It's Friday....

Jones wanted to help.

I Heart Dead Flowers

Which Are You?

Which is your FAVE?







"Butterfinger"
Evasive, slippery, not necessarily to be trusted.







"Candy Corn"
Purely deluded people. They don't get that candy shouldn't attempt to imitate other food groups, particularly corn.







"Reeses"
Generous souls. Those who understand the salty in life, as well as the sweet.

Hat tip to The Reluctant Optimist

I'm Ready

This Is Halloween

Early Moon

At Their Level

I know I've been MIA lately, I just don't seem to have much to blog about these days. Alot of repetition around here.
Thanks to Michael, I've been trying new photo ideas. One being holding the camera low to the ground and just snapping. I don't even look through the viewfinder.
I've come up with some really neat shots, mostly of animals of course, and it's been fun to see what comes of it.
Also trying a new 85mm lens for a change. I thought at first I'd be returning this lens, but with this new venture, I'm liking it more and more.

The bear have retreated and we had our first morning of temps in the teens. 18 degrees this morning. Love it :)

Not really anything exciting to talk about....
I think my NY trip is off, but luckily we have friends there so the invite is always open.
The house is back to just me and the animals.

Now I'm just ready for the snow.

Got it

Design

Architect

Cat Land

If only I could sleep as easily as they do... wonder what he's dreaming about?

The Kids

The two troublemakers.. they're even bigger than this now.

I'm An Artist

My artwork..are you impressed?
I had two up, but it's slowing down the blog, so I leave you with my colorized version:)

Out My Window

Sparkles

We had a brief moment of sunlight today between the storms. I took advantage of it and grabbed the macro lens.

Speechless

I really haven't had much to talk about lately.. or that I can post anyway. We've had about three days of rain, which makes everything very soggy and messy.
I still have the momma and baby bear nightly, but they haven't been too much trouble.
There have been some changes around here, which keeps me in MT more often, but winter's approaching which I love and wouldn't travel much in anyway.
My Oregon trip was delayed, hopefully I can do it around Thanksgiving, we'll see.
My New York trip is still on, I hope. Housesitters aren't easy to come by this far away, but I still have some options I think.

Well, that's all I can really think of.
I'll let ya know if I think of anything else :)

The Train-Yard

It's taken me forever to get around to these photos. Awhile back I went to this train graveyard in Snoqualmie Park. I couldn't get too close to the trains and many were behind fences and barbed wire, but I photographed what I could. I would have loved to have walked inside some of them, especially the old dining cars.

Active

Bit of This, Bit of That

It's Friday..

:)

I stole this from the PQ. I HAD too.

Falling Over

The boys are everywhere. Which surprises me, considering it's hunting season. They usually run off and hide, especially the larger ones. Anyway, I had several in the yard this morning, rather early so not great light.

I drove to Redmond last couple of days, the fall colors are just beautiful, especially through Snoqualmie Park. I wish I had had the initiative to stop, but I didn't. Maybe another time. I'm not sure if I'll get back before they go away.
We have a few colors here, but being a forest of pine trees, it's mostly green. Some yellow aspens here and there. And.. pretty soon it will be all white. I'm ready :)

The hubs made a full recovery and is back to work in Washington. Biggest changes for him will be diet. He's been a good boy so far.
The bear have calmed down for the most part. We replaced our door with a metal door and moved the cat door. Kind of interesting, and I'm impressed it worked, but they made a cat door right into the wall of the building and then reinforced it with steel on both sides. The bear either haven't found it, or couldn't mess it up. Either way, we now have a normal door, and my cats still have a warm place to hole up in the cold weather.
I did have a monster of a bear here last night. I don't remember seeing him before, and he didn't really get into anything, but he did hang out for a bit and he was huge. I really need some kind of night-vision photography :)

I did get some new pics of the kittens in Redmond, but they aren't great. I could NOT get these two to sit still. They are all over the place. But so cute. I'll get some posted soon.

Heart Races

Monday Night Football.
Cowboys vs Bills.
This game was amazing.
I couldn't even sit the last few minutes.
Dallas 5-0.
DAYUM.

Listen.. STAT

Yeah, I was back there this morning.
And I do have a tip. For anyone.

If you wake up with breathing problems, and a fever. Tell someone. Yeah.. anyone.
Don't wait an hour or so. Don't diagnose yourself. Just let your spouse, or whoever know.
I made my second early morning drive to the ER. I'm not complaining, I'm glad we went, of course. But we should have gone earlier. Doctors make the worst patients.

Anyway, so far okay. He's home. Recheck on Monday.
I'm really getting tired of sitting in an ER.
There wasn't ONE doctor that looked like George Clooney in there.

