My Critters

I have a few critters here in our flat. Some I do not want to show you - like the spider I tried and tried to kill a couple days ago but it escaped me anyway, through a crack between the window and window frame. Or the ants in the kitchen that come and go now and then. Or the flies. Oh what the heck... I have photos of them all! Why don't I show them to you? :) :) :)

My cat, Cheyenne, sunning herself in the doorway to the balcony, in the morning before it gets too hot. Her fur is a little scruffy in this photo - she's lost a lot of fur this summer due to the heat, I think. Also, she's an Old Lady Cat now, 12.5 years old! Hard to believe, but true.

Supervising my last weaving project, which still is not completely finished, so I haven't posted about it yet, but I will! She has her own little pillow to sit/lay on while she makes sure I'm doing it all correctly.

My goopies! The Russian pronunciation of guppies. :) :) Yes, I finally broke down and bought 3. Two females and one male. Aren't they pretty? (I had to darken the photo, tho, to bring out the colors because through the water they look rather pale and gray. Also, you can't see the male's tale in this photo - it's orange and black and much larger than the female's tails. Just regular, normal guppies like at your local pet store in America.)

And yes, they do reproduce. They also eat their young. :( But this one has survived so far!

They are really hard to photograph, darting here and there, somewhat scared of me still. I think there might be one other one in there right now, but I also am pretty sure that when I went to feed them this morning that I saw one of the females eat one. So...who knows how many babies are really in there? :)

We've only had one dragonfly in the flat this summer, not like the hordes we had a couple of summers ago! Maybe because the balcony door has been closed much of the summer due to the heat and high humidity?

Flies, flies, flies. Everywhere on the underside of the window bars in the bedroom window. So weird. They 'rest' there for long parts of the day. Sometimes they come in through the open window and rest inside. I could only see one today however, but this is what they do:

I like it when they stay outside. It is interesting to see them there sometimes. I've counted up to 13, some in groups of 2 or 3, others in a line, and some just here and there.

Ants! Yes, we have ants, especially in the spring. Oh my! They were all over the flat at one point. I'd be sitting here at the desk and realize an ant was crawling up my arm. Only found them in the bedroom once, but they are in the livingroom (we eat there) and of course, all over the kitchen. I did take a photo of them on the trash can, but you don't want to see that one. :) :) This is the kitchen wall, and I think that is a tiny piece of frozen spinach they found. After I took this photo, the poor little things just slowly slipped back down the wall a couple inches. I felt sorry for them and left. I have no idea if they ever made it UP the wall, where they were trying to go when I so rudely interrupted them.

This photo was from May. They are mostly gone again now. I wonder where they come from? I wonder where they go? I have no idea. I've tried to find where their trail ends, but it seems to be behind the cupboard - maybe through a nail hole into the wall? The walls are made of stone "bricks" that have holes like very hole-y Swiss cheese (less weight in multi-story buildings). I always think of the ants in Proverbs when I see them, and try to remember that I'm supposed to be like them.

And of course, there are the birds that come and sit on the balcony bars and clothesline, or even on the windowsill and peek in at me, too. :) This is one, another one actually poked his little head up over the window sill and looked me over real good before flying away. Others have sat on the bars and watched me. Should I be scared of The Birds? :) :) haha!

Spider alert!!!! If you don't like spiders, don't scroll down!

Ok, I did not get a photo of the spider, did not even think of taking one (but I should so I can identify it!!). But here is it's web - I did take a photo of the web the day before, in the sunlight. Left it so I could hopefully find the spider and kill it. The web is gone now, the spider, unfortunately, is not. :(

Yikes! I finally really looked at this photo and what do I see???? The spider!!! Took 2 photos and it's in both of them, but this is the best picture. Do you know what kind it is? Ei yi yi. Gives me 'the creep out' just looking at it!! I've got to kill it.

Ooops! Almost forgot this guy, a victim of the spider who lives between the windows in the office room (the other one was the livingroom spider - I have got to clean between the windows again!!! but I can't in the livingroom until the a/c unit is put away for the winter.) He appeared overnight in the window.

PS - Am I nuts???
hahahahahahahahaha

Bits n Pieces

Today is a mostly lazy day. I have done some things around the house, to be sure, but mostly we've been relaxing.

Well, I have been relaxing. Mel, on the other hand, is never relaxed the Saturday before he preaches. His mind is constantly going, mulling over this and that. He reads. He studies. He mulls. It's actually a beautiful process to watch and listen to. I like that he talks so much to me while he is in process, verbalizing things, sometimes asking my opinion, sometimes sharing something with me that he's learned that never makes it into his sermon.

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I realize while I'm writing this just how much I like being the age I am right now. The kids are grown and gone. We have the flat to ourselves, the fish and the cat (oh- and of course the ants, too).

