THE MOMENT I GLANCED

into the sky and saw this great show that was about to begin, I could just feel the urge to blog come flying back in for a landing!  It was late afternoon and bitterly cold when I stopped the car in the middle of the road (sorry, there was no shoulder) to enjoy a  performance of one-hundred and fifty-six geese (give or take a few). 



I had to put the passenger-side window down, and maneuver myself into the passenger seat in order to film the show.  I shivered, I think from excitement (It could have been the cold).  The geese were a noisy bunch, everyone talking over everyone else!  As they landed, they seemed to be  discussing exactly where to look for the best smorgasbord of corn kernels, "I think we should head out in this direction!" squawked the lead male, heading off to my right.

It wasn't long, however, before I heard a small group of females yelling to each other that he didn't know what the heck he was doing.  Didn't he know, the best place to search for food was back in the other direction?!

A little bit of confusion ensued, and all the males were clearly miffed.  But pretty soon the crowd had reversed its route, the ornery clump of females leading the way. 

I could tell there was some competition going on, everyone hoping to be first to discover a superior feeding area.

But no one stopped for very long to eat contentedly.  The manure that was recently spread on this field was likely low on corn. "What does this farmer feed to his cows, anyway?!" Many of the geese were grumbling.  They just kept moving along,  searching the ground but not finding much.  Then I heard one of them suggest that the farmer must have served his cows quinoa.  There was a lot of laughter.  But the lead male (who was no longer in the lead) snapped, "Shut up!"

And from there it was all downhill. 


No one was happy.
I wondered if the show was almost over.
I was shivering now and it was definitely from the cold.
I sensed that the small group of Lucy-Gooseys had had enough.  "Why on earth he brought us here, I don't know," one of them shouted to the others, and just like that, they rose into the air, leaving.

Right after, there was a grand and majestic mass exodus!
My twenty-minute show was over!
I put the window up and drove home.
Ready to blog.
...
...

I THOUGHT IT WAS DONE.

I THOUGHT IT WAS OVER.
The blogging seemed to have died a natural death.
Reader Dear, the days drifted by and it seemed there was simply nothing to blog about.
The sad fact was, however--it was my mind in a deep freeze!
I had been determined to tell you about the days of snow and cold.  Tried to make up a blog post concerning the endlessness of it all.

I'd amassed great piles of snow photos.
(What with the fifteen snowfalls we've had in the past ten days [perhaps a slight exaggeration], my opportunities were extensive!)

I took a video of The Yard Man clearing the sidewalk, no less, with the big toy that the neighbor man loans to him. (At the first sign of the white fluffy stuff, The Yard Man gets a gleam in his eye.  He can't believe his good fortune to get to play with this toy again!)

But the snow post just didn't happen.
........
While I was in this frozen, blotty state, I also took a photo of my new black fridge. Prior to its arrival, I'd hung my black raincoat over its beige-colored predecessor, just to get some idea, you know, of whether I could tolerate such a drastic change*. But a little nail-chewing was still in order, considering I'd never ever owned a great black fridge before.
 
"You've got yourself a lot of fly-swatters up here!" said the tall deliveryman, as he pulled the old beige fridge from its dwelling place, and saw its top.
Yes.  Yes, Viewer Dear (gulp), indeed I did!                                                                                 


(*Turns out I'm chortling about the change)
.........
I even recorded the dancing of my solar-powered Santa, whom I couldn't bear to ban to the attic in the great white and cold aftermath of Christmas.  

But I didn't blog about it, and nothing advanced even as far as a posting title.
Not the fascinating vapor trail that I followed across the sky as I drove into the sunset one evening.

Not the red hydrants that were... newly installed?  ...newly painted?
Viewer Dear, they were definitely newly noticed by me, along a major road that I definitely travel more times in a week than I definitely care to say.

 

......
Not the story of a trip for my Small Actor.
......
Alas, Dear Viewer, not even my stint as  Super Woman made it to the blog,
irregardless and regardless of the super woman-blogger I wished and wish to be!




.........
Nope.  It was over, I thought.
I was certain that the train had left the station for good this time!

AND, THEN! OH!
 (to be continued, Dear Reader...)

HERE WE ARE

at the Farm Show again!

Didn't I promise, Viewer Dear?  Of course, in order to make this post come alive,  I knew I had to bite the bullet and head once again to the Best Buy store (the place where I bought this cranky laptop). I dawdled, delayed and dilly-dallied, but finally got myself to the store and presented my case to a member of the Geek Squad.
"I was at the Farm Show with my two little grandsons and I took loads of videos.  I've searched everywhere and I just can't fine them...."
He pondered my missing videos, and looked for them in every corner.  He scratched his head.
Then he hemmed and hawed.
Then he took my camera's media card and disappeared to the back room.
He stayed there for a long time.
I worried.
But then he emerged...
...and, hallelujah!  He brought along the cud-chewing cow...

