Update about blogCa

Who knew all this would happen afterwards! Flat Creek in Feb. 2024. Much changed by the force of the hurricane floods in Sept. 2024.

Tuesday, October 5, 2021

Catching up with y'all

The last week of a month is usually squeezed for me, since I volunteer to edit a church newsletter. I always seem to get something on the very last day...and this time I found out an error I'd published as well, so I had to send out an addendum.

I realize most of the people in my church don't read my blogs, if any of them do. So technically, blog friends are a whole 'nother group. Hi guys and gals!

I'm so glad to have been reading your blogs while I'd already published something or another this last week. Not my best photos or even notes.

So...here I can share some photos from my latest lunches/or walks/or exercise classes (or whatever comes up!

Let's start with the ending of all our food stuffs, the peelings, parings, and leftovers from whatever we eat. They have to be placed in one of these bear-proof bins. You've got two little links to undo before opening, and then you need to close the hook and eye again afterwards. This bin has not been closed correctly, as you can see the wire hanging off to the right, but the left one is engaged (though at this angle it's almost invisible, just the wire protruding from the catch.

Our other trash bins are simple for non-food stuffs, with bears checking them out sometimes. Usually when a newcomer hasn't learned to separate their trash yet. Unfortunately diapers are also delicious to bears, so must also go into bear proof bins. Some elders do need that help.


Also a view around home, the bedroom window has openings in the maples enough that I can see the mountains on the other side of the valley. Whoopee! And that means I've got about 7 months to have a view with them. As this was taken last week, there are many more leaves turned orange since then.



You know how many wildflowers I know...yep, let's let the experts name them!

Looking up Walker Rd, where I still try to walk at least once a week...that's a big hill, though you can't tell by looking at it!


And looking down Walker Rd.  The vegetation on the right has all been sprayed with Roundup probably to keep it down, under the electric wires, not that anyone is interested in climbing those poles.
The car down the road is a new resident who wants to smoke, and since smoking isn't allowed anywhere on the grounds (due to having Federal subsidies helping with our rent), residents and staff have to leave to smoke. Our former maintenance man caught a smoke at various entrances or exits a couple of times a day.

I remember Pyracanths growing in great arches in Tallahassee FL. This may or may not be the same, since our bushes are all trimmed into these dull little blobs.

I can give myself credit for a couple of minutes of stair climbing, if I wish to walk back up the hill this way. Usually I don't, preferring a more gradual smaller incline to climb my hill. It's still the same height achieved, but a bit easier if each of my steps is only half as high.

Looking at my porch from the outside...before the ground crew cut back the hosta.

The Kalanchoes at the base of my steps.



21 comments:

  1. That looks very pleasant there.
    Plant number 2 is Yarrow/Milfoil(ie thousand leaf)

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    1. Thanks for the plant id...which I may remember for a while, but in all likelihood won't by the time it blooms again.

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  2. That's a thankless task - editing a newsletter. My parents used to collate and staple together our parish magazine; work that was only ever noticed when a page was put in upside down! Nice to have a view from your window, even if for only part of the year.

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    1. Fortunately the church sends the newsletter out only on line these days. And the publisher is not myself. SO I just send the copy to them to distribute. I do remember collating papers through many years however!

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  3. Hello,
    It is nice to volunteer your time. You have lovely views out your windows and I like the plants on your porch.
    Walking the hills and the steps is more of a workout, I can feel our little hills we walk. Take care, have a happy day!

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    1. This is the week I should be cleaning up the plants, throwing away the deadish ones. Maybe.

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  4. ...all of our kitchen scraps are put in a worm bin for composting.

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    1. That's such a great idea, especially if you have your own gardens. A friend of mine who doesn't, still takes her scraps to a compost bin at the community garden. But most of our elderly apartment dwellers don't have that attitude.

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  5. That's rather thorough post. The bear issue surprises me

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  6. I always forget that there are bears there. Wow! I'm glad there are bear-proof bins. Beautiful photos. It's really so lovely there.

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    1. Yes, on the Blue Ridge Parkway a black bear apparently attacked back when a dog that wasn't on his leash barked at him, so the National Park Service is looking for the bear to euthanize him. Many people in Asheville are opposed to that.

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  7. Just so you know, Heather's books are not about pottery. The titles are metaphors.

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    1. Thanks AC...well, she chose that metaphor and now I want to understand why.

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  8. Your window gives you a nice view. Glad that the bins are bear proof, would hate to see one when you are heading to the bin.

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    1. I don't take trash out at night, but wait till morning! Some folks have had their cars broken into as well, so I try not to leave any food trash in my car either.

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  9. When we lived in Columbia MD in the retirement community I did the bi monthly newsletter editing. It is a task. Thanks for the tour of your neighborhood.

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    1. Thanks. You remind me of my last job, where I published a weekly newsletter, which went on a bulleting board on each of the 20 floors...and guess who got to post them! Yep, me and walking the stairs, so as not to hold up the elevators.

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  10. Barbara, We're about a half hour from the mountains with the National Park and National forests so bears rarely make it this far. It's been several years since one raided bird feeders here. They trapped and removed him using Krispy Kreme donuts as bait. We had a herd of deer in our backyard early this morning gobbling up the prolific acorn crop our big oak tree has produced this year. Take Care, Big Daddy Dave

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    1. Black Mountain is backed up to wild mountain territory still, though houses are being built in unbelievable areas. The Blue Ridge Parkway is on the other side of Swannanoa, and they had a bear encounter at the Folk Art Center which is nearby. A black bear apparently attacked back when a dog that wasn't on his leash barked at him, so the National Park Service is looking for the bear to euthanize him. Many people in Asheville are opposed to that.

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  11. Bear proof bins are a necessity in the countryside here.

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There is today, more than ever, the need for a compassionate regenerative world civilization.