nature

Black Widow Spiders

Not too long ago I was watching The Discovery Channel or National Geographic Channel about black widow spiders. This brought back memories about my experience with black widow spiders throughout my life. This series also caused me to dream about the spiders for a couple of nights after the show. I guess the show was pretty authentic. 

Anyway, my parents built their home where a cherry orchard was before. For the first years the home was infested with black widow spiders. The screen doors did not fit very tight in those days and the spiders could crawl in under where the doors hung over the floors. There was I suppose more than a half inch opening between the floor and the bottom of the screen door.  

During my young years I remember my grandma taking the broom and knocking the spiders off of the outside of the screen in the door. There were occasions where my mother would pull open a drawer in a dresser or kitchen drawer and she would discover a black widow spider in the drawer. The most dramatic event was one evening we were getting ready for bed and my mother found one of these spiders climbing up the bed spread at the foot of the bed. This was a scary event for a young child under five years old. I don’t remember if it took me a long time to get to sleep after that event or not.  

The TV show I was watching was about a young child that was bitten twice by a spider that crawled into her bed between the sheets and bit her twice before she realized what was happening. That could have happened to me when I was young. That is probably why I had dreams after that show.

The house did not have a basement; it just had a crawl space of about three feet. I remember when I got older my dad and I would go in the crawl space, and he showed me all the spiders between the rafters that died when he got a unit call “Hari Kari”. It was a small electrical pot that you would put these pills in and the heat from the heating element would cause the pills to evaporate and emit a poison gas into the air and kill the spiders. Those rafters were just covered with carcasses of those spiders.  That Hari Kari eliminated our spider problem. Before my dad passed away, we were talking about the Hari Kari and then he told me they had to take it off the market because it emitted cyanide gas and it was considered too dangerous.  

Another event happened in a field we used to walk through to get to Alameda and Federal. One day we were walking through the field and got curious about this piece of wood that was there for a long time. It looked like some kind of door where three pieces of wood was fastened together with hinges on one side. It was lying flat on the ground, and I decided to pick it up and see what was on the other side. I put my fingers under the edge and stood it up on its side. No more than an inch away from my right index finger was a bright shiny black widow spider. That was a scary moment. I could have been bitten so easily.  

On occasion I run into black widow spiders in the garage now. Sometimes I was washing something down with the hose and disturb a web and one comes crawling out looking very mad. They sure are black and shiny. Black widow spiders have given me some uneasy moments.  

Yes, I Have Collections

I have all kinds of collections. Do they have any monetary value? Not much. My collections are items I have collected over my life. I always think, “can I use this at some later point?” With that in mind I started collecting.

My first collection is my nut a bolt collection. Since I have been a homeowner since the early seventies I have done many projects around the home. You always don’t have the correct nail, bolt, screw, so you trot off to Home Depot and get what you need. You always end up with leftovers. So, I started collecting them. I also had projects that I recycled. I removed every nut, bolt, screw, washer, nail, that I could save. My collection has expanded to five- or six-gallon containers. Bolts in one container, nuts in another and so forth. This collection has saved me many times when I needed a couple of bolts and nuts to repair or finish a project.

The next collection is coins and paper money throughout my life. I have silver dollars, Indian head pennies, buffalo nickels, old quarters, silver certificates of paper money. I also have a stack about an inch high of two-dollar bills. Are they valuable? I don’t have a clue. I have just been collecting them through my life. I also have some World War II savings bonds my parents took out for me. Sure, they could be cashed in, but the paper bond and the age of them is worth more to me than the monetary cash in value.

Third collection is photos. I have photos my parents have accumulated over the years and the photos I have also collected over the years. Many black and white photos and color with my dad’s collection of slides. The last time I looked at the slides they are starting to discolor and fade. I don’t know how long they will last. Digital photography came into existence, and I don’t have a clue how many thousands of photos I have. I have the problem of finding a photo. I never bothered to catalog them. Therefore, I must use the hunt and search method.

Another collection is my rambling writings about my life and experiences. This collection is the most valuable to me. Whether it is valuable to anybody else is up for debate. WordPress contains a large portion of these ramblings. https://tomt2.com/ I have a collection of all the articles that were printed in the Rocky Mountain News insert of YourHub.com. During that time, they published over seventy-five of my posts. This was the motivation to start writing stories and tales down.

My newest project is Ramblings Magazine https://tomt2.com/magazine I have had comments that I should write a book. I thought about it, but a book may take years to do so I thought a magazine would be better since I am in my senior years and my warranty ran out many years. ago.

Daily writing prompt
Do you have any collections?
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Camping Tales

When I was Young the exciting thing to do during the summer school vacation was to sleep outside between the houses or in the back yard. Two or three of the neighborhood kids would have a campout. It was spooky and scary staying outside with no parents nearby. Of course, this was before your parents had to be concerned about rampant crime and many things could be done without that fear.

My next camping experience was after I started work full time and some co-workers were campers and they would invite me to go with them to camp up in the mountains. Fishing and camping over the weekend. What an experience. I never did like sitting around the campfire though. It seemed like the smoke from the fire always followed me and my eyes would burn, and my clothes would retain that smell of smoke for a long period.

My next camping experience was during basic training. You received a shelter half and you had to find a buddy so the shelter half could be combined to make a pup tent. The army didn’t call it camping though, they had their own name, it was called bivouac. Then In Germany they had maneuvers and had these large tents that held eight or ten troops. I can’t remember what kind of tent they called them.

