all before breakfast...

NOTHING like a little snake wrangling before breakfast to whet one's appetite...

This young Eastern Phoebe  was looking for breakfast in the yard this morning..

Hopefully Milo will soon be joining him in the yard, he just had his spray bath  before breakfast and he loved it!! He has been practicing flying in the screen porch a couple times a day...he is learning!!

WHERE'S MY PHOTOS?

I need to learn how to relax like Milo....here's my breakfast..

PEACE

Memorial Weekend

Hooray it was a long weekend....no work today...the Boss said ILL BE OPEN IF YA'll want to work....and when I asked around NO ONE was gonna work, (but the boss)....they all said the same thing "I could use the money, but I need a day off more"...so THERE YOU GO, 4 outta 5 take freedom over money!!!! YEAH we are the 99%.

MILO the Mockingbird is doing great I moved him to bigger digs and he is just loving more room to stretch his wings---and squawk!

I went to the race track and dug this tub full of horse manure and its full of RED WIGGLERS..so his diet is more what it should be now...

THIS tub should last him his entire childhood! HE BEGS for food constantly. I bet I fed him 15 worms today! And he hasnt had his night feed yet.

We had this swell fellow come to visit our Aster flowers...I worked in the yard getting things done on Saturday and Sunday,,,,and made this Veggie-Tarian Pizza for dinner, with Veggie Cheese and TOFUKRY (tofu)I plucked some fresh basil and tossed on top wow it was good!

I like to have little whimsy's around this one and this one, and the birds planted a sunflower for us...

and in the garden I found this....Have no idea what it is, it came up from the compost I made..,.SO I hope it lives to maturity so I can see what it is...could be a winter squash, or some kind of melon?

 

AND today is the last day of my 3 day weekend, and I spent it cleaning up both my Vehicles...boy there were dirty...but now they are shining and looking good!!

        

                                                                         The DLEX

                                                                       The Silver Bullet

So its back to work tomorrow...although I never stopped all weekend so I guess its just more of the same...ONE of these days IM gonna learn how to completely relax like Milo!!




 

PEACE

When Progress Clashes with Nature!

There is a vacant lot behind the building where I work...many of the businesses on the main street and the street where I work are backed by this lot and so its used for parking...and the main trash dumpster is there.

The city has been working on replacing a collapsed drain line since February. First they had to move all sorts of buried electrical wires, gas lines, cable lines, water lines its been a realy PIA for us......and then last week they started at the back of the lot where an alley runs up and they are installing huge 4 foot diameter cement pipes...    WELL this spring between the initial phase of the work and the final stage, a Northern Mockingbird build a nest in the trumpet vine that clumps around this ONE lone Utility pole in the middle of the vacant lot...last yr I took a photo of the trumpet vine when it was in bloom. 
My coworker and I take our folding chairs out back and sit in the shade and enjoy our lunch on nice days...and we watched the Mockingbird feed her new chicks...THEN disaster!!
THE city moved all their heavy equipment into the lot and started digging a huge trench to bury the huge pipes...SO there was big dump trucks, earth movers, big bucket trucks the whole lot was like Ground Zero...

You can just see the pole in the middle of these machines with the dangling vine where the nest was....at the time I took this photo the chicks were still in the nest...

the pole in right in the center of the photo with a man standing beside it

The 2 chicks in the nest were scared to death...not quite ready for fledging but almost they clung to the edge of the nest as the huge movers and shakers rumbled past sometimes within inches of them....I told the crew boss about the chicks and he said they would try to NOT harm the birds...so for 3 days straight they endured this onslought of construction  the mother was so stressed but she continued to feed them THEN one chick was gone from the nest when I arrived on Thrusday morning...I watched the lone chick thru the widow while I worked... checking on him every 20 minutes or so via binoculars.....he screamed all day, but mother didnt come. I think the other chick must have jumped from the nest  when the men knocked off about 6:30 on Wednesday evening, because when I left at 5 that evening,  I checked and both chicks were hanging in there....SO maybe mother was able to coax the one chick to the heavy brush cover behind a fence in a safe area on the adjoining lot...but the lone chick was left behind--- Mother never showed all day while he barely clung to the edge of the nest, I had to go out once and ask them to pull the huge dump truck up as they had it sitting with the motor running and the exhaust pipe aimed right at the nest..

By the end of the day I realized this little bird was doomed So I got a ladder and rescued the bird and got the nest too....there had been a third chick in the beginning...but it was dead.

SO I brought it home...

Its feathered as you can see but no primary feathers at all....some flapping of wings but thats it...
SO for now Im keeping it in my "sick bay" box where I keep the house finches when they have conjunctivites...but now its the weekend I plan to move him to a bigger cage I have in storage.

