Full Navasota Moon
Full Navasota Moon is this Saturday. This full moon rises as the sun sets friday evening at about 620pm. Another nice rise will happen Saturday night at 7pm. It may be cloudy here bouts since we seem to be entering a rainy spell after that "killer drought".
I noticed the pecan trees in my yard must have shed most of their leaves in the drought and are growing a new crop, at the end of October, what will come of that? I have seen this phenom after a hurricane strips all the leaves off, but this is late and this was only a dry spell. Go figger.
10-5-11 Fall Break, that means I have to work, but not teach, hmmmmm, but what if i love teaching 20 year olds, more than anything, I miss them already.
I journeyed over to Gerald Judice's place in Loreauville this morning at 7am. 7 is a perfect time for old guys since it is light enough to see to drive and we have been awake for quite a while so it is just right.
Gerald is helping me do some wedding gift shopping. He loves to fish the Atchafalaya Basin always with an eye for good sinker/floater Cypress wood to match his wood working skills. I know Gerald mostly as a bowl turner and a swing maker ( I love a big swing on long chains and a well turned wooden bowl). Today I seek a beauty of a bowl for my niece/Godchild Katy who is getting married soon, in Navasota. First step is to select a section of wood that has been floating in the swamp for who knows how long (just think of all the turtles, snakes, coons and birds that have passed over that log and all the rains and sunshine). Then after a short conversation of the possibilities for that ancient chunk of xylem, he begins setting it up to turn. I get to watch the entire process (photos too) and in two hours i walk out with Katy's new/old bowl. So very cool, custom made, no two alike. I hope she loves it, for she specifically asked for this gift.
"...it is our work with living soil that provides sustainable alternatives to the triple crisis of climate, energy, and food. No matter how may songs on your iPod, cars in your garage, or books on your shelf, it is plants' ability to capture solar energy that is at the root of it all. without fertile soil, what is life?" Vandana Shiva, 2008, Building Soils for Better Crops
Today I began reading Building Better Soils for Better Crops, Sustainable Soil Management by Magdoff and Van Es, a grand gift from Alisha A. and Jake D. A simple gardener like myself has to become/stay very intimate with the soil and it is never too late to learn more. Thank you for this grand gift of soil knowledge Alisha!
"Follow the appropriateness of the season, consider well the nature and conditions of the soil, and then and only then least labor will bring best success. Rely on one's own idea and not on the orders of nature, then every effort will be futile." Jai Si Xie, 6th Century, China, Building Soils for Better Crops.
Full moon and it is a beauty!
10-6-17 Fall break continues and what a day it is. I even took a well deserved coffee break at a favorite coffee shop on Jefferson St. such a treat AND I get to continue reading in my new soils book. I stopped by by Bach Lunch to eat my salad and listen to the music offering, but was overwhelmed by all of the babies, 1st graders, and the elderly. I just didn't want to have to deal with that crush of humanity on this day. I headed home, stopped in St Martinville to help a lady with a tree issue then off quickly to my house to fall into bed with a fever. No wonder I feel so pissy. Down for a week with a "flu-like virus".
10-9-17 3.5" soaking rain, a drought buster. Big dry is over!
10-10-17 Cade Invitational Soil Judging Contest was held today at the ULL Cade Research Farm. 60 teams from around the state, mostly the southern half, participated 220 individuals strong. We need young people to understand this underappreciated resource, this makes me happy. Thank you Mark Simon for organizing the event.
10-17-17 Lake Martin Road, 7am, wading bird mass exodus, pouring out of the swamp, off to a day of fishing. 710 the rising sun warms my back, a waning gibbous fingernail moon sets in the west.
Idyll
Sky reverberatres
with the smudge of cranes
Their gabble
thaws the clumsy thickness
of winter soaked morning
David Lee, Stone Wind Water, Poems
10-20-17 Journey to Navasota, TX for a Ranch Wedding Extravaganza. Tonight we attend the rehearsal supper, real nice, P feeling puny though. Low grade fever/funk.
10-21-17 Wedding day! P sick in bed, poor darling, she really wanted to be there so bad. Ceremony outside at the bottom of the hill, a long walk. Prairie grass very dry, soil cracked, dry. Threatened rain did not happen, perfect wedding on a perfect wedding day.
10-22-17 Sunday morning, P still sick in bed. Family gathered up at ranch house for breakfast and a visit without all those other people around. Funny thing happened, I'm sitting at a table eating, there is this big bowl full of matches with Paul and Katie's names on them with the date of the wedding, you know how they do that, when Andrew, brother of the bride walks up with a gleam in his eye. He say we decided not to put those (the bowl of matches) out last night with Jean Paul (6 yrs) and his little brother Andrew moving all about and what with the fire danger so high. Smart thinking Andrew, a prairie fire at a ranch wedding would have been a real conversation starter for a generations to come. "Prairie fars" are very exciting. I hauled P home for more days of bed rest and a round of antibiotics.
10-25-17 Cooper Hawk on the split rail fence on the Prairie Au Large restored site in my side yard. So very cool.
10-24-17 Rain today, 1.5".
