• Home
  • She Taught Me Everything
  • Blog
  • Publications
  • Me. Me. Me.
  • More!
  • Contact
  • Signed Copies for sale
  • Get a Book
  • Reviews & Awards
AMY SMITH LINTON

Bloggetty Blog, life Blog...

Anhinga

4/29/2014

4 Comments

 
Picture
This was one of the first images I took with a digital camera. It's an Anhinga, a fish-spearing, southern-swampy watery sort of bird. The scientific name is Anhinga anhinga, a slightly slightly repetitive name name originating from a Native American term for the bird -- which is, of course, anhinga.

Sidebar question: What's the technical term for a word that means only one thing? 


Anhingas spend a fair amount of time spreading their wings in this eerie pose, reminiscent of a Karate Kid preparing for his big Crane kick. Known, among other things as the snake-bird, it looks a bit like a cormorant, but is not much related. These birds prefer fresh water, they have very pointy beaks, when they are moved to speak, they sound vaguely like a clarinet -- one raspy note, low on the scale. 

When they travel in packs, they are known as "a kettle of anhinga." Sometimes, when you look up, you can spot one simply gliding around on a thermal at high altitudes, barely flapping its wings, like a vulture or an eagle. 

I suspect they have rich imaginative lives, the anhinga, going from sea-level to cruising altitude for their own mysterious purposes. I wonder if soaring is a relief for them, a break from the hard work of sinking into the water and chasing fish. I wonder if they compare which vasty blue space they like best: the one with air or the one with food? 
4 Comments

File Under: Better Business Names

4/25/2014

4 Comments

 
Picture
In its heyday, did workers at the Lumberteria stand behind acrylic sneeze-guards, wearing capacious aprons, waiting to dole out big spoonfuls of nails and staples onto the customer's tray?  Did customers stroll past displays of hardware, sliding their trays along the metal railing, idly chatting to the workers about Elmer's versus carpenter's glue, about the freshness of the pine, about the quality of the plywood?  
The Lumberteria building (currently for sale) is located in Paducah, Kentucky. 
4 Comments

The Small Dog Chronicles: Poor Dentition

4/22/2014

0 Comments

 
Picture
My friend L is a social worker. As part of the job, she takes case notes about clients, jotting down health history as well as the occasional personal detail. What kind of detail, one might naturally ask? Her answer: "Oh, you know. The very long single rattail braid. Or -- you know -- poor dentition."

I love this phrasing. The delicacy and precision of "poor dentition" over any one of the less kindly descriptions of gappy or discolored teeth.

Picture
The small dog has poor dentition.  She was already lacking a few teeth when she first came to stay. The vet suggested that she'd probably spent some time gnawing on something metal, like a kennel. A nervous habit. (Sidebar fact: There's a parallel with horses, who have a truly weird behavior -- "cribbing" -- where they press their upper teeth on a solid surface, apply pressure, and then gulp air. No doubt there's something comforting about the practice, like fingernail-chewing.)


PictureLilly at peace with her Cry-baby Lamb-chop toy.
There are no metal kennel gates for Lilly to chew at our house. Her teeth have continued to deteriorate regardless. She has, for instance, a strangely porcine obsession with acorns. Despite -- or maybe because of -- the bitter, tannic flavor, she seems to enjoy rooting around the yard and snarfling them up.  The raw acorn of course, is a stout oaken nugget quite capable of standing up to the odd tooth, so along with the bitter chunks of acorn meat, she chows down on her own teeth.

Also, though it squeezes at my heart to remember it, we helped loosen at least a couple of those teeth for her. She's got a spry way about her. When encouraged, she'll tear up her toys and haul ass around the house, all spring-loaded mischief. But the enthusiasm has a downside.  At first, we did not notice that this fierce little tug-of-warrior was leaving the odd tooth fragment embedded in her fuzzy toy after an evening's frisk. 

