AND THEN, IT DID SOMETHING ELSE VERY STRANGE

I guess I have become a wee bit spoiled as of late with seeing all the nice sunsets these past few months.  With what appeared to be a cloudy sky Sunday night I debated whether to head out for my evening walk.  Isn't it amazing how some of us folks are so dependent and equate sunshine with 'feeling good'.  Anyway, I did go, and despite no sunset, had myself another fine walk.  The whole sky seemed to be hazed over, especially to the west, and it didn't look like a cloud cover to me.  It was kind of eerie.  After parking the car at the side of the road on a flat surface along the ditch line, I walked north 'up' the road.  I often say 'up' for heading north and 'down' for heading south.  Probably has something to do with the location of where I know the North Star to be in the sky.  At the end of my slow northward walk, I turned around to head south back down the road to the car.  Imagine my surprise when I saw the big cheese colored half Moon in the southern sky.  'Wow', what a piece of luck.  Back at the car, I hauled out my tripod, mounted my 7x50 Bausch&Lomb binoculars, (wished I had remembered to put my 17x50 Celestron binos in the car) and spent nearly half an hour not only enjoying my Moon observations, but enjoying too the wondrous summer night.  It was a slow drive home, and oh, how I love my soft instrumental ambient music on these warm summer night country cruises of mine.  Sometimes I wish I had 50 more miles to go.  On my Sirius XM satellite radio, it is 'The Spa', channel 68 that I mainly listen to. (also 'Chill' on channel 55)  No words in this nocturnal music, just wonderfully crafted instrumental sounds to stir one's very soul.  Not for everyone of course, but it sure weaves its wonderful magic for me and has been doing so for many years now.

SUNDAY NIGHT ON MY COUNTRY ROAD WITH MY TRIPOD MOUNTED BINOCULARS BEHIND ME AND THAT YELLOW DOT IS THE MOON...I SENT THIS iPHONE PIC TO WOODSY

I remembered on my way home last night that it was 32 years ago today that Kelly and I first met in a little coffee shop near Doon, Ontario.  I have written about this a number of times over the years, so I won't go into it any further here.  I'll just say that my memories of that first meeting are seared into my mind, and now that she is gone, that loving memory burns brighter than ever. 

 THESE SUNFLOWERS ARE ON A FARM JUST EAST OF OUR PARK ALONG THE SOUTH SIDE OF BAYFIELD RIVER ROAD

Took me a while to get myself underway this morning, but underway, I finally did get.  I had just started my morning walk when something moving ahead, above a distant cornfield, caught my eye.  It was very low over the corn and moving quickly from east to west.  I immediately assumed it was a very distant crop-dusting plane, so when it disappeared behind a forest, I watched for it to arc up into the sky, make its sweeping turn, and head back down over the cornfield.  But, nothing emerged into the air beyond the forest, and here it was coming back already low over the cornfield again.  What!!  About half a mile up the road on my left, there is a barn, and I expected this faraway craft to disappear behind that barn, but it instead flew across in front of the barn.  I knew it was much closer than I had originally thought.  'What the heck'!!  And, not a sound.  If this were an aircraft, I would have heard it loud and clear as soon as I stepped out of the car.  And then, it did something else very strange.  It stopped in mid-air, turned around, and went back across the cornfield.  Aha, I thought, could it be possible that this is a crop-spraying drone?? I'd never heard of that before, but then again, I live a somewhat sheltered life.  Well, without further ado and with my curiosity leading the way, I quickly raced (if an almost 81-year-old can race that is) back to the car and headed on up the road in the direction of the mysterious flying object.  My first clue that, yes, it might be a drone, was a truck parked in an empty spot in the cornfield alongside the road.  Then I saw it coming, and I could see it was definitely spraying.  Yesureeee, it was a crop-spraying drone alright.  Brought the car to a stop, hopped out, and cracked off a dozen pictures.  I was only about a hundred yards or so  away from it when it stopped in mid air, made its turn, and headed off down the cornfield again.  And, I could hardly hear the soft whirring of its eight propeller blades even when I was that close to it.  I looked back over at the truck a short distance away, expecting to see a guy with an unobstructed view on the roof directing the drone.  I then realized, 'no', that drone will have a camera or two aboard, and he's sitting in the cab of the truck with a GPS monitoring system and flying the drone from there. 

 STEPPING OUT OF THE CAR, I SAW THE DRONE COMING UP THE CORNFIELD....THE DRONE TRUCK CAN BE SEEN TO THE LEFT

 YOU CAN SEE THE SPRAY MIST HERE

THE DRONE STOPS, THEN TURNS AROUND

HEADING BACK DOWN THE FIELD WITH ALL 8 PROPELLERS WHIRRING

 AND OFF IT GOES DOWN THE FIELD IN A CLOUD OF MISTY SPRAY....NOTICE THE GREEN AND RED LIGHTS ON THE DRONE

 THE DRONES HOME AWAY FROM HOME

After the drone adventure, I meandered east towards Clinton but turned off on the Bannockburn Road and headed south.  It was a fine morning for another slow drive through the countryside, stopping here and there for a picture or two.  I was home about an hour later.  

 A NICELY SHADED FARM LANE

AREA CREEKS AND RIVERS ARE A BIT ON THE LOW SIDE, WHICH IS NORMAL FOR THIS TIME OF YEAR I I THINK

 THIS FELLA WAS REALLY SPREADING THE SMELLY STUFF THIS MORNING

 CONSTRUCTION ON THE BRIDGE BETWEEN VARNA AND BRUCEFIELD CONTINUES

 A LONE SUNFLOWER PLANT IN A FIELD OF BEANS

Yesterday, I washed the car, so today I vacuumed and cleaned the interior.  By the time I finished that, the humidity chased me back inside the house.  I will be back out tonight after I publish the blog, and hope to see the Moon very close to the constellation, Scorpius.

THIS OLD LAND ROVER IN VARNA, ONTARIO IS FOR SALE....$15,000

Al's Music Box:)) Summer Wind by Frank Sinatra.

GROANER'S CORNER:(( A duck walked into a bakery one day and asked for a pork chop. The baker said, "We aren't a butcher; we don't sell meat here." So the duck left. The following day, the duck went back and asked again. This time the Baker said, "No, if you come here again, I will nail your feet to the floor." The following day, the duck returned and asked, "Have you any nails?" The baker replied, "No." And the duck said, "Well, I'll have two pork chops then."

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Just after the maid had been fired, she took five bucks from her purse, and threw it to Fido, the family dog. When asked why by her former employer, she answered, "I never forget a friend. This was for helping me clean the dishes all the time!

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- My wife is an angel. All my friends are jealous because their wives are still alive.

- It's better to be absolutely ridiculous than absolutely boring.

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Murphy and his wife went for a stroll in the park. They sit down on a bench to rest for a while. Soon, they overhear voices coming from a secluded spot nearby.
Suddenly, Mrs. Murphy realizes that a young man is about to propose. Not wanting to be eavesdropping during such an intimate moment, she gently nudges her husband and whispers, "Whistle, to let that young couple know that someone can hear them." To which Murphy replies, "Whistle? Why should I whistle? Nobody whistled to warn me?"

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A married friend told me that he is working on an Aqua-thermal treatment of ceramics under a constrained environment....I was impressed...On further probing, I learnt that he is washing dishes with hot water under his wife's supervision!!

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Al's Doggy World

Meanings::

Kelly & Pheeb's Corner

 ABOUT 1998

Al's Art Gallery