June 14, 2010. Monday.
Situation: I have to work tonight (though it’s what’s called a “freebie”), and I should also try to do some work this afternoon. So, since Moi didn’t take Mway for a morning walk, I decide to take her for one, to save me some time later today. It’s about 11:30. My walking clothes are still damp from last evening, not having dried at the foot of my bed.
State of the Path: Day lilies are in bloom in record numbers, in front of the house, around the summer house, by Moi’s garden pond, and across from the pig pen. (I had a couple spent blossoms in my stir fry this morning.) Mway turns down the side path, but there is still dew or rain on the weeds, and I march straight ahead on the main path, Mway quickly following. I look at the mullein, and I note definitively that its flowers are pink; so I think it’s not the moth mullein as pictured in Audubon, but I still believe it’s some species of mullein. Just down from the mullein, I note another flowering plant; it has pink flowers in a kind of carnation shape, large soft leaves and a thick, perhaps hollow, stem. I suspect milkweed, and, lo and behold, what I see is very clearly pictured in Audubon under the entry for common milkweed. (I know milkweed, of course, with its pod, but I’ve never really noticed its flowers before.) Down by the creek, I realize just how many black raspberries there are along the bank near the deer stand; some of the berries are starting to turn black, but they’re not yet ripe enough for picking. Today, I also become suddenly cognizant of how much fleabane there is in flower; I see it in places all along the path; I see a rather sizable patch just before the clearing, and I even see a few flowers in the clearing itself.
State of the Creek: Mway walks into the water in a pool beneath the large locust trees. Despite the rain, the creek is still not that high; there’s just a little bit of water in the feed channel.
The Fetch: Toss the “pro-quality” stick, standing a little ways into the goldenrod. The stick whips at the weeds as I wind back for one of the tosses, and Mway’s body whips against them as she dashes after the stick. The fleabane jiggles as she runs past the flowers. More fetches today than I care to count.
