Today is the summer solstice so the days will start getting shorter again. Winter will be on us in no time as we do yet another lap around the sun. Sure, it’s hotter than Hades right now, with humidity that can fell an ox, but at least we have a lot of daylight. I don’t mind the changing of seasons, but I really like the extend light of late Spring and early Summer.
We have been busy in Ed and Lise world. Can’t say I have a lot to show for it either. Too many things that just suck the time out of you. My brother-in-law spent about three weeks with us. He wanted to build a bookcase for his grandson. I have better tools and workspace than he does, plus I could bring some expertise to bear on the project. I enjoyed helping him, but it put me way behind on my own projects. Like finding time to write or do photography was nigh onto impossible.
On the travel front, we’ve been getting in some short trips. Lise’s work has taken us to Pokagon State Park and to Spring Mill State Park. The Spring Mill trip was on real short notice. We only had a few hours’ notice and only spent one night there. We did get to explore some and got in a bit of birding. Spring Mill is in a geologically interesting karst area. Lots of caves and sinkholes. A whole subterranean ecosystem that few get to experience.
The park also contains Donaldson’s Woods, one of the tiny fragments of old growth pre-European settlement timber left in the Indiana. Huge white oaks, some more than 300 years old. If you’re not impressed when walking through there, I feel sorry for you. Something’s very wrong with you.
Our other trip of note was a four-day excursion back to Okemos. This was a social trip for a wedding and a graduate school graduation party. Two different people, two events, both in the same family. Good times with good friends. Life can’t get much better than that.
What hasn’t been happening is birding, chasing dragonflies, and the photography that goes with those adventures. We’ve been getting in some birding, but it’s been sporadic. We’re both at 192 species for the year. Not a bad number but nothing to brag about either. It’s a matter of effort. We just didn’t get out during the spring migration like we should have. There’s still some opportunity to get the migrants we missed this spring, but it is more difficult. But we shall try. As Lise pointed out today, I can do my shop projects in the winter. But, the birds and dragonflies are ephemeral. They’re not here all year.
Ed's and Lise's Biggish Years 