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Our Daily Thread 6-27-17

Good Morning!

Today’s pics are from Cheryl.

And Mr. I Can’t Remember Dates Even When I Write Them Down nearly forgot it was her birthday as well. 😲

Happy Birthday Cheryl! 

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Anyone have a QoD?

 

59 thoughts on “Our Daily Thread 6-27-17”

  1. I told you yesterday there would be a song. I never knew Roy Clark sang like this. I always saw him on Hee Haw. Yesterday this came on Willie’s Roadhouse on satellite radio.

    Liked by 3 people

  2. Good morning everyone.
    I had the weirdest dream about Muriel and me trying to find my ;50 Chevvy in a repair shop.
    Muriel was a HS girl friend, not sweetheart, but a good friend. She never knew about the ’60 chevvy.
    I said before, I almost never recall a dream. But this was vivid.
    I never did find the car.

    Liked by 2 people

  5. That photo up there is a tailed jay. The underside is quite different, and only yesterday did I realize a different photo I took is of the same butterfly. That is on my husband’s straw hat. While we are in the butterfly garden, he pretty much constantly has one or two butterflies resting there, and even staying on it for ten or fifteen minutes while we walk around. Since green is my favorite color, that was one of my favorite butterflies in there, maybe my top favorite. Funny thing is, I couldn’t find that species sitting still anywhere but on Hubby’s hat until nearly the end of our time in there (others were also on the netting at the side, but they didn’t sit still on plants), but it was on his hat nearly the whole time.

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  6. Oh, it came to me in a flash. Last night I dreamed I was flying to France. I was at the airport in a rush only to discover that my mother had not purchased my ticket. Luckily I was able to buy one there but there was a delay. Somehow I had a Yellow Lab with me. She was very well behaved and rested by the fireplace with another passenger’s German Shepherd.
    I woke up before I got on the plane, so I can’t tell you anything about the flight or France.

    Liked by 1 person

  8. We had that Roy Clark song on here a few months back. Husband and I listened to it several times and thought of our children. I enjoyed it.

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  9. QoD: Whatever a four-and-a-half-year-old girl growing up on a farm in the sixties would have been doing. All I know is that I wasn’t being born that day, like someone else I know. 😉

    Happy Birthday to the little cutie in the pink bonnet today. 🙂

    Liked by 1 person

  10. Fifty years ago? Well, I was nearly ten so I had a paper route. And I had a bike. And a tennis racquet. And was going down to the swimming pool, a couple of miles away, either walking or biking. Usual summer activities.

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  15. I was almost six & a half 50 years ago, & would have been living in Tennessee at that time. Was probably playing outside with my neighbors.

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  16. 6 Arrows – Am I confused? You are a year younger than I am, right? I was born in 1961, you in 1962, right? So how could I have been six & a half 50 years ago, but you were only four & a half?

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  17. Let’s see, summer of ’67. I probably was spending time playing with my boyhood best friend, riding bicycles to the park or playing with Matchbox® cars in the backyard. We had little grass in Tucson, so we made roads in the dirt. My friend figured out that by wetting the dirt, then tamping it down we could have “paved” roads. It was a lot of fun, until my older brother and his friend showed up and tried making it into a remake of some spy show from TV.

    Liked by 3 people

  18. Oh, and Happy Birthday to another native of Arizona, now living in the Midwest.
    Cake and ice cream for all!
    🎂🍨 🎂🍨 🎂🍨 🎂🍨 🎂🍨 🎂🍨 🎂🍨 🎂🍨 🎂🍨 🎂🍨 🎂🍨 🎂🍨 🎂🍨

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  19. Happy Birthday Miss Cheryl!!! ❤ While you were bein' born I was excited that I was going to be a teenager in a couple weeks….what do 12 year olds do…well we babysit neighborhood kids in the summertime, we go to the neighborhood pool, play at the playground, roller skate, listen to our transistor radios, lay out in the sun after we slather on our baby oil/iodine concoction….then we slather on the noxema for our horrid sunburn…life in the 60's….I miss it 🙂

    Liked by 1 person

  20. Oh, and we had rock fights. Similar to snowball fights but with rocks. We built forts and threw rocks at each other. That was when I was playing with my brothers and their friends. Other times, going to the home of the old bus driver and his wife, and swinging on their rope swing hanging from the tree in their back yard. It went really far. Funny how the world has changed since then. Now when I go by that house, the back yard is not very big and not very steep and the swing would be almost normal. But back then it was huge and went forever.

    Liked by 1 person

  21. I don’t really remember it at all. But fifty years ago I was very cramped, very constricted and in some sort of a holding pattern, but with an understanding I was next in line for take-off, at that location anyway.

