Happy Birthday to Dawn!

Shenandoah Blogger Dawn M. Miller

Dawn is one of the few bloggers in the Northern Shenandoah Valley,  and the only one besides me who has been posting regularly for well over a decade. She uses the WordPress platform for her blog, The Day After. I think of it as “Lingering Visions” because that is in the URL.

I knew Dawn from her blog before I met her one day in the grocery store. Later, she organized some shows for local photographers, but that was before the pandemic interrupted things.

Check out her blog when you get a chance.

The Case of the Guilty Dog

Poor Charlie! he did not mean to hurt me. But now I'm in pain and he has to spend the weekend in boarding.

It happened Tuesday morning before 7 AM. He had awakened me while it was still dark, and we went out for a morning walk as soon as the sky lightened. Uh oh! There was his nemesis. The little dog that raises his hackles was out for a walk with his mom. I thought we could get far ahead of them so I started walking briskly with Charlie behind me on the leash. 

He started to follow me, but suddenly turned to run back toward the other dog, twisting me around and pulling me down on the damp sidewalk. My landing was painful. I struggled to get up, but pain shot through my body. Fearing that I had broken something, I called out to the other woman that I needed help. She put her dog in her house and came to help me.

I gave her Charlie’s leash and tried to get up, but I couldn’t. She said her sister would be there in just a minute. (They meet for a walk every morning.) Her sister hurried to me and helped me get to my feet, and we walked back to my door. By then I knew that I hadn’t broken any bones, but I wasn’t sure what damage might’ve been done.

As soon as my doctor’s office opened,  I called them and left a message. They called back and did not have any openings that day. I already had an appointment with them for the next morning, which was a follow-up to discuss lab results. 

As the day wore on, I didn’t feel better and decided to go to the hospital. I called Deborah and she was not able to take me, but she said that Frank could. The hospital is not very far, and I didn’t have to wait very long either. The doctor there felt that the CT scan was in order so I was taken to radiology. The scan showed no broken or fractured bones, just a compressed disc, which may have happened previously. I had soft tissue injuries. He instructed me to rest, not lift anything over ten pounds, and not walk the dog for two weeks.

Fortunately, my sister was due to arrive the next day, so I left Charlie in boarding overnight. Peggy arrived and helped with Charlie for the few days that she was here. Before she left on Friday, we took him back to the kennel.

I’ve been treating my lower back pain with an ice pack and painkillers, mostly mild ones. The pain is at its worst when I try to get out of bed, but after I loosen up, it’s bearable and I’m able to get around in the afternoon. Then I get really tired and achy and have to rest.

I’m not sure how I’m going to handle the rest of the required 10 days off from walking the dog. Deborah offered to walk him some of the time, and Kayla from the kennel can sometimes do it. But he likes to go out five times a day and I have never been able to get him on a convenient schedule. In the long-term, I can find a house with a fenced yard, And I’ll try to find effective training for him. Our previous visits to trainers were not very successful because Charlie was frightened, Plus, he is not motivated by treats or toys so did not respond to the usual methods. 

Then there’s my age to consider. I am too old to just bounce back from an injury. I hate to think about that, but I don’t want to wind up in a nursing home anytime soon.

I feel guilty that I don’t have a great yard for him, and I have not been very successful at training him. The idea of giving him up his heartbreaking. 

Here’s a picture from the day that Lynn and I picked him up from his foster home in Charlottesville. He’s a sweet little dog.

I’m With My Boys, I’m With My Troops

"I am walking down the street
I'm feeling all right
I'm with my boys
I'm with my troops.”

— Paul Simon

Do song lyrics just pop into your head sometimes? I’m sure I’m not the only person who experience this.

Cloudy in the West and it Looks Like Rain

My sister is visiting for just two days. It turned out to be helpful timing to me because I hurt my back on Tuesday and was instructed by a doctor to not walk the dog or pick up anything over 20 pounds. 

She drove me to Front Royal today so I could buy some items and return a package. We also drove into Shenandoah National Park because it’s right there at the edge of town and Peggy misses the mountains.

We arrived at the Visitors Center as a ranger was giving a talk about black bears. He stressed the importance of keeping food and garbage where bears cannot get them.

My phone sent alerts that a thunderstorm was coming. It was sunny then, but soon we saw the storm over the Massanutten Range to the west.

The storm moved closer and finally reached us. The rain was heavy but did not last long.

Red-winged Blackbird at Franklin Park

Loudoun County

It was sitting on a sign. I didn’t have a real camera with me; these are cell phone pictures. It flew to tall grasses and perched for a minute.

It flew almost out of the frame.

So that you can see what a red-winged blackbird looks like, here’s a picture I took a few years ago.

Country Lane, Vineyard, and Mountain

Star of the Valley Vineyard

Wordless Wednesday on Tuesday

New Bookstore Opens in Woodstock

Bonfire Bookstore and Yarnery

As you can see from the reflection, the bookstore is across the street from the old courthouse. A small yarn shop is incorporated into the bookstore.

