Spike's Meadow

The meadow is full of yellow flowers which Siri tells me is 'Lesser Hawksbit'. I wonder what Greater Hawksbit looks like? Spike is oblivious as he runs around in circles.

It is a steep walk up one side of the hill to the meadow, a completely flat walk through the meadow and a steep walk down the other side. I am always struck by the complete change in climate from one side of the hill to the other. It's fairly sunny and and warm as we trudge up the hill, hot in the meadow, and cool and ferny on the downhill side. The collage in extras shows the different kinds of vegetation in each place. Manzanita berries on the left, meadow grass in an unmowed patch of the meadow by the frog pond, and ferns and poison oak on the way down.

There is a quarry with a sort of amphitheater at the very top of the hill which we always say we should walk up to, but the trail up to it is even steeper and we always decide, 'maybe next time'.

There has been no action in the bird's nest I disturbed in the top of our umbrella and I wanted to put it up, so I took the nest out. I always marvel at the engineering and materials used in nest making. It was mostly lichen which hangs from the oak trees some distance away, lined with something very soft. There were bits of pieces of string, some gauze (where did they get that?) and even some dog hair (which is in literally everything around here). It was cleverly attached to one of the inside struts of the umbrella. The only thing they didn't prepare for was me coming along and opening the umbrella. That took us all by surprise.

I pulled some weeds, pruned the olive tree, and cut back the buddleia which is engulfing the Buddha. I think we'll have to move him to another location. I sat out there for quite awhile just enjoying the day, the sunshine and the garden, and tried to think where to put him. He has been exactly where he is ever since the movers put him there 13 years ago. It's hard to imagine him anyplace else and even harder to imagine actually shifting him. We should have had Gustavo do it when they were working here last week. He could probably do it singlehanded.

Tomorrow is a holiday (Memorial Day). Dana and Jim should be home from Bottle Rock. Dana sent me a picture of one of today's highlights....an 18year old shredding on the guitar. For us, it's been a pleasant, low key weekend.