Standing Into Danger

Friday, June 19, 2020

Here's to a Lovely Summer Morning!

I've been struggling with social-distancing this past ten days or so.

Self-isolation seems to stretch into the future with no end in sight.

The weather has been hot and windy,

and yesterday the air was heavy with wildfire smoke.

After days at home wallowing, I forced myself out of the house this morning

and went for a long overdue walk in the open space along Piney Creek.

This is the lush, fecund season with female mule deer dropping their fawns,

cottonwood trees releasing their seeds, and wildflowers springing up everywhere.

Birds are winging back and forth, catching insects and ferrying them to their young.

The earth is alive and filled with promise.

Here's to a lovely summer morning!

Cool Green Beckoning

Along Piney Creek

Aurora, Colorado

June 18, 2020

Male Goldfinch

Aurora, Colorado

June 7, 2020

Best Guess: Lacy Tansyaster

Along Piney Creek

Aurora, Colorado

June 18,, 2020

Cottonwood Seed Capsules

Plains Cottonwood Tree

Aurora, Colorado

June 18, 2020

Bursting Cottonwood Seed Capsules

Releasing Seeds (cotton) on the Wind

Plains Cottonwood Tree

Aurora, Colorado

June 18, 2020

Bursting Cottonwood Seed Capsules

Caught in the Grass

Aurora, Colorado

June 18, 2020

Cottonwood Seeds

Scattered in the Grass

Plains Cottonwood Tree

Aurora, Colorado

June 18, 2020

Middle Pond

Along Piney Creek

Aurora, Colorado

June 18, 2020

Grackles in a Cottonwood Tree

Along Piney Creek

Aurora, Colorado

June 18, 2020

Showy Milkweed (Asclepias speciosa)

Along Piney Creek

Aurora, Colorado

June 18, 2020

Showy Milkweed (Asclepias speciosa)

Along Piney Creek

Aurora, Colorado

June 18, 2020

Summer Meadows

Along Piney Creek

Aurora, Colorado

June 18, 2020

Spiderwort

Along Piney Creek

Aurora, Colorado

June 18, 2020

Mule Doe with Fawn

Along Piney Creek

Aurora, Colorado

June 18, 2020

Mule Doe with Fawn

Along Piney Creek

Aurora, Colorado

June 18, 2020

Same Mule Doe Hiding in the Grass

Along Piney Creek

Aurora, Colorado

June 18, 2020

Upper Pond

Along Piney Creek

Aurora, Colorado

June 18, 2020

Prickly Poppy

Along Piney Creek

Aurora, Colorado

June 18, 2020

Prickly Poppy

Along Piney Creek

Aurora, Colorado

June 18, 2020

House Finch

Aurora, Colorado

June 7, 2020

Musk Thistle

Along Piney Creek

June 18, 2020

Male Robin

Along Piney Creek

Aurora, Colorado

June 18, 2020

Summer Leaves

Plains Cottonwood

Along Piney Creek

Aurora, Colorado

June 18, 2020

I hope you are staying safe and healthy!

All the best to you!

Till next time ~
Fundy Blue

On the Bay of Fundy
© M. Louise (MacBeath) Barbour/Fundy Blue
All Rights Reserved

For Map Lovers Like Me:

Location of Aurora, Colorado, USA

Wikimedia

Area Where I Took the Photographs

(by the asterisk in the lower middle)

Google

Southern Aurora and Northern Parker

Google

Adapted from a Sign in the Park

Red-Tailed Hawk Park

Aurora, Colorado, U.S.A.

Friday, June 12, 2020

A Promise Kept

Did you ever have to jostle at work for a project you really wanted?

Guaranteed there was jostling on my third grade team

when it came time to teach our geography unit on Europe.

Usually we team taught this unit, dividing countries among us

and teaching our chosen countries to all of our students

who rotated from teacher to teach in class groups.

That way each teacher prepared lessons for only one or two countries,

while the students got to know all the teachers, and we got to know all the students.

First Glimpse of My Chosen Country

June 11, 2014

My colleagues jostled over who would get to teach France, Italy,

the United Kingdom, or other popular countries.

Me? No jostling. No one ever clamored for Iceland but me.

I wanted Iceland for three big reasons, all contained in this photo:

Þingvellir (Thingvellir) National Park

June 12, 2014

Photo by Terry Barbour

First, Iceland has the oldest surviving Parliament in the world, the Althing.
It dates back to 930 AD, and in 1930, on the Althing's 1000th anniversary,
Þingvellir (Thingvellir) National Park was established on the site
where the Althing met until 1798.

19th-century rendering of the Law Rock in Þingvellir

by W.G. Collingwood

Wikimedia

Second, I loved the delicious irony that Iceland is not continental.
It is oceanic and straddles the Mid-Atlantic Ridge.
Even if no one else in the world found humor in this (including Terry),
I took great delight in it.

