the spotted lantern fly motherload

 

Today my nephew came over to mow the lawn. I hate doing yard work alone. Hmmm. I hate walking alone. I'm sensing a theme. Alone is not my friend. Anyway, while he was mowing I decided to clean up some weeds. I piled them by the garage where they make great bedding for the stray cats. They love it there. Basically it's a compost pile.

He's working in the alley and cleared out some of the weeds —I've given up trying to grow flowers there— and I noticed on the retaining wall a large vine root. I went into the garage and cut the root at the bottom and began to pull it. The vine wasn't on my property. It went across the sidewalk and up the side of the garage. I pulled it again.

 

All the vine on this section of the garage came out. I kept rolling it up. My nephew stood there with the OMG look on his face. Finally I thought I had it all and took it to the pile.

I came back to get the clippers and I noticed some just hanging there. So I pulled it again. More came off. I just stopped. I was afraid this one fine was attached to the whole garage and maybe the renters like it. I saw spotted lantern flies and killed them. Maybe about six.

Then I look down and there are many spotted lantern flies. Clearly this was a grape vine. I killed many. My niece kept saying there's another one. This mass of vine is a hot spot for SLF. Next spring I'll spray it with dish soap water.  It doesn't hurt the plants but the SLF eggs die.

This whole time I am to the right of the compost bin. He is on the left. I go to hop off the retaining wall and catch my foot in the vine and go splat. Karma sucks. Thankfully he wasn't nearer with the weed whacker.

mystery socks

 

The other day I received an email from the Humanities secretary saying I had a delivery and I should come and get it. Say what? 

Yesterday after my walk and the picnic, I went and had my driver's license photo taken and I still had time to kill. I decided to pick up the package. I kind-of expected a pink slip. But the envelope was soft. In the hall I opened it and it was a pair of socks. I have no idea where they came from or why.

The only think I can think of is they came from the Wellness Warriors, the faculty/staff fitness group on campus. I signed up to be part of this year's walking challenge. But they said nothing about prizes. And these socks have no logos.

I'm puzzled.

walking around the college

I'm an adjunct at a community college in Jersey in addition to my regular teaching gig.

I last taught there in 2018. When I went in June for the interview I noticed that they had a new community walking path. I decided to check it out. I already knew that part of it circled the parking lots and ran parallel to the road. From the lot I knew no bikes were allowed and there was a lot of benches.

My class ended at 12:30 PM and I didn't need to be to NCC until 2:30 PM. The weather was beautiful so I decided I'd go to the picnic and then check out the trail. I had a few reservations. Last week we received a email from public safety saying there was a bear spotted on the trail. Love bears. Don't want to be up close and personal with one.

I grabbed my food and went to a bench a bit from the party. I was greeted by the friendliest husky. He quickly went off to greet someone else. I thought maybe he belonged to a student or faculty member. I finished my lunch and headed toward the woods.

The path was sunny, but protected, and paved all the way around. I walked thru the wooded part singing "please don't eat me mister bear." We we're always told in Girl Scouts to make a lot of noise to keep the bears away at camp. I quickly reached the other side of campus and headed toward the lots. But the sun was very strong so I decided to go across the grass to go back in the shade of the building.

There were some recreations fields but no sports I ever heard of. What are these used for? There was also a big pit of some kind, with poles and on top of the poles were buckets.

I passed the picnic, and got back on the trail and followed it past the rock pile to the beginning.

I took a photo of the sign and was deciding if I wanted to to the parking lot trail for the car or walk in front of the building and I heard a loud car. It said "animal control". Oh no. The bear?

I went in front of the building and went inside to use the restroom before driving back to Pennsylvania. As I came out I heard one security guy tell the other it was the dog they were after. They came and took it to doggie jail. 

Miles/Steps:  The trail is 1 mile. I didn't do the "sides" of the lot, so I probably came in at 3/4 mile.
Weather:       mid 70s, sunny

looking for inspiration

 

 

I've been looking for inspiration to get myself moving again. 2023, the year of the health issues, will be over before I know it. I need to get my fat, lazy, ass moving again. And I need to do it alone. The scoobies are all long gone. I need to face that reality.

