Misc Photos

Yikes!

Up A Tree

We had the dead and broken branches trimmed from around our house today by a crew that ordinarily would be ice fishing in Minnesota at this time a year. We called a couple local places but either they never returned our calls or told us that it would be at least a couple weeks before they could even think about giving us an estimate. These folks were going door to door with flyers. They were here for over 4 hours and they worked on seven trees total with 4 of them working at death defying heights without a net.

While watching the crew of four guys working we chatted up the owner of the company. He told us he has collected a couple hundred cards from the different tree companies working in the area. While helping clear out Hitchcock Woods he got to talking with someone familiar with the workings of the city and he found out that in the ice storm of 2004 the city collected 80,000 cubic yards of debris and so far from this storm, and they are nowhere near done, as evidenced by the piles of trees lining along our road, they have collected over 800,000 cubic yards…

Empty Christmas Wonderland

Christmas in Hopelands

Donna and I walked the 1-1/2 miles up to Hopeland Gardens to see the annual light display, but we didn’t go in. We couldn’t. Even though it was advertised as being open on the 24th, it wasn’t. I poked the camera through the fence and took the above photo of the lights that were on and the empty walkways surrounding them.

Horsing Around

Horsing Around

Just trying new stuff with the blog. Bigger pictures for one. And I may just do a restyle for the new year…

Started up, went down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 1280

South Boundary Morning

South Boundary Morning

It’s the weekend so we opted to sleep in. And sleep in we did, getting out of bed at nearly 8:00 AM. The only problem was, at almost that exact same moment a mile away, the 10k Whiskey Road Race was starting and the course travels right down our little street. Our plan had been to drive to downtown Aiken, get breakfast, drop off some dry cleaning and visit the St Mary’s School’s 25th annual Chocolate Festival, but by the time we were dressed and ready to go the first runners were trotting by our house. This meant that for the next 30-45 minutes hundreds of runners of all shapes and sizes and speeds would follow.

Plan B was implemented, we walked. It was a beautiful fall morning and it is only about 2-1/2 miles one way through very shady neighborhoods and along the low traffic dirt roads of the horse district to our destination. We ended up at the New Moon for muffins and drinks. We used to eat here more frequently, but the prices have gone way up. In spite of that it has gotten very popular, making finding an outdoor table impossible. Reminds me of that old old Yogi Berra quote: “Nobody goes there anymore. It’s too crowded.”

By the time we were finished with all our running around we had walked 6.8 miles.

Be Funky Beard

BeFunky_Sox-Beard

The night before last’s photo run through something called underpainting1 on BeFunky.com, an online photo editor with effects.

Some more (and hopefully the last) Red Sox Beard updates:

  1. Those dollar tickets for next Wednesday’s Dollar Beard Night game against the Orioles are “until supplies last” and there is no mention of how big the supply is.
  2. My RedSox Blue Beard photo made the official gallery: http://mlb.mlb.com/bos/social/virtual_beard_gallery.jsp?transactionId=318226764

Its Thursaturday!

Walking On A Horse

It is a day off of work because of the holiday, so even though it is Thursday it feels like a Saturday. Tomorrow won’t feel like Sunday because it is back to work. We went for a walk in Hitchcock Woods this morning and this afternoon I listened to the FRS on the radio while Donna baked brownies to send over to a local National Guard Unit in Afghanistan.

Last night we missed out on the fireworks at Fort Gordon in Augusta because we were scared off by the weather (they had them anyway.) So tonight we got on the tandem and rode over to the east side of town to a small festival that was going to have fireworks. They didn’t have them for budgetary reasons. They will have fireworks at the end of tomorrow night’s Augusta Greenjackets game. Maybe we’ll go see them if the weather cooperates and if we feel like sitting through 2-1/2 hours of stupid corporate sponsored, fan participation stunts interrupted by a baseball game to get to them.

Merrell And ?

We went for a 4 mile walk in Hitchcock Woods this morning. Started at the Fulmer’s Stable entrance and headed uphill until we couldn’t go any further then looped back a different way down the hill. Because our start point, being near the stables, is a major horse riding meeting spot, we have to keep our heads down while walking around near there to avoid the recycled hay piles. As we walked I kept noticing a lot of small flowers along the trail. About a third of the way through our walk I decided to document all the different ones I saw.

Because I can only positively identify what the very last picture is of, the first person who can identify the kind of flower, plant our fungi in all of the first nine pictures will win a fabulous prize of my choosing. Just leave your answers in the comments.

Started up, went down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 1230