Saturday, March 30, 2013

Winter-into-Spring at the Casa

As the onset of Spring brings joy to most midwesterners who are sick and tired of winter, a friend once shocked me with her declaration:  "I hate spring!" Whuh...What? Robins! Sunshine and warm air! Daffodils, and buds on the trees!

And, she reminded me, snow and sleet, and slush. Mud and raincoats and wet socks. Gosh, when she put it that way, I realized: Spring does kind of suck. All of those things are pretty miserable.

In the last 10 days, the weather has run the gamut. It has been balmy and it has been rainy. 8 inches of snow a week ago kept most of us home, and then most of it melted away 2 days later, turning the countryside into a marshy, swampy, muddy pit.

As mucky as it all can be, I still can't help rejoicing about spring. The galoshes are pulled on when it's time to fill the bird feeders. The house is still chilly and I wrap up in fleece early in the evening, before I settle down with last year's garden journal, to figure out what I will and will not plant in this year's.

And while I am wrapped up, either inside or out, the view at the Casa is still often pretty magnificent, no matter the weather.

(Click to enlarge for a better view of this herd of deer. Or for a better view of any of the photos, taken mostly through house or car windows)

 






 

4 comments:

  1. You sure get a variety of fauna. What's that last bird? And why does it remind me of whiskey?

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  2. Yes, we do. The fauna is not, of course, all our property, but still near-daily scenery for us. The bird is a pheasant. Now that you mention it, it reminds me of whiskey too, so I ran off and did an image search for "whiskey labels." I found bunnies and bees, but no pheasants. There IS a pheasant-shaped Jim Beam decanter on sale on eBay, however.

    At any rate, I like them because it's funny every time I refer to one as a peasant, when I spot one.

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  3. I was going to ask if it was a pheasant. Thanks to GeeWits and you for answering already. It is pretty enough out there, but far too clean. Where's the smog? Where are the skyscrapers and trash? I bet it's even quiet at night. How do you sleep without city noise? ;)

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  4. Let's see...if the wind isn't slamming against the house, sometimes actually making it whistle, there are birds making a deafening racket, and owls (yes, I know they're birds too), playing a low bass in the background. Raccoons fighting, deer huffing and snorting, and coyotes howling. All of this offset by farm implements so large that they look like monster robots from Sci-fi movies.

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