't sleep, so I'm  watching a documentary about World War I. 

Just when I'm somewhere  in the midst of Gallipoli, my cat Bosco comes running in the room, making spooky squeals, and jumps on the bed. He has a big mouse in his mouth!

"Holy crap, don't bring it here!" I yell, while leaping out of bed.

Bosco leaps down with me - still clutching the rodent - and takes off for regions unknown.
I don't know what the hell happened to the mouse. 

A few years ago one of my cats left a dead mouse in bed on my pillow!

That's nothing. I have a friend whose cat left a dead bird in her bed.

There's no purpose or satisfactory resolution to this story, but I figured I'd tell it anyway. 

Change of subject

The first day of spring was nearly 75 degrees (that's Fahrenheit, for those of you in Wuhan).

I naively thought that the frigid winter weather would kill all those pesky Asian beetles that plagued us last autumn. To my consternation (and disgust), the sudden warm weather revived the beetles and they were everywhere again. 

Today (Saturday) the temperature has plummeted and it's 38 degrees. The Asian beetles.....and spring....have vanished.

An Aside:
Is it racist to call them Asian beetles? After all, I wouldn't want to offend anyone.


Yesterday (Friday) was bleak and dreary - like a monochromatic painting - with bouts of torrential rain....and several foul weather warnings.

Flash flood warning. Severe storm warning.

The tornado warning  came while I was eating an early dinner. I checked the radar on the computer and was relieved to see that the tornado was several miles south of my location and heading east.
I wouldn't be in danger unless it decided to suddenly reverse its course.

In a moment of courageous abandon, I grabbed my El Cheapo camera and  wandered outside for a brief walk. Everything was colorless and cheerless but at least no tornado was in sight.
A downpour eventually encouraged me to head back to the house, but not before I took a few extremely unimpressive photos.

 Two views of the front "yard"

(above and below)

.....and the cow meadow at the end of my property

(I know that will impress you)

I have to make the dreaded trip to town next week and I'm more than slightly apprehensive.

Let's put it this way:
During the very best conditions, shopping at Walmart scares the royal crap out of me. Most of the people who haunt the store look like they're carriers of deadly diseases - - and a few of them look like they died several weeks ago.

Hell, I don't need a surgical mask. I need a Medieval suit of armor.

STRANGE DAYS

The days linger like the far side of a  half-remembered dream.

Thanks to the recent rude change of the clocks, daylight is minimal - rushing impatiently to a premature dusk.
The forest trees - even with rapidly dwindling leaves - manage to eclipse most of the sunlight. 

The autumn chill has vanished, replaced with a near-tropical warmth and an insolent wind that reminds me of my suffocating days in West Texas.

A feeble, delicate amber light haunts the apathetic afternoons, accompanied by sporadic showers of dead or dying leaves. The strange rotation of earth on its axis yields a surrealistic pallor on this rustic autumnal environment.

Jon, you're damn good even when you don't try
(sorry - I couldn't resist....)

And then the beetles descended from seemingly nowhere. It happens every year at around this time. They resemble lady bugs but they're brown and extremely aggressive. Thousands and thousands of them.

The air is thick with them and they cover the ground. They climb the porch rails and congregate on the eaves. They crowd on window ledges and scale the screens.
They cling to my hair and hide in my clothes. I find them on blankets and bed covers.

Even with windows tightly closed, they manage to get in the house. Last night they were crawling on the kitchen table, the lamp, my laptop....

...and then they quickly die. In a week or so they will be gone.

 My bedroom window ledge last night. I had to remove the screen and clean everything - - but more of the beetles appeared there today.

I had to walk through the woods once more today, for what will probably be a last look at the glorious foliage. Rain is expected late tonight, with a fairly dismal week ahead.

 

 

I hope my autumn foliage photos aren't becoming tedious. Look at the bright side - at least you don't have to trek through the mud and bugs.