There she'd be, shivering a little with excitement, holding Cry-baby Lamb-chop clamped between her jaws, the light of battle still shining in her buggy eyes, despite the little smear of blood on the greyish fur of the toy. Like a kid refusing to admit chill after hours in the lake, she'd want us to continue yanking on the toy. She'd want to go on sliding on the hardwood with her back legs braced, growling. 

Smiling her jack-o-lantern grin in a Platonic ideal of poor dentition.

0 Comments

Beginning Farm: Back to Class

4/18/2014

3 Comments

 
Picture
The Cornell Cooperative Extension web-based seminar ckasses for agriculture started with "Beginning Farmer 101."   Naturally.  

It was an excellent class. I enjoyed it very much, and was sad to see it end in November.

Would-be farmers like me -- having taken the intro -- were encouraged to learn more. We could sign up the following semester for either:
  • "Exploring the Feasibility of Your Farming Ideas"  
  • "Understanding the Business, Tax, and Regulatory Implications of Your Farm" or
  • "Use of Back-Pack Pesticide Application." 

While I might eventually decide to use a Back-Pack for Pesticide Application, I'd just as soon wait before learning my poisons.

Does it even bear saying that I would never willingly take a class to explore the Feasibility of any of my Ideas? When exploring the feasibility of my ideas, for crying out loud, I want to end up with a basket of apples, not a plan of action. 

So, it's Understand the Business, Tax, and Regulatory Implications of Our Farm for me. The first hour of the webinar was devoted to risk management. Farming. Risk. Seriously?

Farming IS risk: drought, pests, soft markets, hard soil, bad luck, and plague. Broken fences, floods, hail, wandering livestock, honey-bee collapse, the neighbor's marauding dogs, trespassers -- these few just off the top of my head.  

Picture
Still, my impatience only goes so far.  Unlike a lot of beginning farmers, Jeff and I aren't betting the farm -- on the farm. 

In a rare moment when the tired investment metaphor actually jumps up and does its trick, this eccentric farming endeavor of ours is precisely where the phrase "minimizing one's exposure" nearly makes sense.  

Most farmers borrow money in an effort to pull dollars from the ground (or pluck pennies from the trees). But Jeff and I aren't starting in an unleveraged position, thankfully. We aren't investing in livestock. We have no plans to sink funds into buildings. We will not be signing mortgage papers for tractors or combines or agitators or seeders. This year's farm budget might touch the lower end of the cost of a busy sailing season -- making our exposure laughably small: 

  • We purchased a four-wheel drive truck that's old enough to vote. 
  • A mail-order box of seeds arrived recently, costing less than a tank of gas for the truck. 
  • Soil testing, is, well -- dirt cheap.
  • We've culled a sweet armful* of hand-tools from the collection out back.
  • We're going to need a truckload of gravel from the quarry down the road. Not a big ticket item.

(*The reference is from John Webster's The White Devil. "Stop her mouth with a sweet kiss, my lord. So/ Now's the tide's turned, the vessel's come about./He's a sweet armful. O we curled haired men/Are still most kind to women." Not much related to shovels and loppers and rakes, but I like it anyhow.)

The real investment this year will be some hours and sweat and a good chunk of brain-time.  We can afford that much.

3 Comments

The Small Dog Chronicles: Dinner Bell

4/15/2014

2 Comments

 
Picture
The small dog comes trotting to my desk, the sound of her feet like small-arms fire. The addition of metal taps could not make her noisier on the wooden floorboards.  Her small, flattish face has an expression of urgency. 

"Oh no! Is Timmy in the well?" I ask her.
She replies with a dismissive snort. She hates it when I am facetious.

I tilt my head to the side and gaze deeply into her goldfishy eyeballs. "What is it, Lilly? Tell me, girl!"

She snorts. She's not having any of my phony-baloney. 

Backing up with a lot of unnecessary ball-change steps, she gives me a look of as much impatience and disbelief as she can muster. Which is considerable.  

If I insist on finishing the sentence I am typing -- especially if that sentence turns into two or three sentences -- she lunges with both front feet held out straight.  She delivers a canine judo chop with her chilled ratty little feet. 