10-27-17 Buried Barras today, a good bud, a funny friend and his was an amazing life.
This afternoon Victor and William met me at the Zeus bioswale site in central campus which is to be expanded to include a short grass prairie restoration. Prep work completed with guidance from the Prairiedog. A project with a goal for mowing reduction campus wide of 10%.
Hey Beth, today I passed an oil train on my way home! I have not seen one for a long time in this town. Two locomotives pulling a boxcar, pulling 120 loaded oil tanker cars, pulling a boxcar, pushed by two more locomotives. Entering Lafayette from the SE near the airport. We are so stupid and careless and arrogant! (Oh no, not you and I Beth, but some of those other people are though)
Owl Poem
One has to say this for the rounds of life
that keep coming and going; it has worked so far.
The rabbit, after all has never asked if the grass
wanted to live.
Any more than the owl consults with the rabbit.
Acceptance of the world requires
that I bow even to you,
Master of the night.
Mary Oliver, Blue Horses, Poems
10-30-17 GHO (Great Horned Owl) calling in the predawn darkness, I even hear a Barn Owl's lament. It has been years since I have heard a Barn Owl in the hood. Each spring Paula and I would walk over to our neighbor Russel's strip of land next to ours to hear and see the excited parents and terrified fledglings as they learned to fly from and around that old rotten Pecan tree. Hey I even wrote a poem under the watchful eye of David Lee about those days, lets see, hmmmmm, maybe over here...
Well I'll be, lookie what I found!
Night Baby
-nocturn-
SHREEEEEEK!
SHREEEEEEK!
SHREEEEEEK!
Piercing massive walls, openings tightly glazed and shuttered
With call like chalk carelessly pulled across board
Drawn to porch by screams of terror---
Or was it delighted shrieks? Confused, eyes recovering from light,
Listening, air liquid, warm tasting of sweet privet
Prairie almost illuminated by barely adolescent moon
Memory flooded, fledglings shrieking into the darkness of the unknown
Training wheels off---
Hey! This flying thing is almost like riding a bike
SHREEEEEEK!
sorry I just had to do that... But only with my buds.
10-31-17 230am awakened by setting moon through bedroom window. 724am sunrise over the airport runway, we are racing towards Winter Solstice. Gratitude that it rises and sets every day like the fine time piece our solar system is.
11-1-17 Massive rain today in and around Lafayette, 6.5" in north, 1.5" at my house south of the big city, I guess you would call that spotty.
Margaret say November is Thanku season, a time for writing thank you haiku.
I noticed the pecan trees in my yard must have shed most of their leaves in the drought and are growing a new crop, at the end of October, what will come of that? I have seen this phenom after a hurricane strips all the leaves off, but this is late and this was only a dry spell. Go figger.
10-5-11 Fall Break, that means I have to work, but not teach, hmmmmm, but what if i love teaching 20 year olds, more than anything, I miss them already.
I journeyed over to Gerald Judice's place in Loreauville this morning at 7am. 7 is a perfect time for old guys since it is light enough to see to drive and we have been awake for quite a while so it is just right.
Gerald is helping me do some wedding gift shopping. He loves to fish the Atchafalaya Basin always with an eye for good sinker/floater Cypress wood to match his wood working skills. I know Gerald mostly as a bowl turner and a swing maker ( I love a big swing on long chains and a well turned wooden bowl). Today I seek a beauty of a bowl for my niece/Godchild Katy who is getting married soon, in Navasota. First step is to select a section of wood that has been floating in the swamp for who knows how long (just think of all the turtles, snakes, coons and birds that have passed over that log and all the rains and sunshine). Then after a short conversation of the possibilities for that ancient chunk of xylem, he begins setting it up to turn. I get to watch the entire process (photos too) and in two hours i walk out with Katy's new/old bowl. So very cool, custom made, no two alike. I hope she loves it, for she specifically asked for this gift.
"...it is our work with living soil that provides sustainable alternatives to the triple crisis of climate, energy, and food. No matter how may songs on your iPod, cars in your garage, or books on your shelf, it is plants' ability to capture solar energy that is at the root of it all. without fertile soil, what is life?" Vandana Shiva, 2008, Building Soils for Better Crops
Today I began reading Building Better Soils for Better Crops, Sustainable Soil Management by Magdoff and Van Es, a grand gift from Alisha A. and Jake D. A simple gardener like myself has to become/stay very intimate with the soil and it is never too late to learn more. Thank you for this grand gift of soil knowledge Alisha!
"Follow the appropriateness of the season, consider well the nature and conditions of the soil, and then and only then least labor will bring best success. Rely on one's own idea and not on the orders of nature, then every effort will be futile." Jai Si Xie, 6th Century, China, Building Soils for Better Crops.
Full moon and it is a beauty!
10-6-17 Fall break continues and what a day it is. I even took a well deserved coffee break at a favorite coffee shop on Jefferson St. such a treat AND I get to continue reading in my new soils book. I stopped by by Bach Lunch to eat my salad and listen to the music offering, but was overwhelmed by all of the babies, 1st graders, and the elderly. I just didn't want to have to deal with that crush of humanity on this day. I headed home, stopped in St Martinville to help a lady with a tree issue then off quickly to my house to fall into bed with a fever. No wonder I feel so pissy. Down for a week with a "flu-like virus".
