A Different Breed of Sag...

I should have taken a photo. I guess I could run snap one really quick before the large-item pickup comes...

Back in our bicycle touring days, my motto was "Death Before SAG." SAG stands for "Support and Gear" and is the affectionate and/or comical term for being picked up when unable to ride any further. I've never really liked the word. It has a negative connotation all the way around. But I see SAG in a whole new light now. Sagging isn't just for weary cyclists. It can mean SO much more.

I was beginning my daily task of adding the previous day's high and low temperature squares to my 2024 digital temperature quilts when I noticed my external computer keyboard was not level. I looked beneath my first home standing desk set-up, which consisted of a very inexpensive short table atop my old sewing machine desk, and was horrified to see two of the table legs leaning so far inward, I was shocked they hadn't yet collapsed.

All four screws on the bottom side of the table had completely stripped their housing, dramatically tilting all four legs. Two legs were severely skewed. If I had leaned on my desk, which I sometimes do while closely inspecting photo details via my (now four-month-old) computer monitor, that little table probably would have squished my year-old laptop and perhaps even destroyed my camera, which was nestled atop the sewing machine desk. I'm sure my computer monitor would not have survived the crash. The keyboard would have been usable, but I'm not sure any of the rest of the electronics would have lived to tell the tale. If I'd leaned just right, I think the resulting disaster probably would have physically injured me, as well. Especially if I'd been vintage me and had tried rescuing my camera, which you can darn sure bet I would have risked just about anything to successfully accomplish.

The old desktop table had lasted a good six years of perhaps way too much weight whenever I leaned on it. I couldn't really have asked for a longer life for the $40 or so I spent on it back in 2018, long before I ever knew I might one day be working from home most of the time.

I knew the desktop standing desk my bosses bought for me in about 2012 was very expensive; that's why I had such a cheap model at home. I was blown away when I looked at the post-pandemic prices of new desktop standing desks and new standing desks. I had initially thought it's probably time to just replace that old sewing machine desk. Now that I've thoroughly explored potential standing desk (scary price) purchases, I think that approximately $90 1984ish sewing desk has quite a few more years of very precious life in it!!!

Last summer, a variety of furniture from our old work office was offered free of charge to anyone who wanted it. I asked if any standing desks were available. Lizard wasn't using his work desk anymore, so he gave it to me for my work-at-home office. It's tough as nails because he bought it way back when he was in college, back when we weren't expected to replace everything every time something new came out. I just love his desk, but, it doesn't go up and down. And I couldn't afford to purchase a new desktop standing desk in 2020. Or now...

I had given the desktop standing desk my bosses had given me to Lizard for his virtual LOUD therapy a couple of years ago. It wouldn't fit on the desk he gave me, and we had to make it fit on the little desk we set up for his laptop. I quickly claimed one of the available desktop standing desks at work last summer, and that's what I'm using for my work computer at home now. PERFECT setup. Absolutely perfect. (At our new office, everyone has motorized standing desks, which also are absolutely perfect but absolutely unaffordable for me at home.)

Once again, Lizard told me he doesn't really need a desk anymore, even though he still tries to use his computer now and then, particularly for virtual doctor visits. He helped me move the desktop standing desk I had given him onto the old sewing desk. My new personal computer space takes some getting used to because it's pretty cramped compared to what it was before the old desktop table nearly folded. There was no room for my mouse if I centered everything!!! It's a tight squeeze, but my re-gifted desktop standing desk is free, and it works. I will adapt. I'm getting pretty good at adapting these days!

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Bear With Me

We had SUCH a nice rainstorm last Thursday. That meant I didn't have to water on Friday!

And good thing. Not just for water conservation. I had visitors!!! Didn't know I'd spend the morning pretending to be Goldilocks and the Two Bears!

It's been quite the summer so far.

First, we had the largest spider I'd ever seen (other than tarantulas in the butterfly museum) in our problem child window well. Yes, the very same window well that had been flooding our basement seemingly every time we visited my parents in California. But more frequently for the last three years. Once we successfully (so far) fixed all the various errant water sources, I thought it would be so cool to put a diorama in that window well. I imagined changing it out for every holiday. But that window will not be opened without good cause anymore!!!

Turns out our visitor was a dark fishing spider, which doesn't actually live near water and is one of the good guys. Or, in this case, a good lady. The males don't reach this size... three inches long!!! Perhaps she was checking out my now dry real estate because I think we've finally eliminated the bog in our backyard... My new lady friend apparently didn't like being photographed through the sealed basement window and found another location to set up housekeeping. Which is fine with me because I really don't need 2,000 more just like her in my window well, much less inside my house!

Then we had a garter snake near the front porch. That was kind of fun. Garter snakes also are good guys. This one wasn't very big at all, and I was happy to have been able to avoid accidentally stepping on it. It would live to slither another day.

