An Odd Duck Am I

I am an odd duck who is slightly quackers.

This photo ↓ proves it, or it will once I supply the background info. Be patient, dear fellow blogger, and all will be revealed.

With both Sue and me falling prey to certain bodily issues, we have been having probiotic yogurt at least once a day. This is in addition to having a probiotic pill.

I frequently have blueberries, yogurt and granola for breakfast with all three ingredients mixed together in the dish. But I don't want to do this with grapes as you can see in the photo. And I especially don't want them sliced in half first, which is what Sue does. But whether sliced or whole, grapes in that dish put me off for some strange reason.

My solution is to keep them separate as you see in the photo. I then put some of the mix on the spoon and place a grape on top. Surely it's all the same as mixing the grapes right into the dish, but I just don't like to see the grapes mixed in like that. Blueberries yes, grapes no.

One night, we had peaches instead of grapes. Sue thought I would want the peaches on the side. Well no! I want the peaches in the mixture, just as with blueberries. But not those grapes. No siree, Bob!

Yes, I am an odd duck. Quite quackers.

I have another odd food aversion, but I'll write about it some other time.

I don't suppose that any of you have any odd food quirks like this?

Second Trip to Blakeney

I returned to Blakeney, a week after this ↓ first photo that I posted then.

The Week Before

On this second day ↓ the light was different, and there was somewhat greater colour, particularly in the yellow centre beyond the foreground rocks.

This Week

Sue caught me doing my thing.

So this scene is starting to look pretty good, but for the most part around here, the colour is lagging, which is what one would expect so early in autumn. However, I did find another of those two-toned trees fairly near our house. I was a glary day, but at least I have a record photo for comparison should I remember to return. I deliberately included the dead tree on the right; perhaps, I shouldn't have, but I like its shape, and I think it provides a bit of balance to the image.

It would be nice to get some clouds in the sky, but I can't fuss too much. I go out when I can and get what I can get at the time.

On the First Day of Autumn

The lady and I went for a little walk in the park. The great majority of trees were not yet turning. This one was partway there. I like it when trees are two-toned like this. 

I want to make it a point to return with some regularity this year to monitor the progress of this tree and others in the park.

My Invisibility Syndrome

The invisible man syndrome struck again yesterday. 

I have posted from time to time that I seem to get lost in the shuffle of life. My operation in June is a recent example. You remember, don’t you, that there was no hospital bed for me? After lying on the narrow gurney for hours, constrained by a catheter and an IV drip, I chose to have the surgery and convalesce at home.

Now, having just finished a subsequent course of antibiotics for prostatitis, I called the surgeon, as previously directed, to let hm know that, after three weeks, I still seemed to have the infection. He ordered lab tests. So far so good.

That was on Tuesday, but I only heard back from urology minutes before the lab was to close, so I went in the next morning, yesterday.

But of course, they had no record of the referral.

I called the urologist. Yes, they sent it but would send it again.

I waited. It didn’t appear.

The Lab: “Sometimes, it takes awhile to work through the system.”

Me: “I have stuff to do, so I’ll call back.”

Two calls later, it hadn’t appeared. So, I called Urology once again, and suggested that might try sending the requisition to the other lab in town.

Glory be! It got there in relatively short order, and now we await results.

But I do wonder why this seems to keep happening to me. I look in the mirror and see that I am really there. I am not tiny, and I am not completely unobtrusive, and I swear that I don’t put on an invisibility cloak before I venture forth in this world. 

Sometimes, it sure seems like it though. 

Old Autumn Colour Photos

I wasn't planning on posting today, but as autumn approaches, I have been perusing some previous photos. They would have all been posted here at some point, but I think that a little repetition is acceptable.

The first two are individual trees in the park by the river. They are both from last year.

Also from last year are two photos from a road just a very short way out of town. I seem to return to this spot every year because it is both pretty and accessible. 

If we drive for even less than an hour, we find ourselves in the very rural highlands.

The final photo for today is older. It's from our last backroads trip to the cottage in 2018. Life changed after that, and we haven't returned. It was by a small creek by the side of the road.

The Beginnings of Autumn at Blakeney

Yesterday, I mentioned that I might post my DSLR Blakeney photos, so here we are. There was not much space from which to take different compositions,  and there was also not a ton of colour over there, so the views were limited, and you will see that the three images are similar.

I like the first one ↑ best, probably because of the front and centre foreground rocks.

I zoomed in more for this ↓ one, but I miss the rocks. I thought the dead tree would present enough interest, but the little foreground that there is looks rather blank.

I was trying something ↓ but I didn't execute very well.

By the way, Blakeney is a little conservation area just about twenty minutes north of us. It is on the edge of the Canadian [Precambrian] Shield, and those are very, very old rocks that you are seeing. The ancient bedrock is very close to and even right at the surface here, as is usual on the Shield.

Random Photos

I've missed posting some photos from the past week as I nattered about fogs and cats and driveways. Not that any are the necessarily the kinds of photos that I would want to show off (well maybe some of them) , but they do reflect bits and pieces of my life around here, especially in Beloved's absence.

First off, if you will excuse the hubris, I present a selfie. I didn't take it because I am simply in love with myself but to send to Sue to show her that I was wearing that warm, red-black, autumnal jacket. I donned it that day when the temperature only around 10C/50F until it warmed up later.

All of the photos that you saw previously about our driveway job were phone photos. They did the trick, but I did take a few with the big beastie camera. It gave me enough pixels to crop in past distractions like garbage cans and recycling bins and yet still have a reasonably sized image. I took a few snaps of this worker cleaving our two driveways, but this one had the most dust.

Out back, I noticed a volunteer viola by the bird bath. Somehow, it must have seeded itself from a pot of violas that weren't really all that close to the bird bath, and I am not sure how it managed that. This pic was also for Sue's benefit that I shared via Messenger because it was so unique and unexpected. Most of the rest of the greenery around the bath will be next spring's forget-me-nots. They do not look exactly charming at this stage, but I do like to see them in the spring.

Another photo for Sue (who is now back in the fold, by the way). I thought she'd appreciate the sunset from our bedroom window.

On Saturday, I drove up to Blakeney to see what I could see. What I could see were a few tinges of colour across the river. This is a phone photo. I also shot with my DSLR and may post those tomorrow.

Early Saturday evening, I went for a short drive to see what I could see in the golden hour. Truth is that I didn't see much other than corn fields, so I soon turned around. However, I did get one photo of a dead tree by a soy (I think) field. While it isn't a stupendous image, a golden field at golden hour is not nothing. 

Sue arrived home last night and is sleeping soundly at 5am. I, however, am not. This is how it goes.