What’s happening here? We finally got some rain and….
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‘Shrooms.
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Giant ass ‘shrooms are happening here…
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Like this one the husband brought in the other day.
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Dead mice are also happening. And while part of me is sad it had to come to this…. the other part remembers having her car towed to the mechanic 3 times in one month because mice were nesting in the engine and chewing their way out. So dead mice? Yay.
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They make me smile.
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Lord Dudley Mountcatten? He’d much rather I ditch the poison and let the live ones in the house.
It had been a while since we visited our farming neighbors across the road, so the other day we took a walk.
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Unfortunately they weren’t home, but we took the time to check out what was happening on their farm. There’s something about strolling through verdant fields of crops that just makes me smile.
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Every time we visit there’s something new.
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This time it was a veritable village of greenhouses.
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These seemingly sprung up overnight, with full irrigation… which must have been quite a feat.
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A house addition was under way as well.
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Why was there a skeleton prominently displayed on the barn wall? It’s probably better if we don’t ask.
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Ugh. I suppose a row of kale was inevitable.
🤢
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There’s our Barn Mahal/man cave in the background.
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We never realize how much it dominates the landscape until we see it from far away. Oops.
☺️
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On our way out we had to stop by the farm stand they opened when Covid shut down most of their markets.
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And naturally we came home with a few things.
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Lettuce, spinach, potatoes and blueberry yogurt. You can’t get much fresher than that.
Possibilities of seasonal views. Which means – From your heavily wooded lot, in the dead of winter when all the trees are bare, if you stand on the edge of your bathroom sink and crane your neck to the north? You might see a tiny section of ice covered pond water.
Technically they’re not lying, but still.
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Lord Dudley Mountcatten loves his toys. He loves them so much he shreds an average of one a week.
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It’s a veritable catnip mouse slaughterhouse around here.
Ever since we painted the barn/man cave the perfect shade of red, I’ve been sputtering about recovering the porch furniture because now… it clashes.
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I recently bought some color coordinated fabric and found a local woman who’s going to do the job.
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Me… sew? Yeah, that’s not happening. So while I was waiting for the seamstress to tell me she was done with prom and wedding dress alterations, I saw this:
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WTH?
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The edges of all the cushions had been shredded!
I ranted, I blamed woodchucks. I cursed, I blamed mice. I sputtered, I blamed chipmunks. But guess what?
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The real culprit..
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Was a bird looking for nesting material.
Mother Nature. She has all manner of ways to drive you crazy.
If you’ve ever visited my state and had a conversation with the locals, you might have been baffled by some of our regional expressions. You had no idea what the hell we were talking about? No worries… I’m here to help.
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We say this a lot. (But please ignore the ‘how’. It should be now.)
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Hint – “The County” is usually uttered with derision in southern Maine. Aroostook is potato country, way up by the Canadian border…. we have to pump sunlight to those people.
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This a is a very popular word in my neck of the woods. It affirms a position as well as cutting off the need for further discussion. Mainers can be a taciturn bunch.
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Personally, I don’t use this term. The word tourist and it’s synonyms… snowbirds, outta staters, Massholes ( specific to people from the Boston area ) are much more common. But these people do swarm our best areas from June to September and are extremely easy to spot.
While I enjoy a good Hendrix riff as much as the next girl, the purple I’m talking about is of a different variety.
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Irises!
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Japanese Iris to be exact.
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They’re smaller and easier to deal with than their larger cousins.
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But still put on a lovely show.
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These pictures were taken a few weeks ago, before Maine started its horrible drought and heat wave. Things were still green, instead of the crunchy brown they are now. It’s amazing how fast the change can come. Today’s temperature?
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91 and feels like 104…. at 9:00am!! Unheard of in my state. Our two window a/c units are working overtime and barely keeping up. Even His Lordship is feeling it….
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Which is why I put him on an ice pack.
When I tried to remove it?
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I got the look.
😳
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Where there's only one step from the sublime to the ridiculous.