That Stiff Penknife

Sometimes it is very difficult to open a penknife. The spring may be stiff or you may have broken a thumbnail so that you cannot open it in the ordinary way.





Here is a very simple way out of the difficulty.





Take a strip of fairly stiff paper, fold it across at the middle and slip the fold under the blade of the knife. Then, gripping tightly the two ends of the folded paper, pull them up and the knife-blade will will be lifted sufficiently to grasp it and pull it right up.





Now aren't you pleased you read this little post?





This handy little tip is brought to you courtesy of EVERY BOY'S HOBBY ANNUAL, 1931

Central Texas News Roundup - Few Photos, Lots of Links

[Image from the Lower Colorado River Authority website showing the system of dams which made the Colorado River into a series of reservoirs called the Highland Lakes]
LOCAL NEWS[We're fine in my neighborhood - the flooding happened Northwest of here]
Maybe you've seen some of the stories or photos already? Over seventeen inches of rain fell within a few hours on Marble Falls, NW of Austin, with flood waters engulfing other Central Texas towns like Smithwick and Kingsland. Area map, with Austin in the lower right corner.
The flood-tumbled, mangled remains of a vehicle was found today, but the teenagers who were in it are still missing. Residents of that area have lost houses, property, cars and trucks, and one organic chicken farm has lost all their hens. People were rescued from rooftops and the municipal water system isn't working. The parts that need fixing are still under water, so the townfolk are doing the best they can with bottled water.
Mystery writer Susan Albert lives not too far away... she's okay and her house is on high ground, but she had a few adventures with livestock as the storm hit.
Fellow Austin Blogger Mrs Quad has some scary photos of what the water's done.
EXTREMELY LOCAL NEWS
In this little corner of Austin the only drama was recorded in this not-too-clear photo of a 3-inch slug, an unusual shape here. We get lots of those little roundish slugs that look like a kindergardener couldn't find a tissue and used a leaf instead. This particular speciment was heading toward a clematis but did not arrive at that destination. Some of the garden plants have been thrilled with a year's worth of water in just a few months, while others resent it. The peppers, sunflower and Tropical Milkweed/Asclepias curassavica are growing, but could use some sun. The tomatoes look terrible, and most of what fruit remains is fit only for a compost heap.

The City of Portland Cannas, on the other hand, surrounded below by Salvia guaranitica, are looking fine, without the usual crispy edges seen in drier years.

I've been growing the lime green and purple potato vines for a decade, valuing their cascading foliage in hanging baskets. In all that time none ever bloomed - but this purple one produced flowers! Is it a result of our eighties instead of nineties with everyday rain?

Here's the Clematis viticella, rescued from the awesome slug, making another flurry of buds and blooms. The pale blue flowers at its base are a Plumbago, a plant that throws lanky branches up to 4-feet high by mid-fall, and sometimes makes it through a NW Austin winter. This spring it was killed to a couple of inches in height, so it wasn't blooming when the clematis was scanned in April.
The big weedy looking leaves at the lower right belong to a big weedy Brugmansia AKA Angel's trumpet. It's supposed to be yellow and fragrant. It's never bloomed, in spite of water, fertilizer, great soil and what should be a perfect location with morning sun and protection from the hot afternoon sun.
The paint on the green loveseat from the previous post was fresh when the rain began so we put it in the shed to let it cure. Any guesses on when the new garden furniture gets into the garden? Storms are in the forecast through the 4th and the weather radio goes off a few times each day, warning us of flash flood danger.
ALAMO DRAFTHOUSE
One of the quirky Austin places we've loved is the downtown location of the Alamo Drafthouse, the original nucleus of the burgeoining Alamo Drafthouse group. Food and drink accompanied a movie- the movie could be something new and weird or old and cult-oriented, or even a silent movie. We've watched Buster Keaton in The General and Louise Brooks in Pandora's Box up the screen, while musicians Guy Forsyth and Graham Reynolds played music specially composed for the movie. We've been there quite often when the Austin Film Society screened Essential Cinema. On the Tuesday night just passed we went to the Alamo Downtown, watched a truly extraordinary British Science fiction movie from 1961, The Day The Earth Caught Fire, and drank a last toast to this particular Alamo. Wednesday night was the big final party before the Alamo moves to a new location on 6th Street. This wonderful place will be no longer be quite the same, but the concept and the proprietors will still be here, and the memories have been blogged for posterity.

Last day in the Smokies

Our last day in the Smokies and we encounter a traffic sign we had never seen before - I guess this confirms that sometimes we are going around in circles!

The Foliage is spectacular - rivalling New England's - there are more species of trees in the Smoky Mountains than there are in all of Europe

Babbling brooks, streams and rivers are everywhere

Cades Cove Loop is a scenic drive in the Northwest part of the Park with some of the historic buildings remaining. We had hoped to see Bear but missed a mother bear and 3 cubs that had passed by an hour before us.





Some hikes you just can't do in a day!

The center of the Park is where the border is between North Carolina and Tennessee

Unfortunately, an ash borer is dessimating the Ash trees in the Park

We will continue on to Nashville to visit with Gary's Aunt and Uncle where an inverter we won on Ebay will be shipped. Soon we will be able to raise and lower the bed and make coffee without the Generator!

