Just as I was working on my blog post for yesterday’s Friday Photography, a thunderstorm hit and decided to play havoc with the electricity. It came back on after a few minutes, thank goodness, but kept the internet out into the night.
Tuesday morning I woke to a very coral shade of sunlight washing through the windows. Looking out, I could actually see the difference in the hazy sky. Hims thought it might be due to pollution in the air, but there was no pollution alert (unlike on Wednesday) and the coral-pink color remained with us all day long.
Yes, again it’s not Friday. I know! But it’s somebody’s Friday for their workweek somewhere, so that counts.
Cuz I said.
A few days before Thanksgiving last year, Hims and I took a little drive and found ourselves at the Miamisburg Mound. The Miamisburg Mound is the largest conical earthwork in Ohio, and during excavation in 1869 it was discovered to be the burial place of at least one bark-covered skeleton about eight feet down, with an empty vault twenty-eight feet below that surrounded by logs. Historians believe this was the work of the Adena people, who are said to have lived in this area in prehistoric times (1000 B.C. to 400 A.D.)
The Miamisburg Mound, still quite a walk away from it.
That’s me, looking out over the landscape!
We actually walked – I mean hiked! – all the way up the 116 steps to the top, which is more than three feet shorter than what the mound originally was. (The beginning of the excavation sheared off the top of the mound before deciding to try it a different way.) It took me awhile, and I had to stop and catch my breath three different times. Hey – I made it, though! I was a bit envious of an older gentleman who was taking his exercise there that morning, jogging up and down the stairs a number of times while we visited. Not sure if I’ll ever get to that point.
Hi! Isn’t the view amazing from up here?
I’m hoping to get back to the Mound sometime soon, to take photos of it while it’s all green and covered in grass and wildflowers. Maybe take a picnic with us!
I love picnics in the park in springtime. Today was the first one for the year, and Hims and I chose to go to the Bellbrock Park in Sugarcreek/Bellbrook.
Another thing I love? History – and this area is rich with it. The park where we ate this afternoon was the site of the Sugarcreek United Presbyterian Church from 1859 to 1871, when the members moved to their present location. There were plans for the vacant structure to be converted into apartments in 1883 after sitting vacant for a decade, but those plans were scrapped when workers discovered the water in the basement well contained magnetic properties. The apartment plans were scrapped, and a seventy room hotel was built – The Magnetic Springs Hotel. In the 1800s, mineral springs were huge attractions. People believed that the water had restorative properties, bathing in it and drinking it to become healthier. (Much like the often believed curative properties of Bath, England, as well as many late 19th Century resorts in the United States.) For ten years, people came to take advantage of the mineral springs at the hotel, bringing much prosperity to the town of Bellbrook, but sadly the hotel burned to the ground in July, 1893. (There is a good little article about it from the Dayton Daily News here.)
A soft breeze played with the flag as we picnicked.The view of part of the park from the gazebo. The little house is a place for kids, I think, and was locked up this afternoon.
This was the odd photo here… There was a wedding last weekend when we passed by, and this netting was draped all around the gazebo, sparkling with a ton of glitter sprinkled through it. When I threw some napkins away, the shiny stuff glinted up at me from inside the trash can as the sun hit it. I never expected to see wedding decorations in the park garbage.
And then there’s me, with the magnetic springs (or what i suspect is them) flowing merrily through the park beneath the bridge. I love my silly hat, by the way…
More cold, more snow. I’d say all I want to do is climb under the blankets and quilts and hide until Spring, but that’s not true. All I want is for the days to warm up a bit! A light breeze, warm sun, blue skies with puffy white clouds floating along, in the upper 50s to mid 60s… *sighs*
As it is, Dexter has learned about burrowing under blankets for warmth:
Dexter has the right idea!
He’s even got one paw possessively over my warmest cardigan, like there’s no way he’s going to give that up! Smart boy.
(Yes, I know – Cat Photos. I have two cats, and their pictures will show up here once in awhile. I promise not to inundate!)
The cold rain yesterday turned into freezing rain, which turned into little ice pellets sometime during the night. When I went outside this morning to feed the birds, I immediately came back in to grab my phone for a few shots of this:
Little snowy balls of ice on the arm of my patio chair.
These look like tiny snowballs! I half expected the chipmunks to have a snowball fight with a squirrel sometime this morning.
Snowballs for the chipmunks!
Another shot of the pebbles of snow on my wooden patio chair in the blue light of early morning. I thought this was an interesting view.
And the hoary little things on the seat of my chair!
If you are expecting some nasty winter weather (like what they are predicting for us) in the next 48 hours, stay safe and warm!
Last August, I woke to a thick blanket of fog just beginning to be lit by the rising sun. My camera was grabbed, and as I was dashing out to take some photos, Hims suggested we go to one of the lakes so I could get a few shots of the mist rising off the water. On our way out there, we passed the Museum of the US Air Force, where the field was shrouded and the planes on the other side of the buildings not even visible from the road. Perfect. (Note: Please click on the photos to open larger versions of them; they will look better that way!)
The closest of the line of planes. The large one with the black nose is the Hanoi Taxi.
It was nearly silent that morning, and what little noise I could hear was muted, like the fog was muffling everything as it wrapped around me.
The tree line quite a few yards from the planes, fading in and out.
The fog began to lift a little, allowing me glimpses of a tree line in the distance, and every so often an oddly echoing honk of a goose could be heard.
Walking between these huge machines, I could look up and see birds waiting for the sun to appear and dry out their feathers. Some were on the tail of the famous Hanoi Taxi, and others rested on propellers that hadn’t moved in decades.
Me, Take Three 