Things Going On

I have learned this week that there are things going on "behind my back" that I did not know about.

For one thing, having a new tablet to explore (see previous post) is very educational. One of my discoveries while downloading and checking apps on the new device is that in Google Photos, I had immediate access there to photos taken with my phone. 

This made me go to the computer later and check Google Photos there as well. Then I got confused at first, because there I found different photos, which seemed to be camera photos I used on my blog in the past - but not the most recent ones, and not those from my phone. A bit of thinking required... 

But then it hit me that I use two different accounts, and each of them has their own set of photos. On the computer I also use two different browsers (to save me from the trouble of logging in and out of certain places). One Google Photos account has the photos from my mobile phone. The other seems to have been collecting photos I used when blogging via Open Live Writer. However, some time back around New Year, I ran into problems with OLW (for some reason, it wouldn't post to Blogger). So I switched to preparing posts directly in Blogger, and have kept on doing that since. And those photos seem not to get stored in Google Photos. (I haven't been bothered to check OLW for a while, but did so just now, and it seems to be working again. But I'm writing this in Blogger as I've kind of got used to that again. Too many decisions just now...) Strikes me that possibly that's got something to do with Blogger leaving Google+ (?). But as I never joined G+ in the first place, I haven't bothered to explore much what's involved in that. (Neither have I tried to dig deeper into which of all my photos from the past ten years that are stored in the Cloud or not...)

Phew. I felt I'd had enough of the digital world for a while and went out for a walk. I decided to walk some streets/paths where I hadn't walked all winter; and it turned out I was in for another surprise. When I last went that way, a certain path down by the river would take me past a tennis court, and a club house. Now both the tennis court and the club house are gone, and at the moment the area looks like an odd kind of desert (with a few park benches planted). But it's probably going to be an open park with generous lawn areas.

Anyway, when I got back from my walk... I was able to access these phone-photos directly from my computer.

 

Thoughts on a Foggy Day

Chasing fog has a lot in common with chasing rainbows. (I.e. when you get to the point where you thought you’d be able to catch it, it’s no longer there, but has moved further away...)

Walking (in the fog) along a familiar short path with apartment buildings on one side, you don’t really expect to suddenly find a tepee on the other! But there it was…

In a novel I’m reading at the moment, Garden Spells by Sarah Addison Allen – a romance novel with a light touch of magic to it – there is a character, an elderly woman, who keeps bringing people strange gifts: “When Evanelle brought you something, you were usually going to need it sooner or later.” It seems my brother must have the same kind of magic as Evanelle; because the chain of coloured LED lights he sent me for Christmas has already come in handy. (When he bought it, he did not know anything about my problem finding more replacement bulbs for my old chain of lights – which lasted over Christmas, but broke down again today.)

Surprise (FMTSO)

Actually, it came as a bit of a surprise to me when this morning (Saturday) I looked up the FMTSO link-up page and realised that it was already time for the topic that I had myself recently suggested… I just wish I could remember what it was I had intended to post for that theme… The combination of summer heatwave, a study facing south + lots of documentation to be sorted for the sale of the house has not allowed much time for photo editing lately.

But one pleasant “surprise” recently was finding a quiet place of refuge from the heat to which I can easily escape for a while on a hot afternoon to sit in the shadow and read. It’s in the Remembrance Garden by the chapel in the old cemetery only 5 minutes walk from my home.

The little fountain in the pond provides a soothing sound of running water. And often this secluded place is quite empty except for a rabbits and birds (and me).

The first day I sat there I noticed that there were some flowers thrown on the ground, next to empty vases. I wondered who would do such a thing… But after sitting there for a while, I got the answer! I’ve not yet been able to catch evidence on camera, but it turns out that both magpies and hooded crows have figured out that the vases make very good drinking cups for birds their size. And if they find the flowers to be in the way, they simply pick those out and throw them on the ground!

Friday My Town Shoot Out

Cookie?

Wednesday afternoon about 5 p.m.

Ding-dong! goes the doorbell.
I’m not expecting anyone.
When I open the door, I find two little boys (perhaps 5 years old?) outside, holding a plate with a few Digestive biscuits unevenly spread out.

Boy (very polite):
– Excuse me, would you like to buy some cookies?
Me (shaking my head for emphasis):
– No, thank you.

When I’d closed the door and got over the sheer surprise, I could not help laughing, though!

The End.

Now I’m Impressed

I put in my order to Amazon late on Monday evening, see My Amazon Adventures. Yesterday I got an email that the order had been shipped, with expected delivery Friday. Today, Thursday, at 1.30 pm, there was a knock on my door, and when I opened, there was a delivery man with a package. (I had totally counted on having to go to the post-office/supermarket to pick it up, which is the usual procedure when I’ve ordered something.) Now that I call a nice surprise on a rainy day!

So my Kindle is here, and seems to be working just fine. Not that I’ve had time to check out every detail yet, but I’ve connected it to the Wifi and it responded by immediately downloading the free books I’d already ordered for it. I’m feeding it electricity just now; and before I do anything else I think I’d better go feed myself too (haven’t had lunch yet because I couldn’t wait to open the package)…

Saturday Surprise: Pink Punk

  

Ï’m not really very bold when it comes to taking photos of strangers in the street… But sometimes I just can’t resist!

So I used the “shooting from the hip” method we practiced recently in the Friday My Town Shoot Out Challenge (which I take part in from my other blog).

If I had been a more daring reporter (or a very close personal friend), I would gone up to him and asked how long it takes him to do his hair in the morning…?

Saturday Surprise (‘Allowed To Peek’–2)

In my last Booking-Through-Thursday post, Allowed To Peek, I quoted from Moominland Winter by Tove Jansson. It came to mind for me again today, for a different reason.

In that book, Moomin wakes up in the middle of the winter and can’t go back to sleep (Moomins are usually in hibernation from November to April). With the rest of the family still snoozing away, Moomin feels very lonely. He goes out into the empty kitchen. There he suddenly becomes aware of a pair of eyes staring at him from under the sink…

   

This morning, sitting at the breakfast table,
I suddenly became aware of a glint of blue under the fridge…

I thought it must be a clip for plastic bags that I’d dropped.
So I found some kitchen tool with a long handle
and bent down to poke “it” out…

Imagine my surprise when I found a pair of eyes staring at me!

 

Especially since it was a pair of eyes I had never seen before!

On second thought he reminds me of someone…

He must have been hiding under the fridge ever since I moved in (2 years 8 months ago). Probably longer! (A young family lived here before me.)

What on earth made him suddenly come out now? Have I not been leaving enough cookie crumbs on the floor for him???

Spooky… until I remembered that I made a half-hearted attempt last week to stick the vacuum cleaner under there. Even my extra thin tube didn’t get in properly though, so I gave it up. The suction must have been enough to draw him half way out anyway.

Now I wondered what else might be under there! So I had to figure out how to remove the grid, without actually lying down on the floor. (Not too sure I’d be able to get up again without injuring myself if I did that!) I managed to solve it sitting on a low footstool. Phew. No more “monsters”... ;) Just a bit of dust.

Now the cookie monster is sitting on the freezer.
There might be some cake left in there… or not… 

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PS. Scroll down for today’s weather report.