Of course, some weeks here lately would have been better off missed. The horrible shootings at Virginia Tech and the recent bombings in Baghdad being prime examples of things we could all wish had never happened. The world is an ugly place at times. Hopefully, one of the good things that can come of this sadness is that, at least, some us will redouble our efforts to do good and to love our neighbors as ourselves.
I’m sure you’ll be happy to learn that I finally finished Chernow’s biography of Alexander Hamilton, LOL. As I said earlier, it’s a great book and I recommend it. Hamilton was certainly a genius. He had his own personal faults, but he was one of the great people who helped to set this country on a good foundation.
I’ve decided to go back a bit farther in time with my reading now. I’m working through some of Plato’s writings at the moment. I’ve read some of the ancients in earlier times, but it’s fun to get a fresh taste of them at this point in life. Who knows? They may still be able to teach me something before it’s too late.
What other diversions are sprinkled through my life, you ask? Well, my wife gave me an early birthday present – a subscription to Major League Baseball’s games on TV so I can watch my favorite team, the Cardinals, through the rest of the season. I expect to devote a good share of time to watching their ups and downs. Unfortunately, so far I’ve seen them lose more than they’ve won. Ah, but good baseball fans never give up. We didn’t last year and look what it got us – a World Series victory!
Something else that added some spice to my life recently was becoming the victim of a credit card scam. Some conscienceless person managed to charge a couple notebook computers to my card. Unfortunately, for him or her a detective was waiting when they delivered the packages to an Ohio address. I’m not sure that my quick alert to the credit card company and a call to the company that sold the computer was the sole reason for that happening, but I like to think it might be.
Another of Dickie and my evening entertainments is working through the old “Upstairs, Downstairs” series on Netflix dvd’s. We didn’t have TV back in the days when the series was first run, so we’re catching up, so to speak. The worst thing about it is that our hearing is deteriorating and we sometimes find it difficult to understand those English accents.
And, yes, I’m still taking pictures. Here’s a bee I found pollinating some lavender the other day. It’s good to see some bees around. From the reports of their mass elimination, I was afraid they might not show up around here this year:
We still take our daily walks, camera in tow. That’s how I captured this mourning dove on film the other day. He was high enough that he didn’t flinch when I pointed the lens at him:
Lately, when we walk by the horse corral a few blocks away, we’ve been seeing a small covey of quail that appear to be using a blackberry patch as a nesting place. Here are three of them that posed for me. If you don’t know, the males are the ones with the dark brown rings around their necks. Females are the plainer sort, like the one in the middle of the picture below. Both male and female Calfornia quails sport a plume on the top of their heads:
Enough for now!
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