I've almost always enjoyed being the age I am at that time. Except being a teenager - I can't say that I really enjoyed being a teenager. But I enjoyed being a young 20's, being a newlywed, then a young mother. I enjoyed watching my kids grow up. I did not enjoy so much watching them leave home, yet at the same time, it was very good to watch them go. Now I enjoy being a grandmother, tho I wish it was not from afar. I'm glad, yes I am really, truly glad, that it is Mel and me alone right now. I enjoy each stage of my life. Besides, I may end up living with one or more of my kids again some day in the future and they can take care of me. {hear an evilish laugh! heh heh heh}

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As I write those words above I am somewhat nervous because I have this nagging suspicion or fear that if I verbalize my pleasure in something, God will change it somehow. Bad way to think, I know, I know. Yet, there is a certain amount of fear that when I enjoy something or someone an awful lot, God will remove it/them so that I concentrate on Him instead. I don't know why I think this way about people. I do know why I think about things and places that way: because God has done just that many times in my life. Removed the thing, moved me, or whatever. It has never been easy for me, but He does it anyway. The good news is that each time, it's just a tiny bit easier to 'let it go.'

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Why am I thinking along these lines this evening? Probably due to the sermon that Mel and I just listened to. It was from Hebrews 11 on Abraham being willing to sacrifice Isaac to the Lord.

I am so glad I found these sermons by Arturo Azurdia. I think I found them by way of Rebecca Writes. From there I went to Monergism, where Azurdia's sermons/website are listed, along with a whole lot of other things if you go exploring. I have listened to his whole series on Revelation, Mel is most of the way through Hebrews, and we've listened together to a variety of them.

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My last goldfish died. I think I fed it too much. I gave it too much food one day by accident, the next day he/she was laying on the bottom of the pond. Two days Fishie laid there, only moving around when I forced the issue. The 3rd day, he/she was belly up.

Bummer. I MISS him/her!

Fishie was always happy to see me. I'd walk up to the pond and he/she'd swim right over to the edge and beg me for food. Fishie would swim right under Cheyenne's tongue as she drank out of the pond. Sometimes Cheyenne would watch him/her, but never once did she try to catch Fishie.

RIP Fishie.

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I waited 3 or 4 days and then decided that the pond was very nice like it is - but... BUT it needed something more. So while I was in Nikolaev on the "adventure" last week, I bought a pretty pink plant. I repotted it and set it kind of behind the pond. Now the purple pond with the blue glass fountain that sits on a bright pink bucket with bright yellow lid has a dark pink plant sitting there behind and above it, planted in a white pot next to another dark green plant potted in a white pot. How's that for adding color to your life? I notice that there is no bright red. That's probably because I really do not care for bright red, or bright orange either, for that matter.

The plant is very nice, adds something to the area.

BUT it is not alive in the same way an alive creature is.

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When Mel and I went shopping over at our local Oskar Thursday, I stopped in at the tiny little pet store beside it to see if they had any gold fish.

No gold fish, but they do have guppies and a couple other fish. I bought 3 guppies. They are kind of plain little things - no big bright beautiful and colorful tails. Just plain little guppies with so-so black and white tails. I carried them around Oskar in my cart, watching over them like a mother hen. Yes, of course! They were in a plastic bag!! :-)

We finished shopping and we brought them home. I took the rubber band off the top of the plastic bag and put the bag to float in the water to equalize the water temperatures and eventually to add a bit of pond water to the bag water until I could just dump them into the pond willy-nilly.

I came in and sat down at the computer. A couple minutes later we heard a fish jump. Oh ho! thinks I to myself. One of them has made it's way out of the bag, floating there on the water. I finished what I was doing on the computer and went out to check on the fishes.

I looked in the bag and there were only 2 fish. I looked all over the pond - no extra fish. Finally I looked over by the balcony door. They lay poor little guppy fish, all dried out and starting to curl.

I picked him up (it's a him) and saw that one of his gills moved very weakly. Life! I quickly put him into the pond. Within just a few minutes he was weakly swimming around. No, it's more like he was just kind of hanging there in the water, moving his gills a bit, but he was alive.

Oh my.

Yesterday I looked for my 3 guppies and could only find 1. I picked up the fountain to check and see if the one had died and gotten stuck against the filter. Immediately, one of them went shooting out from under the overhang and took a flying jump out of the pond and onto the rug in front of the balcony door. Good grief. These guys are easily spooked! I gently picked him up and dumped him back into the water.

He was very traumatized. Too much in too short of time. Poor little fish. I'm not sure he's going to make it. The first Flying Guppy died. I found him against the filter this morning (good news - second Flying Guppy did not shoot out of the pond this time when I picked up the fountain). I waited to pick it up until I was sure the one healthy guppy was looking at me, watching me. I talked gently to it - they can hear you, you know - and then picked it up and found poor dead guppy under there.

