What is this?

It looks sort of other worldly.

Thirsty bees.

I built the little pond in the lower left (middle picture) on a whim about 3 years ago. During the summers I tried to keep it free of leaves and other debris but I see now that I may want to consider letting it age naturally because the bees love to use the leaves as landing strips while they slurp up water. And I'm told by more experienced beekeepers that the bees prefer aged water to so-called fresh water from the tap.

I don't want to say it too loud but I think the girls may have survived the worst of the winter. I peeked under the top the other day and it sounded like there were plenty of them in the hive, and I just ordered a food source called pollen patties, which I'll slide under the top soon just in case they are running out of honey.

I continue to feel like I'm wandering alone in the desert on this bee business, and every decision I make is sort of a guess. No one warns you, in the beekeeping classes, about the anxiety factor in all of this.

Basil in mid-winter. Wish these plants were growing in my family room.

These healthy plants are growing in a friend's family room. They get southern exposure but no other special treatment. They grew outdoors in those pots all summer, but before the first frost my friend just picked up the pots and plopped them down near a sunny window. Now she has fresh basil all winter. Note: she doesn't have kitties or doggies, which might be a key to such success. I know my kitties would make a nice meal of that entire crop. And I'm not giving up kitties for basil.

It's Art.

'Grow Your Own' - from the Policing Genes Project from Thomas Thwaites on Vimeo.

From a London exhibit.
I heard about it first from my daughter's friend who works for an artist. Next, I heard about it from my beekeeping listserv group. Today NPR did a story on it. Oh those Brits and their humor.

King's Speech was very good. The wallpaper was the star of the show.

Scottish Deerhound (not this exact one) wins it all. A sweet-looking dog.

Photo from greatdogsite.com

Westminster Dog Show tonight and tomorrow!

Don't miss it.

Home-made bookmarks by Margo H.

My Clever Friend Margo H. makes these sweet bookmarks and sends some to me occasionally. She cuts up old greeting cards, prints out a nice quotation about reading for the back of each bookmark, and laminates the whole thing. I may have to buy myself a little laminator (I think I can get one for under $30) and a little paper cutter and go into the bookmark-making business myself. Thanks Margo!

Hat repair. I can do this.

This hat has been everywhere, coast to coast, and it's gotten a little banged up, but I told My Lovely Daughter that I could fix it. Maybe clear matt-finish fingernail polish to hold down the frayed straw, then some black stitching over that to reinforce it and blend in with the existing two rows of black stitching?

I'll try.

Temperatures got high enough today -- high 40s -- and the sun peeked through enough for some bees to get out briefly. "Bring out your dead!"

Top shot taken at about noon. Bottom shot taken at about 3. This tells me that the colony is still alive. If they are still cleaning house by dragging out bodies that's got to be a good sign (right?). But I think the big question is the size of the colony by April.

I think the hive had 30,000, maybe 40,000 bees in the fall. If babies are being born to replace the bees that die of natural causes over the winter, and if the total population is high (over 20,000?) in April, I think that would be called a success. But it's a long time until April, and I don't know if baby bees are being born. Or if the Queen is laying eggs, or is even still alive. If she did die in the winter, I don't think the bees would necessarily swarm (or abandon the hive) in search of a new Queen, but I guess it could happen. And I don't know how much honey is remaining. It's so much about the food, I gather. Winter losses are often about starvation.

I've got to find that mental place in beekeeping where you do what you can but then you stop speculating on what may or may not be going on inside that hive.

Sunny tomorrow with a high of 55! They'll be out for sure, "cleansing" and undertaking.

A peony pokes up his head. First sign of Spring -- in mid-February? Maybe.

I admit it. This gets me excited.

I'm going to fix these signs -- from the park next to my house.

In each case the number at the bottom is missing a zero and a decimal point. I can fix that. I'm such a rebel.

Check out the coat of arms for Fergie's family---the Fergie who is still the Duchess of York, not the Black Eyed Peas' Fergie (of SuperBowl "fame").

