In spite of the fact that it's in the mid-eighties and ever so slightly humid the dogwoods are beginning to change color. There are a few red leaves on the giant Sassafras tree in front of the house and the spiders are moving back inside [yes, not crazy about that part of the Fall season].

I don't know why it seems early to me this year. It's been a sweltering summer. I should be glad to see the changes coming__looking forward to the crisp temps, the changeable weather, but I wouldn't mind if the warm stayed around for awhile. No, I wouldn't mind.

The bear in the yard is still around and showing no signs of wandering away and there are a couple of young bucks that seem to think this is a fine spot, too. I thought they'd all be gone by now since they've eaten all the berries but, no, they linger on. Maybe they plan on spending the winter here. Mattie would be happy with that. It gives her so many things to roll around in. [yuk] I bathed her today and it took two soapings to subdue the odor. She probably could have used three.

The neighbor to the west, the one who blew up the Thanksgiving turkey a few holidays ago in the turkey fryer out back, has split up with his wife and is planning on moving west. At least that's the story the last time he spoke to Matt. I haven't seen a for sale sign on the property and it's not a great time of the year to try to sell up here. Oh, it looks good when the trees change but trying to navigate on this road in late Fall and Winter if you're not prepared for it is, well, we'll call it challenging. It's better to try to sell in Spring. But, hey, who knows with the way the market is anything is possible. He says he wants to go to California and get into the medicinal pot business. Ok. I would imagine he may find it a bit crowded but there again who knows?

I never see any dragonflies here in the yard. They're down at the lake and I see them all over town when I go but I suppose the elevation may be too high here [not that it's all that high__this is the Blue Ridge, after all and these mountains are Old. Old and worn down__short in other words] but still higher than the surrounds and I guess that may be one reason why the dragonflies don't come up here. It may also be that we're on the east face of the mountain and they don't like the shade. I like dragonflies. I take it as a sign of good luck when I see one. Do you have any naturally occurring objects that you consider lucky? The reason I ask is I've been seeing many when I wander on down off the bump. More than usual. I like that.

This turned into a long blog. And it's a wandering blog. Blondering? More like blithering. Oh, well. The virgin page has yielded, if not to fine prose then at least to words, many, many words. Let her be blogified.