Little Girl Lost?

While on vacation earlier this month I came across a wonderful scene on the shore of Lake Michigan. As I moseyed along the beach (I do mosey from time to time) I found this little girless shoe among the stones. What joyful visions this stirred in my mind. A playful little tot prancing along the warm stones, the cool blue lake beckoning ahead, a mad dash to confront the breaking waves with such enthusiasm that the missing shoe doesn't faze her. The stones, the water, and the shoe remain but the little girl is gone. Or is she?

You can take the little girl out of the shoe,
but you can't take the little girl out of the little girl!

Back, Back, Back . . .

I just don't know. I go away for a week and the Cubs go nuts. During my absence I think they won forty or fifty games in a row. Then I get home just in time to see one of them get skewered with the sharp end of a broken bat.
Meanwhile back to the vacation stories. There was no one really far out occurrence (that spelling doesn't look right to me, but who's to argue with spellcheck?) We did do a lot of back road driving which gave me plenty of time to muse. I didn't use to muse but now I find myself musing all the time. (besides it's neat to say) One of my many musings involved people's need to give humorous names to their possessions, mainly vacation homes, boats and, the queen of them all, beauty shops. Unfortunately I didn't muse this muse in time to photograph a bunch of examples but there is no play on words that escapes these people. Jo and I tried our hand (or head) at coming up with a few names. I guess we're not meant have a boat to dock at our vacation home while we primp and perm at the shoppe because we couldn't come up with anything worthy of posting. (although I kinda like "Curls Night Out" for a salon name and "Richie Haven" for a cottage) But we did pass a sign outside a business (not a cottage, boat or salon) It was a store for yard ornaments called Ta Da . . . "Birdbaths and Beyond"
Enough musing for now. Most of you who know me know that I have strong yearning for chocolate, pie and ice cream. (and I throw in hamburgers for the nutritional value) At our lunch stop on Washington Island I wacked the entire food pyramid with one or two sweeps of my fork. A really dark chocolate ice cream provided the dairy portion, apple pie took care of the grain (wheat flour in the crust) and fruit. Just to cover all the basics I threw in a cup of chili for meat and veggies.

One other food note. On the way up to Door County we found a little burger joint in Two Rivers (pronounced Trivers), Wisconsin that ranks right up there with Petes in Prairie du Chien. (see "Make Mine Plain" - April 25, 2009)


Nuf said about food.
I'm still in the process of editing the hundreds of photos that Jo and I shot hoping to narrow them down to a few good examples of the beauty that we saw. Until then I'll leave you with a story of the photo we didn't take.
In our travels we run across deer fairly regularly. Normally we are either face to face with them or left with a view of their "white flag" (tail) disappearing into the woods. Last Tuesday we were driving down a nice quiet little road in Door County chuckling at the silly names at the end of driveways of vacation getaways when I noticed a deer up ahead. She was standing in the middle of the road not paying a bit of attention to us but rather staring in the opposite direction at an approaching bicyclist. She was completely oblivious to anything but that biker. Almost as oblivious as were the two tourist sitting in their Honda not taking pictures with any of the three cameras at hand. Finally the cyclist got fairly close and another deer, who was enjoying the whole thing from the edge of the woods, yelled (or whatever deer do to get each others attention) and they both took off into the forest. A day or two later a different deer did stop to pose for me. It actually started to approach the car but got scared off by another car zooming by.

And one Eagle for good measure!

Pictured Rocks, Lighthouses and waterfalls are up next!

Bye for a while

Although my posts have become few and far between, I always intend to write more often. Normally I have two or three really interesting/funny stories bouncing around my head (usually in a sleepless period during the night) but, by the time I get to the computing machine, they have dissolved and run off to the land of lost stories. This coming week I have a legitimate excuse for not posting. We're going on vacation. This will provide Jo with a much needed rest away from work and other household responsibilities and give me an, even better than usual, excuse to take an unneeded rest from work and other household responsibilities. My job for the next week or so will consist of finding and shooting a whole bunch of outstanding photos. I still haven't found "The Photo of the Year" for 2010. And, maybe I'll even find a clock or two for my wall. The count is presently up to twenty one and I want to tell you that twenty one ticking clocks certainly provide plenty of "white noise" for what ever "white noise" is good for. Watching the preparations for a week long trip in the Blume house is somewhat like witnessing a circus ringmaster load up the VW with a thousand clowns. This season of year, especially when you're traveling "Up North", things become a little more exciting. Warm sunny days, cool crisp nights, possible rain, the chance of snow, earthquakes, forest fires and the occasional, dreaded tidal wave all give JoAnne the heebie jeebies, which is Spanish for, "I better pack this in case of that!". I have almost finished packing my Piggly Wiggly reusable shopping bag with my stuff and Jo, who promised to limit herself to one suitcase, is just about finished repacking for the _______eenth time. (our neighbor has been kind enough to offer the use of his brother's fork lift to help load the "one" suitcase into the car.) Now that we have selected and packed the necessary clothing, we can devote this afternoon to the gathering of the important supplies...snack stuff. Going on vacation is no excuse for going nuts and abandoning your normal, healthy diet. So, with that said, I'm personally attending to the food pyramid. Let's see, does chocolate go on top or create the base for all other nutrients? I've already covered all the essentials, stopped the mail and newspaper deliveries and stopped at the bakery to assure them that I was coming back so there would be no reason to panic if I didn't show up for a week. Well, all we have left is load the cooler(s), fill up with gas (which naturally went up a nickle a gallon while I was writing this), try to figure out which chargers go with which electronic device, wind the compass and hit the road early tomorrow morning. We'll be back in a week with great photos and even greater tales of the North Woods. (some even true).

As we used to say in the old country, "See Ya!"