If I continue to ignore her, she will be so moved as to give a gruff bark. It's five o'clock, dammit! 

And after all -- really, truly -- who am I to resist her blandishments?  I might be her Food Goddess, but it's evident my little disciple demands that I kick my divine self into gear and dish up the goods. It's dinner time already.

2 Comments

For Paris is a Movable Feast

4/11/2014

8 Comments

 
Picture
It was not the best of visits to the City of Lights, in August when the city was empty of natives except those who must stay to deal with the tourists. 

There was, for instance, an unpleasant restaurant episode involving a snotty waiter who suggested, sneeringly, that we might like catsup with our lamb.  

I took my traveling companion on a day-long Bataan Death-March tour of the city starting in Saint-Germain, to Notre Dame, past the Louvre, by the Jardin des Tuileries, up Champs-Elysee, to Le Tour and beyond, until she demanded a taxi back to the hotel, or at least a cafe, some wine, and probably a cigarette. Possibly a foot-masage.

Still. 

Paris.

Picture
Picture
My companion claimed that Le Tour Eiffel looked just like an asparagus spear. Or a radio tower. And not one of the charming ones, either. She might have just been cranky, having clocked her 217th kilometer on the hard cobbled streets without adequate pause for refreshments.
Picture
She did not seem to notice the Rodin statues mocking her, pretending to be mimes. Under the plane trees. With the scent of madeleines in the air.
Picture
Even so, note the child wearing chic little black dress and hat with father in black espadrilles. In the Jardin du Luxembourg. Naturellement.
Picture
This snack, served without rudeness, was enough to make me wax Hemingway-esque: "As we ate the crusty bread smeared with pate with its dark, rich flavor, and then crunched the little sour pickles so that the darkness was washed away, leaving only the taste of richness, and as I drank the cold beer, I lost the empty feeling, and I became happy again."
8 Comments

Happy Happy, Joy joy

4/8/2014

0 Comments

 
Joy. What IS that stuff? Ineffable mood? Attitude? 
 
Describing what joy brings to any activity is like trying to answer, "Why Jell-o shots?" "Who would do Parkour?" or "What happened to the undercarriage of your grandfather's car?" 

That is, you can answer, but you can never really explain. And like many another, it's a quality easily identifiable at ten paces.

As an illustration, take a look at this strangely joyless rendition of the goofiest, happiest of dances:
It's easy to imagine these people are on their last legs, and that the Chicken Dance is the only part remaining of their memory of life above ground. 

This flying lawnmower (yes, I know this video has been around for ages. And yes, I understand how they did it. Don't be a buzzkill, bro) on the other hand, is utterly joyous:
0 Comments

Scary Toys

4/4/2014

2 Comments

 
So many things in this world are alarming. And childhood is difficult.  
Should toys be this frightening, even for plucky British youngsters?
Picture50p to ride these horses on the esplanade in Weymouth? I wouldn't risk it -- it's obvious that these are white selkie horses who will gallop straight into the surf and never stop until you arrive on the perilous shores of Tir na nOg.
 

Picture
Someone probably loved this china doll. But she seems both wistful and creepy to me. It's obvious that she gets up and about when no one is looking. From Appuldurcombe House museum on the Isle of Wight.
Picture
C'mon, kiddies, let's get into the fiberglass Conestoga Wagon o Death, pulled by a matched pair of zombie ponies! Located in the old-fashioned beach resort of Weymouth.
Picture
Punch and Judy -- traditional British sea-side entertainment for the under-10s. Puppets AND violence. Yay. This scene on the beach in Weymouth. In the background, those hills hold the famous Osmington Horse cut into the chalk hills.
Picture
To me, it looks as if she is going to swim through the air and start using those flat little teeth on my face when I sleep. This doll with jointed limbs on display at Appuldurcombe House museum on the Isle of Wight.
Picture
These kid-sized hamster balls found at Needles Park on Isle of Wight. Okay, not at all scary. In fact, I think we should all spend time inside transparent orbs. The technical term is "zorbing."
2 Comments

The Small Dog Chronicles: Knock Knock

4/1/2014

6 Comments

 
Picture
Within the first days of Lilly coming to stay with us, we discovered that she was an excellent watch-dog.

