BITES, culture, and bits and pieces

The critters have hatched – three bites in two days!!  A horse fly, and two unknowns!

I told someone to beware of those cute little ladybugs, they like to BITE when they first come out of hibernation.  They do hibernate and especially at the base of large rocks with a sunny exposure.  They come out HUNGRY!

BTW – best salve for a bug bite – toothpaste.  Most backpackers carry it in their packs, and it works!

We have several “Shoe Trees” along our stretch of the highway over the Sierras.  Is it because we have the Cal Alumni Camps or are Shoe Trees now a part of our culture?  I understand that this fad started on a LONE TREE on one of the “loneliest highways in the country.”  It must be a bit like mountain climbing….Why do people climb a mountain – because it is there? 

I saw a DEAD pine tree with ONE LONELY pair of sneakers, they had obviously belonged to a teenaged boy.   The odor was strong enough to KILL a tree!!  Where else in the WORLD would people throw perfectly good shoes over a tree branch?  Folk Art someone told me; waste if you ask me!!

Mother Nature was so confused this year:  Spring in January and February, Winter in March, April, and May and NOW SUMMER!  We have enough pine and cedar cones to reforest several hundred acres!  BUT we have less precipitation than even the Northern Sierra; only the Mohave Desert is drier, so we still have more trees than the ecology can sustain, even after THREE YEARS of beetle kill.

What do you call someone who does the same thing over and over expecting a different result?   A FOOL!  A fool and their money are soon parted…but since the LOVE of money is the ROOT of all EVIL according to the BIBLE …avoid being a fool, but also avoid evil. 

An attitude of Gratitude is a great way to start the day – EVERY DAY!