I fear, however, this little character managed to fall into our basement somehow. We ended up calling upon the charitable service of a trained snake handler to successfully relocate the young garter snake back into the garden where it belongs. (Accomplished while I was on a work conference call!!!)

Then came the raccoon. Raided the growing pot of strawberries on my porch. Every night! She eventually tried to tunnel beneath our porch. Took two cheap packages of bulk washcloths and six bottles of ammonia to successfully deter what may have been her attempt to find a safe nesting spot. (And yes, we did make sure there were no babies before we used any ammonia.) We ultimately will have to cement the gap the critter dug beneath our porch. But for now, she's gone.

Then, during a walk, I discovered another very large spider, not quite as large as our previous temporary visitor, but still much bigger than most spiders I encounter. This one was covered with bumps, so I thought it was another new (to me) species. Googled my telephoto photo and discovered wolf spiders carry their babies on their backs!!! I zoomed in on the photo for closer inspection, and sure enough, there are tons of little legs attached to those little bumps! Totally left the critter alone; it wasn't there when we returned. Wolf spiders also are garden helpers, not garden terrorists. I happily kept my distance.

Last week, my neighbors tipped me off before I had a chance to go out to water that they currently had a mama and baby bear in their yard. I got a few great shots from a safe distance (that telephoto lens sure comes in handy!) before the bears meandered away.

Then came the rain and no need to water the garden. Thank heavens!!! Mama and toddler next slept in MY tree! I am SO thankful the neighbors again alerted me before I went outside.

14 years ago, our second year in our house, I had begun composting in the backyard. One morning I took out the previous day's scraps, only to discover the previous collections had been dug up and devoured. It was the first time I'd ever seen bear tracks. Ever since that day, I've been vigilant when going into the backyard. I always check both corners of the yard. We've had many bruin visitors, and I have always wished they'd stay long enough for me to capture good photos. Through the window, of course.

I even lamented the ability of AI (artifical intelligence) to appropriately render a bear froclicking in my lavender garden after Lizard witnessed such an act and the bear was gone by the time I returned to the living room with my camera.

Now, I'm going to have to look up in the trees each time I go into the backyard because that's where mama and her baby hung out for about three hours, a repeat of what they did in the neighbor's yard the day before. It isn't the picture perfect piece of art for which I long, but I finally got an actual photo of the bears in my lavender!!!

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Mooned

I'm often unable to get back to sleep after giving Lizard his 4 a.m. pills. I'll often curb the frustration by working on snowflakes, which sometimes relaxes me enough to get back to sleep before my own 5 a.m. alarm goes off. Sometimes even crochet doesn't work, so I fire up the computer to check the weather, record the overnight low for my 2023 crochet temperature project, and check work email, although I try very hard not to begin working before I'm supposed to...

The work computer is in the spare bedroom we've converted into an office. I have blinds over the window to keep the sun from bleaching my books and melting my computer equipment. If I'm in there with the light on, I often don't notice the sunrise, and I often miss it.

On May 17, I was working on a snowflake in the home office prior to sunrise when one of my bosses began emailing me copies of receipts from his then-current business trip for his expense report. He was two hours ahead of me, so he wasn't truly trying to put me to work that early. :) Thanks to audible email notifications on both computers, I jumped up from the work computer to silence my personal computer in the bedroom so as not to wake Lizard, who'd actually been able to fall back into deep sleep after his pills. (I have my work email set up on both computers because work email archiving renders the work computer useless during the process, and I can respond in a timely manner from my personal computer.)

Had I not jumped up and run into the bedroom, where the shades were still open because the sun had not come up, I would have missed the extremely narrow sliver orange moon just above the horizon with Jupiter right there, nearly touching the moon, as if the Heavenly bodies were best of friends. Coolest blessing in the world for me at that moment. I was SO thankful I had been able to see it! I wished I could shoot it!!! The sun would have crossed the horizon and erased any trace of night sky lights before I could grab my camera and drive to a suitable photography location. Many times these days, I have to be grateful I'm able to watch magical moments and not worry about recording them photographically.

I later searched the internet and found the lovely photo above (by Colorado photographer Lars Leber) of what I'd been able to briefly enjoy.

And then I set to work trying to recreate what I had seen in AI, or artificial intelligence.

Oh, the frustrations!!! I actually ran out of paid time in the program for the first time ever and was given a choice of buying more time or waiting until June to try again. I was not tempted one bit to pump more money into AI. And, even though it wasn't as brilliant and colorful (and Jupiter isn't nearly as close to the moon because I had to wait for a cloudless morning), I was able to photographically capture the phenonenon last week when Jupiter appeared on the opposite side of our moon. (Handheld, I might add. I didn't have time to dig out the tripod.) Once again, what I create with my camera or in Photoshop is better than anything AI can muster.

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Wordless Wednesday

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Wordless Wednesday

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Wordless Wednesday

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