Fruit!

I've been busy dealing with cherries. Our four trees (two Rainier, one Bing and one pie) are feeding most of the European Starlings in the county. They start eating early in the morning. They carry half-eaten cherries all over the property. They make sinister noises while they eat, then all fly out of the trees at once with a big whirring wing-flapping noise. What the birds don't eat, our dog eats off the ground.

You can imagine how things go after a 90-pound Rhodesian Ridgeback spends an afternoon eating cherries. First, he walks into the house with a piece of mashed fruit lodged between his big foot-pads and tracks cherry juice through two rooms. Mistress of House follows him with a bucket of soapy water. Next, he naps, waking himself up occasionally with terrible dog gas. Mistress of House grosses out and sends dog back outside. Dog eats more cherries, scratches at back door until admitted to house, has more gas. Spouse, who usually finds dog gas mildly amusing, admits he's getting sick to his stomach.



I'm trying to get a few cherries for myself, using a stepladder. This gives me access to about one twentieth of the cherries on the trees. The cherries taste very nice. We leave for Michigan in a week; I'll try to post once more before then. Love to all.