Such is the life of fish. I have one healthy, one not quite healthy and one dead guppy. It's hard to see them in the pond because they are gray and the pond is dark. I have to really search. But the blue fighting fish, Sargon, is still alive and doing well. Knock on wood, cross my eyes, er, whatever I'm supposed to do...

I miss my golden Fishie.

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Thursday evening while I was listening to the sermon with Mel, I realized I was going to run out of the embroidery floss color I was using. I bought this as a kit 4 or 5 years ago so I can't just take it back and say, "Hey! I need more of this color floss! You goofed up on this one." Nope, I'm going to have to go searching to see if I can find this color here in Kherson. I searched all of my floss last night, going through the 3 floss containers and two bags that have floss with other stuff and none of the colors even came close to matching. I really hope I can find some before we go back to the States in November. If not, I will have to wait until we get home and then finish the project there. I'm taking the project home with me, one way or the other, because it is a gift for someone. I'd just hoped I'd have it completely done by then.

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I continue to monitor earthquakes and sunspots. The sun is still spotless
Spotless Days
Current Stretch: 42 days
2009 total: 184 days (79%)
Since 2004: 695 days
Typical Solar Min: 485 days
Updated 21 Aug 2009

There is a very interesting article today on spaceweather.com about disappearing sunspots.

As far as earthquakes, there have been 2 or 3 small ones in various parts of Colorado recently, plus a large one in eastern Colorado. This larger one happened in an area that has no previously recorded earthquakes. It was also quite near to where friends of our live (hi Marsha!). Unfortunately they were gone to Kansas and didn't feel it. I like earthquakes that do no damage - that's why I write 'unfortunately'.

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We have another spider on the balcony. A nice little garden spider has built it's web between the clothesline wire and the grapevine. Two spiders, I guess, because there are two webs fairly close together. I don't know - do spiders build more than one web, or is it one web per spider? I'll have to look that up.

Anyway, I found it while I was hanging clothes out. So, I hung the clothes in such a way as to do the least amount of damage to the spider's web. Trying to make up for murdering that spider so many years ago, I guess. ha ha! But I'm glad they are there as they will catch and eat flies and mosquitoes. I don't think their webs are strong enough for the wasps, tho, that will be here as the grapes continue to ripen (they are mostly purple now!).
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I have a couple of more things I want to write about, but they will be complete posts all by themselves. So for now, this is it.

Two Things

Two things and then I'm out the door for the day.

A spider has been living in our shower room for the past few months. I leave it alone because it's a Daddy Longlegs type spider and it eats ants and mosquitos. It has lived a long spider life up in the corner above the shower.

Now I do not like spiders, but this spider has done nothing to bother me. In fact, I like what I see in it's web - dead ants. We have an ant problem. The whole building has an ant problem. I've written about his before - old news, I know.

This morning, however, Spider had built it's web down to connect to the shower head. The shower head is the kind you can take down and move around. Mel took it down to rinse out the tub before he got in for his shower. That's when he found out Spider had a one-strand connection to the shower head. Down came Spider and down the drain Spider went.

Does this sound like a children's song to you? It does to me.

Mel told me Spider was gone by reminding me of a Twilight Zone episode I'd watched many, many years ago and had told him about many years ago.

The episode where the woman washes a spider down the drain and it keeps coming back up and out of the drain, bigger and bigger, until she thinks she's finally washed it completely away. She leaves the sink, goes into the other room and there is the spider, as big as the room practically, waiting for her.

Gave me nightmares for years.

So - guess what I kept thinking about as I took my own shower this morning?

I refrained from checking the drain over and over again, but kept praying I wouldn't feel something crawling over my foot and up my ankle.....

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And on that happy note :) as soon as I finish this I will be leaving to go interview - I hope - a new interpreter.

I asked Olya K. if she knew someone at the institute she is attending and she said she'd ask around. I need one to help me when I teach.

She called me yesterday afternoon and said she'd told a few of the girls I was looking for someone, but the were "afraid." Afraid of what? Well, afraid of me, of the church, what they might have to translate I guess.

You know something? I say - Good Girls!!! People need to be more careful! There is so much garbage being taught here in Ukraine, all under the name of Christianity. People NEED to be more careful in what they listen to, in what they are involved with.

One of the girls later told Olya that she would like to meet me, but not at the church. I said great, I'd like to interview her.

What is her name?

I don't know.

You don't know her name?????

No. (and then a funny little laugh)

Ohhh-kaaaay. How old is she?

I don't know.

Ohhh-kaaaay. What does she look like?

And I got a very short description that could be half of the young women I see on the street each day.

So I agreed to meet her at a local pizza place, talk with her, and if she is agreeable, then we'll walk over to where the church currently meets so I can show her how to get there.

I'm going to go meet someone that I don't know, I don't know her name, I don't really know what she looks like, but I'm going to meet her.

This could be very interesting.

I love my life.