May 31, 2017. Flowers, Wildflowers and A Business Called Fred.

 

May 31, 2017.  Flowers, Wildflowers and a Business Called Fred.  We had lunch today at the Cookery, in Fish Creek.  On the way, we walked by Fred and Co., A Women's Clothier.  I wondered if this Fred is a member of the Fred's Club.  I have a friend named Fred who is a card-carrying member of the Fred's Club.  I once asked him the requirements for membership.  "You have to be named Fred," he responded.  It sounds easy, but that's a pretty rigorous requirement.  I, for one, would be unwilling to change my name just to join the club.  I might be willing to do that to gain admission to the Abraham Club, if such a club existed.  Sadly, it does not.

Tulips, lilies and wildflowers are abundant in Door County.  I've given you a few more examples above.  Believe it or not, these are a small portion of the total number of flower photos on my laptop. I am not sure why I take so many pictures of flowers.  Perhaps, I have a case of camera-bug-itis.  Or, maybe, it is just my compulsive nature surfacing.  I am convinced that we all have a touch of that. What's yours?

We have one more day here.  I don't know what we will do with it.  Given the size of Door County, it is a good bet that it won't be anything new.

Goodnight.

May 30, 2017. Mostly About a Goose.

May 30, 2017.  Mostly About a Goose.  Not much to write about today, so I've been thinking about my friend, the goose.  We had another chat today as Annie and I finished our late afternoon walk.  I wondered where he came from and where he is going.  Of course, there is no way to know.  But, some generalizations can be drawn from looking about Canada Geese as a species.

Did you know that the oldest known Canada goose lived to be at least 33 years, 3 months?  She was banded in Ohio in 1969.  She was shot in Ontario in 2001.  I wonder how long she would have lived had she not been shot.

Did you know that birds of both sexes tend to choose mates of a similar size?  Biologists call that "assortative mating."  If humans were to exhibit the same tendency, I would have married a girl who was six foot, three inches tall.  I won't mention her weight.  Instead, I got stumpy, aka, Annie.

Did you know that the Canada goose almost became extinct in the early 1900s?  Hunting pressure nearly eliminated them altogether.  I recall reading in James Michener's Chesapeake that geese were killed by the thousands by hunters who shot them at night using a cannon. When I purchased my first hunting license in the early 1970s, the limit on Canada geese was one.  The Canada goose, as a species, has recovered nicely.  In many urban areas, they are considered a nuisance.  In rural areas, farmers use propane cannons, fired at regular intervals, to scare the geese away from their crops.

The solitary goose is still here.  He came close to the shore as we passed by today.  I offered up my horse whistle and he turned his head to look at me.  That was our second conversation.  I expect we'll have another before we leave.  I am beginning to think we will leave before he does.

Goodnight.

May 29, 2017. Jellystone to Weborg - Herdmans to Wildlife

 

 

May 29, 2017.  Jellystone to Weborg - Herdmans to Wildlife.  Five nights back, Annie was awakened by a scratching noise.  She laid awake for a long time before getting up to locate the source.  She was telling about it the morning after.  I laughed at her for being such a fraidy-cat.  I told her it was probably a water bottle in the trash can which was not tightly sealed after it was crushed.  The crinkling sound she heard was the bottle expanding as air seeped back in, said I.  Smugly, I retrieved a crushed water bottle and loosened the cap.  As air filled the bottle, it made a crinkling sound.  I smiled knowingly.  "That wasn't it," Annie exclaimed in a huff. 

This morning, I popped the hood to refill the DEF container.  Atop the air filter, I found an acorn with hull shavings indicating a critter had been under the hood munching, likely late at night.  I brought the acorn hull to Annie, showed it to her and apologized for trivializing her reaction to the night sounds she heard.  I am really getting tired of apologizing to that woman.  She is going to have to be right less often, or I will have to stop being such an overbearing bore.  Wonder how that is going to work out for me?

You wondered why I posted the second picture, didn't you?  Look at it again.  Do you see the turquoise color in the center?  See the skin tones?  That is Annie riding shotgun in Harvey shot through the windshield.  At first blush, the picture seems to be simply a reflection of the sky.  I thought it was cool to see Annie in the clouds.  It is almost angelic, isn't it.  