I Take The Long Way Home

When lonely days turn to lonely nights
You take a trip to the city lights
And take the long way home
~Supertramp

Almost Gone

"No one finds fault with defects which are the result of nature."
~Aristotle

No More Ax

I took these photos on my drive home yesterday. I'd say it was about 4pm, and we had fall colors everywhere, but snow on the mountains. I swear I must have seen at least 5 rainbows on my way home. It was a wild drive. But, actually, it was a wild day.
I didn't plan on blogging much about this, but thought I would for one major reason. Paying attention to your body.













A few years ago, hubs and I were eating lunch at a restaurant and he started having pain in his chest. We just assumed it was indigestion. When it started moving into his arm and more pressure, we decided to take him to the hospital. Making a really long story short, it was indigestion and he was out the next day. Although, he was supposed to have stress tests as a follow-up, he didn't. You know what great patients doctors make. He didn't follow-up.
And, has had no problems since.
Well, all of that changed Thursday morning. Around 1am, he started having the same pain. He ignored it. About an hour and a half later, 2:30am-ish, he started feeling the pain in his arm and into his jaw. He finally decided eh-maybe we should go to the hospital.
32 degrees, dark as can be and raining, we drove the hour to the hospital. The whole drive my mind was wrapped around whether he was going to fall over (he was in a lot of pain), having an accident or hitting a deer. It wasn't a fun drive for either one of us.













The usual going's on when you arrive to an ER with chest pain. Got him right in, did all the tests, etc. But didn't like what they saw. Sandpoint has a pretty small hospital so they wanted to send him somewhere else. At about 4am, they careflighted him to another hospital another hour away. I then followed.
I don't need to go through every detail except to say that he did have a 'mild' heart attack and had to have a stint put in. He's still in the hospital today, and even though he felt great this morning and was supposed to go home, they have decided to keep him a little longer.













It sounds like everything will be okay. He doesn't seem to be too stressed about anything except that he will not grow old gracefully. Oh and that he's the worst patient ever.
But.. the doctors did say that it was a good thing he decided to come in when he did and not brush it off as indigestion.
He had been working on the property all day, splitting and hauling wood etc.. and had planned on doing that all day Thursday too. It's frightening now to think if we had been here at home and he had a full blown attack. An hour away from a hospital is not comforting.

It was definitely a long hard day, and I'm impressed I stayed awake with all the driving. But, as I was driving home and seeing the beautiful scenery and all the rainbows, it just makes you stop and think.
Think about what's important and what's not. Pay more attention to your surroundings. I know, it sounds like a hallmark card. I guess you think like that sometimes after a day like yesterday.

So anyway, I think everything will be fine and the DR. will be back at work as soon as he can. I might have to take the ax and chainsaw away from him though.

Some Color

We've had mostly rain for two days straight now. I had just a brief moment of sun to catch this. Our pond with fall colors and reflections.

Big News

So, you wanted to know the exciting small town news? Ok.

Since it has been in the paper I can blog about it. I won't name the people or the town though, just for privacy sake.

So.. about a week ago, we had a neighbor kid that was shot in the face. It started with the news of a life flight in our town ( which is VERY rare, of course) that picked up a 16yr old boy that had been shot.
Come to find out it was our neighbor, a boy (and family) we know pretty well and see quite often.
At first, it was a fear of a suicide attempt. But when we heard that ATF and US Marhalls were at the scene, that wasn't the case. Next thing we knew, the stepfather had fled the scene after shooting the boy. Accidental? That's the story. But he fled anyway.

The boy was life-flighted to a nearby hospital where he had reconstructive surgery on his face and his jaw wired shut. Turns out he will be okay, and not much damage. Apparently it went behind his ear and threw his lip. He was VERY lucky.

The ATF were called in when police entered the house and found over 40 guns in the home. I think there was a fear of another Rooby Ridge ( and yes, I spelled that wrong on purpose).
It took a few days, but step-dad finally turned himself in and is in jail. There's a lot of mess going on with CPS and local authorities on what's exactly happened and it's quite the hot topic in this little town of 700+/-.

Still not sure on all details, but it looks like the step-father will not rejoin this family, and even the mother is having to go to court to get the boy back.
I haven't seen anyone in the family since all of this happened.

Since we are neighbors and 'friends' of the family, some of us have been involved in questioning. Luckily, since I'm a hermit and don't get out much, my name is not out there.

So far anyway.

Gold

Culprits

Not my best work (hey.. it's cold, rainy, and windy).. but here's the two culprits this morning.