Rain, and male witches.

Hiking

We’ve done a fair amount of hiking recently, mostly on Virginia Creeper trail (VCT), but, when weather didn’t permit, along the main streets of Abingdon. The houses in the latter, especially the older ones, have rather nice yardscaping, so it’s almost as good as total wilderness.

Here’s a neat ‘little’ cave, discovered some 6 miles from Abingdon, along the VCT.




Plants

Another online trade is (hopefully) happening this week! A bunch of my guys (kalanchoes, spider plant) for a bunch of someone else’s sedums. They’ve sent first, which I wholly appreciate.

African Violets, as a whole, are doing rather well. I’ve wicked a bunch of dwarf ones, and they seem to be thriving. The pink jasmine isn’t exactly blooming, but it is putting out a bunch of new shoots, as is the spider plant. The spidey’s magnificent- still giving off 5-10 flowers per day, with very little leaf browning. Guess I was under-watering it before.

Stuck a bunch of lavender into the rectangular planter in hopes that something will finally thrive there (thanks for the seedlings, Mina!). There’s been some aphid problems with the stevia, and leafhoppers on the sunflowers. Both were tended by ants, and both were liberally sprayed with soapy water. Though, with the amount of rain that we’ve been having, it’ll probably have to be done again.

An odd moth also decided that the outdoor light was a perfect predator-safe location. (In this, it was mostly right. Birds tend to avoid that side of the house for lack of cover, and OtherKitty isn’t there much, as a result.)



Lastly, since good pictures are lacking this week, here’s an old shot from Biltmore’s conservatory. Not sure what this guy is, but he sure is pretty!



P.S.
Apparently, begonias have male and female flowers! Never knew that!


Pets

Mushka was limping on her right foot yesterday, with one of the toe-pads swollen. It seemed to get better today. I sincerely hope that it was an ant/spider bite, rather than her cancer coming back.


Other

Elrin found a game for me, called “The Witcher”. After not touching the said game for over a month, ‘ve finally picked it up and started playing. Something about the main character struck me as familiar…

Witcher, or male witch, is ‘ved’mak’ in Russian.

And there was a call to relatives and some wiki-ing to double check.

And there was much “SQUEE”-ing.

Apparently, the game’s based on a series which I absolutely loved when I was about 11. Granted, it was a rather filthy-mouthed series for an 11-year-old to read, but, in my defense, it was in my mom’s fantasy collection, which I used to sneak books from. For guilty pleasure.

I’m pretty sure that fantasy books were the beginning of my sex education. I’m also pretty sure that an English copy of the first book in the series is coming in the mail within a week.