    Liked by 4 people

  23. I learned something new yesterday from a fellow reporter who used to work at the local Starbuck’s — light roast coffee is higher in caffeine than dark roast. I always thought it was the opposite.

    It’s supposed to start cooling down today for us, with the rest of the week looking much more comfortable in the low 70s.

    I need to find a new mechanic, my former one sold out to another business that’s too far away. There’s one place in town, Butch’s, that consistently gets good reviews, especially for being no-nonsense and affordable, so I’ll probably go there — but I need to figure out how I get to work from there (old place had loaners); they also close at 5 which means leaving work early and somehow getting here before then. And it’s not very quickly “walkable” from my house, it’s only a couple miles away but it’s straight down (or up) hill, depending on which way you’re going.

    Liked by 1 person

  24. Happy Birthday Cheryl.
    In the summer of 1967, we were just getting established financially. That is about the time we went to a nice restaurant, took in features at Wolf Trapp, etc. It was about that time that I was promoted to GS-11. You can live on that in the Washington area. But it takes that.
    The DC area is expensive.

    Liked by 1 person

  26. Re: My 11:03
    A “nice” restaurant to us was Red Lobster or Longhorn. Still is.
    We don’t go for fancy. But they are upscale from Chick-fil-a and Long John Silver.

    Liked by 2 people

  27. Let’s see, nine years old going on ten, playing with Matchbox cars was probably in there somewhere for me too but only indoors. We lived across the street from the elementary school which had a summer playground program, so I would have been over there playing tetherball and caroms. And the school library had a summer reading program so I would have been reading either books from the school library or my growing collection of Hardy Boys and Tom Swift Jr. books. Maybe bossing my brother and sister a little bit. Riding bikes around the neighborhood. Looking forward to a week at my grandparents’ house, sitting with grandma in the rocking chair on her back porch and singing “Summertime”. Watching re-runs of “Star Trek” whatever night it was on in its first season.

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  28. We lived a block from the Catholic school with a large playground and playfield. Lots of independent tetherball and baseball. My brother broke a lot of windows there. And paid for them. He bought a house and lives right across the street from them now. I see they now have a fence around their playground and field. I am sure it is not related. Probably just rules and regulations about fencing in children from the street. Probably nothing to do with my brother and his baseball technique.

    Liked by 1 person

  29. I never watched “Hee Haw”. But I do remember “Yesterday When I Was Young” very well and now will probably have it in my head all day. Looking it up to find out what year it was (1969), I’m surprised to find that it was originally written in French in 1964, and was also translated into Spanish, Italian, Danish, and Japanese. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hier_Encore

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  31. OK.

    It’s not Bob Newhart, but it was another fav of mine from that time. And they had Roy Clark on showing his expertise as a musician.

    Liked by 2 people

  32. What Is So Rare As A Day In June

    And what is so rare as a day in June?
    Then, if ever, come perfect days;
    Then Heaven tries earth if it be in tune,
    And over it softly her warm ear lays;
    Whether we look, or whether we listen,
    We hear life murmur, or see it glisten;
    Every clod feels a stir of might,
    An instinct within it that reaches and towers,
    And, groping blindly above it for light,
    Climbs to a soul in grass and flowers;
    The flush of life may well be seen
    Thrilling back over hills and valleys;
    The cowslip startles in meadows green,
    The buttercup catches the sun in its chalice,
    And there’s never a leaf nor a blade too mean
    To be some happy creature’s palace;
    The little bird sits at his door in the sun,
    Atilt like a blossom among the leaves,
    And lets his illumined being o’errun
    With the deluge of summer it receives;
    His mate feels the eggs beneath her wings,
    And the heart in her dumb breast flutters and sings;
    He sings to the wide world, and she to her nest,
    In the nice ear of Nature which song is the best?

    Now is the high-tide of the year,
    And whatever of life hath ebbed away
    Comes flooding back with a ripply cheer,
    Into every bare inlet and creek and bay;
    Now the heart is so full that a drop overfills it,
    We are happy now because God wills it;
    No matter how barren the past may have been,
    ‘Tis enough for us now that the leaves are green;
    We sit in the warm shade and feel right well
    How the sap creeps up and the blossoms swell;
    We may shut our eyes but we cannot help knowing
    That skies are clear and grass is growing;
    The breeze comes whispering in our ear,
    That dandelions are blossoming near,
    That maize has sprouted, that streams are flowing,
    That the river is bluer than the sky,
    That the robin is plastering his house hard by;
    And if the breeze kept the good news back,
    For our couriers we should not lack;
    We could guess it all by yon heifer’s lowing,
    And hark! How clear bold chanticleer,
    Warmed with the new wine of the year,
    Tells all in his lusty crowing!

