What are you, yellow-bellied?

 

Sciara hemerobioides

 

 

 

 

'I say you're a bunch of gutless lily-livered, yellow-bellied eastern sissies.

All you've done since you got here was whine and complain.

Now why don't you go back and leave the west to the real men !'

 

~Bartender in Wagons East, 1994~

 

 

Wait for it on 0:54

 

 

candy stripe lavender

 

 

 

The candy stripe spider (Enoplognatha ovata) on a lavender sprig



 

 

 

I wonder if spiders get the same soothing effect lavender gives me when I smell its wonderful perfume...

 

 

 

 

 

'My dear, have some lavender,

or you'd best have a thimble full of wine

your spirits are quite down...'

~John O'Keeffe, A Beggar on Horseback ~

 

 

 

Chuck sings

Chuck is the wild European Serin (Serinus serinus) that lives in our garden.

 

I caught him on the rare occasion that he brought his evening song in a tree close to our home, but I didn't like the result...

 

 

 

So from one rare occasion to another, I edited the picture. 

 

 

 

 

This is my favorite colour: The black outline of a tree against a deep blue evening sky...

 

 

 

 

Photochallenge Daily Post: Contrast

'There are dark shadows on the earth,

but its lights are stronger in the contrast.'

 

~ Charles Dickens ~

 

 

A forest in Saint-Léger



 

 

 

 

If you would like to add your view on Contrast, pleas visit the Daily Post

 



Longhorn moth

 

 

If there would be a contest for the longest antennae, we might have a winner here...

 

Nemophora degeerella

 

 

 

'The antenna is a growth not always

functional in all people '

~ Mia Anderson, 'The Antenna' ~

 

 

 

 



Photochallenge: Between

 

Gate of All Nations, Persepolis, Iran

 

 

 

 

 

 

“Persia !”the current shouted, and then slowed down.

But since the paddles were lost, there was no choice but to wait...

But what for?

 

“Sometimes the current can go slow

but you'd be surprised at what flows underneath.”

the lioness whispered.

 

~ My copy of 'Creation' by Gore Vidal ~

 

 

 

The challenge this week was to capture something in the middle of two things.

If you would like to participate in the weekly photochallenge, click through to The Daily Post.

 

 

 

Itsy Bitsy

 

Welcome home!

 

 

 

I've been waiting forever it seems

 

 

 

Right here so you could see me when you unlocked the door

 

 

 

 

The beetles and flies at the sight of him fled,

And even the birds were afraid.

He had two great nippers, and eight wicked eyes;

How he ran and what leaps he made !

 

 

I and all who lived in the garden knew

That terrible spider's lair,

And told their little ones, under their breath:

'O never, O never go there!'

 

 

~ Passage from 'Spider and Wasp' by A. Vine Hall ~