...and the two little guys milking one.
"It's not a real cow," the Little Actor explained to me.

There was also the startled chicken...

and the hungry one
(very hungry)!

  Not to mention little chickens just getting started in life.


And here's the gander at whom we took a gander. ( He made such a strange noise.)

Then, too, you get to see this strange breed--Homo Sapiens, I believe they are called--crowding the food court (Wouldn't you know, Viewer Dear--I hear eating is a favorite activity of theirs! And there are freshly-made potato doughnuts here, milkshakes to die for, batter-dipped veggies, hot apple dumplings and maple-sugar cotton candy...among a vast assortment of other things these creatures eat and about which they chortle!)

Here's a video of farm equipment in motion.

And two farm show attendees in motion atop farm equipment.

Finally, Dear Viewer, there is this view of an ovine haircut in process.  Sorry to say, this video was clipped short!*

*My camera battery died.
Which meant (arrgh, no photos of the merry time on the merry-go-round):
THE END

IN ALL THE ENSUING WEEKS

since I last posted on a regular basis (You know, Reader Dear, how it used to be that every day or so I'd find some tidbit or other to conflate into an event), I have taken countless photos of the weather.  One reason for this is because so often during the past few weeks, the weather and its peculiarities were the big news of the day!  The headlines were blaring broken records for cold; and the snow and the rain and the ice just kept coming!*



 Honestly, though, I took the photos mostly because I couldn't stop myself. When I glanced out the window and was surprised to see the air polka-dotted with snowflakes, I had to record it.

 Down along the creek on a Sunday morning, every little whisp of nature wore ice.  I held up the two cars behind me as I grabbed my camera for a picture.

 And it's almost embarrassing,
Viewer Dear, how often I snap photos of the sky!

Then, too, there was an evening when nature was helping me out as a back-up fridge.  I set a full pot of soup on the porch to cool.  The next morning when I thought to bring it in, it was frozen solid.










It was a cooking first.

I also had to make a record of the trip The Yard Man and I took to the movies one evening when I was going stir-crazy, and he was crazy enough (eager) to drive us over unplowed roads to the theater.  I was happy enough (grateful) to ride along!

.....

I'll have to admit, over the holidays I took lots of photos of food, too.   Oh, boy, the food!


At the extended, but not-too-extended, family Christmas celebration with the Yard Man's clan:
(Five.  Count them--five pitchers of gravy to go with the chicken-corn pies!)





At the New Year's Eve party, where we like to carry on our traditions:
The food is always delectable!
The friends are always dear!
The game is always dominoes!
(And, [how on earth does this happen?!]  the women always win! 

 (Some of us are getting very old.  Time is speeding up.)
......

At the even-more-extended family reunion on New Year's Day, where the tables are even-more-extended!

There's a puzzle freak here, at this more-extended clan group; I have to take a photo of the jigsaw puzzles that I helped her lug in from her car.  This shows only a fraction! It's puzzling, the number of puzzles she carries around!














Some might say it's puzzling, the number of photos I carry around.
But you understand (or please say that you do), Dear Viewer of mine; I can't blog without them!
......
*This is still going on.
I'm losing my fascination with it, Reader Dear.

I CELEBRATED

the Fifteenth Day of Christmas by completely denuding the Christmas tree, sweeping up a month's worth of needles, and enjoying the Pennsylvania Farm Show with two of my diminutive actors!




From the time The Yard Man and I picked up the Little Actor at his house until we carried him,   semi-asleep and clutching the bag of maple sugar cotton candy, back into his home again, we had some real oodles-of-fascinating-animals-stinky-smells-climbing-on-every-kind-of-farm-equipment-mobs-of-people-greasy-fatty-yummy-food-eating-off-the-dirty-concrete-floor-fake-cow-milking-video-filming-merry-go-rounding fun!

 (The Small Actor made the trip to the show with his parents and joined us there.)

But, wait, did I say video-filming, Reader Dear?!

Oh, yes, indeed I did.  Lots and lots!  My short actors performed scene after scene, the whole world of the Farm Show being their stage*! The animals acted so admirably, as well! However, alas, I am clucking my displeasure, Dear Viewer; my computer is braying, stamping its hooves, and not allowing me access!  It appears we will have to come back to the Farm Show another day.  Creature action is desperately needed.

...

...

*(Er, well, film studio.)

 

Ah, Reader Dear.  I realize the difficulty when you come to this site to be the Dear Reader and you find a big blank!  How on earth can you fill your role as Reader Dear when I've come up with not one jot nor one tittle for you to read.  (No, alas, not even a tittle, as piddling as a tittle may be!)
Hence, I've written these words:

Do not fear!
I did not die, Reader Dear!
I am still here!*

...

*I hope it is a comfort.