NCT Hike- Just Fun

 
Met up with pals Connie and Jerry Allen to grab a few more miles toward Hike 100.



We hiked from Highbridge to Dilling Road on the NCT- a piece I just hiked earlier this year, but that's ok. Here's the beaver pond in August.



Some pretty little orange mushrooms.



Here's home for the night. Connie and Jerry are in a camper.



If you know them, you know that Buster always goes along too.




North Country Trail- Highbridge to Dilling 6 miles. Hike 100 Total= 51 miles

	See Same Hike Other Direction
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Great Balls of Fire! Or Not

 
Great Balls of Fire! Literally and in an exclamatory sense. It's only mornings like this one when you can really look at that great ball of fire in the sky.



A few minutes later the red color was gone, but the scene was magical. This tree is nothing but an annoyance to mow around, except that I consider it my own private bonsai tree.


And the moon tonight was neither a ball, nor is it fiery, since it has no fire of its own. But I loved the blue sky.



In an exclamatory sense... Great balls of fire! There was no water last night when I went to bed. What the heck? We just had a new pump put on the well this past winter (at great expense). And, um... it's certainly not frozen this week. So I was not looking forward to getting in the well pit. I did check the breaker, which was fine. Laid awake agonizing over it all. So, this morning I dialed the pump man, and just thought I'd turn on the faucet while the call was going through. Water! Hung up, since I don't like talking to the pump man who is always annoyed with me.

I have no explanation for this. The well is not dry. It's 165 feet deep with 85 feet of water in it. It never ran dry when I was doing two loads of laundry a day and cooking for herds of people; I'm sure it's not in trouble with two of us who may do two loads of laundry a week and avoid cooking like the plague.

Someone suggested that new pumps have a thermal shut-off if they get too hot. This is my only guess.

	See Foggy Day- for same tree in afternoon fog
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Yellow Hen and Chicks

 
I've showed you this before but not for a long time. This is one of the hens and chicks I have growing all over my garden. There are some that are hardy, and this is perhaps the hardiest. It spreads like wildfire. The rosettes are small- the largest are maybe 2 inches across. I nicknamed it "green star."



Genus Sempervivum, sometimes also known as houseleek. When the rosettes become mature they send up a single impressive scaly stalk with flowers on the end.



A lot of them have pink flowers, but these are yellow. This rosette will then die.



No clue what species it is. There are just too many choices. I was given a handful of these from the Matthaei Botanical Garden maybe 25 years ago. It turned out to be a great filler in my rock garden. Now it's everywhere.

In other news: I worked hard on paperwork from the Writers' Rendezvous, and did errands. Now we have no water. No clue why. I'll call the pump guys in the morning.

	See Sempervivum!
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Little Green Things

 
This little tickler was crawling on my arm the other day. I managed to convince him to sit on my thumb. Bugguide has helped me decide this is an assassin bug nymph (instar). A very early one.



Here's looking at you!



The next day I found this interesting tracing in the duckweed at the edge of Hamlin Lake. Since I love patterns, I had to snap it.



But what would have caused it? Turns out the gentle waves were forcing the little green floating leaves out of a small notch in the edge of this sharp rock every time a wave bounced off the seawall, creating a line. Then they would float out and be caught by the next wave coming in, so they would circle around... and again and again....



In other news: I applied for two things having to do with books. I'll let you know if anything comes of either of those endeavors. I wrote a chapter in DMS Mistletoe. And I did laundry.

	See A Good Day to be Green (katydid instar)
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Red Roots

 
Today was the Manistee Book Expo, and after it was done I walked the Riverwalk. This was my most interesting find. Who knew that willows can have red roots?



I thought maybe I was being fooled by two trees growing close together, but I did find some other pictures on line of willows that had roots growing into water that were very red. These were really floating, wafting in and out with the gentle waves.



It was a gorgeous day. A little warm, but not unbearable.



I sold a few books, visited with a friend, took this walk. I didn't sleep well at all last night. Is it too early to go to bed?

	See Manistee Riverwalk Again
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