The Trace of the Mid-Atlantic Ridge Rift Valley

Þingvellir (Thingvellir) National Park

Third, I'm a geologist, and the one story I remember from my grade two reader
was about an Icelandic family that went on a picnic
and boiled eggs in a hot spring near a geyser for their lunch.
I fell in love with Iceland, its marvelous landscapes, and its geology.
Right then and there, all of eight years old, I swore that I would go to Iceland.

The Calm Before an Eruption

Geysir, Iceland

June 12, 2014

The Geyser Erupts

Geysir, Iceland

June 12, 2014

So there I am in that photo: in Iceland
standing in the Mid-Atlantic Ridge Rift Valley,
with my hand on the North American tectonic plate
where the Althing met for hundreds and hundreds of years.
Am I thrilled or what?

I never had the opportunity to boil eggs in a hot spring,

but I did something even better.

I soaked in the Blue Lagoon with Terry,

a man-made pool heated by geothermal water from the Mid-Atlantic Rift.

The Blue Lagoon

Iceland

June 14, 2014

Terry

Blue Lagoon, Iceland

June 14, 2014

Me (Louise)

Blue Lagoon, Iceland

June 14, 2014

I always had a blast teaching Iceland to the kiddos.

I covered everything required by our curriculum and standards,

but I squeezed in a lot of extra material, especially geological.

My goal was to awaken my students wonder about our amazing planet and how it works.

And I'm sure there's more than one kiddo who became passionate about geology

and promised himself or herself a trip to Iceland someday.

It's important to keep those early promises you make.

Friday, June 5, 2020

Avoiding Reality

This evening I avoided reality by escaping into funnies about LOTR.

If you're not a fan of The Lord of the Rings, you might as well skip this post.

Me? I love all things Tolkien.

Forgot to Copy Link

Forgot to Copy Link

Take care, everyone!

Wednesday, June 3, 2020

IWSG: Wednesday, June 3, 2020 ~ No Secrets to Share

It's the first Wednesday of the month,
the day that members of the
Insecure Writer's Support Group
share their writing struggles
and writing successes
and offer their encouragement
and support to fellow writers.

To visit the IWSG website, click here.

To become a member of the IWSG, click here.

Our wonderful co-hosts who are volunteering today,
along with IWSG Founder Alex Cavanaugh are Pat Garcia, J. Q. Rose, and Natalie Aguirre.

I hope you have a chance to visit today's hosts and thank them for co-hosting.
I'm sure they would appreciate a visit and an encouraging comment.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Every month the IWSG announces a question that members can answer
with advice, insight, a personal experience, or a story in their IWSG posts.

Or, the question can inspire members
if they aren't sure what to write about on IWSG Day.

Remember the question is optional.
This month's featured question is:

Writers have secrets! What are one or two of yours, something readers would never know from your work?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Happy June, Everyone!
I hope all is well with you.

I'm skipping this month's optional question.
I have secrets, but they are not ones I can share.

However, I have questions for you.
Are you entering the 2020 IWSG Anthology Contest?
Have you started writing your science fiction short story?
How would you like some insider writing tips from last year's winners
featured in the IWSG's latest anthology, Voyagers: The Third Ghost?

If you would, I invite you to check out last Wednesday's and today's posts
on the Insecure Writers Support Group Anthologies Blog:

Insider Writing Tips for the IWSG 2020 Anthology Contest ~ Part 1 Click Here

Insider Writing Tips for the IWSG 2020 Anthology Contest ~ Part 2 Click Here

As for my writing progress, I sure hope it goes better in June than it did in May.
Nuff said!

Be safe and healthy!
Happy writing in June!

Till next time ~

Fundy Blue

Books Read in 2026

"18 Days in Heaven" by Gale Poirot
"A Serial Killer's Daughter: My Story of Hope, Love, and Overcoming" by Kerrie Rawson
"Eat Your Ice Cream: Six Simple Rules for a Long and Healthy Life" by Ezekiel J. Emanuel, MD.
"Is Math Real? How Simple Questions Lead Us to Mathematics Deepest Truths" by Eugenia Cheng
"Project Hail Mary" by Andy Weir
"Tell Me Everything" by Elizabeth Strout
"The Covenant of Water" by Abraham Verghese
"The Dawn of Everything: A New History of Humanity" by David Graeber and David Wengrow
"The Life Impossible" by Matthew Haig
"The Lord go the Rings" by JRR Tolkien
"The Match" by Harlan Corben
"The Night the Path Disappeared" by Terri Bergen
"The Notebook: A History of Thinking on Paper" by Roland Allen
"Theo of Golden" by Allen Levi
"Think Twice" by Harlan Corben
"Why Christianity Must Change Or Die" by John Shelby Spong

Standing Into Danger

Pages

Friday, June 19, 2020

Here's to a Lovely Summer Morning!

Friday, June 12, 2020

A Promise Kept

Friday, June 5, 2020

Avoiding Reality

Wednesday, June 3, 2020

IWSG: Wednesday, June 3, 2020 ~ No Secrets to Share

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