Farewell

Yesterday was a special family dinner to say good-bye to Brent for a while. I roasted a whole beef tenderloin, Julie brought a wonderful mixed greens salad with a special dressing, and we had baked potatoes w/sour cream and chives, buttered carrots and my Brownies for dessert. Summer is over and time to return to school. He is looking forward to his junior year in college and excited about his choice of creative writing classes. One is "English Prosody", the rhythm of language. When he told me, I must have looked puzzled. I had never come across that word before. Prosody. He explained what it meant and I was interested enough to look it up. According to Webster -

Prosody - tone, accent, song sung to music; the science or art of versification, including the study of metrical structure, stanza forms, etc. ; a paticular system or style of versification and metrical structure. (Dryden's prosody)

John Dryden 1631-1700; English poet, critic and playwright; poet laureate 1570-1688.

laureate - woven of sprigs of laurel; said of a crown or wreath; crowned with a laurel wreath as a mark of honor or distinction; worthy of honor; distinguished; preeminent, esp. among poets; a person on whom honor or distinction is conferred.

Morning view

Early, early every morning this week, when I go out with the dogs, the brightest planet in the eastern September sky greets me. I think it's Jupiter. It's appears very peaceful, but it's not. When reading about Jupiter, I find it's the biggest planet in our solar system. It has a famous "landmark" called Great Red Spot (GRS) which is thought to be a giant swirling storm cloud. Jupiter's atmosphere is very stormy with high winds of up to 250 mph and lightening. It is very violent. It gets my attention very morning. hmmmm.

A thought for this day

"The time may be delayed, the manner may be unexpected, but the answer is sure to come. Not a tear of sacred sorrow, not a breath of holy desire poured out to God will ever be lost; but in God's own time and way will be wafted back again in clouds of mercy, and fall in showers of blessings on you, and on those for whom you pray." St. Theresa

Rummage Sale!

Today was the big rummage sale at The Center! I did find some treasures. A very nice gold key pin, a rusty star, a sweet little collage that reads "Be glad of life; it gives us a chance to love, work, and look up to the stars." Henry Van Dyke. And two little plastic princess houses for a little princess I know. I know her little people and animals will move right in.

I will have to attach these two treasures to collages of my own one of these days.

And I just couldn't resist this owl! He is a lamp. I just could not leave him there. I am thinking of putting him in Danielle's bedroom.

Isn't he precious?

The art of being happy lies in the power of extracting happiness from common things. Henry Ward Beecher


Continuing to sort things today. Need to organize my art room! Don't know where to start first. So just thinking this morning. Watching "Henri" stalk a fly that keeps landing on the floor.

Today was a paper-sorting day. The entire day. I had three paper piles that needed tending to. I haven't been able to find things lately. I need to get organized!

A Fall Visitor

Here he was on my kitchen window and I wondered. I looked on the internet and according to the article "Grasshoppers Go Crazy In The Fall" by Donald Lewis, Extension entomologist at Iowa State University Extension. I found it so interesting.

"It happens every autumn. It is no exaggeration to describe the behavior of some grasshoppers in the fall as crazy. Adult grasshoppers conitnue to feed until they die of old age or are killed by freezing temperatures, whichever comes first. It is in this period of waiting to die that we see the aging grasshoppers eating unnatural foods such as window screens and latex paint. It is after the eggs are laid, after the biological destiny has been fulfilled, after Nature has no further expectations of the grasshoppers that they seems to go crazy. If grasshoppers had thoughts, feelings or human qualities we could imagine this weird behavior is the outcome of senility. Or maybe it is boredom. It might even be revenge for decades of insecticide use. Show some pity. You too will be old someday and may engage in behaviors that others find hard to explain."