My final tale was after I was married and had two sons. We had friends that had a van, and I became enthused about a camping van. I bought a delivery van from the company I worked for and converted it to a camping van. The kids would sleep outside in a tent and the adults slept in the van. It was a fun time of my life. Unfortunately, I became divorced, and the budget could not afford a van and camping.

After my life became more stabilized, we occasionally went camping. I would rent a RV for the weekend or the week. It was fun, but I did not enjoy driving the wide RV and the length of the RV. I learned to take a tranquilizer before I started the trip. It was fun and enjoyable though and it gave me many good memories.

My camping days are over now.

Daily writing prompt
Have you ever been camping?
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I am Ready for Spring

After months of cold, snow and being shut in more than what I like, I am ready for spring. The days are getting longer, and I am getting excited about the warmer days of spring. I like the spring. I enjoy watching the trees and bushes preparing to green up. Since we have moved, I do not have much space for gardening, but I still get the many seed and flower catalogs for me to thumb through and think of flowers and vegetables. I enjoy watching things grow and many days I just go out to see how things progress. Last year I did not have very good luck growing tomatoes but that did not stop me to attempt growing tomatoes again. The other day Dee and I went to Dollar Tree, and I happened to notice some seed packets. I had to buy some. I am not sure where I am even going to plant them, but I just could not pass up the good deal. 

Spring is just a happier time for me. Winters are hard for me to stay in. I am glad when I am able to get out and enjoy the outside without freezing my tail off. My attitude changes and it is just a better time in my life. That is one thing I really like about the Colorado weather and that is the many days of sunshine this area has. I remember when I was in the army in Nurenburg Germany for about 8 months. In those eight months I do not think the sun was out more than 2 weeks for the entire period I was there. This was from December to July but even the springtime was cloudy and overcast. The Nurenburg weather was not my favorite. I guess I will be a Denverite the rest of my time.  

I am sure there are other things that happen in spring, but I just can’t think of anything at the time. I guess I am stuck on the weather. Dee has asked me if I am writing about my duck. So, I will write about my duck. I won a duck at a bazaar when I was young. This was a recently hatched duckling and I enjoyed watching this duck grow up that summer. I made a cage and the duck stayed in the cage during the day and at night I would pick up the cage and the duck would follow me into the garage. The duck would stand on the paper. The duck waited for me to put the cage over her. This duck knew the drill. Also, I dug a small pond and would fill it with water and watch the duck swim around and have a ball. This duck gave me many fond memories. 

SPRING IS MY FAVORITE TIME OF THE YEAR! 

I Survived the March 14 Record Snowstorm

For three days the news media has concentrated on the gigantic storm coming to Denver metro area. It finally started to rain last afternoon and turned to snow sometime during the night. Woke up with five inches of snow this morning. Some foothill locations got forty inches. During the day the lights flickered occasionally but never went out. However, there were reports that around 50,000 were without power due to broken trees taking out power lines.

We live in a community of forty-four homes and the HOA handles snow removal and received an email that snow removal will be done after the snow stops. Well, it has been snowing all day and I hope there is not a medical emergency in the circle. There have been very few auto tracks on the street, and I don’t know if a fire truck or ambulance could navigate the amount of snow on the streets. plus, none of the driveways or walks are cleaned. Wonder if someone has a medical emergency and emergency treatment cannot get in, can the HOA be sued for neglect of duty? Since this post was started Thursday night I will finish it Friday.

Here it is Friday morning, no power outages, no fallen trees or branches. We still are snowed in though. The HOA crew has not done a thing on the snow removal. I have thirteen inches of snow on the front porch. The city did plow down the middle of the street. However, that leaves a twenty-four-inch pile of snow in front of the driveway. No way could I drive over or through that pile. I am over eighty and no way can I remove that pile of heavy wet snow. I guess I am snowbound for a while.

My Interests Have Changed

Throughout my many years I have had many interests. In my teenage years, cars and hotrods captivated my interest. After I got my driver’s license, I bought a 1940 Ford two door sedan. It was a refugee from the junk yard. I paid $125.00 for it. My dream was to make it a car show item. I didn’t have a garage and spent many hours in the back yard sanding, cleaning up and learning about engine repair and modifications. This was before all of these emission requirements, and they were not as sophisticated as they are today. I quickly learned that those hot rod items were expensive, and my budget did not have room for those expenses. A couple of years after high school this hobby was over.

After I got married, we bought a home where the basement was partially finished. This was my next interest, to upgrade the basement. Hanging drywall and paneling was one of the jobs. Putting drywall on a ceiling is a task you never forget. Everyone wanted a bar, so I had to have a bar. All of these projects were a learning experience. you learn to appreciate craftsmen that do this for a living. You could easily see that my projects were done by a “do it yourselfer”. 

The most recent hobby I had was building birdhouses. We moved into a new home for us in 2016. This new home had a workshop and I started building birdhouses. One had to put this new workshop to use, right? I built many birdhouses. I gave birdhouses to neighbors. I sold birdhouses in garage sales. But after a while I had an overabundance of birdhouses. I finally thought enough is enough. In the end I gave the remaining birdhouses to a thrift store.

There have been other interests and hobbies that I enjoyed. Fishing, hunting, RV’s, computer repairs and others. As I aged and matured my interests have changed. The longest interest I have retained is writing. Computers and the internet have helped this interest. I remember that you had to retype many manuscripts before you had an acceptable piece. I have had this site since 2009. It was a little dormant for a period. Now, “I’m Back.”

 My first post

Daily writing prompt
Are there any activities or hobbies you’ve outgrown or lost interest in over time?
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