    Joy comes, grief goes, we know not how;
    Everything is happy now,
    Everything is upward striving;
    ‘Tis as easy now for the heart to be true
    As for grass to be green or skies to be blue,
    ‘Tis for the natural way of living:
    Who knows whither the clouds have fled?
    In the unscarred heaven they leave not wake,
    And the eyes forget the tears they have shed,
    The heart forgets its sorrow and ache;
    The soul partakes the season’s youth,
    And the sulphurous rifts of passion and woe
    Lie deep ‘neath a silence pure and smooth,
    Like burnt-out craters healed with snow.

    –James Russell Lowell

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  35. In case you are wondering, it is in Cambridge. Considered by some to be among the most prestigious schools in the world.

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  36. I knew there was a reason I held back Cheryl’s butterfly pics for today……

    Sorry for not remembering first thing Cheryl.

    But I did find my birthday list for those that gave me their’s! 🙂

    Liked by 1 person

  37. I bet my wife moved it……..

    They do that ya’ know…. move your stuff. 😀

    Ask Leon, he knows what I’m talking about……..

    Liked by 2 people

  38. It is too bad we wives have to move things—and clean and organize them, as well. 😉

    Happy birthday, Cheryl.

    Not sure what I would have been doing. I would have been in my babysitting era. I did have an almost full time job doing that for one summer and it may have been then or the next summer. We also enjoyed a lot of swimming in the local wide spot of the river. We had to dodge cows, cow pies and go through a barbed wire fence. None of that stopped us or all the others who went there, including parents. Apparently, the farmer never objected. This was our ‘everyday’ beach as opposed to the nicer beaches and actual lakes. We did have to be driven there, but it was a short drive for a short swim and no picnic.

    I would have also been spending some days at my grandparent’s cabin. Joyful days in so many ways. Loved the poem, Cheryl.

    Liked by 1 person

  41. I am inside, can you tell? Today is laundry day for me but mine is done so nine year old is getting hers done. Eleven did his yesterday but folded it a few minutes ago. After morning chores, we went on a four mile bike ride. The biggest hills ever are my only way out of here, and back again. But we did it. We turned around when I smelled that a farmer was putting poison on his field and I did not want us breathing it. Then we pulled some weeds and fixed the pond pump, cleaned the filter, etc, and moved some cardboard onto unused raised beds. Sadly, the mice had moved in. Son is good with his feet though so there are now fewer of them. Now I am in to fix dinner. I like being outside. Summer is wonderful.

    Liked by 1 person

  42. Kizzie, true, I was born the year after you, but later in the year (September). So technically, I am one and two-thirds years younger than you. To be more exact, I could have said I was four and three-fourths years old when Cheryl was born.

    Which adds up to me being about 29 years old now. 😉

    Liked by 2 people

  43. A Happy Birthday to Cheryl.
    QoD: Nothing, as I didn’t exist. As my mother used to say when we as small children tried to figure out whether an event happened before or after one of us was born, “I (you) was (were) just a twinkle in my (your) Daddy’s eye.”

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  44. I really, really, want to whine about the “vacation” I’m going on next week with my family. A small house, 12 people, lots of friends stopping by to sail and boat, no yard, kitchen looks sketch, potential of ants in the poorest county in California which has NO tourism industry anymore.

    I just want to put down my head and cry–but that seems so very wrong. So, if you think, pray for my attitude:

    Thankful I’ll be with almost all my family.
    Friends will be visiting.
    The lake is beautiful.
    I have books to read.
    I can go home early (which I will, I have to work and attend a party, thanks Lord)
    Even though it will be in the 90s, I can stay inside the air conditioning and look at the lake.
    The kids are excited.
    There’s a park with trees two doors down.
    I’ll be with my whole family.
    I can always go somewhere in the car. (But where?????)

    My husband knows this is NOT my idea of a vacation–we’ve done it biannually for 10 years now. But we always had nicer, bigger houses with yards–which mitigated some of this. This house . . . Yikes. I feel like a total ingrate, spoiled and I’m struggling to be gracious.

    I find the setting, though beautiful, utterly depressing. Lake County is starved for Jesus, hope, life. Maybe I’m being sent there just to pray? Sigh.

    Liked by 1 person

  46. I like how 6 computes her math…forever 29…sadly it’s all but a blur at this age….
    AJ…remember…a place for everything and everything in it’s place….my husband has yet to let that one sink in… 😛

    Liked by 1 person

  49. LOL, NancyJill. Same story here — we operate more on a “A place for some things, and few things in their place” level too much of the time. 😛

    Kim, thanks — I’ve always liked that song, Yesterday, When I Was Young. Such superb melody writing.

