School Starts, Getting into a routine is hard

    School has started and both classes seem pretty polite. Or maybe it's partly that they don't remember a damn thing about logic and are trying to get it all down. The fourth class I had them read and then write about a few "case studies," judgments concerning the  use of guns and cell phones. I hope they were at least a little interested in it. It was hard to tell.
    One student wanted to "sit out" the class and told me so. He said it was "too nice" outside. I said we would go on a class walk next week, and would he come to this class? He did and I hope he thought he made the right choice. This generation of college students is very distractible. I hope they are learning something-- we'll see with the first quiz next week.
   I'm getting into the "school" routine, but not the writing routine. Both things are very isolating and wish I was doing this "more" with someone. But that is the nature of both. I am a very independent person anyway, I guess, but sometimes I would like someone here to confer with and encourage me with my writing.

School is right around the corner

Well, I have enjoyed my visits to Mount Airy and Fairy Stone State Park, but soon I will be teaching again. Teaching is that less than perfect profession. College adjuncts aren't paid a lot for their time and students should appreciate all the effort  we/I put into my classes. A few in the past have been downright rude. I hope this semester's students are decent.

Fairy Stone Park peaceful, now back to work

    We were probably the  oldest couple there-- in a tent, that is. But all ages can stay in a tent, one of those "pop up" tents (a metal bottom with wheels the car pulls, and the sides "pop out" so you have some sleeping space) or an RV. And our air mattress inflated to a foot high! And at Fairy Stone State Park (VA) recently we had all three! It was relaxing, coming during the middle of the week, mostly. Wednesday evening it rained and we had to stay in the tent and it wasn't that much fun. But the other days we lit out.
    Ranger naturalist Janette Lavier pointed out loads of info on one trail, from the fluffy orange mushrooms called "chanterelles" to the red eft (juvenile) newt she and I saw on the trail. If you know something about what you are looking at in the woods that makes it so much more interesting.
    We didn't swim "enough" (not in my opinion) but we went out in a rented rowboat and saw those slider turtles (what the ranger called them, as they have a red marking on the side of the neck/ear area and can easily slide into the water, though they look a lot like the painted turtle) sunning themselves on logs and also some cute, furry baby herons -- and I didn't have my camera with me!
    At the visitor center we saw a pile of "fairy stones" on display and also went to a site off Route 57 where you can look in a creek bed for the distinctive cross shaped pattern. Needless to say, we took some little rocks but they weren't at all cross or crisscross shaped!
    On the way back we stopped in Floyd at the "travel through time" shop for some nice frozen yogurt. And the cat survived our staying away (we left out water and dry food for her).
    Now I have to revise my syllabus somewhat and have to teach again very soon!

Naturalists Picnicking, Getting Back on dieting wagon, loads of cukes

    When you have something coming up, like a picnic or baking for the fair, then it is quite easy to dump all your precious dieting plans, in favor of, well, stuffing your face. I am afraid I had one piece of pound cake (someone tempted me with whipped cream to put on it and I gave in) too many, and we were sitting around talking and eating. As Master naturalists, we should have been also walking and hiking, though those who arrived much earlier also had jumped into the fast moving little river nearby before it started to rain. But we did have a canopy or two to keep out the rain.
    Fran(k) played a bit of ping pong with Will and Michael Williams, and I watched and stuffed my face too. I did talk to a few new people and I realized they had done a whole lot more volunteering than I did. I really need to get back to water monitoring and some other projects. And I am going to try to go back to my dieting!
    And my square foot garden is producing a lot of cucumbers with all this rain we've had this summer. I put them in the fair and they won nothing. But the zucchini bread took second place!

The Lone Ranger "is" a good movie, the wild west

     At the end of the movie we hear The Lone Ranger, John Reid, has just said to his horse "Hi-ho, Silver, away!" I believe he asks Tonto what he thinks of that and he replies," Never say that again!"
     There were a lot of humorous moments in the Johnny Depp/Armie Hammer movie (the names of the lead actors) The Lone Ranger, and I found the movie to be rather entertaining. That is why I can't, for the life of me, understand why it was unanimously panned by movie critics. What were they expecting with a Johnny Depp movie? Doesn't he try extra  hard to be "quirky"?
     Quirkiness was the great appeal of this movie, where we see General (Colonel?) Custer already trying to oppress Indian tribes and the railroad pushing its way through Indian territory in the American West. Without giving it away, you could say it was Indian legend that brought the great 'lone ranger' to life, and Johnny Depp in his wild face paint also has a tale to tell about why he always looks that way, and really, why he shouldn't trust a white man. And yet, he decides to help lone ranger John Reid (Armie Hammer) in order to help justice prevail, at least in Reid's world. The world of the native American is already on the downward spiral.
     I read an article in Smithsonian magazine, with its great emphasis on history, on how some Oglala Dakota Indians in So. Dakota are trying to reclaim their heritage, in spite of great poverty and a lack of a plains territory to live off of like their ancestors did. It is close to where the "Battle of Little Big Horn" took place and ol' Custer met his doom. But so many native Americans were uselessly killed during decades of "Indian Wars," and this special note is hinted at in The Lone Ranger. The critics didn't like the fact that the movie could be both serious and funny, but I thought that balance was appropriate, especially when you have Johnny Depp in the movie! He made the Wild West look interesting.

The Fourth of July happened

     Well, the town decided, with the local park partly flooded, to cancel the usual town festivities, except for the 4th of July fireworks. The spouse was a grump because we picked a different spot from which to watch them from, as I thought our spot near the museum on the hill was too close.
     This time, it was even closer! The fireworks filled the whole sky where we were, in a lot on the right side of Wade's Supermarket, and it was so loud I plugged my ears! Big sprays of orange, combinations of red, gold, blue and green were interesting, as well as gold shimmering and some "whistling" sounds. Today, July 5th, the water receded from the park so I can walk there later if I so choose. But it has already rained today again, at least in some areas.

Rain, rain, (go away) -- Gardening pros and cons, canoeing for litter

     It's been raining for days-- is this good for tomato plants, to be rained on every day? They have grown fairly fast in the last week and are now sprawled on the ground, probably not the best place now that they are producing green fruits. So we bought these supportive "sticks" at Lowe's (sp?) and could have put them next to the tomato plants but guess what? It's raining again!
     Certainly being in the garden and taking in the luxurious, pleasing scent of the tomato plants is better than dealing with sibling  rivalry or the lack thereof (don't ask -- just say my friends  have been better companions to me than my siblings have been in the last 30 years). Gardening and planning and watching over the tomatoes, cucumbers, zucchini plants -- they're like your little green children you want to nurture along. Too bad you have to eat your children when they become big and tasty.
     The other day I "helped" nature by canoeing along the lake coastline at Claytor Lake State Park to do a summer litter pickup. I really worked out my shoulders, and yet, they didn't seem achy the next day, paddling against the currents of outboard motorboats passing by as the spouse and I used the end of the paddles to lift plastic, bottles and other refuse off the banks of the park's lake. The news said many others did this and came up with 100 bags of trash in all. My, but there are some big litterbugs out there!