Thursday, January 04, 2007

Bribing Myself

I didn’t have any pressing errands to run today, but I knew it was going to be nice out again. I told myself I couldn’t go for a walk until I applied for another job. Going out this morning to bring up the empty trash can and recycling bin really lit a fire under my butt; it’s gorgeous out today, sunny and 55 degrees. Of course, even then, I putzed around for a while first: putting away clean dishes, loading the dishwasher, checking my email, reading blogs, updating lists.

I finally hunkered down to work on the job application early this afternoon. It was another application that must be completed online, and of the worst variety, too. “Paste your resume” into this rinky box and lose all your formatting. Super! So I dinked around with that for awhile before I got it into acceptable shape. Then I was free. I grabbed the camera and headed for Stormwater Park.


Our city has a great program where they pick up holiday trees curbside starting after the New Year. The trees are taken to one of several compost sites, where come spring time, they are ground into mulch. The mulch is available free to anyone who wants to come and pick it up. So to entertain myself along my walk to the park and back, I kept a tally of the discarded trees. Three balsam firs (Abies balsamea), two Douglas-firs (Pseudotsuga menziesii) and one Frasier fir (Abies fraseri). Nice trees, with the exception of the one Doug fir that had been spray painted with white streaks; some people are really desperate for snow, I guess. What the fake snow does to the mulch, I don’t even want to think about.


The park was bustling, mostly with families at the playground, and dogwalkers. I swear, dogwalkers are the friendliest lot you ever could meet. I love how when you make casual conversation with a stranger and their dog, you invariably learn the dog’s name but not that of their human companion. Today I exchanged greetings with many a fine folk, and had a friendly conversation with one man. His canine friend Reese approached me while I was taking pictures of the ducks, and tried to sit on my feet. Of course we talked about how the water should be long frozen by now, what a beautiful day it is, and how happy the foolish little mallards look.

All us foolish little humans looked pretty happy, too, if truth be told.

7 comments:

Nicole said...

Beautiful! Oh, and when you find the motivation to apply for jobs, could you send it my way? I haven't seen it in awhile.

a/k/a Nadine said...

I hope you are enjoying the nice weather enough for both of us. 'Cause I haven't had the chance...

Anonymous said...

Hard to believe its January, isn' it? Sigh.

Dog parks are kinda like kid parks that way. At the end of an afternoon I could tell you the names of all the kids my kid has played with: "Hey kiddo, say goodbye to Dylan, Brianna, and Tyler, we're going now!" Kids exchange names at the drop of a hat -and of course you hear the parents calling them...

Molecular Turtle said...

I really love the picture of the mallards. What kind of camera are you using, I'm looking for one myself.

Aliki2006 said...

I'm glad you were able to escape for that outing! Marvelous pics...

BerryBird said...

Molecular Turtle, the camera is a Canon Digital Rebel XT. They are not cheap, but I was fortunate to receive as a Christmas gift last year. I'm very happy with it: it's fun to use, and takes great pictures. A new camera sounds like the perfect way to celebrate your new job.

Welcome, Aliki! It's nice to see you here.

Mary Stebbins Taitt said...

The pictures are lovely, glad you got out! I like the Stormwater creek shot particularly well.

It was snowing here a few minutes ago, but now the sun is out.