HE IS eating good, canned dog food!! So I hope I can finish raising this chick..if the mother had continued to feed it no problem..but with all that work going on she Flew The Coop with the other chick...I did look for the other chick in case he fell and got run down but it was impossible to tell with all the frehsly moved earth...I hope he did make it.

I am really sorry I didnt get them the day before but mom bird was still flying in and doing her best to feed them...SHE just got overrun, I was afraid to go out there myself when all that equipment was there,,,the photo up there is only the dump truck and the big scoop, they had many other machines there as the day progressed!!

SO Wish me luck...

I was a volunteer bird rehabber in the past so I have some experience in helping wild animals...not usually so young is all...

PEACE

Sic Daze

Blogger seems to have decided to let me keep the old Interface a little longer...yeah!

WELL after my weekend in the mountains, I came home and have been quite sick! I did the working sick thing for a week, then basically died on Saturday spent an entire 48 hrs in jammies and slippers and ate pbj sandwiches to stay alive, okay Im exaggerating a wee bit but thats about how bad Ive been feeling.  Then another week of dragging myself to work on days when I would rather stay home in bed!!   Hope now Im on the mend a bit,,,,body aches, like crazy, and I had a mega fever of 104!!! Chills the whole nine., trust me you dont want it!! 

Ive been eating out of my garden, and NO that's now the cause of the illness, the illness came in before the Beans did,  my first "mess" as we say its a MESS OF BEANS....they were good for sure right off the bush into the pot and then on my plate!

I hope after all the rain of this week another Mess will be on the bush by weekend.. I also picked this fancy lettuce and its quite tangy...

 I also have fresh basil, parsley, spring onions, some small carrots and the cherry tomatoes are clustering again....the deer came by and topped all my bushes when I first set them out so they've had to catch up...

All the plants on the deck are making me happy, Im especially happy with the prickly pear cactus I put it in this pot 2 yrs ago, and this yr it bloomed...  Prickly Pear grows wild here and I never realized how well they will grow in pots too!! SOME get quite HUGE so Im gonna try for a BIG One...

and this FRIENDLY SUN is one of my deck buddies...

The little brown headed nuthatch had a visitor knocking on the foot of his tall pine...so he came down to investigate...do you see him there on the upper left?

KNOCK- KNOCK

Who's there?

Pileated Woodpecker that's Who!

SO, as we say in the deep south Good Lord Willing and the creeks dont rise,  I will be cleaning up the yard its about 4 weeks past due and just chllin in my little piece of the American Dream better known as HOME this weekend.

Hope you're all doing the same.



PEACE

GOOD LUCK!!

GOOD LUCK!!, originally uploaded by Dixxe's Pixel's.

HEY look what I found, maybe my luck is gonna change...Hopefully it will be for the better! HA!

Fun Weekend

IT was an exciting weekend for me, I packed up the DixxeLand Express, the girls jumped in, picked up my best friend and away we went--to the BALL GAME.

Friday night we had dinner in the city and later we went to the game, the Greenville Drive at Flour Field..it was great, unfortunately the Drive lost in the 9th inning, 6 to 5. A fantastic Fireworks display followed the game...

We drove to the Clemson Experimental Forest, a beautiful wilderness area...The DixxeLand Express had to make the stream crossing, we didnt get a shot of US crossing but we got a shot of these people as they crossed...they had a 4 wheel drive we DIDNT but the DixxeLand handled it better than I thought..

Then Saturday we went on a short waterfall hike, to a very small falls on Wild Cat Creek.  We had a nice picnic before the hike you can barely see the picnic shelter on the left on this shot...this was taken from the other side of the stream after we had started our hike.

...which took us to this small waterfall/feature its listing in my Waterfall Hikes of Upstate SC guidebook, we had intended to hike to Riley Moore Falls but we NEVER FOUND THAT ONE...duh..so we saved the day by selecting this one that was in the area of where WE were..lol

 on Wild Cat Creek.  Such a pretty area...we saw several Louisiana Waterthrush some of them newly fledged, it was fun to watch them....

Another highlight of the hike was seeing some really cool forest flora, like this Verigated Milkweed

and this Indian Pink, it has a little vine wrapped around it so it may look like too many leaves...

always good to see one of these around when hiking in the woods!!

PEACE

With Honor....

For Taphophile Tragic

AMERICAN BATTLE MONUMENTS COMMISSION


Isaac N. Alexander
First Lieutenant, U.S. Army
Service # O-1175626
592nd Field Artillery Bn, 106th Infantry Division
Entered the Service from: Georgia
Died: 16-Dec-44
Buried at: Plot C Row 12 Grave 8

Henri-Chapelle American Cemetery

Henri-Chapelle, Belgium

Awards: Bronze Star, Purple Heart

While in Quaker Cemetery in my town of Camden, SC I found this small family plot, (the 3 markers one flat and 2 upright) and of course I noticed right away the 2 stones that were so similar side by side....so I had to investigate..and this is what I read the flat stone is Thomas Loryea Alexander and his wife Ellen Boykin, ...you may not be able to read he was a Brig Gen US Army.

