Blogger is behaving badly. Hopefully it will let me make a post this evening.

I couldn’t even visit any of my friend’s blogs.

;-(

My big brother (looking ghoulish above) has had Halloween Costume parties for years. There hasn’t been one in a few years, but this Saturday he’s picking up the tradition again. They’re great fun and my brother and sister-in-law really go all out with decorating the house and having lots of good food. The two of them are also the most creative with coming up with costume ideas and think of the best things. My father was also great with his costumes and seemed to get a real kick out of doing the unexpected. The pic above is from 1990, I think, in the time leading up to the Gulf War. Dad went as a sheik, complete with oil can. Another year he wore the most outrageous wig as Howard Stern. My husband and I have always struggled to come up with a costume – and this year is no different. Neither of us have any idea what to go as. So far the DH’s only suggestion has been that I wear bunny ears and he’ll borrow the dog’s Xmas antlers… we’re badly in need of some creative thinking on this. The pics from the first year we attended (in rented clown suits) have mysteriously gone missing. I thought we looked adorable, but my husband was humiliated by the experience. The following year, in a nod to our common love of coffee (and in tribute to how we met – while I was in college working at a 7-11) we went as coffee with half-n-half. I thought I did a pretty good job of recreating the artwork on both the coffee can and the carton of milk, but we couldn’t sit down or eat easily with the costumes on.
Dad as Arnold Schwarzenegger and my brother Brian as a box of tide. His wife that year did a fine impression of a dirty pile of laundry.
This was an easy costume for us to do. My DH wore his turnout gear (he’s a volunteer fireman) and I went as his dalmation, complete with bone and hydrant.

Each year the stakes seem to be raised in terms of a great costume; my brother is just too creative for the likes of me! I find myself anticipating what they will come up with, yet I’m always surprised. If anyone has any last-minute easy ideas for costumes I would love to hear them.

A friend of mine is very fond of Turkey Vultures; she’s not a birdwatcher, but is someone who loves nature and the out of the doors and all animals. Knowing my love of birds, she often mentions vulture sightings to me. I like to give her a gift at Christmastime and struggle to find something appropriate. Kathy is hard to describe. She’s almost twenty years my senior, a child of the 60’s and a hippie at heart, yet she was raised in a very wealthy family from what I understand. We work together at social services and her pragmatism and forthrightness with our clients is sometimes startling to me. I’ve known her for many years, yet feel that I don’t really know her at all. Suffice it so say that she is not easy to shop for. One year as a *gift* I brought her along on a winter birding trip at Barnegat Light to see Harlequins and Short-Eared Owls. We froze our butts off and the short-ears were a no-show, but Kathy was a trooper standing out on the jetty.

Following a day spent kayaking in the Pine Barrens a few summers ago she told me that she considers Turkey Vultures to be her totem or spirit guide. She sees them often during her meditative walks through the Barrens. Finally knowing that she had a *favorite* bird I then set out to find her the perfect vulture-themed gift. Not! Turkey Vultures, it seems, are not the poster-child for avian beauty or affection. This year, though, I think I may have hit the jackpot with Letters from Eden by Julie Zickefoose. There’s an essay all about tv’s and pencil sketches and even a personalized inscription that Julie wrote special for Kathy.

I did a little digging around on the Web to see what I might find about vultures as totem birds and learned that the vulture is a powerful totem, bringing purification and signaling an end to hardship. I also found a creation story about how the vulture saved the world (which I’ll inlcude below) and a neat American Indian Trickster tale about vultures.

In the earliest of times, the sun lived very close to the earth – so close in fact that life upon the earth was becoming unbearable. The animal world got together and decided to do something about it. They wanted to move the sun further away.

The fox was the first to volunteer, and he grabbed the sun in his mouth and began to run to the heavens. After a short while, the sun became too hot, burning the fox’s mouth, and he stopped. To this day, the inside of the fox’s mouth is black. Then the opossum volunteered. He wrapped his tail around the sun and began running toward the heavens. Before long though, the sun became too hot, burning its tail, and he had to stop. To this day the opossum has no hair upon its tail.

It was then that vulture stepped forward. Vulture was the most beautiful and powerful of birds. Upon its head was a beautiful mantle of rich feathering that all other birds envied. Knowing that the earth would burn up unless someone moved the sun, the vulture placed its head against it and began to fly to the heavens. With powerful strokes of its wings, it pushed and pushed the sun further and further up into the heavens. Though it could feel its crown feathers burning, the vulture continued until the sun was set at a safe distance in the sky away from the earth. Unfortunately, vulture lost its magnificent head of feathers for eternity.

I wonder how common it is for people to think of having an animal or bird as a spirit guide. Totem animals are those that a person feels connected with or particularly drawn to. I don’t know that I feel such a connection to a particular bird or animal, but wonder if you do. 😉

My husband’s parents were married on October 21, 1945. She was born and raised in NJ (and has lived most of her life down the street from the childhood home that she was born in). He was born in California, but grew up in Tennessee. She was around 17 years old when married, he had already been to war and was stationed at the nearby army base on his return. They met at the roller-skating rink. This is a scan of the only picture from their wedding day – her dress was light blue. They honeymooned in Newark, NJ. We gave them a 50th wedding anniversary party in 1995, but my father-in-law passed away before they celebrated their 58th.

