After two weeks, I decided I’d had enough of the West Virginia place.
Um, maybe that’s not entirely true. I love life in the country. I’m just trying to convince myself that I’d had enough, hoping it would make being back in this crazy, crowded, metropolitan Hell more tolerable. Really I had to come home to do chores and stuff.
Anyway, why I came home isn’t important. The ride home is what I’m talking about here. We hadn’t, as we’d hoped, had many opportunities to ride our motorcycles in West Virginia. Not only was it horribly hot, I was way too busy with work stuff to get away. So I decided I’d ride my bike home. If I can’t do any riding in Maryland during the week, at least I’ll have the rides to and from under my belt.
Although cloudy and rainy most of the morning here in Maryland, sunny, blue skies were supposed to prevail by afternoon. All was pretty much fine weather-wise. I did get rained on a little bit. But what was not fine was this weird thing that happened while I was on I-70. Before I describe said weird thing, you need to look at a picture of my helmet.
Red arrow = air intake; blue arrow = air vent.
I wear a full-face helmet. With the visor/face-shield down, there’s not a lot of circulation and sometimes, just like a car window, the visor can fog up. That’s why many helmets are designed with some sort of ventilation. The red arrow shows the vent on my helmet. That air is directed upward so that it blows out of those holes indicated by the blue arrow onto the inside of the face-shield, reducing the chances of fogging. My face-shield is up in this picture. When it’s down, those vents are on the inside with my head, about three inches from my nose.
While cruising along on I-70, to my complete surprise, a large bumblebee hit my leg and then flew up and hit my helmet. It was stuck right in front of my face. From what I could see, it was stuck, holding on for dear life right near that vent. I couldn’t look too closely because I had to watch the road. I turned my head to the left and to the right several times thinking the bee would just blow away.
It didn’t.
Even though the bee was only three inches from my nose, it didn’t seem to be moving, so I wasn’t too freaked out. Yes, I was a little weirded out. But not enough to risk my life stopping on the shoulder of an interstate highway. Besides, I knew I was almost at my destination. And how much harm could a bee do while clinging to the outside of my helmet?
Once I did stop, I was quite surprised to realize the bee was on the inside. It had ridden there, mere inches from my nose for about fifteen minutes!
The Bee
What are the chances of a bee hitting my leg, bouncing off and getting sucked into that tiny little air vent? Fortunately for me, either the collision, being sucked into the vent, or a grisly combination of both killed the bee. Can you imagine having a bee fly into and around inside your helmet? There’s not that much extra space in there, trust me. (In case you are wondering about the big, black thing inside my helmet, that’s my backrest. I usually stick my helmet there when I get off of the bike.)
Other than that, the ride was pretty much uneventful. And you know what? It’s actually kind of nice to be home.
While traveling in Europe recently, we noticed that there seems to be a lot more tunnels (highway and railway) than here in the US. One might argue that there are a lot more hills. But doesn’t it seem like tunnels would be more difficult to build than roadways? And more expensive?
We didn’t expend too much mental energy trying to figure it out. But we did mention it to our Belgian friends. During one of our many conversations, the kind you have when stuck for hour after hour in a car during a long road trip, Hubby or I asked “Why are there so many tunnels here?” Yves’ reply was interesting. And pretty amusing. He said, “Well, because, unlike Americans, we like to make things look nicer and tunnel under stuff that’s in the way. Like mountains. You Americans just blast your way through.”
Good point. Here’s the perfect example of that very thing.
Sideling Hill in Maryland
There’s already a road over this mountain. It’s just a regular road, as opposed to a high-speed interstate. So when I-68 was being built, they blasted the mountain away. This is just west of Hancock, Maryland on I-68, not far at all from where I-68 and I-70 meet.
I commonly call it “the cut” because you can see the giant notch that was cut out of the mountain from many miles away. You can READ MORE ABOUT SIDELING HILL if you like.
A closer look at Sideling Hill.
Seeing the different layers of rock is sort of cool, but it would be more fun if we had a pass like this one.