Right beside them 

is their son born on Jun 14, 1920,
 Lt. Issac Newton Alexander's stone, and that led to me to the Henri Chappelle US Memorial as seen above and the burials of thousands of our fallen and the Lt. who died in the Battle of the Bulge in Ardennes sector.  It was the bloodiest battle of WWII.  The US Lost 89,000 men 19,000 Killed,  47,000 wounded and another 23,000 were captured!! Lt Alexander was in one of the assigned Artillery units, the 592nd, of the 106th Division, the "Golden Lions" an inexperienced unit out of Fort Jackson, SC he was part of the  HHB 155mm artillery guns units. His unit was overrun and eventually, though slowing the German advance down, they had to surrender...Mr Alexander was 24 yrs old when he gave his life in attempt to stop Hitler's advance into Europe.  His remains are buried in the Henri Chappelle US Memorial Cemetery, (anyone who is reading this from Blegium, I would love to see a photo of his marker)  THIS stone commemorats his life and service lays next to his what I have to imagine, grief stricken parents...here in my town Camden.

                                     He received the Bronze Star and the Purple Heart

 

 


Bronze Star                                   Legion of Merit                                                    Purple Heart

TO the right of Issac Newton's memorial in Quaker Cem. is HIS TWIN BROTHER

Lt Col. Thomas Loryea Alexander Jr.  He received the Legion of Merit award, the Purple Heart ,the Army Commendation Medal and the Italian Medal of Valor

HE survived the war having been sent to  the North African Campaign

both born on June 14 1920

I have to imagine it was HE that erected the stones to his parents, and his fallen brother.
He passed away

March 19, 2006

One was taken right away and one lived to tell the story....

PEACE

Allegiance

For Taphophile Tragics

I am having some problems with the new interface of blogger...but Ill try this.

I have spent a lot of time in various cemeteries over the past yr and I have learned a lot about history from browsing the stones and going in search of the history behind the stones, the life lived...

I wish I had taken more time here at the Veterans Cemetery in Window Rock, AZ. 

I did notice all the stones are facing the same direction....and there are lots of flags since it is a veterans cemetery...but the strange thing about this cemetery is that it is in a sovereign nation, the Nation of the Navajo, and all buried within are Navajo Soldiers of the US forces!!

The Navajo tribe has given a lot of its native men and women to the cause of wars of the United States of America, including the work they did in WWII as code talkers....their language was not understood by any of the enemy or any of the allies for that matter, so they were able to keep troop movements from being traced by speaking their native language over the 2 way radios.  This memorial sits in Window Rock, the capital city of the Navajo Nation.

I was happy to be at the memorial just a few days prior to Memorial Day, the Navajo are very proud people and although back 1864  the Navajo people were forced to walk 300 miles to be incarcerated in a fort called Defiance, where they lived a harsh life as prisoners of Kit Carson who was ordered to make war on them... this is known as the LONG WALK...

They were eventually released (1868) and granted the land which is now the largest Native American Reservation in the USA. IT encompasses parts of 3 states and covers about 26,000 square miles.  Its so amazing to me that a country that  tried to eradicate its native population would later depend on those same people to help them defeat another enemy that threatened to eradicate all of us!!

PEACE

One Ringy Dingy

Yesterday I had to purchase a new cell phone, Keith calls it a mobile I like that better, it sounds more like what it is....and now I own this model of mobile.  (photo from Bing) Nope I didnt get one of those touchy touch screens and I have to share this story...recall a few weeks back when I told you my sister and I came across a lost angler while we were hiking in the Chattahoochee National Forest? Well we found him hopelessly separated from his friends and scared to death....we helped him find his vehicle in the end but the funny thing was this:

I HAVE a very old Cell mobile phone..a motorola, flip top... it does nothing except make and receive calls and it will text.  Well the battery got to the point it will not hold a charge and I was told they dont make mobile phone batteries, just mobile phones, SO A new phone would have to be purchased...I was able to find what i imagine is the last flip top available now...although it has a lot more Bells n whistles like it has a camera....GREAT now i can pocket dial and take photos at the same time......I dont like the new flat screen touchy things...dont like the size of em, they're too sleek, slim and  awkward!  I pick one up and immediately it slides right out my hand while I juggle it and cause it go flying across the room....my clumsy fingers need some Texture to hang onto..But I see everyone who is a mobile geek using these Star Trek reminiscent devices so I have a clue how to use it,  Ive seem the owners--- touch them, dragging imagery across the screen, and poking at it with the tips of their fingers.

