I wish I could say that I've been doing other things, but that wouldn't be true. That is, we have been doing other things, but not so much that I couldn't write now and then. Oh well.
A few days ago, my Mom and I went to a new butterfly exhibit in town called, appropriately, Homosassa Butterfly. The guy shows a 'movie' first, which is really an educational video he got from a school. The movie is all about the life cycle of the butterfly. Then, he talks you through a few rooms, one with butterfly eggs and one with caterpillars and chrysalises. To his credit, there are a lot of living samples of each. Finally, you get to go outside into the butterfly habitat, which is fun. There is not a huge a variety of butterflies, but there are many, many monarchs. It's always fun to walk around in that kind of exhibit. You can see my picture set on Flickr as part of my trip pictures.
On Tuesday last my Dad and I went down to 'old' Homosassa for lunch. Old Homosassa is on the river and is much more representative of Florida in the previous century. We went to a small print museum that also happens to serve killer Cuban sandwiches and garbonzo bean soup. (Although, I usually opt for beans and rice with my sandwich.) While we were there, Florida came out of its drought. Withing 20 minutes, it went from overcast to downpour. Storm cell after storm cell surged over us, dropping lightning everywhere. We had to stay in the shop an extra 20 to 30 minutes waiting for the rain to let up enough for us to dash to the car. But what a beautiful place to have to wait. The shop backs up to a marshy border of the river. The trees all have Spanish moss dangling from them.
It has rained every day since. Rain has been the headline news in all the papers and on all the news casts this week. Every day the storm cells build up and then unload as they travel across the state. My parents' house, however, sits in a small patch that doesn't get as much of the rain. (Rain in Florida is very, very localized.) Old Homosassa, where we were trapped in the downpour, is 15 miles from my folks' house, but we got home to find the ground was only wet, not pooling with water. Yesterday evening, after dinner, we sat on the back patio and watched the storm come up from the south. The sound of thunder was constant— literally! For an hour or more, you could hear thunder every 10 to 15 seconds. It grew dark and sprinkled on us, but the storm seemed to split and go both east and south of us. So, although it's been nice to have rain in the area, I would enjoy more of it falling directly on us here. (FYI, the patio is well covered!)
I spend some time every day sitting on the patio and watching the wildlife. There is a surprising amount! In fact, from the nearby highway, one learns that my parents live in bear territory. I've never seen one here and I don't believe they have either. There is the occasional report though... We have seen, however, a small grey fox come through a few times. His/her daily routine seems to include a sweep past the house. One afternoon, about to open the screen door to let the dogs out, I saw a black snake slithering across the bricks. Unfortunately, so did the dogs so I had to take them out on the opposite side of the house. My Mom says black snakes are quite common in the area. And, I've added some new birds to the list of birds I posted about earlier. In addition to the cardinals, blue birds, blue jays, and bobwhite, I've now seen towhees, woodpeckers, and a swallow-tailed kite. The kite, in fact, came very close to the house and was chased out by mockingbirds. Here's a picture of this magnificent bird:
Well, that's enough for today. Some day I mean to write about my parents' crazy dogs!
"Nature will bear the closest inspection. She invites us to lay our eye level with her smallest leaf, and take an insect view of its plain."— Henry David Thoreau
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