One Out of Two

  I'll spare you the moldy pictures of the ick in "before" shots. But here's how I spent the day and you get to see the "after." It does feel nice to have it clean. Didn't lose much that was in the refrigerator. I had emptied it of most real perishibles before I left, and then Om left a week later. Ketchup and pickles and unopened bags of nuts and stuff like that survived.

Best find of the day: We bought this fridge, used, a number of years ago. The bottom bins were missing, and I've never stumbled across any that fit it. I did discover today that two of the large salad green plastic tubs fit in that space. Not perfect but a definite improvement over nothing.

The freezer was truly awful. Everything except the bread (smells OK, but I haven't tasted it yet) was a goner. So it's looking empty, but it's also cleaned up.

The good news is that this job is now done for a while. It takes something monumental to make me clean a refrigerator. This basically took all day. Unloaded a few things from the trailer and picked up the mail from the Post Office.

I'll tackle the big freezer in a couple of days so that the re-frozen spoiled meat will go directly to trash pickup without a day or two in between to thaw and smell bad. Everything except a package of hot dogs from the small freezer could go to the compost.

Have to talk to Om, but maybe I won't run the big freezer again until after my hike. Omer doesn't make any use of it, and there's no point in spending a pile of money to re-stock it if I'm not here.

See From Eggplant to Salad

From Eggplant to Salad

  I am home! Two days ago, at Irene's, we were admiring jewel-like baby eggplant. (They got a late start).

This morning, I was in Ohio with Marianne Duvendack, and we went for a short hike on part the new route of the NCT in Oak Openings Metropark and the Maumee State Forest.

She had graciously let me park at her house. We have a lot in common, so it's fun to visit. The forest was lovely.

I returned home this afternoon to no power and a big mess in the freezer because the power had been out for days. But I had stopped on the way home to get salad fixings, so I did get to have my yummy large salad for dinner. Then I just stuffed it all in the cooler that was still in use from being on the road. The power is on now, and tomorrow will be soon enough to deal with the yuckiness. Things happen. It's part of life.

It was a wonderful trip!

North Country Trail miles for 2021 is at 388.

North Country Trail, Oak Openings Metropark and Maumee SF. Toledo, OH. about 2 miles

See Big Beasties

Seneca Park Zoo- Mostly Big Beasties

  Today was a travel day, and apart from driving several hours in heavy rain it was uneventful. But there are more zoo pictures available. I think I mentioned that it was an exceptional zoo day in that almost all the animals were visible. The last time I was there, the Polar Bear never came out at all. This is Anoki. We got to see her spend some time in the water, and then she climbed out on the rocks.

One of the favorite offerings at the zoo is the Red Pandas. There are supposedly babies this year, but we did not see them. We did see Mom and Dad, but I don't know which is which. They are so adorable, it's hard to remember they are rather viscious.

The snow leopards also have babies. Not only did we not see them, we only saw one of the adults. But he did come out and walk around quite a bit.

The otters are not as exotic, but they were sure fun to watch. Most of my pictures are just streaks of fur in the water. Minnows had just been released in their pool, and they were busily chasing down their snacks. Most of the water animals have viewing areas where you can see below the water surface to observe how the animals swim. That was a lot of fun, but they were still really fast!

We also thought we weren't going to see the tiger, but it was out when we went past the second time. This is an Amur (Siberian) Tiger, native to far eastern Russia, China and Korea. It's status is Threatened. They are generally pale with brown stripes.

And that's all for today. I think there will be one tiny adventure in the morning, and then I'm off to home.

See Bright and Weird

Seneca Park Zoo - Bright and Weird

  I'll show you more of our zoo visit today. Too bad these beauties are poisonous. The yellow banded, and blue poison dart frogs are native to South America. Apparently they are not a danger to each other since they stopped for an afternoon chat.

If I were ever going to go to the expense and trouble of an aquarium, it would be a salt-water aquarium. I don't know the kinds of fish, but they are swimming among corals and anemones.

Here's another frog from Central America. This is the Panamanian Golden Frog. It's critically endangered. I know he's hiding, but at least I got a glimpse of it.

This one is totally weird. This is Henkel's Leaf-Tailed Gecko from Madagascar. There were two of them just plastered flat to the glass like this. From the top side, they looked like dead leaves. You know what's really weird? The front feet seem to have the suction pads in the right place, but look at the back feet. It an animal spreads its back legs out straight, the tops of the feet would be touching the glass. But these geckos seem to be doing just that and there are suction pads holding them in place.

Finally for today, I'll show you an animal which is native to the northeast U.S. But I've never seen one in the wild. This is a Hellbender. It's a giant salamander- the gray blob beneath the log. They are really unique in that they breathe through their skin. To be honest, I thought these were the same as a mudpuppy, but they are not. I'm glad it wasn't completely hiding. This one was only about a foot long, but they can get almost three times as big.

Today was our last day. We finished the book we've been reading together, we played our game, we ate whatever we wanted. It was a nice relaxing day. This blog is supposed to be only the good stuff, so I'll try not to tell you that I'm sad. Tomorrow we each head home although it will take me a couple of days to get there. It's been wonderful!

See African Animals

Seneca Park Zoo - African Animals

  This is the zoo that Irene and I went to 2.5 years ago. We really had a spectacular experience today. Almost all the animals came out to show off for us. I'll just show you the African animals today. They were almost all indoors on our previous trip beause it was winter. Gotta love the giraffes.

I hadn't ever really grasped how much bigger they are than zebras before today.

The elephants are fed part of the time from high feeders to simulate what they would need to do in the wild.

The white rhinocerous was mostly just walking around, but it was startled by a small machine that was moving some materials, and I thought this was a more interesting picture.

The lions were mostly sleeping, but they were fun to watch- acting like any cat of any size. Finally, the male looked up. Check out the one on the hood of the bus in the background.

Finally for today, there were a number of baboons. They were playing and grooming themselves. I liked this one.

Here we are: Irene, Marie, and me. We had a really good time, and there are more pictures for another day.

One more day for Marie and me to spend together. We plan to just chill and enjoy it.

See Seneca Park Zoo- Mammals