Fleeting Beauty

Blooming Cactus

Friday morning I took the Buick back to Mike Cary’s shop so that he could look at the recently cleaned engine to see what was leaking.



Mike and his crew seemed to think that the leak was from a pan that covers part of the transmission. They discovered that of the many bolts that held that pan in place, a number of them were somewhat loose.

They tightened up the bolts, added a quart of transmission fluid, and sent me on my way with instructions to put something white underneath the engine at night, so that if it did leak again I could see what color the fluid is.



It was still morning when I returned, so I took a look at Dorothy’s garden on my way to the side entrance to building A. I saw a splash of color that wasn’t there the day before, so I turned on my camera and walked over for a closer look.



I was happy to see five cactus blooms on the cacti near the garden owl. I took pictures, went upstairs, printed a couple of 4 x 6 cactus pix and headed back down stairs to give them to Dorothy.

I saw Doris sitting by the front entrance and showed her the pictures of Dorothy’s cactus flowers. She said, “You should see mine”.



Sure enough, her plants were festooned with flowers, (someone said 34), and I began taking pictures of these beautiful pollinator attractors. (Most likely, moths and bats visited them to drink some nectar during the night)



I am glad I got up to take the Buick in to be checked, or I would have missed the opportunity to see and photograph these beautiful cactus flowers. By the end of the day, they were gone.

I took pictures on Saturday evening of some of the other Treehouse plants and sights. I put them into a Flickr slideshow for your enjoyment.




Whipped Cream








Trader Joe’s made a weird change a couple of weeks ago. For some reason, they put ‘whipped topping’ on the shelf where the real whipped cream used to be. I even accidentally bought a can because it looked a lot like the can of real stuff.

When I got it home I saw that the cap was a different color, and it had something like, ‘cream colored whipped something you cannot digest’ written on the can. 

I gave it away, but I feel a little guilty for giving someone this can of what I consider harmful fake food. I should have returned that stuff to the store and got my money back. Instead I worry that I may have condemned my friends to some debilitating disease filled future as a result of them eating this toxic HFCS laden chemical compound that looks like whipped cream.

For now, I can get extra heavy whipped cream in a can from Raley’s. Even Raley’s has discontinued selling regular real whipped cream and has some sort of whipped  substitute on their shelf, too.

I think I may have to whip up my own whipped cream if I want it to be nutritious and chemical free.

I will pursue that course later this week.

Today’s Colorful Video;



Love the 4 Man Drum Set