Coming up with topics for this Blog isn’t always easy. It’s something I struggle with often. There are often snippets of stuff to Blog about, but that would be like showing you a pile of fabric scraps instead of a finished quilt. Sometimes scarps can be cool though. So today I’m going the scrap route.
Hubby and I have been working on a few very different projects of late. Some of those projects are bigger than others. Beautifying our long-neglected MD yard is one of them. I’ll give you the whole scoop on that later. For now, though, I’m giving you some pictures.
Rain Isn’t Always Bad
There’s just something about droplets of water on plants the intrigues me. It makes for some interesting images, that’s for sure.
NOTE: you’ll really appreciate the images if you click on each for a larger view.
Droplets on Leaf
Look at the colors. I tweaked the photo a bit to make the colors stand out more. And I really like the result. I never realized that the stems of the honeysuckle were sort of purple. That bush has the coolest colors. Purple stems, green leaves, and coral-and-pink flowers. Like these…
Honeysuckle Flower
I still don’t know the exact type of honeysuckle, or whether it blooms all Summer or just during the Spring. I just love the colors on this plant.
Honeysuckle Flower
The blooms in the pictures shared above are slightly past their prime. Here’s one that’s just emerging…
Newly-emerging Honeysuckle Bloom
I’ve bought quite a few flowers over the past couple of weeks. I’ve planted some of them. Hubby has planted some, too. But there are more to go. Here are some marigolds that still wait to be planted.
Wet Marigolds
Dry Plants Are Interesting, Too
Plants don’t have to be wet to be interesting. Last April, I planted a little shade garden. In it are a Mountain Laurel bush, several ferns, and a hosta or two. All of the plants have actually done very well. And now the Mountain Laurel is starting to bloom.
Mountain Laurel
The blooms are quite interesting, wouldn’t you say?
Mountain Laurel
But the ferns? The ferns are VERY interesting. I’ll have to get a shot of the whole garden. These close-ups are awesome, if I do say so myself. But I’d like to show off the whole garden.
Fern
The ferns stayed green all during the Winter. The multiple feet of snow we had smushed them a bit, but they survived. And now they are huge.
I’ll try to get a picture of the whole garden to share with you soon.
Yesterday was one of those I-just-can’t-stay-in-this-house-today days for me. That’s okay in a way because it was my day off. I have plenty of stuff that needs to be done around here that I could have done instead. But the weather was supposed to be in the 80s and not very humid. I figured I could do my chores on Saturday and Sunday when it’s supposed to be rainy.
So, I threw my camera equipment into my backpack, grabbed the keys to Shannon’s car, and headed out for the day. Her car hasn’t seen much use, so I figured it could use some exercise.
I wanted to do something different. Something urban. Don’t ask me why I decided to be among people. I’m not usually a city girl. Maybe it’s because I was driving Shannon’s car. She is a city girl. Since we almost never go to Washington, DC, despite the fact that it’s only about 30 miles away, I decided to go there. The last two times I was there, I went to the National Mall / Capitol area. So this time I decided to head to Georgetown. I thought it might be cool to see this end of the C & O Canal (as opposed to this end).
Mid-afternoon temps hit 92 degrees (taken at just one of my MANY traffic stops).
Bad idea. Bad, bad idea.
I was totally not prepared. I mean, I pretty much knew how to get to Georgetown. But on the whole, I don’t know DC very well. I didn’t take a map. I also didn’t bother to check out what was going on in Georgetown yesterday. As I learned later, this is graduation weekend at Georgetown University which, of course, is in Georgetown. Traffic SUCKED. Traffic was heavy all of the way through the city, but it got really bad in and around Georgetown.