....but  back to the lost hiker...well previous to us finding this poor guy in the woods wandering around lost, my sis and I made the drive up from her home about an hr away.  As we drove she told me she didnt have my mobile number saved in her Blackberry...so she handed it to me and asked me to put my mobile number in her phone and save it...OKAY..

so I start touching the screen, and nothing happened...I touched, slid, swooped, and poked  my finger on the little icons on the screen and NADA...so she starts to laugh LOUDLY...

"OH Its not a touch screen its the older model of Blackberry, you have to use the keypad." OHHHH ok I can do that its more like mine...just no flip top its smooth and brightly lit but has actual buttons to push SO eventually i get my number in there..and fumble it back to her drop it on the floor of the car, retrieve it and finally its done, now in the old days I could have written my number on a piece of paper in about 3 seconds flat.....not the probably 15 minutes it took me to insert my number into her BLackBerry..

WHEW...

....now back to the lost angler turned hiker, the first thing he wanted to know is do we have our Cell  mobile phones on us, ....uhhhhhh    NO, why bother no reception up there in the woods...and he had left his in the truck, why bother to lug it to the Chattagoo River when he trekked down there with his fishing gear???

...when we finally hiked back to our car he wanted to try the mobile to see if he could call his buddies and have them tell him where the trucks were parked..but one BIG PROBLEM, he said,

"OH I have an iPHone, dont know how to use this Blackberry..LOL".... he is used to the touch screen....SO when I reached to get it back, fumbled it to the floor and finally retrieved it and handed it to my sister who knows how to operate it and while SHE drove on the curvey mtn road she would dial the number on the Cell mobile phone for him!! OMG, can we say PULL OVER?

... she asked for the buddies phone number...and GUESS what -----he didnt know it!! HE realized nowadays no one memorizes phone numbers we have them programmed in our mobiles and cordless home phones...SO he didnt know the number.  The only number he could recall was his step mom's phone numbers back in Georgia, (we are in SC) so my sister dialed and eventually as we drove to the top of the mtn he got some reception bars on the phone and the call went thru..

WELL since the step mom didnt recognize the name or number on the caller ID of her phone she didnt Answer the phone!! ( she probably had a T-Mobile or Sprint Phone...lol)

...he had hopes that she had his friends number in her phone and he could get the number via her, call the friend, who could hopefully tell him which road their trucks were parked on...SO she didnt answer and he also tried step mom at her home phone and no answer there...

DARN...

Meanwhile we gave up the whole idea of calling and just stated looking at road turn offs that may lead down to the river and thats how we eventually hit the right gravel road and found his truck and his friends trucks too...YEAH he was back...he got his mobile out, tried to call his friend to tell him he had been lost in the woods for the past 2 hrs and he was NOT down on the river bank where they possibly thought he was, but NO service on the phone..SO he said he would wait by the trucks,,,I suggested he blow the truck horn to get their attention.

WE Left...back at home an hr after our arrival my sister got a call on her mobile phone...IT was the step mom back in GA....when she got home and saw the same strange number show up on her caller ID that had tried to call her Mobile Phone..she got worried and called back to see who and what was going on...we told her that her step son had been lost in the woods and we had found him and let him try to call for his friends number, with my sisters phone, but got no anwer...She said she did see the call come in but chose not to answer!!

SO It is in the digital age, we are so well connected BUT NOT...we all had phones, and each was a different technology that the others couldnt use and were unfamiliar with... none of the phones had service when we needed it and when finally the very technology that no one wants to be without got service for the call to go through--- the person who we called and could have assisted with help used the very same technology---- to ignore the call..SO with the technology, and money for buying the motorola, the blackberry, the iphone and the monthly bills associated with the phones,,,,,,THEY... were not worth Jack when we really needed them to work... and we all know Jack!!

SO thats the story and now I have a new phone its an LG-its very sleek and Ive dropped it already a couple of times, and I've programmed in the numbers of all my family and friends and I just hope when the time comes that I actually NEED the dang thing it will WORK and hopefully by then I will have learned how to use it...

Over the weekend my same sister came down to visit me..we went antiquing and had lunch...a we browsed the shelves and stalls of old antiquated stuff I overheard a youngster ask her grandmother 'what is that" and the grandmother replied, "thats a rotary phone." the grand daugher asked "does it text?" And all Grandmother did was laugh quite loud, "NOPE" she said you have to put your finger in those little holes and dail it....like this

WOW we've come a long way wonder whats next?

oh gotta go my phone is ringing...lol yeah its on Speaker PHONE ~~~~~yahoo!! It tells me the number calling, Let me see If Im gonna answer or NOT, OH NO WAY dont know who the heck that is...hope it wasnt YOU!! hahaha

PEACE