The barn swallows are gone. The mosquitoes are rare now. The flies are still here. The starlings are appearing in great droves called murmurs. And the spiders webs have arrived.
Everyone racing to fatten up for winter. Not me. I am racing to fill the shelves and freezer. The pumpkins are harvested.
The blush of midsummer is bowing to the rich, gold of late summer. (I am not mentioning the F word). We are drifting. I feel drifty in this clement weather.
Every animal and bird on the property is being offered pumpkin. And eating it like mad! Pumpkin is very good for clearing worms from bellies as we know.
Yesterday got hot. And still no rain which is hastening that late summer feeling.
But the nights are deliciously cool again.
Sleep is easy now.
Next week on Tuesday I have to zoom over to California for a week. I have so much to do between then and now. And so much to do while I am there that I may drop off the blog radar for a few days every few days.
I am not even going to take my lap top – which may or may not be a mistake. I can do most everything on the mini device called a phone. Hmm. Now I am thinking about that. I will be leaving my writing behind. Maybe I can’t leave my writing behind. OK, I have changed my mind. I will take the laptop. Just in case I get a few hours down time.
And words might come to me. That I need to notate into their proper position.
There will be a train after all. And planes. I need to train myself to write more as I travel. Usually I drop into a mindless reading zone. Wasting time.
I hate wasting time.
Celi
The Kitchen's Garden 
43 responses to “The Times they are A’changing”
That turkey’s beginning to look like a vulture!
I can’t write or do much with my phone at all. It’s far too small. I can remember 30 years ago when computer screens had poor resolution and were tiny. Everyone was desperate to have a bigger screen. All the kids today, addicted to phones wil have dreadfull eyesight by the time they reach 30 😉
And hunched backs. The hunched back from leaning like a question mark over a screen really worries me.
Ha ha – people cross roads and ride bikes while immersed in their phone world 😳
Terrifying. And they walk – then SUDDENLY stop in the middle of the airport concourse. No spatial awareness at all. No concept of a whole crowd of people having to suddenly part for them. It is an interesting period in history. I wonder how it will evolve.
They walk into and out of shop and just stop, blocking the doorway. They’ve lowered the speed limit here to 20. I’m sure that’s for all the phone fools!
Oh! Lowering the speed limit is so funny! (And not bad thing – I worry about shaking foundations of our old buildings. (Especially in ancient cities like Rome) Do you think slower lorries might be better for the longevity of the old structures ?).
…but driving in third gear does cause a lot more polution.
That’s true.😣
…as do the speed bumps near schools 😱
Driving in 3rd would increase both air (emissions) and noise pollution (higher revs) AND more vibration. People just seem more stupid altogether these days (and I firmly believe there’s more to THAT ‘distraction’ than just phone use… :/)
You could be right – perhaps to make driving a miserable experience!
Aye, and that ‘miserable experience’ taking more off the roads in the long run…
It doesn’t seem to be working here!
As with most of those ‘brilliant ideas’…. Yeah?
🤣
Yes, the wheel of the year is turning.
It is. How is it out your way?
Our nights are getting cooler, some beautiful days in the 70s F., crisp air, with a few hot ones still thrown in for good measure. There is just the tiniest bit of color starting and some leaves falling.
It is a lovely time of year!
Yes, it is. The light is changing too.
Scrub jays and yes, spiders and webs are all over here. My neighborhood is also full of acorns and walnuts and the squirrels believe they are in heaven with the bounty!
So many pumpkins. Best photo is the hammock with all the resting fruit. I think the golden glow from the changing fields is lovely against the blue sky as Boo checks out the track.
Scrub jays! The things we learn here. I guess the squirrels you refer to are beautiful red ones? Apart from a few isolated protected areas we only have grey squirrels now.
Yes Andy, Scrub Jays! Gorgeous blue body but the chest is gray. They mimic hawks and I learned this past winter personally that they also hunt like hawks when food is scarce 😦 We do have lovely deeper blue and black crested jays also. They seem more pleasant but are rare.
Also the gray squirrels are the common species here by far. They are totally urbanized. There is a very common forest camping song young children learn and we never forget it- “gray squirrel, gray squirrel shake your bushy tail…” of course you must stand and shake your own bottom at that part 🙂
Oh I’m glad you decided to take your laptop! Writers need their words. I’ve dragged mine all over England and France and Spain and around the US but I would be lost without it. I just can’t do things as well on my phone like the young-uns do.
I take my tablet to write on when I travel (and keep in touch etc) I can’t travel with a laptop as they are too heavy, even when I had a small notebook. Your pumpkin harvest looks fabulous! Pumpkins are the most photogenic of vegetables.
I don’t travel. I do however like to sit outside and have found that the battery life of my laptop isn’t long enough for me to do things I like to do out there. I found a neat little sort of hybrid tablet mini laptop for $80.00 which is perfect. It’s got a decent size keyboard and screen but is small and light with a battery life of about 15 hours. That’s what I would take if I did travel and I do use it when outside and sometimes inside. I think it’s called and Evolve and I got mine at Micro Center which offered the suggestion that they’d be great for those returning to school.
Huh! I will check that out! Thank you!
I would never think of reading as wasting time, but I would call it stealing, especially those times when other matters press, such as company coming or exams. Then I bury myself in Dickens or Hardy or Austen & can’t be pried loose till just a few more chapters. You have so much to do on your plate, though, I can see how you might see sitting still & reading as time wasted. But on planes & trains, you must sit still, so you might as well read or write, yes?
Yes! My thoughts exactly
Think of it as battery-charging, not time wasting. Words in, words out. You are topping up some internal reservoir of words.
We are having sunsets very similar to yours, but at the opposite end of the cycle. It’s spring, the days are warming up, the cane harvest is in full swing, the chickens are laying more reliably, and it’s light again at 6am. Sadly, it also means the reappearance of giant predatory insects decimating my vegetables, so I’m enjoying the last of my winter crops before the battle for supremacy begins again. Travel in safety, arrive in health.
There you are. I have missed your sensible advice – I will pop over to your blog today and catch up!
I’ve had a lot of distracting pain and dropped out of blogland for a little while. Back now 😊
oh no. Well. Shoot. Sorry to hear that. I hope you are feeling better.
It’s going to take surgery. I just had to stop and accept I couldn’t keep on as usual. Now that I’ve slowed right down, it’s manageable. Waiting for a surgery date.
Oh how I understand that type of gearing down! Many hugs sent while thinking of you Kate!!
Thank you! I hope the enforced idleness is temporary, as I find it hugely frustrating to be unable to briskly just get things done. Being unable to drive is the worst!
🙏
Oh those pumpkins, what a rich bounty. The last year l had my allotment l grew just pumpkins, it was very satisfying and a good way of signing off. I LOVE reading when flying, it removes all thoughts about what are we doing in this scary and totally unnatural and wrong way of travelling, needs must though. We have recently managed to get the whole of our village turned into a 20 m.p.h zone which feels so much safer.
And no-one bothers a person while travelling. I especially like the train. Trains are great for reading.
Love the (visual) delicacy of your ‘crocheted’ pink hammock Celi!
‘Delicacy’ being an oxymoron with that incredible load of GORGEOUS orange pumpkins, lol
Don’t know what’s happened but I’m not receiving your blog in either of my accounts. Veery strange.
This happens to me too. I miss so many notifications. Maybe unsubscribe and resubscribe?