I made one wrong turn on M Street and ended up heading away from the main shopping area. No worries, though. I have a great sense of direction and knew I’d get back there eventually. I was almost back to that spot, though, when I made another wrong turn and ended up heading across the Potomac into Virginia. I could have just turned around and headed back at that point, but opposing traffic heading back into Georgetown was backed up all the way across the bridge. I’d already had my fill of the whole stop-and-go scene, so I hopped onto the George Washington Memorial Parkway, instead. It pretty much parallels the Potomac River from Great Falls, Virginia (northern end) to Mt. Vernon (southern end). Because one of my Flickr contacts (Nikographer [Jon]) has shot lots of great critter pics there, I made a spur-of-the-moment decision to head to Great Falls National Park. I’d never been to the Virginia side before.
Aside from the kamikaze commuters doing 80 mph on the GWMP, my drive to the Falls was without incident. NOTE: click on any of the images below for a larger view.
Great Falls of the Potomac
Great Falls National Park in Virginia has three “official” overlooks providing views of the river. You can see it from many more spots, too, where some of the gazillion visitors over the years have blazed their own paths to the river’s edge. An average of seven people die from drowning here each year. Not all, but most of them fall into the river after blazing or following one of these paths and climbing on the rocks. Idiots. I stuck to the overlooks (a sure sign of impending old age!).
Overhead shot of a Great Blue Heron
I didn’t realize until I was at the Falls that I’d left my zoom lens at home. I was so bummed. There were Great Blue Herons all over the place, fishing for lunch. Luckily, I had my doubler (doubles the power of a lens). That did allow some degree of closeness. But I would’ve ended up with much better bird shots if I’d had the zoom lens along. These are just snapshots to give you an idea of what I saw.
That Great Blue Heron was on the rocks right below the overlook. I got a couple of half-decent snapshots of him (or her).
My favorite GBH shot of the day.Same bird, different angle.
There were a lot of international visitors there, which surprised me. I never knew Great Falls drew tourists from afar.
Another thing that sort of surprised me were how many people would come to the overlook, “ooh” and “aah” about the water, but not even bother to notice the birds. These are BIG birds; they’re 3.2 to 4.5 feet tall with wingspans of 5.5 to 6.6 feet.
When I left the park, I was not at all happy to discover that traffic on 495 was stopped. I wouldn’t have needed to be on there for long, but I didn’t feel like sitting in traffic. So I just stayed on the Georgetown Pike. I’d never been on the road before, but I figured with a name like that, it HAD to lead back to Georgetown. I was right. But it was even more crowded and congested than it had been earlier in the day. So I just decided to get out of the city. Remember, I don’t know my way around DC. So I just drove. When I saw a road name I recognized as a route to the suburbs (New Hampshire Avenue), I followed it. Easier said than done. It’s not a straight road. And the traffic! Ugh.
I followed that route until I saw a sign for 193 heading east, which was the direction I was seeking. I recognized that road name, too, so I followed it for a while. Another mistake. More heavy traffic. When I got to US-1, a road I know runs north/south and passes relatively close to my house, I turned right. Yet another HUGE mistake. That right turn not only put me on US-1 south (the wrong direction), it put me into the heart of College Park.
The University of Maryland is based in College Park. And guess what yesterday was at UM? Graduation day. Crap. (That’s not the expletive I chose, I’m just keeping things clean here.)
I should have known it was graduation day there because a close friend of the family actually graduated from UM yesterday.
Jaime Gibbons (the graduate) and her sister, Nadya Spice.
Anyway… traffic CRAWLED through College Park. It was awful. I was so happy to see signs for the Capitol Beltway. But then, of course, the Capitol Beltway was stop and go, too. I got back onto 193, heading east again, to get to the BW Parkway. Traffic was stopped on that, too. So I just stayed on 193.
By that point, I’d spent most of my day in the car. I still wanted to get OUTSIDE. So I headed for the Patuxent National Wildlife Refuge. The last time I’d gone there was in January. I am still kicking myself for not having that zoom lens with me, but I got some neat shots anyway.
A toad! How appropriate.The first time I have EVER actually seen a duck coming out of one of these boxes here or at any of my other many visits to wildlife refuges all over the country.A Blue Grosbeak; first time sighting for me.Lily pads and other aquatic plants.
It was a LONG day. It wasn’t nearly as relaxing or refreshing as I’d hoped it would be, but you know what they say… even a bad day off is better than a great day at work.