After two days of watching the Herdmans, we were ready for a change of pace.  I had an email exchange with my youngest this morning in which I reported that at 6:00 AM, the two-year-old girl was walking around in her full-body pajamas in the dew-soaked grass.  A few minutes later, she had popped opened the cover to the gas nozzle of the Suburban and was trying to figure out how to screw off the gas cap.  I turned away from the window before she succeeded.  I don't know what she planned to do when she got the cap off.  I could imagine her dropping in some rocks or grass cuttings.  I didn't want to know. 

The couple which occupied this site before us had scattered some bird seed and orange halves on several stumps at the rear of the campsite. We watched and photographed the wildlife for more than an hour.  Several squirrels, chipmunks, warblers, cardinals, blue jays, red-winged black birds and Baltimore orioles visited the smorgasbord.  The few pictures shown above were culled from nearly 100 photos.  That proves the old adage about photography; take enough pictures and some of them will turn out. 

We wanted a change of pace from the chaos of Jellystone.  We got it.  From the Herdmans to wildlife is like moving from NYC to Nevada.  Oh, yes, the solitary goose is still here. 

Goodnight. 

May 26, 2017. From Solitude to Bedlam to Quiz Results.

Editor's Note:  We have been without an Internet signal for two days.  We have one today because we drove into Sturgeon Bay.  Tomorrow, we will return to Weborg in PSP and should be okay for the duration.  This and the next entry were written on the dates indicated, but not published until this afternoon.

May 26, 2017.  From Solitude to Bedlam to Quiz Results.  We left Peninsula State Park this morning and drove to Sturgeon Bay, WI.  We are at Yogi Bear Jellystone Park. The campground is filled with families enjoying the three-day weekend.  The campground we left was quiet and spacious.  The campground we are in is loud and crowded.  After we set up this afternoon, four trailers and a number of cars pulled in next to us.  The trailers set up and people poured out of the cars and began setting up tents.  When they finished, there were three tents standing within 15 of Harvey.  We felt a little crowded.  The occupants seemed to know one another.  We concluded it was a family, a large family, gathering of some sort.  Annie looked outside and some of our neighbors were sitting on our picnic table while others set up their tents.

At PSP, we had birders walking around the campground.  But they were quite and respectful.  They honored our personal space.  Not so here.  I wanna go home to PSP.

All the grandchildren correctly identified all ten pictures shown in this trip's quiz.  I have copied and pasted the correct answers submitted by E and M below for those of you who were excluded from the quiz, yet interested in the results.

1. May 12- light-up reindeer in a barn hayloft. 2. May 12- The Hobo fishing
boat hoping to catch small mouth bass
3. May 8- statue in Marquette Park
4. May 10- notch from possible aspen or birch tree
5. May 13- mushroom platforms growing on a high and dry tree 🍄 🌲
6. May 15- person walking behind a tree at Eagle's bluff lighthouse. 🦅
7.  May 17- the comb of an Art Deco rooster 🐔
8. May 19- the wing of a seagull leaping off a post into flight.
9. May 6- smokestack on the way to warren dune state park
10. May 10- the top of a toll bridge that would cost Harvey $10.

Congratulations to everyone.  I am flooded with pride that you not only took the time to complete the quiz, but that you did so perfectly.  I think the results reflect well on you and your parents. 

Goodnight. 

May 26, 2017. The Herdmans Arrive.

May 26, 2017.  The Herdmans Arrive.  I described Jellystone as bedlam yesterday.  I probably understated the craziness happening here.  Someone three sites down from us has had their music turned to 10 and is a lover of country music.  Merle Haggard has been singing "Mamma Tried" most of the afternoon.  The residents are playing some yard game which is stimulating great enthusiasm, likely aided by generous portions of beer.

Then, late this morning, the Herdmans arrived.  You remember the Herdmans, from the "Best Little Christmas Pageant Ever."  They pulled in behind Harvey and kids just kept pouring out of an older Suburban.  First was a boy, about ten years old.  Following the boy were three girls, ages 2, 3 and 5, as best I could tell.  Mom had pink and orange hair and was nearly full term with child number five. She was wearing a swim suit which barely covered child number five in front and failed to cover her fully in the back.  Dad was wearing a black tee-shirt with the sleeves cut off at the shoulders.  The chaos was just beginning.

After unloading enough gear to support a full Army division from the Suburban, Dad tried to set up their tent.  He laid a hammer on a cooler.  As soon as he turned away from it, one of the smaller girls picked up the hammer and disappeared with it.  He and Mom soon had the tent up and he fished stakes from the tent bag.  Then he turned to the cooler for the hammer.  Of course, it was gone.  He looked all around the ground near the tent for it unavailingly.  Finally, he picked up a stick of firewood and used it to drive in the tent stakes.