Last Saturday I grabbed this book from a Little Free Library box outside my sister-in-law's church. We were assembling there to carpool to the Poconos for my brother's "green" burial in a forest. I'm horrible at small talk. I had to be pacing and exploring and ended up bringing four books home.

This one appealed to me because of the strong graphic design of the cover. Nice vector drawing. Great colors. Good type. Inside was also pretty dang good. As a walker, the tagline "How to turn the most boring thing in the world into something extraordinary" caught my attention.

The book is a biography of three months, and 1000K (62 miles) in the author's life when she was recovering from a hip replacement. The blurb on Amazon says:

An absurdist adventure travelogue and self-help book for jaded cynics, WALK chronicles the antics of a movement fanatic who walks 1000 km after total hip replacement surgery.

Phase 1: denial
Phase 2: training to fall by skating on asphalt
Phase 3: learning to pee
Phase 4: walking 1000 kilometers

Left with no other options, the dancer/martial artist/adrenaline freak forces herself to walk and walk and walk and gradually discovers the virtues of slowing down. Along the way, the reluctant walker learns to see the world in super macro, think like Sherlock, and invents puzzle games while pacing.

... Speed is not the goal. Seeing is. WALK shows how to turn the most boring thing in the world into something extraordinary.

She was a world-class martial artist and dancer and didn't think highly of walking. Well, actually, she hated it. But it was the only exercise she was allowed to do. She did 5K walking up and down the halls of the hospital one day after surgery. (She's in Prague. I can't imagine a hospital in the US allowing that. They won't let you do anything alone. Even pee.) But she grew to embrace it and find the value in her journey is often called "awe" walking. Taking time to smell the roses.

It was a really quick read. There were a lot of pictures. There were 9 spreads (48 images per page), plus an additional 8 pages with three screenshots of screenshots from every walk. After the initial excitement over the page design, I was disappointed because of how inconsistently the text was formatted. Especially since the writer spent time as a designer. I tell my students I'm always critiquing. I guess it's true. So I did it on my professional blog.

 

It has a bunch of pages for you to use like a workbook which was interesting. Like a spread where you stepped on the book. Tangible evidence of taking your first steps. I didn't. The next person to read this book doesn't want my dirty foot prints.

Mei is an advocate of goal setting, rewards for reaching small and large goals, and documenting... that's why all the screen shots and photos. She also advocates you look for, and document,  the "Seven Wonders of the World" that you saw that day, playing I Spy (make it difficult) and looking at details of your walk using micro photography. Ie: Instead of seeing a push, come in really close and see the bud.

The book had no publisher on the spine, or on the copyright page. It is clearly self-published and it shows. A good editor would have caught some of these errors. As would have a proofreader.

If you want to read my critique, hope over to the pro blog. As my mom would say, the devil is in the details.

I had no epiphany's. It was funny at times, preachy at times. She is clearly in competition with herself in any thing she does. This book goes back in the car, and back to a Little Free Library somewhere. I wonder if the next person to pick it up will see a motivational story or see its design flaws? 

it's been awhile but ... s p l a t

 

Nothing is worse than being greeted with a selfie, right? 

It's been a while since I posted and I thought I did post about my glasses adventure, but apparently not. You'll have to wait for the splat story. Sorry.

I went for my eye exam at 4 pm on the 15th and told the doctor that I was not leaving without an RX. She checked my surgical eye and said it was healing well and the TWO stents looked great. On the 11th of September I go to the glaucoma doctor (who is back from maternity leave already) and maybe she'll discontinue some of these eye drops.

I hurry out to the waiting room to Bonnie. I had my old glasses in my purse—the rimless one. I decided to pay a kings ransom at Lenscrafters because I really wanted my glasses NOW. You pay a premium for one-hour service. I tell the clerk that I just need distance vision and one lens. I'll wait to get the bifocals. They are very expensive. She writes everything up, I pay and say see you in an hour. We went to Red Robin for supper and came back.