Most days here at the ToadMama abode are pretty uneventful. Notice I said “most” days? Yesterday was no different.
Actually, there was some excitement yesterday. Eric came over for dinner. That’s my youngest child. One of the things we talked about was whether I had anything exciting planned for his 21st birthday. Yep, my baby will be 21.
Gasp!
More on the visit and what I cooked later. But first, some doggie pics. I couldn’t resist snapping this shot of the dogs yesterday morning.
All three dogs asleep while I work. Notice the biggest dog in the smallest (cat) bed again?
I’m not sure why Meg likes the cat bed so much, but she does. She likes to lay in some of the strangest positions in it, too. (Remember my infamous Meg’s Dilemma slide-show?)
Check out yesterday’s position…
Meg under the pillow.
She’s one of those dogs that likes to fluff (i.e., scratch loudly at forever) her bedding. Whether it’s her dog bed, a pile of sheets waiting to be washed, a pile of bras, a scatter rug (our rugs in WV are always a mess) or the carpet, she’s a scratcher. She stayed like that for a long time, too.
Once she got up, I moved all of the dog beds out into the hallway so I could vacuum. And this is what happened MINUTES later.
Princess Belle
Yep, she’s laying on all three dog beds.
Now back to Eric’s visit. I don’t have any pictures of him to share. Sorry. I’ll have to work on that, too. I’m way better at taking pictures of inanimate stuff and nature than of people. In case you hadn’t noticed.
Anyway… for dinner last night, I made Garlic Lime Chicken Fajitas. Hubby and I have been in search of the perfect fajita recipe for the longest time. We’ve eaten fajitas in a lot of different places, but our favorites by far have always come from Plaza Garibaldi right here in Glen Burnie / Pasadena, Maryland.
Last night’s attempt? They were “good, but still not Garibaldi’s” fajitas. Hubby said they tasted too limey. Eric and I both liked them. Hubby said I should have served them with insalata (he actually said that). That’s lettuce, which I did not have.
The point of this whole story is not to tell you about my good-but-not-Garibaldi fajitas, but about the recipe I used. It was one of McCormick’s new Recipe Inspirations, which I just had to buy because the packaging is way cool (unlike me, as evidenced by the fact that I still use terms like “way cool”).
McCormick's Recipe Inspirations come in way cool packages.
If you follow the Recipe Inspirations link you’ll see they have six different flavors. I bought the Quesadilla Casserole one, too, but we haven’t tried it yet.
Not only is the packaging fun, but there’s an index card-sized recipe card on the back that lists all of the ingredients as well as the preparation instructions so you can easily replicate the recipe without having to buy this pre-measured spice pack again. Although, for folks that don’t keep stuff like cumin on hand (we always have cumin on hand), this pre-measured pack is the way to go.
So… that was our excitement yesterday. I hope your day was just as much or maybe even more fun!
I headed north to watch Brianna play lacrosse again last night.
Action Shot
Unlike the last game, when I went by myself to pick her up, Amy and the boys were there, too. Which was good and bad. Good because it’s always nice to see Amy and the boys, too. Bad because Amy and I alternated between chatting and watching Joey entertain himself with a unique tug of war game and THAT means I didn’t concentrate on taking pictures.
Celebrating a Teammate's Goal
So even though the light was better AND I had the better camera with me, I didn’t get many good Brianna LAX shots. I did get a few really cute Joey pictures, though.
This black and white image might be my favorite.
Pull, Joe. Pull!
He was having quite a good time.
There were quite a few giggles to be heard.
Are you wondering yet what he was pulling on?
It’s sort of like that scene from Where the Wild Things Are (the book!) where Max has something on the end of a rope, but you can’t see what it is.
I'm not sure who was more entertained, Joey, the dog, or Amy and me.
Gaige was there, too, but he had a bad day at school and was being punished. So, no pics of Gaige in this post.
That means I can only share pics of two out of three grandkids. I’ll try to capture some shots of Gaige next time.
