Spring is in the air . . . and in the trees, on the deck, in the water -- spring has invaded every nook and cranny at the Boonedocks! The dockmaster's use of the garlic-based Mosquito Barrier has apparently kept the mosquitoes at bay around the house and had no effect on our beneficial wildlife. A pair of chameleons, who near as I can make out are usually loners, have been seen chasing each other around the deck, the male, I presume, putting on a manly show of color and throat sac ballooning. Swift fleets of minnows have returned to the creek. Driving around the county last week, we saw sudden shows of wild wisteria and Carolina Jessamine all along the roadsides. Our trumpet vines are beginning to put out leaves, heralding, we hope, the return of the hummingbirds. The several weeks before we saw all that purple and yellow on the roadsides, nature had presented us with a wave of white-blooming vegetation, mostly Bradford pears and various cherries. I'd tell you more, but it's time to get out in the garden!
April 4, 2003.

The weather gal is a bit of a stargazer, a real amateur - she has one of those "your-first" telescopes, a real kid thing, but then the weather gal is a bit of a kid, after all. If you're like the weather gal, you might need the assistance of a good star chart to locate and identify those shiny things in the night sky - she uses the online sky chart at Sky and Telescope Magazine online. That explains why sometimes you see her running back and forth between telescope and computer. Well, it explains what she's doing, but as to why...? Might be easier to print that sky chart, eh? Stargazing at the Boonedocks doesn't require pricey equipment. Binoculars will do, or even bare eyes. This week, you don't even have to wait until dark for a good display; instead, you can jump out of bed at the crack of dawn and get a good view of Venus in the southeastern sky. Jupiter and Saturn are pretty prominent this week, and both are easy to find in the night sky. In the end, it doesn't even really matter if you know what you're looking at, either. Lying on our back looking at hundreds of clusters of stars overhead or popping out of bed and seeing a low-hanging brilliant light in a violet sky quiets the mind and releases us from the responsibility to identify and classify everything we see.
April 5, 2003

Okay, admittedly, at least one of us here at the Boonedocks is a curmudgeon, which my dictionary, by the way, defines as "a crusty irascible cantankerous old person full of stubborn ideas." I leave it up to you to decide for yourself if it's the dockmaster or the weather gal who fits that description. But I don't think you have to be a curmudgeon to shake your head over the following notice from an obituary appearing in a "big-city" newspaper:

     "The memorial register may be signed online by going to "Funerals Scheduled" at www.*****funeralhome.com."

It's not that we hate or fear technology, it's just that this particular modern convenience makes us a bit squeamish. A quick web search for funeral homes here in Pamlico County fails to turn up online registers - just another good reason to live in Pamlico County, we think.
April 13, 2003

This week has been notable for two separate sightings of ruby throated hummingbirds. Nice to see them back.
April 17, 2003

During the first two weeks of April we saw turkeys alongside the roads, right up until about April 12 when turkey season opened here in North Carolina. Now we don't see the birds anywhere at all. Perhaps turkeys have a bit more on the ball than we give them credit for, eh?
April 24, 2003

Butterflies are beginning to return to the Boonedocks - not in great numbers yet, but just enough to keep things interesting.
April 25, 2003

A bit of irony is to be found on the shores of Broad Creek. You spend five dollars and countless hours on a tropical vine, a specimen plant, cajoling it to grow rapidly in your acid-rich soil. Then you spend five hours a week searching for and destroying ten varieties of hardy vines that seemingly grow 20 feet overnight and return relentlessly from even the most severe pruning, digging, burning, chopping, or, dare we say it, poisoning. On the one hand, we'd like to encourage our native plant life; on the other hand, those fast growing vines are either woody and choke trees or full of thorns. In the spirit of compromise, we've left one dead half-tree (until the next hurricane brings it down, we suspect) for the vines--and the woodpeckers. As usual though, given 'em an inch and they'll grow a mile.
April 29, 2003