We came back in about an hour but I still hadn't gotten the text so we just sat and chatted. Soon someone came over and said "May I help you." I replied that we're just waiting on the text that my glasses are done. The person looked puzzled. "We aren't doing one-hour glasses tonight. Our tech left at 4 pm." WTF? Why didn't they say that when I came in I would have left. They called the clerk at home and she swore she told me. Really? When I left I said see you in an hour. If there was a misunderstanding that's the time to clear it up. She said they'd do them first thing in the am. They open at 10. I called at 10:30, and they weren't working on them. At 11 Bonnie called and put the fear of god into them and got the store manager to call me. At about 11:30 they called and they were done. We went to pick them up. Honestly I was so pissed and I will never darken their doorstep again. Nor will I recommend them for glasses. 

Two days later I took my sunnies and other pair to Costco for new lenses. Without the Costco membership fee I got two pair for the price of their one, but not Transitions. Just plain. I picked them up earlier this week. Sadly, I wasted money on the bifocal. I still take my glasses off to read and use the computer and phone.  I really, really, want Pair eyewear that I can change my look everyday. But it's a money pit that I cannot allow myself to fall into. Not with medical bills coming almost daily. But the idea of snapping on sunnies is so appealing. I either leave them in the house, the back seat, or sometimes the kitchen. It's a PIA.

As the email person for the Liberty Bell Wanderers I filer all kinds of forwards, and send out a comprehensive email once a week. There's a walking festival in Kingston Ontario next May. I can still kick myself that I didn't make it to Texas. But this is 5 hours, rather than 3-days, away. I got an email from the Princeton (PAWS) group president saying she booked a room at Queens University dorm (conference hotels full) and it has two beds. She was looking for a female roommate. I replied yes.  I never forwarded the email. There's 5 people going so far from PAWS so we'll have to figure out a carpool. I certainly am not driving to Princeton to come back again. I'm either going to need a park and ride, or someone to shuttle me. Yesterday I registered for the festival. I think I'd be gone less than a week. Two days driving. Three days walking. I'll tell the roomie in March.

I need to get in shape. Maybe this is the kick in the ass I need.

I also would like to go next weekend to the Penn Dutch Pacers event in Manheim, Pa. It's west of Litiz, and north of Lancaster. This isn't normally a walk I'd attend but the Penn Dutch Pacers are closing up shop this year. Their walks have been picked up by other groups. The problem with these walking groups is the people in them are retired to really old. If they don't recruit younger people (50s, 60, 70s) they die off. And again it will force me to walk to see how much I can do and how much I need to get back in shape. Maybe we could stop at the Cloisters on the way home.

Finally, yesterday Pat and I went to Scholl's Orchards farm stand. Both she and Sharon received $50 in Farmer's Market money from the state. (It was five $5, then $6, now $10 coupons.) We've been going every week and buying veggies and corn. Then we take half to Sharon's house. I think we have two left.

I parked the car and Pat was out in a flash and headed to the corn. The table was filled, it wasn't like they were going to run out. I'm working my way to her and suddenly I'm headed face first to the asphalt.  I have no idea what I did. Some customers came over to help, and I think and employee too. I wanted to dig a hole and climb into it. I got up but my knee and shoulder hurt. I bought our groceries, went to Sharon's and headed home to work. 

My nephew came over to do the lawn just as my Zoom meeting started. I went to stand up and my knee protested. But once I got moving I was okay. I could not get off the couch either. I have to hold on and put all the pressure on the right side. I'd love to take Aleve, that's always my miracle cure, but I believe with my new meds NASIDs are a no-no.  Last night I got up to pee and thought I wouldn't be able to stand. But I managed okay. This morning I was stiff and it hurt. It's not black and blue but it is red. The more I walk on it. The better it feels. 

Eventually it will heal. It always does. Until one day when it doesn't. I'll cross that bridge when I get to it.