Merry Summer Solstice

No, I'm not doing some pagan hippie dance in the street, just holding the camera overhead in the last sunlight of Spring.

Weaving Spiders, Come Not Here

The other day, I came across the largest spider web I've ever seen in my life. It was at least 2 feet by 2 feet. Thank goodness the spider wasn't in it!

(I tweaked the color and contrast hoping it would show up little better, but it was difficult to see at any rate. It takes up most of the photo.)

Prickly Poppy

The white prickly poppy is a beautiful flower. Its petals look like delicate paper. At dawn and dusk they seem to glow with an inner light.

They are unexpectedly appealing, growing wild in the scrubby landscape.

 But beware, they are well named. If you try to pick one, you will be thoroughly punished.You'd be better off trying to pick one of these. 

cactus flower

Dog Days

It's something I noticed in early May, but have only got around to writing about now. The cicadas, those cheerful (if noisy) green bugs of Summer, began to sing a month early this year.

This is something I pay attention to. Each year, for many years now, I've noted the first whirring drone from the trees. I suppose this is because to me it's the primary sound of Summer. It goes with the blinding sunlight and searing heat, and especially as a youngster, was synonymous in my mind with freedom.

The dog-day cicada

The sound they make is certainly hard to ignore.

Before this year, the earliest I've ever heard them was June 6th, though mid-June is more typical. But early May? Very odd indeed. What could have caused them to sing so early? It seems wrong, as if the normal cycles of things have gone off track.

What's more, the katydids, whose song is a late Summer phenomena for sure, have been buzzing away every night for weeks.

I can't help but wonder if this deviation is normal or if climate change is playing a role.Though sometimes, I half-jokingly think, this is more evidence that the simulation is glitching.

It may be less scary to imagine that our universe is a simulation rather than our world changing in ways we are not prepared to face.

In The Month of Jupiter

This is part of a dream I wrote about over on the Fortean Times forums, on February 28 of this year
...
I was laying out tarot cards, but in an unfamiliar pattern. Like this;

It was a reading for events in the "month of Jupiter" (whatever that might be.) In the dream, the placement of the cards was in a very specific order, but in waking life, I wouldn't even be sure how to read this. The individual cards are lost to memory, but the meaning was "a great upheaval, resulting in a greater good."
...

I wasn't sure what was meant by the month of Jupiter, but suggestions on the forum made it out to be most likely June, or maybe July. The dream did have a hot-weather feel to it, so I'm inclined to agree. Being that it's now June, it seemed a good time to bring it up.

The subject of the dream reading was not personal, but political and world events. The sense was that something being tenuously held together would finally break apart, leaving something better in its place.

This could apply to many things, but it will be interesting (if perhaps unsettling) to see what the month of Jupiter might bring.

The Beauty Of Ordinary Things, Part 2

A rainbow of bottles.

Part 1 here.

Release The Kraken

Down at the hobby store, over in the jewelry department, I came across an unusual sight.

It's a fairly large locket, suitable for pictures or mementos. But for whom? I couldn't help but wonder.

Not for a sweetheart, as the giant blank-eyed squid on the front seems a tad unromantic. Not a sailor either, as the squid has clearly just wrecked a ship or is about to, which is frankly asking for trouble. And certainly not in memory of those who have been victims of the squid, as that's just plain insensitive.  Even a fashionable marine biologist hot on the trail of architeuthidae might find the bulky design a bit inconvenient.

After much thought, I've come to the conclusion this locket might only be appropriate for members of some arcane octopus cult.

By the way, the cult must be fairly popular these days, as there were a few octopi to choose from:

Not pictured is the smaller, plainer octopus locket I nearly bought, until my husband convinced me that the blue Minoan-style pendant was more my look. Should the octopus god return unexpectedly, I'll be prepared. 

It was my birthday, though, so I chose a symbol most likely to get me through the next (sure to be harrowing) year...

 A little extra protection never hurts.