If someone rang the doorbell or knocked on the door, she was up and barking, sometimes before she was even awake.  

One memorable UPS delivery ended up with Lilly somehow summersaulting off the couch and landing upside-down between the side-table and the couch-leg, stuck like an angry capsized turtle. She remained there, wriggling and barking wildly, until I un-wedged the table. By the time I got to the door, the UPS guy was in full retreat, swinging himself back into the truck, probably having visions of three or four huge mutts tearing up the furniture in their eagerness to get to him. 

Naturally, I wanted to turn Lilly's useful canine instinct into a party-trick.

Picture
One evening, playing with the small dog, I gave the wooden floor a few experimental knocks and called out "Helloooo?"

 Lilly was off like a stick of dynamite.  

A few minutes later, I did it again and got the same rewarding noisy reaction.  She was ready to tear someone UP. 

This went on for a while.

By the, let's say the sixth time, she barked less explosively. As she raced to the door, she kept glancing back to keep an eye on me.  

Seventh time, she barked, and stayed nearby. She studied me as I stifled my hilarity to call out "Hellooo? Who's there?"  By the set of her ears and by the wary, suspicious look in her eye, it seemed as though she might be catching wind of the game.  

Eighth time, she bounced up, barked once, and then came over and gave my knocking hand a decided nip. The message being emphatic: Do. Not. Freakin. Mess. With. Me.  

Of course, I continue to mess with her. 

6 Comments

    About the Blog

    A lot of ground gets covered on this blog -- from sailboat racing to book suggestions to plain old piffle. 

    To narrow the focus, select one of the  Categories below.

    Follow

    Trying to keep track? Follow me on Facebook or Twitter or if you use an aggregator, click the RSS option below.

    RSS Feed

    Old school? Sign up for the newsletter and I'll shoot you a short e-mail when there's something new.

      Newsletter

    Subscribe to Newsletter

    Archives

    April 2025
    March 2025
    February 2025
    January 2025
    December 2024
    October 2024
    September 2024
    August 2024
    June 2024
    May 2024
    April 2024
    March 2024
    February 2024
    December 2023
    September 2023
    July 2023
    June 2023
    May 2023
    April 2023
    March 2023
    February 2023
    January 2023
    December 2022
    November 2022
    October 2022
    September 2022
    August 2022
    June 2022
    May 2022
    April 2022
    March 2022
    February 2022
    January 2022
    December 2021
    November 2021
    October 2021
    September 2021
    August 2021
    July 2021
    June 2021
    May 2021
    April 2021
    March 2021
    February 2021
    January 2021
    December 2020
    November 2020
    October 2020
    September 2020
    August 2020
    July 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014
    May 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    February 2014
    January 2014
    December 2013
    November 2013
    October 2013
    September 2013
    August 2013
    July 2013
    June 2013
    May 2013

    Categories

    All
    Beauty Products
    Big Parks Trip
    Birds
    Boatbuilding
    Books
    Brains
    Contest & Prize
    Dogs
    Everglades Challenge
    Family Stories
    Farming
    Fashion
    Feminism
    Fiction
    Fish
    Flowers
    Flying Scot Sailboat
    Food
    Genealogy
    Handwork
    Health
    History
    Horses
    I
    International Lightning Class
    Mechanical Toys
    Migraine
    Movie References
    Music
    Piffle
    Pigs And Pork
    Poems
    Sailboat Racing
    Sculpture
    Social Media
    Song
    Subconscious Messages And Dream
    Travel
    Wildlife
    Writing

Picture
© COPYRIGHT 2023. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
  • Home
  • She Taught Me Everything
  • Blog
  • Publications
  • Me. Me. Me.
  • More!
  • Contact
  • Signed Copies for sale
  • Get a Book
  • Reviews & Awards