I would never have learned about this coat of arms if Ms. Complaint Department, in the course of musing on the term "time sink," hadn't led me to this very useful website.

My sister-in-law's sister-in-law's bumper sticker.

Credit to Dave P. (brother-in-law of my sister-in law) for the term.

Then -- August -- and now.

Isn't that an awful sight?
Today I finally took down all that shabby fencing, and most of the posts. There's nothing there for the deer anyway. I'll put back some fencing in March. I'm sure my neighbor is relieved that I finally got around to taking down that mess. If I were she I would be cursing me for having a trashy side yard.

These fish magnets keep getting more complicated.

This either means life is a puzzle and the pieces don't fit, or it's a puzzle and if you just put the pieces together dummy you'll see how it all hangs together, or it means nothing. The missing left hand is my favorite part.

"Do you hear her back there, saying that we look 'well-fed'? I know what she's trying to say."

Power out from ice-snow storms: 13 hours. We were among the luckier in the DC area.
Internet out from ice-snow storms: 3.5 days. We were among the most unlucky in the DC area.

As I keep telling friends & family: it was odd being offline so long. A little unsettling, but also a little pleasant. I've concluded that I have a mild Internet addiction but not a full-blown one. Yet.

While I was offline I kept imagining posts -- both mine and others. Not so sure that's healthy. Would have been much better to just dig down and read. But when you don't know when, if ever, the juice will be turned back on, you can't really settle down. I can't. And what about Egypt! I had radio so I knew basically everything going on, but I didn't know as much as I wanted to.

Possibility of more ice pellets tonight. I love the winter, I love the winter, I love the winter.

I'd like to take this pledge but I'm not sure I can do it. I'm apparently addicted to Palin news.

Dana Milbank of the Washington Post is boldly going where every journalist worth the name should go. He's swearing off writing about or talking about Sarah Palin for a month. I could not talk about her, and for sure I could not write about her, but could I stop myself from reading the latest bit of non-news about her?? Very, very doubtful. But I'll decide on February 1. It IS a short month after all.

I bought this very neat seltzer water maker (SodaStream) to help me with Resolution No. 5. It will pay for itself by April.

Status report on Resolutions:
1. Don't eat after midnight. (a tiny bit of success, but not really enough to count)
2. Walk each day. (got off to a great start....)
3. Eat only fruit or yogurt before dinner. (some success at this)
4. Read each New Yorker as it arrives and never skip an issue. (100% success so far!)
5. Don't bring soft drinks into the house. (90% success!)
6. Read only one novel at a time and one non-fiction book at a time. (some progress; I have high hopes about this one)
7. It's OK to start knitting a new pair of socks but it's not OK to start any new scarfs or quilts. (100% success so far)
8. Try to finish most of the 20+ scarfs I've started. (nothing to report yet, but hey it's only Jan 22)
9. Finish at least two of the 20+ quilts I've started. (see above--too soon to tell)
10. Be better about replying more promptly to emails and acknowledging birthdays and gifts. (tiny bit of success)
12. Post something every day on this blog. (total failure so far)

I think this is an immature great black-backed gull. (Try saying that real fast.) At the Delaware shoreline yesterday.

I'm never cold. Or rarely cold. But this winter is whupping my ass. I loved being at the ocean, I fantasized about being in the water and I thought ahead to our traditional week at the beach. But manohman the cold took my breath away yesterday.

Wisdom in the key of F.

Andrew Sullivan alerted the world to this very helpful observation from another blogger, Scott Adams.

Scott writes:
As I'm sure you've learned, it's impossible to speak to a spouse if he or she is near running water, or using power equipment, or concentrating on something else, or eating something crunchy, or wondering if the squeak in the distance is the cat dying, or there is a child within a hundred yards. Amazingly, that covers 90% of every conversation you might attempt at home.