 

I had heard that there was a mural in the store, but at first I didn’t see it. Then I noticed this huge cabinet with the doors open.

Of course! This is the entrance to the children’s section. The wardrobe is a literary reference to a children’s classic.

And there’s Aslan!

Monday Murals / Mosaics

I did not read The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe when I was a child. It existed, but I don’t think it became popular in the States until a little later. My daughters read it so I heard about it. 

Another clever touch is wallpaper made of actual pages from books. Overall, it’s a pleasant place to shop.

Inside a Sears Barn

Although I have been inside Sears houses, I did not know that Sears once sold mail-order barn kits. It turns out that the Sears catalog offered these from 1911 to 1929. This means that any of these barns still standing are about 100 years old.

Yesterday’s blog post mentioned a barn We were there for an indoor “yard sale.” Aside from that being something to do on a rainy afternoon, I wanted to see the Sears barn that was mentioned in the announcements for the sale.

In the Village of Mt. Olive, Shenandoah County

This particular barn has been used for barn dances, so it’s decorated with lights. The timbers are not as thick as ones that I’ve seen in older barns, but they look closer together and more uniform in size.

Like the Sears home kits, the barn kits were shipped by train. The Sears homes that I have seen are all in towns along railroad lines. They are very nice inside, with craftsman-style woodwork. 

 Many of the items for sale were just old tools. (Farmers use a lot of tools.) I took some pictures of cute dolls.

The owner told me that the barn was built on the foundation of a previous barn. Downstairs I noticed there were some hand-hewn beams. I neglected to take a picture of them. I may have been distracted by the rain and the cows, and the crazy things happening in the world..

Charlie’s Mid-June Report

 Hi, it’s Charlie! I had a pretty good week, and only had to stay at daycare one time so Mom could get to the foot doctor. I always get her up early so she doesn’t miss her appointments. I like to get up when the sun comes up. After my walk, I take a nap. In the afternoon, we usually go somewhere.

Do you like to roll in the grass? I do, but yesterday I rolled in something that smelled interesting but Mom said it was disgusting. She washed me with a hose before she let me come in the house, and that was horrible. I hate hoses and I don’t like showers or baths. 

With that trauma out of the way, I’ll tell you some more pleasant things. Sometimes we sit in the front yard. Mom took my picture with the pink sky behind me and she didn’t realize that a porch light made my nose look like it was lit up.

Yesterday we went to the park but first we drove past a store and a farm.

There was a cat in the store

There were cows at the farm. I like seeing them from the car. I don’t like to walk close to them because they are big and could step on me.

We didn’t stay at the park long because rain was coming. Mom took a picture of some butterflies.

Silvery Checkerspot

Today we went to Sadie‘s house and then we all went for a ride. We saw a different farm and the cows were running back to the barn because it was lunchtime.

I saw a pink bicycle and wondered if it belonged to a cow.

Now it is raining again. I think it's time for a nap.

Twenty Years of Blogging!

My first blog post was on June 13, 2005. Even I am amazed that I've been blogging for 20 years.

Post #1

When I started, we were spending a lot of time in our Glebe Harbor home and the Internet connection was painfully slow. They didn’t have high-speed Internet in our corner of Westmoreland County so I had to use the phone line, and it was a very old phone line. I would actually click on a link, go to the kitchen and get coffee, and return to see that pictures on my screen were still opening. And pictures back then were much smaller because many people still had dial-up connections!

When I wanted to post a page with photos, I would compose it on my laptop and shrink the pictures to 3 x 5“ size (at 72 dpi), and drive to the library which was about 5 miles away. There I would connect to their DSL Internet and upload my text and pictures. I did not post every day until after we moved back to Bryce Resort and got a high-speed connection at home. 

I’ve selected a few pictures from my early months of blogging. There were other favorites that are too small to look good on today’s devices. 

Our view at Glebe Harbor

Even then I enhanced pictures in Photoshop.

Assateague Sunset

Marie

Evening Flag

Saturday is Flag Day.

I don’t have a flag right now, but my neighbors just got one that’s big enough for everyone on the block. I don’t know why they erected a flagpole that is taller than their house. There is a light on the top so they don’t have to take it in at night.

Right now, the flag is just hanging there because the wind‘s not blowing. But a fresh breeze will come along, and it will fly proudly again.

I’m a fan of subtle metaphors.

Blogging with Birds

Since I have a major blog anniversary coming up on Friday, I've been digging around in my old posts. I found I've been posting pictures of birds since my first year of blogging.  We were staying in Glebe Harbor at that time, and our deck had a long view of a creek that led to the Potomac.

I posted these pictures of great blue herons on September 8, 2005.

Over the years I continued to occasionally post photos of birds. I found a link to Wild Bird Wednesday in January 2014. I don’t know if it was my first time joining that linkup because I did not look at all my posts with birds. That particular post included this photo of a goldfinch.