I sometimes think my husband gets a kick out of sending me to buy the biggest and heaviest tools as gifts for him. Very seldom am I sent to find anything that I can easily carry or wrap nicely.

His birthday is this Sunday, and rather than totally spacing his birthday as I often do, I knew just what to buy for him this year because he kindly pointed it out to me on our last visit to Lowe’s to buy new blinds.

The object of his desire is that Bosch Power Box. I’m not exactly clear on what it does, besides that it plays music, stuff plugs into it, and you can drop it from a few stories up without breaking it. Most importantly, his friend Pete has one; I think that must be why he wants one. Toy envy.

It was light enough that I was able to carry it out of the store without any construction workers feeling sorry for me, but I don’t have a clue how I’ll wrap it.

I wonder if my husband feels as out of his element when shopping for gifts as I do. Does he roam around the bookstore or camera shop with no real idea what he’s buying, like I do when browsing the tool section? Does he wish that I liked jewelry or perfume or some other easy to purchase thing? What do wives buy for their husbands besides tools?

I totally stole this pic from the October BunFun newsletter sent out by Leith Petwerks. I’m not sure which looks more annoyed at being a pumpkinhead – Patches or Flynn. Leith sells great bunny stuff, by the way!

The *where we live* photo meme post that Laura at Vitamin Sea started a few weeks ago has me thinking like a tourist. Rather than staying home the past few Sundays (grading papers like a good teacher) I’ve been dreaming up places to visit that I usually just breeze past on my way to somewhere else. It’s been a good excuse to get a homebody like myself off my duff and keep the camera in good working order.

I’ve been very pleased with the complimentary comments posted here about the beauty of my home state; I understand that NJ is not often thought of as so picturesque. Most of my travels searching for photos have brought me to the shore, whether close to home at Sandy Hook or further south to Cape May. Today I headed south again, but just a little ways to the tip of the NJ Pine Barrens and then headed west into the bogs and cedar swamps of the pinelands.

The pic above left was taken just outside of Whitesbog Village, which was home to the largest cranberry farm in NJ during the early 1900’s. I spent a few hours roaming the sandy roads that traverse the abandoned bogs and blueberry fields, and watched red tails and kestrels hunting despite the clamor from kids on motorbikes and ATV’s. I’d heard of Whitesbog before, among birders, because the area attracts Tundra Swans in late winter and Gull-billed terns in September, although I’m not sure that is still the case. Would Patrick know?

Cranberries are still grown commercially in the area, although the blueberry is the state fruit, and by nosing around down enough sandy dirt roads (an awful lot of them labeled for some gun club or another) I came across an active bog in the process of being harvested. The beauty of the harvest was hard to describe – I think just the combination of berries against the water, with the blue sky and pine forest in the distance. From what little I know about cranberry harvesting, I suspect a machine had gone through this part of the bog earlier in the day to *beat* the cranberries from their vines and the wind in the vast open bog had pushed the berries to one corner where they would later be harvested with the use of a boom to keep them corraled in one place. There is a complicated system of canals and gates to flood and empty each bog as required by the season. Of the twenty or so working bogs that were visible in this one field, only five were completely flooded and three, like this one, yet to be harvested. Most of the others had some water remaining on the margins, and the expected herons, egrets, and waterfowl that one might expect to be there. Of course I have more photos, which Blogger stubbornly won’t allow me to load, but they were mostly meant to give you an idea of the size of a cranberry farm. Very big and windy on a chilly October afternoon.

It was a nice way to spend a few hours, there was no traffic jam on the way home like last Sunday, and it sure beats grading papers! I’m thinking of going back next Friday for a sunset hayride through the bogs, followed by pinelands songs and stories around a campfire. I’ll at least get back to see the Tundra Swans in February.

We’ve been looking for a small tree or shrub to replace this old bridalwreath spirea for a few years now. I almost hate to yank it out because it’s been there forever and the mockingbirds sometimes like to nest in it. The center of the shrub is woody and it hardly blooms anymore, so today I went to the nursery around the corner hoping for a bargain. The nursery stock was all 25% off, but I didn’t find anything that grabbed me.

I asked one of the owner’s sons if he might recommend something; he’s always made good suggestions in the past so I trust his ideas. He suggested I consider this Common Ninebark (Physocarpus opulifolius) pictured at right. I liked the reddish purple foliage and the pinkish white late spring flowers sounded nice. I wasn’t sold on it though, so instead took a few pics to show my husband.

I checked my Manual of Woody Landcape Plants by Michael Dirr to see what he has to say about the Ninebark. From the section on landscape value: “Quite coarse and therefore difficult to use in the small home landscape; limited in usefulness because of rather meager ornamental assets; bark on older stems exfoliates into papery strips exposing a rich brown inner bark; unfortunately, this character is masked by the foliage and dense tangle of stems.” Also, “The Minnesota Landscape Aboretum has a large collection of ninebarks and after looking over the entire group, I still came away with the opinion that about anything is better than a Ninebark.“

Well… I guess that answers my question!

Do you have a favorite shrub or smallish tree? Can you suggest something that might be nice as a specimen for full sun in the middle of our back yard? I’d prefer something that blooms and has berries that the birds might find tasty. My husband is inclined to plant a pine, but I want something a bit more showy in such a prominent spot.