Search This Blog

Friday, June 15, 2018

May/June update

A word about the “fake prairie life".  There are blogs about "prairie life" that include dressing up fancy and pushing products on the net.  THAT IS NOT PRAIRIE LIFE.  That’s downtown Denver life.  Believing this fantasy land can lead people to think moving to the prairie is romantic.  Suddenly, the kid is bitten by a rattlesnake, the dog attacked and killed by an eagle, and the home flooded in a hail storm and electricity is out for two weeks.  Assuming one is still there when winter hits, it's 10 feet of snow and 60 mph winds.  The lie of the prairie romance is exposed.   I find all of this type of “make-believe” harmful to the world, creating a false story that people fall for and can end up dead from.  I realize that fiction is the new “reality”, but I have to mention that reality still exists even if you think you can ignore it.

Speaking of rattlesnakes, I came out of my garage and found this on laying along the path to the house.  I fetched the snake hook, a cooler and the snake is now in the taped shut cooler in the shade to be released after my hubby comes home.  We usually look for an open place to release these, though the wiping out of ranches means there are fewer and fewer places the snake can actually live.  (For those of you who hate rattlesnakes, all I can say is "haunta virus".  You kill the predators that keep the vermin in check, you get more vermin.)

A couple of days later while mowing I went over the top of a baby rattlesnake, about the size of a pencil.  I couldn't catch him and he slithered out of the yard.  About 4 days later we found him again out in the windbreak.  Again, couldn't catch him.  So now I do yard work with leather gloves on!



Speaking of vermin, I now live between two rural ghetto junkyards:






These are vermin haven.  The bunnies like it too, but I worry that the number of mice breeding is huge.  The county doesn't care in the least.  You can have 100 dead cars and other junk and nothing is done.  Now, for the lowlifes who want to live in garbage, that's great.  However, I caution you if you want to move to Wyoming that you may be living next to garbage dumps.  

There is an up side to this.  I was going to paint my house all one color and make it look nice.  However, since I live between garbage heaps, I'm sticking with the calico motif and painting the walls, trim and skirting whatever colors I have.  Actually, I kind of like the quirky look and since my neighbors have made it clear that there is no reason to care what your lot and house look like, I plan on going with the idea.  Plus, adding some colorful "garden tool statues" (really recycled tools welded together and called "art"), probably a few other cute artsy things in really hideous colors, etc.  It's quite freeing to live where there are zero standards. 

The good news is the really ugly, rotting trailers up the road (that we drive by daily) are being torn out.  I guess the owner finally sold them and maybe the new owner will actually care about having a decent subdivision.  Maybe….. These are the remaining blights, and the demolition of other trailers.




This one is torn down now


Now, just some pictures.

Kingbird

Pincushion cactus blooming

Prickly pear cactus about to bloom—looks like a face!

Locust tree in bloom

Iris in bloom






Monday, February 5, 2018

Most odd-looking critter

We saw this yesterday, the 4th of February, on the way home:




A mule deer without ears—or without the usual big "mule" ears they are named for.  This one has like teddy bear ears.  Slightly creepy…..