Care free

Just another day free from the care of doing my taxes.

My father recited this bit of doggerel fairly regularly when I was a young moohoo.

One evening in October, when I was one-third sober,
An' taking home a ‘load' with manly pride;
My poor feet began to stutter, so I lay down in the gutter,
And a pig came up an' lay down by my side;
Then we sang ‘It's all fair weather when good fellows get together,'
Till a lady passing by was heard to say:
‘You can tell a man who "boozes" by the company he chooses'
And the pig got up and slowly walked away.

I just today discovered that these are lyrics to a song written in 1933. Here is a 1934 recording by someone named Frank Crumit. I'll get back to this.

April returned again today. Average temperatures for these April days is a bit of a shock after so many days of averages fit for May. But it was a pretty day and I have the gear.

I have wanted this exact picture for a couple of years. It always seemed as though every time I was out there the shadows were wrong. It turns out that you have to go in the middle of the day in mid-April.Neighborhood watch note, edition 3: That neighborhood isn't doing very well. Despite the sign saying that criminals should beware, if the watching neighbors are the businesses in that strip mall, then there aren't very many people doing the watching. My recollection is that as recently as last year those store fronts were mostly occupied.

I got this picture of Lake Emily from the north end. This is another one of those opportunity moments. Later on in the year the sun angle makes photos from this end a matter of proper time of the day. The real problem though, is that later on when the foliage fills in you can barely see the lake from the road.I rode around on the other side of the lake to see what I could find. Here is another thing that I didn't know about. There is an abandoned structure out there in the middle of all that wildlife habitat which occupies nearly all of that quadrant of land except for the lake front. This too will become totally invisible once the trees and shrubs reach summer time fullness.I was turning around to ride away. There is a house directly across the street and I was surprised to see that this house appeared to have a full size deer statue in the back yard. I was interested enough to turn around again and go back to try to get another look. There was lots of stuff obstructing sight lines into the back yard but eventually I rolled up to the spot from which I could get a clear look.

And the deer lowered its head and slowly walked away.

Anyone seeking to understand this post should be informed that the queerest sight I ever did see was the night on the marge of Lake LaBarge they cremated Sam McGee.