“Cock your hat – angles are attitudes.”
I wish it would rain. The day is cloudy and a dampness has given the house a bit of a chill so I’ve lowered the downstairs windows. Yesterday I did a few chores and a couple of errands. One stop was for cat food and clay flower pots at Agway. Tomorrow I’ll shop to fill the pots and also get herbs for the herb garden and the deck window boxes. Next week I’ll buy some front garden flowers. I noticed a few empty spots.
The spawns have found a new way to harass me. The tall bird feeder holder with the anti-squirrel baffle at the bottom had to be moved. The spawns were jumping from trees to get at the top of the pole where there are holders for four feeder stations, and the spawns have enjoyed dining at each one. When Skip came last week, I had him move the pole away from all the trees. Now the spawns are flying off the deck to the feeders. The problem, though, is getting off. There is no easy way so they sort of just fall unto the fence below the pole, the fence which is protecting my vegetable garden. The spawns knock over the posts and the wire gets bent down from the force of their bodies falling from so high. It has happened three times and I have fixed the fence three times. Now I have this dream of a hunter dressed in khaki, wearing a pith helmet, also khaki, sitting on my deck steps with an elephant gun in his hand just waiting for the spawns. I think I’ll have them mounted. Meanwhile, the feeders remain empty until I can figure out a solution.
The hunter’s pith helmet got me thinking about hats. When we were little kids, we had two main hats. One was for winter, a woolen hat with ear flaps and a pretty design, and the other was an Easter hat, usually a new one each year to match our dresses. The Easter hats had ribbons in blue, yellow or spring green, but it didn’t matter to me how pretty or flowery or filled with ribbons the hats were because I never liked hats. My mother, however, insisted I wear a hat when I walked to school on blustery cold winter days, but it never helped all that much to keep me warm. My head might have been fine, but my face was always freezing cold with bright red cheeks. Mittens were more essential. The Easter hat went into the closet and was pulled out only for Sundays.
I don’t wear hats any more. In the winter I sprint from the house to the car and back again when I get home. On Easter I wear one to my friends’ house: it’s a wide brim pink hat like those models during the 50’s wore. I don’t wear it to dinner when we go out though I might one year as a lark.
Maybe in my future is me as an eccentric old lady wearing a hat every place I go, even the dentist. I think I’ll start with the old faded red band hat with the plume. I’ll drop feathers everywhere I go.
Explore posts in the same categories: MusingsTags: bird feeders, chores, clay pots, Clouds, Easter hat, elephant gun, hats, herbs, hunter, rain, spawns of Satan, Sunday hat, winter hat
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May 23, 2013 at 12:26 pm
One can’t but admire the ingenuity those spawns show š You must have another red species than we do because ours are very shy all the time.
I’ve owned one “real” hat in my entire life. It was grey and I liked it a lot but I must have forgotten it at a cottage I once rented because I can’t find it any longer.
I had my yellow woolen cap all winter when I grew up and I still have it š I hated it back then and now I don’t want to be without it. It has been with me for so long now that I think I see it as a family member š š š It must be over 39 years old by now š
Sune has discovered that it’s possible to take a bath in my pond and it’s impossible to stop him š š š The water was so clear and fine but now it’s brown and muddy š š š
Have a great day!
Christer.
May 23, 2013 at 5:43 pm
Christer,
My spawns are grey. There are also red ones, but they don’t cause any problems. Neither variety is shy, but the grey spawns are the worst.
My ears get cold so once in a while I use ear muffs but only if I’m going to be outside a while.
I totally understand your hat becoming a family member. When you have something for so long, it’s difficult to think of life without it.
The pond isn’t really cold? I would think Sune would wait until it gets a bit warmer for bathing. Gracie doesn’t love water enough to bathe in it.
Have a wonderful evening!
May 23, 2013 at 3:03 pm
This post made me laugh – – KA-BOOM!!!!