10-9-17 3.5" soaking rain, a drought buster. Big dry is over!
10-10-17 Cade Invitational Soil Judging Contest was held today at the ULL Cade Research Farm. 60 teams from around the state, mostly the southern half, participated 220 individuals strong. We need young people to understand this underappreciated resource, this makes me happy. Thank you Mark Simon for organizing the event.
10-17-17 Lake Martin Road, 7am, wading bird mass exodus, pouring out of the swamp, off to a day of fishing. 710 the rising sun warms my back, a waning gibbous fingernail moon sets in the west.
Idyll
Sky reverberatres
with the smudge of cranes
Their gabble
thaws the clumsy thickness
of winter soaked morning
David Lee, Stone Wind Water, Poems
10-20-17 Journey to Navasota, TX for a Ranch Wedding Extravaganza. Tonight we attend the rehearsal supper, real nice, P feeling puny though. Low grade fever/funk.
10-21-17 Wedding day! P sick in bed, poor darling, she really wanted to be there so bad. Ceremony outside at the bottom of the hill, a long walk. Prairie grass very dry, soil cracked, dry. Threatened rain did not happen, perfect wedding on a perfect wedding day.
10-22-17 Sunday morning, P still sick in bed. Family gathered up at ranch house for breakfast and a visit without all those other people around. Funny thing happened, I'm sitting at a table eating, there is this big bowl full of matches with Paul and Katie's names on them with the date of the wedding, you know how they do that, when Andrew, brother of the bride walks up with a gleam in his eye. He say we decided not to put those (the bowl of matches) out last night with Jean Paul (6 yrs) and his little brother Andrew moving all about and what with the fire danger so high. Smart thinking Andrew, a prairie fire at a ranch wedding would have been a real conversation starter for a generations to come. "Prairie fars" are very exciting. I hauled P home for more days of bed rest and a round of antibiotics.
10-25-17 Cooper Hawk on the split rail fence on the Prairie Au Large restored site in my side yard. So very cool.
10-24-17 Rain today, 1.5".
10-27-17 Buried Barras today, a good bud, a funny friend and his was an amazing life.
This afternoon Victor and William met me at the Zeus bioswale site in central campus which is to be expanded to include a short grass prairie restoration. Prep work completed with guidance from the Prairiedog. A project with a goal for mowing reduction campus wide of 10%.
Hey Beth, today I passed an oil train on my way home! I have not seen one for a long time in this town. Two locomotives pulling a boxcar, pulling 120 loaded oil tanker cars, pulling a boxcar, pushed by two more locomotives. Entering Lafayette from the SE near the airport. We are so stupid and careless and arrogant! (Oh no, not you and I Beth, but some of those other people are though)
Owl Poem
One has to say this for the rounds of life
that keep coming and going; it has worked so far.
The rabbit, after all has never asked if the grass
wanted to live.
Any more than the owl consults with the rabbit.
Acceptance of the world requires
that I bow even to you,
Master of the night.
Mary Oliver, Blue Horses, Poems
10-30-17 GHO (Great Horned Owl) calling in the predawn darkness, I even hear a Barn Owl's lament. It has been years since I have heard a Barn Owl in the hood. Each spring Paula and I would walk over to our neighbor Russel's strip of land next to ours to hear and see the excited parents and terrified fledglings as they learned to fly from and around that old rotten Pecan tree. Hey I even wrote a poem under the watchful eye of David Lee about those days, lets see, hmmmmm, maybe over here...
Well I'll be, lookie what I found!
Night Baby
-nocturn-
SHREEEEEEK!
SHREEEEEEK!
SHREEEEEEK!
Piercing massive walls, openings tightly glazed and shuttered
With call like chalk carelessly pulled across board
Drawn to porch by screams of terror---
Or was it delighted shrieks? Confused, eyes recovering from light,
Listening, air liquid, warm tasting of sweet privet
Prairie almost illuminated by barely adolescent moon
Memory flooded, fledglings shrieking into the darkness of the unknown
Training wheels off---
Hey! This flying thing is almost like riding a bike
SHREEEEEEK!
sorry I just had to do that... But only with my buds.
10-31-17 230am awakened by setting moon through bedroom window. 724am sunrise over the airport runway, we are racing towards Winter Solstice. Gratitude that it rises and sets every day like the fine time piece our solar system is.
11-1-17 Massive rain today in and around Lafayette, 6.5" in north, 1.5" at my house south of the big city, I guess you would call that spotty.
Margaret say November is Thanku season, a time for writing thank you haiku.
for abundance in
voices of wisdom and comfort
I give thanks for you
We, I am grateful for the poets among us...
OK, that is it, get out and enjoy being out and the moon and the sunset of your life, enjoy the loves of your life.
peace love possumhugs
BT
Thanks for including my little Thanku poem. Sorry to hear about the flu-like thing. We thought of you last night at La Poussiere.
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