not again...

before the frost

I saw this girl eating a grasshopper a couple weeks ago. Hopefully she laid her eggs before these last few nights of frost...

it's always the one you least suspect

I would have bet on the ninja, but that just goes to show how much I know... This is the [crime] scene I came back to at my desk after going for a run at lunch today. Woah...

Sunday afternoon

I think this squirrel likes hanging out on my neighbors wall. He seems pretty fearless, and I decided to test this by walking slowly towards him with the camera, taking pictures every few seconds. You can see he eventually turned to run from me, but even then popped up a few seconds later to see what I was doing.

looks like I have a problem on my hands

You know, I thought my new little goldfish was acting a little strange when I got up to feed him yesterday morning... Now I know why. Apparently he'd been out stenciling his name on public property the night before. Oh, Thor...

my favorite thing in a while

Sitting at the bar at Salt on a rainy Sunday afternoon with Kate, she pulled out her notebook to write something down and I saw this sketch which I immediately fell in love with. Whales! Big blobby whales with amorphous bodies and content expressions! *sigh* So great.

new friend

I was a little worried that Sidekick would eat any new friend I introduced him to, but I figured I'd give it a shot. (Mudcarp died when I was out of town a few weeks ago- I thought it would be nice to give Sidekick a new friend.) I actually gave him two new friends, Thor and Cupcake, but Cupcake got sick and died a week after I got her. Thor and Sidekick seem to be pretty fond of each other, though, despite the disparity in size. I have noticed that Thor stays clear of Sidekick when I feed them- he holds back and eats the little bits of food that drift down to him, or he swims to the opposite side of the tank to eat at the surface. Smart lil' guy.

where are the acorns?

plums

Oh my, little plum tree. You're making me blush...

plum jam

I made and canned 10 jars of plum jam yesterday, after harvesting all the plums I could from the tree in my backyard. The ladder I was using put me at eye level with the top of the neighbors cinderblock wall (that they undoubtedly have to keep out the riffraff- aka: me) and as I was picking plums a lil' squirrel decided to come see what I was doing. Totally fearless, he just sat and stared. I threw a plum at him. It landed on my neighbors' patio. Oops... (heh-heh...)

check out this bird

it's been a while...

...and my sketchbook has cobwebs. The last month has felt like a whirlwind and I simply stepped back and watched as all sort of things were happening around me (and sometimes to me). My brain is muddled and I'm tired and ready for a bit of downtime to dissect all that's been going on...

notes from a meeting a long time ago

This was a collaborative page of notes from a meeting a long time ago with a coworker who no longer works with me, unfortunately. We were imagining that our boss lived in a trailer out in the prairie dog field by our office. We decided he must have had a long extension cord from the building so he could get power. (The rest of the drawing is a bit less clear- but I'm sure it made perfect sense at the time...)

the industrial park where I work is a lot like an enchanted forest.

lil' bunny

This lil' guy liked his patch of worn down grass next to the walkway. He seemed to be too young to know to be afraid of me. It's sort of ridiculous how cute the baby bunnies are. I can hardly stop myself from making audible coos when I see one. Though it was fun the year the owls nested in the tree outside the conference room, I don't miss the torn up bunny parts strewn across the walkways when we would arrive at work in the mornings- evidence of the mother owl teaching her owlets how to hunt and preying on the naive and vulnerable little bunnies... I'd rather be greeted by bunnies like this little one, chewing on grass and watching me as I pass by.