In the meantime, the three girls were running all over the campground.  They were in the cooler drinking soda from two-liter bottles.  Mom, who turned out to be - understandably - a yeller, would gather them back to their site then try to help Dad set up camp.  The girls took off as soon as Mom turned her back.

The three-year-old came onto our site and spun the wheels of the bikes which were mounted on the rear of Harvey.  She then noticed the unoccupied tents next to us.  She toddled over and tried to look under them.  The boy came and carried her back.  As soon as he put her down, she ran back to the unoccupied tent and disappeared inside.  The five-year-old girl came and drug, litterally, drug her out. I could not begin to estimate the number of chiggers who enjoyed the ride.

Five minutes later, the two-year-old dropped her drawers near the cooler and answered the call of nature.  Mom yelled again.  By this time, the three-year-old had set up housekeeping in a tent which belonged to someone else.  All this occurred while we watched from inside Harvey.

Soon, the boy was standing in front of our door.  He rapped loudly and asked Annie if they could have our picnic table.  I went to the door as Dad stepped up.  Someone had taken their table and they needed ours for lunch.  They probably did need it more than us, so I helped him carry it to their campsite.

And, so it went most of the afternoon.  Annie and I were trying to read outside in the puffy chairs, but the Herdmans held our rapt attention.  I doubt if I read more than 25 pages in two hours.  The younger girls kept going into the neighbor's tent.  Papa, Mom's dad,  showed up and another tent went up with stakes driven into the ground with a stick of firewood.  The boy stood behind the picnic table and he too answered the call of nature in his pants.  At first I thought he was pouring water on the ground.  I was wrong.  Mom yelled, again.  Then, the boy changed his pants outside their tent.  He put on shorts three sizes too big and walked around the balance of the day holding his pants up with his hand.

Dad and the five-year-old girl left in the Suburban and soon returned with the girl driving the vehicle while sitting in Dad's lap.  Papa later drove his car through our campsite to get something from the store.  He returned the same way he left.  With all this going on, the children kept returning to the picnic table, our picnic table, and chugged more Mountain Dew from two-liter bottles.  The girls kept going into the unoccupied tent and Mom yelled, again.

I wish you could have been here.  When we came inside for the night, we locked away everything we had outside and then we locked the door to Harvey.  The little girls are cute, but I don't want them coming inside while we are asleep.  With all the Mountain Dew they've had today, I doubt they will sleep at all.

So, that's been our day.  Was your day as interesting?  I doubt it.

Goodnight.

May 25, 2017. Cottage Row and Chasing the Monarch.

May 25, 2017.  Cottage Row and Chasing the Monarch.   We biked to town late this morning for lunch at Juniper's Gin Joint.  No, we had no gin, but my perch sandwich was good.  On the way into town, I noticed newly planted flowers in anticipation of the Memorial Day Weekend.  Those same flowers will be tenderly nurtured over the next three months adding yet more color for the pleasure of visitors in Door County.

After lunch, we biked down Cottage Row, an area you've seen before in pictures.  Cottage Row is a road which has very expensive homes fronting the lake.  It is an older area of Fish Creek.  I think it may have been a hotspot for summer homes for the wealthy at one time.  Now, there are some owner-occupied homes, but many appear to be rentals.  The most distinguishing feature of Cottage Row is the ancient stone fences which line the road.  There are several old gates which have been featured in past blogs.  In fact, as I type this, one of those pictures hangs on the wall of Harvey behind me.  Here are a few more gates which haven't appeared before.  Relax, now you have seen them all . . . almost.

The weather has been much better today.  The sky was blue, the sun warm and the temperature in the upper 60s.  After returning to the park, we sat in the sun, read and napped.  I noticed a visitor to the campsite, a monarch butterfly.  Did you know that that the monarch is both a long-distance flier and a sprinter?  That's right.  The monarch migrates 3000 miles to Mexico each fall.  It can also fly short distances at speeds of 12-25 miles per hour.  It is pretty hard to photograph a butterfly moving that quickly, but I chased him all over the campsite until he landed.  What you see above is what I got.

We move tomorrow to Sturgeon Bay and Jellystone RV Park.  That will change the scenery and the types of pictures you'll see.  We will be back here Monday to check on the solitary goose.  He was here today and I took more pictures.  However, I had others I wanted you to see.  Hope you like them.

Goodnight.