Recently I discovered that spouses, like computers, must be booted up before they can hear what you say. Try walking into a room where your spouse is otherwise engaged and simply launch into your statement or question. Notice that your first sentence doesn't count. That might go like this.

You: I think the ice maker isn't working.

Spouse: What?

In that example, the spouse had not yet booted into listening mode. You can solve this problem with what I call the boot up tone. It is a sound that serves no function except to say, "Shift to listening mode." I highly recommend that you use your spouse's first name as your boot up tone. People are programmed to hear their own names even when they won't notice other background noise. And I recommend speaking in the key of F, even if that isn't your normal range, because it's a great tone for penetrating background noise. It's also a good idea to stretch out your spouse's name a bit. I turn Shelly into She-e-e-e-e-lly. Try it at home. It works. But use your own spouse's name.

[Monday, Jan 10, 9:45 PM, National Championship Football Game] I'm rooting for Oregon. Can't resist a team called The Ducks.

And those yellow day-glow socks are nice!

George, Anabelle, Norah, and their feet. (Plus Momma's feet.)

My beautiful niece's beautiful children. If there's a heaven, and if people in heaven can see what we're doing, my father is saying "take off those shoes and show me your feet!" He loved to make family members show their feet so he could say "look at how beautiful my feet are compared to yours." He would then in a brutal (I mean of course good-natured) way tell us who had ugly feet, toes, etc. I miss that.

A working list of resolutions. And I love my winter-blooming rosemary.

1. Don't eat after midnight. (hard but possible)
2. Each day walk around the pond next door or walk a mile on the treadmill. If I miss a day I can double-up the next. (easy and possible)
3. Get back to my years-long habit of eating only fruit or yogurt before dinner. Exception: I can have lunch with friends and eat a smallish lunch but I should always bring home leftovers. (possible)
4. Read each New Yorker as it arrives and never skip an issue. (hard but possible)
5. Don't bring soft drinks into the house. Instead, drink iced tea or water or those nasty Crystal Light drinks. (Goals = using less plastic, aluminum, and glass; drinking fewer chemicals; saving money.) Exceptions: I can drink a soft drink at someone's home or in a restaurant, and anything that someone else brings into the house I can drink. But I can't say "hey, while you're at the store could you pick up some soft drinks." (hard, maybe unrealistic)
6. Read only one novel at a time and one non-fiction book at a time. If I start the non-fiction but don't pick it back up for a week, put it back on the shelf and start another. (hard but possible)
7. It's OK to start knitting a new pair of socks but it's not OK to start any new scarfs or quilts. (very possible)
8. Try to finish most of the 20+ scarfs I've started. (hard, maybe unrealistic)
9. Finish at least two of the 20+ quilts I've started. (hard but possible)
10. Be better about replying more promptly to emails and acknowledging birthdays and gifts. (possible and should be easy)
11. Listen more, talk less. (possible but unlikely)
12. Post something every day on this blog. And either get over the feeling that having a blog means I'm either a narcissist or an exhibitionist (I don't think it about others, so why would it be true of me?) or quit blogging. (unlikely)

Thanks to Natalie F. for alerting me to this.

Could these be poison ivy berries?

"Hmmmm...flour. I haven't tried that yet. But I'm sure I'll love it. Let me just dive into that bowl and knock it to the floor. That's always fun!"

With temps over 40 and a bit of sun the bees have been taking cleansing flights. And they tossed all the bodies off the front porch. So tidy.

There's quite a bee cemetery below the hive entrance--bottom picture. I'm surprised something or someone hasn't eaten them. Lucy likes to eat dead bees, but then there's not much Lucy won't eat. Fruit, bread, vegetables, bees.

There are some pretty plants even on 1-1-11 (I love writing that date & have 3 more chances this year to see such symmetry).

Yucca on top and I-can't-remember-what in the middle and bottom pictures. It will come to me.

The park next door on Thursday or Friday.

The deer discovered the sedum I hoped would be safe on the front steps.