Vanity Plates: Thy Name is

Saturday, September 22

With apologies to Shakespeare … his line, “Frailty, thy name is woman” is often misquoted as “Vanity, thy name is woman,” so I hope he doesn’t mind another misquote.

We’ve always lived in states that required both front and rear license plates on our vehicles. So, when we transferred our vehicle registrations to Florida and received our new license plates, we were a little taken aback that only rear plates were provided. That’s all the state requires.

The Phaeton and the CR-V both felt a little naked without a front plate. What to do? Well, we decided to get some fun vanity plates made, and we went all out and used a couple of our favorite travel photos for custom backgrounds.

Dressed up and ready to hit the road.

Here’s a closer look …

This plate represents our travels in the US …

… and this one represents our non-Phaeton international travels.

Mystery critters

Argh! The camera was so far away! What in the world are these creatures?!

Critter #1 was just crawling out of the creek bank, I think. The back legs are possibly still below, out of the picture.

I lightened it up a bit, but I'm not sure it helps. This is about the limit of the flash's range, unfortunately.

Critter #2 does us the favor of showing his tail.

Here's the picture lightened up a little.
Since there's no perspective for size in these pics, here are the larger uncropped shots. I'm including yesterday's deer and coyote for comparison. Ignore the times/dates - they got a little off, and haven't been reset.




I'm fairly certain that critter #2 is a muskrat (Ondatra zibethicus). We don't have nutria here, and I don't know what else would have a tail like that.

What is critter #1? I was really trying to make him into a mink, but the more I look, the more I think he's really an otter. Especially when I compare with these earlier game cam shots. But let me know what you think.
Here are more otter pictures, in daylight.
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Updated:
Here is a closer look at critter #2 (click to enlarge slightly):

This is where I am seeing his outline, and why I thought it was a chunky muskrat. This may not be right, however. Like I said, it's difficult to see where his back ends and the brush behind him begins.

Very Long Day

Our day started early with a 6.1 mile hike at Dwight D. Eisenhower Park in northwest San Antonio. The hike start time was 7:45 a.m. to allow us to walk during the "cooler" part of the day. That meant we were up at 5:30 a.m. to get ready. Ugh.

After bowls of oatmeal with blueberries, cinnamon, nutmeg and ground flaxseed, we drove to the park and met the group a few minutes before hike time. We start on time. Today's pace was just right and allowed some picture taking stops, even though I had to run to keep up after I took the photos.

Once again, we were hiking with the San Antonio Hill Country Hikers meetup group and Paul was our leader. He set a reasonable pace and we kept up pretty well until the steep rocky section. That slows me down quite a bit and I stop to breathe. Eventually I catch up again. Bob stays with me.

The tower at the top of the hill was a good stop. Climbing to the top of the tower rewards you with a cooling-effect breeze. Because of the recent rains, more wildflowers bloomed in the past week and they are gorgeous.

Start - everyone's fresh and perky.

Blue morning glory (Ipomoea indica).

Maximilian sunflower (Helianthus maximiliani)

Powering up the steep part of the hill.

Lookout!

Dayflower (Commelina erecta)

Dayflowers with Englemann daisy (Engelmannia pinnatifida).

Rest stop.

Dwarf cinquefoil (Potentilla canadensis)

Still trying to identify these flowers.

Field of dayflowers.

Purple horsemint (Monarda Citriodora)

I was lagging farther behind.

We opted to hike two loops with the group. Paul stopped at the parking lot after we completed one loop. Some people had other obligations for Father's Day so they left.

The rest of us geared up for Round 2 and off we went, taking a different trail this time. There were a couple of steep, rocky hills and those combined with the heat did me in. By the time we were to the top I wasn't feeling too well. I rested more and we continued to try to catch up with the group. We finally found them back at the parking lot. Thank you, Paul and Jake, for another great hike.

I will continue today in another blog.

To be continued...

Anglepod

We found a new vine near the pond: Anglepod (sometimes written Angle-Pod). It's one of the climbing milkweeds, and the latin name is either Matelea gonocarpa or Gonolobus gonocarpa. The latter doesn't exactly roll off the tongue, but was apparently the original name. Then it was changed to Matelea, which sounds much more poetic, if you ask me. Then it was changed back. Maybe.
Several internet sources cite the "it was changed back" story, but the USDA plants site and the Integrated Taxonomic Information System pages both show Matelea as correct.
They've both got .gov at the end so they must be correct, right...? I have no idea.

To make things even more confusing, there are two similar species, the gonocarpa and the suberosa (or suberosus if you are going with Gonolobus instead of Matelea). Basically the difference is that one has smooth (glabrous) flowers and the other has hairy (pubescent) ones. But in one scientific paper, it is suggested that yes, there should be two types, but they should be distinguished not based on hairiness but on flower color. (The flowers may be colored as shown here or they may be pure green.)
I think I'm just going to call it Anglepod! And try to avoid writing it down.
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Hilton Pond's article on the hairy two-toned version.
Wayne at Niches has written about this confusion previously. (And if I'd been better about keeping up with my blog reading lately I'd have seen it before I wrote all this!)