    Today is a blessing in so many ways. It started out with a great night’s sleep last night — from 10:00 pm until 7:30 am. That’s earlier than I usually go to bed, and later than I usually get up (I’ve been setting the alarm for 7:00 am, but fell back to sleep when I shut my alarm off this morning), but I guess I needed that extra sleep on both ends. I woke up only once in the middle of the night, at 2:22, and fell back to sleep almost immediately. (A rarity if I go to bed earlier than usual — I can almost always count on a 2-hour period of insomnia in the middle of the night when I hit the sack much before 11:00 pm.) Anyway, so I had lots of energy once I got up this morning, and got both bathrooms spic and span in our morning cleaning time. Living room, stairway and entryway are looking good, too.

    Then my piano student who came at noon did very well. She is my newest, the one who started last month and who goes off to college in two months. I have her working on quite a bit of chordal music, as she did not study much music like that with her previous teacher, and one of her goals was to get more accomplished with that before her college music studies commence. Last week I assigned her “Important Event” from Schumann’s Kinderscenen (Scenes from Childhood), and after only one week, she’s got it note-perfect — every note of the thick texture played, and no hesitations in rhythm before big chords or anywhere else. I was impressed. She beamed when she said that was the best she’d played it all week. She had worked really hard, and overcame the biggest challenge for her in the piece — thick harmonic texture. Now we’re on to expression for the main focus on the piece this week. I love when we can get beyond melody, harmony and rhythm basics and go deep into the expressive elements of repertoire.

    I was thinking this afternoon, while working in the kitchen after her lesson, that I don’t think I have ever thoroughly enjoyed teaching piano as much as I do now. For the most part, I have liked doing that during the years I’ve taught, but there are always downsides. But I gotta tell ya, the three students I have now — the two high school girls and my 9-year-old daughter — are so inquisitive, so willing to explore, and really on fire for music-making. Nothing like having 100% of your students really getting into the music. 🙂

    Sixth Arrow, in the last few weeks, has started to learn transposing major-key exercises to other major keys in her Technique book, and this week, she took one of her new Repertoire book pieces, one she’d only been playing a few days, and figured out how to transpose it from C Minor to G Minor. So much fun to be privy to her every experimentation at the piano. She enjoys composing, too, like my student who comes tomorrow, who has just finished a week at a music composition camp. Can’t wait to hear about that experience, and see some of the work she did there!

    Liked by 3 people

  51. Here’s “Important Event” from Scenes From Childhood, by Robert Schumann, which I mentioned above that my student played today.

    Liked by 1 person

  52. The net of butterflies is not my usual “style.” But basically the butterfly garden is a tent surrounded by this netting, and filled with plants, and stocked with fruit for butterflies that like fruit, and so on. Butterflies feed or rest, and they’re used to people so they land on people readily. But up on the netting they get a good amount of sun, and they’re out of the way of people, etc., so they really collect up there. I snapped just this one shot of the group on the net, as I’d rather focus on the ones on plants or other interesting backgrounds (including my husband’s hat), but I sent it to AJ because it is rather interesting to see how many insects there are and to get an idea of the variety. I got somewhere between 16 and 20 species, I don’t remember for sure how many. The list of butterflies showed 24 species, and I photographed it for reference . . . but after I got home I realized the sheet said page 1 of 2, so it’s possible they had more on the back (or also possible page 2 didn’t have anything useful on it). I did find at least two species that I had to identify using the internet, not the reference guide. But it’s always possible someone in the sending country sent a chrysalis for the wrong species, and not that there were other species on some page 2, since clearly the vast majority of them were on page 1. . . . (But page 2 might have been an overflow page, with just three or four species on it, for all I know.) At any rate, this particular area of the net only has a few species, but there were a lot more in all.

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  55. The new butterfly one is also not on a plant; I sent AJ one e-mail of butterflies on plants and one in which they were on manmade object. This one is funny to me, because it was on a stranger’s shirt, but between the lady’s shirt (which shows a cougar) and her purse, it is very well camouflaged. It’s a tattered but large and beautiful butterfly. The exhibit had two very similar species, and I can’t tell which it is (giant owl or forest mort blue). Research says the main way to tell them apart is to see their inner wings, and that they rarely rest with wings open, so I can’t identify it with any certainty.

    At any rate, this same butterfly (probably the exact same one, since photos show the same wing tatters) tried to hitch a ride on me on my way out. On leaving, you go into a little isolation room so an employee can look you over and make sure you have no stowaways, and this fellow was on my back. It may be the same one who also rested on the back of my husband’s knee for 20 minutes or more while my husband sat on the bench watching the butterflies and me. He had two butterflies on his hat and one on his leg most of the time he sat there. I cautioned him, “Don’t lean your head back, and don’t put your leg against the bench!”

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