I was big on hats as a kid….but never ladies hats. Baseball caps were my chapeau of choice. When I was nine my Mom bought me a Mets cap on my first visit to Shea Stadium. I wore it forever, until it finally self-destructed in the wash. My mother used to say that if I wore hats all the time I would go bald. It’s one of the Mom Myths out there, because I still have a full head of hair!
Waving From Jersey…
Coleen
May 23, 2013 at 5:45 pm
Coleen,
I’m glad it made you laugh! I figure a spawn story is always good for a laugh, on e it seems each time. They are creative critters.
I went through a visor stage when I was around 11. I thought I looked perfectly smart wearing it all the time!
My brother-in-law wore caps all the time until people told him he’d go bald. He stopped wearing them. I didn’t tell him any differently.
May 23, 2013 at 5:35 pm
I wish it won’t rain. 46Ā°F, biking today wasn’t fun. The funny crab hat in the picture would be perfect as a bicycle helmet to keep the cars at distance.
Great flying squirrels circus show! A crocodile in your garden should solve the spawn problem š
May 23, 2013 at 5:47 pm
Birgit,
I really did think it would rain today. I know it’s rained in other parts of the state but not here, maybe late tonight.
I think the crazy crab hat would keep the world at a distance!
That’s it. I need a crocodile!
May 23, 2013 at 6:07 pm
Hi Kat,
I love hats. I actually looked forward to getting a new Easter hat and matching purse when I was a kid. I hated the dress, though.
As an adult, every spring I would shop for and adorn my official horse/dog show hat for the season. It was usually a straw hat with a wide brim. I would hot glue mad flowers on it or some other odds and ends that I had collected. There are still a couple of them stored away upstairs.
Of course I knit winter hats but I never remember to wear them. Like you I dash for the car or the house in cold weather or I put my hood up.
Perhaps you should bow to the inevitable and put a landing pad underneath the feeders? The spawns are too fast and there’s not enough meat on them to justify the energy a crocodile would have to spend catching them.
It’s murky up here but a windy murky.
Enjoy the evening.
May 23, 2013 at 7:11 pm
Hi Caryn,
I probably was more tolerant of the hat as I didn’t like dresses as I got a bit older.
There are no places I go which demand a hat, but should I get invited to the Queen’s tea, I’d get a proper one!
Never! I will not in any way aid and abet the spawns. Maybe I’ll put a net underneath so they’ll get captured and then I can take them miles away, but I guess that’s only a dream! My spawns are meaty from all that bird seed.
In Paga, a small village, in Ghana there is a sacred croc pond. The villager calls a croc and one, usually huge, comes out of the water to the land. To thank him, the croc gets a chicken, a young chicken, with less meat than my spawns. I bet they’d love a meaty squirrel.
May 23, 2013 at 9:01 pm
The ladies millinery business is about as robust as the buggy whip business. I think Jackie Kennedy was the last first lady to make hats a fashion statement with the pill box. Ladybird Johnson wore hats because she was from the previous generation and I can’t remember what any of the later first ladies wore.
Some people look good in hats, but they make me look like a dork. After the sixth grade I gave them up except for a stocking cap for the coldest days of the year in New York until I got into High School. Since I drive everywhere now I am not out in the cold that much. I only recently have developed a small bald spot on the back of my head so I didn’t wear gimme caps to keep the sun off of my dome. You have to have the right shape face and have the right kind of personality to get away with a hat. Nathan Lane and Truman Capote are good examples of men who look good in a hat.
Today we had the plumber come and replace some faucets and a couple of toilets that was here since the house was built 28 years ago and needed upgrades. I should have gone into the plumbing business and I could have retired early. It’s one of the great professions that can’t be out sourced. When your toilet is blocked up a call center in Mumbai just won’t help š
May 23, 2013 at 11:52 pm
Bob, your last line is priceless! ROTFLMAO! :0
Coleen