I think we will all be more at peace if we learn to consume less, and not keep wanting more, more, more, more.
Our 'to do' pile of firewood to be split currently stands at this point
Brrr, it's cold out, but it's given us an opportunity to walk on the ice in our cove confidently early in the season. Look at all the beautiful things we found on our short traverse before our feet started feeling numb.
I'm stunned by the variety of shapes and structures along this small section of ice - angular crystals, sinuous edges, striations. Magnificent!
Whilst working in Orange, MA. on L & R's kitchen, we had a little dusting of snow, transforming their neighborhood into a pretty wintery scene.
The frigidity of our weather this season is enough to burn the skin off my lips! Ouch. It's painful when the daytime high temps remain below freezing and drop even further down to 2°F (-16 °C) at night - time to stay in bed, methinks.
Our fallen tree is frozen in time, and casts a beautiful shadow, like that of a giant stick insect on the ice. All the water that had rained onto the top of the previously thin ice and snow has become rock hard in these subzero conditions.
My recent 'take' on our new electric car had a few people concerned that we weren't happy with our commitment to electric vehicles, so I guess I hit the wrong tone with my wry realism on a day where many things weren't perfectly executed by us.
Our next long trip went so smoothly! We are learning a lot about what is required and what new strategies we have to adopt.
What I omitted to mention in my previous 'rant' was that our trip experience was a combination of poor planning (we started with only a 70% charge) and extreme weather conditions (well below freezing) that crippled a fast charger. Together this made for a perfect storm for failure, no different to someone running out of gas (petrol). In addition, we were trying to rely only on the fast chargers to which we have free access for the first two years of car ownership, which limited our options and restricted us, despite there being loads of chargers available all over the country. It's nowhere near as daunting or scary as I suggested - I guess I tend to exaggerate!
When I drove our regular old internal combustion engine this week, it felt heavy and sluggish by comparison. I hadn't predicted that.
I was so taken with the outstanding beauty of this heartleaf foamflower leaf (Tiarella cordifolia) on a winters' day (the leaves are usually green). Our natives are just SO impressive!
This plant has formed an amazingly dense groundcover in my garden, as intended, and I'm thrilled to have this wildflower thriving in my environs since it supports a wide range of pollinators.
Winter solstice! What's not to love? It's so exciting to know that the days will only be longer from here on out - oh, joy!
It creates a great accent effect, making irregularities stand out more easily
𝅘𝅥𝅮 late December, but in '24 𝅘𝅥𝅯 (hat tip to Frankie Valli & the 4 Seasons), but our night was definitely NOT about a thrilling experience. It was a loooong journey home in our electric car in a frigid 25°F (almost -4°C) night, necessitating 2 recharging stops, one of which extended to 45 minutes plus (the charging station needed a re-boot because of the cold), and also included a speeding stop.
We traveled home from Orange, MA after dinner, with 69% battery charge, did a 15 minute grocery run, and then stopped in Tewksbury, MA to recharge for 30 minutes (too cold for me to get out of the car and find out how it all works). What isn't often talked about is how much heating, defrost, fan, wipers, lights, etc., all chew up one's battery. Our projected 'cushion' had dropped down to a mere 5 miles, which was too risky in the cold conditions, so we realized we'd need to make another recharge stop in Kittery, ME.
Dale did the outdoor parts of the 'expedition' in Crocs and his compression stockings (silly man), and had to take his gloves on and off multiple times to try and work the phone App and the icy cold 'bowser' handle. At bay #1, after multiple tries, no charge was being delivered to our car, so we started the engine and moved to station #4. This effort too, yielded the same result - unable to charge. We finally decided to call tech support (Dale had successfully used recharging stations a few times previously, so he knew what the procedure was). He obviously had to go through a long-winded set of steps before speaking to a person, who then began trouble-shooting from the beginning, and getting our details through. Ugh, a few tries of being walked through the process confirmed that it was perhaps the charging station that was at fault (conditions too cold) and it would need a re-boot from the remote location. Of course, this also took a while as we waited for Windows to cycle through a reset. Even after that it still failed to initiate charging so the tech support person had to initiate charging remotely after going through a process of getting full authorization from us to do so!
There were no other customers around (it was almost 11:30pm for goodness' sake), and we got our top-up charge completed in 15 more cold minutes. We still had an hour to go before getting home, so hurriedly set off for the I-95, only to see a police vehicle light up in glorious red and blue flashes as it pulled in behind us! Dang! We'd been going too fast in a 25mph zone - closer to 50, I heard him say. Oh no! The officer was very friendly and understanding when we told him briefly of our "Oh what a night," ordeal and he let us go with a warning. Phew! We were so relieved that we turned right immediately after the traffic stop, only to find that it was a turn too early and we ended up in the 'gamadoelas' (South African slang for being in the boonies) far from the highway, so decided to retrace our steps. Wouldn't you know it, we encountered the same officer pulling over a car at the exact same spot he'd caught us - Dale waved as we drove past.
We felt haggard by the time we got home (12:20am), I can't lie (and all I did was sit in the cold car, shivering and watching). It was a 4.5 hour trip that usually takes just under 3 hours! Using an electric car is a whole new mindset, and demands a bit of learning to get the unfamiliar procedures understood and working comfortably, but the same goes for anything new. I'm certainly not regretting buying one.
How bright and cheery is this iridescent green moss in the drab leaves!
It's the perfect native substitute for a lawn too, so encourage it, don't lime it to get rid of it. It's beautiful, low-growing and a useful stabilizer and protection against erosion, as well as for recycling nutrients.
A variety of mosses can grow together in one patch, making for a varied and interesting substrate that is also soft and cushiony underfoot.
The canes of black raspberry (Rubus occidentalis), a lovely New England native, have a lovely purplish - crimson hue in the starkness of winter.
According to Go Botany (Native Plant Trust) the whitish bloom on the canes occurs on first year stalks. The bloom is easily rubbed off the glabrous (smooth) stem with a finger as I did in the pic below:
This monochrome, wintery scene looks bleak and beautiful at the same time, but it's also a reminder that the solstice is just 9 days away! Isn't that good news - darkness will start to come later: bring it on!
This wood grain could also be sand dunes, waves and beach sand, sedimentary deposits ... patterns in nature recur wherever we look.
We were able to get good manufacturer rebates that matched the current federal ones available (Hyundai doesn't qualify for the federal rebate because not enough of it was manufactured in the U.S. so Hyundai simply matched the rebate to make it competitive). We also tapped into Maine's state rebate - together that amounted to $21K off - woohoo - it made us feel as if we were getting a good deal.
So spacious! I hope the better posture, angle and knee space under the steering column will benefit Dale's back issues too. Wait till I introduce my kayak to my SUV next season ...
