Why I Oughta...

For Mother's Day this year, Nat's Mom gave her a small Flowering Tobacco Jasmine plant that came in a little plastic capsule.  There was very little instructions with it other than that it was potentially poisonous (see ASPCA page on it being poisonous to dogs here !).  Nat's Mom has given us a few Disneyland Roses ( first one in 2017 and two more in 2018 ) and a couple of hydrangeas , but this is the first annual that she's gifted us. I wasn't sure where to put it, so I ended up sticking it on the side of our house on the southside - near where I put the 2018 Disneyland roses and was planning to do a Belgian Fence.  I didn't pay it much attention and didn't even water it consciously.  And look at it above:  beautifully tall and graceful.  But, this isn't just a looker.  Nope.  It does a couple of things that are interesting.  First...it transforms from day to evening.  The listing on Select Seeds calls it a "night bloomer" .  Then it

There we were, minding our own business, walking back to our car after a movie at one of the local movie theaters when one of our kids shouts out that they see the Ghostbusters car.  Sure enough, some creative soul has outfitted their four door sedan with a roof rack that holds a custom-built Ghostbuster rig with lights and canisters and pipes and other what-have-yous.  The decal on the door seals the deal.  "Take my picture" was the request.  Request approved. 

Thanks to our good friends who have Chicago Bears season tickets, I'm now the proud owner of this Red Grange - the Galloping Ghost - Bobblehead courtesy of United Airlines.  This is the first in what the Bears are billing as a season-long program of bobbleheads that will be released at every one of their 10 home games. The full list of this year's Bobbleheads : Red Grange Bill George Coach Ditka (with his sunglasses) Bronco Nagurski (with a sweet uniform) Sweetness - Walter Payton Brian Urlacher Sid Luckman Gayle Sayers AND Dick Butkus (they put both on one statue???) Mike Singletary Devin Hester Some of them are way more attractive (to me) than others.  Of course, the top on the list - Red Grange - is the one that I'm most interested in (not just saying that because that's the one I am in possession of right now!).  But, Da Coach Ditka one is awesome, too.  Those would rank highest.  The dual Gayle Sayers/Dick Butkus one is weird to me.  I mean...

We have two very large Oak Trees in our backyard.  One of them has been documented here on the blog last Summer - and has our tree swing hanging from it .  The other is on the southside of our property and is almost as massive as the first.  I posted a photo of it's trunk when I was talking about a potential tree house here .  We also have a few medium-sized and a few MASSIVE Black Walnut trees in our yard.  Having these trees around means that come mid-to-late August, our yard starts to transform into a nut wonderland.  Above you see three of the green acorns that I picked up.  They were among HUNDREDS of their brethren.  Some in good shape. Others that have been already worked over by various critters including the Acorn Weevil .  These things aren't falling of their own accord.  Or at least...most of them aren't.  They are being released by squirrels.  It is kind of fun to watch these guys climb up into the extremities of these trees, hang on for dear life and gnaw a

Had this Beach Blonde Golden Lager from the folks at Crystal Lake Brewing when we stopped into the Brat Haus in Richmond on a recent visit to Twin Lakes.  Like a lot of places these days, they have a pretty extensive beer menu with a mix of national and local choices and - much to my dismay - a heavy (as it seems always these days) focus on hoppy-IPAs.  This lager was a natural choice for me - something local, light and crisp.  Beer Advocate gives it a 81 which puts it below the normal range of the beers that Dr. Jeff has us try during his beer education sessions .  Speaking of which...we should do one of those again now that school is getting back in season and we'll be in more on the weekends as the weather cools down.  Ah...Fall is coming! 

I've posted about the street trees of Tokyo a few times here on the blog.  In those posts, I've talked about the hard pruning that they do to *some* of the trees, how others have a more columnar nature to them and what species they might be (a lot of Ginkos!).  On my most recent trip, I walked down a fancy street in Ginza and saw some trees in full foliage.  And these trees aren't Ginkos.  Here's a close up of the leaves of the same tree you see above: Looking through the list of popular trees on The Street Trees of Tokyo site , I made it all the way down to below the top 30 to find what I think these trees are: Pretty sure it is a  Popular .   And...the Lombardy Popular is columnar variety . 

I've posted a bunch of times about fountains and ponds here on the blog including a look at some designs that I'm documenting to save as inspiration for something that *could* eventually find the way into our backyard.  In April, I showed this park pond in Woodridge .  And last year, I posted about these bowl-like fountains that I found at Wannemakers .  Today, I'm sharing this image that I took at the Fragrance Garden in the Morton Arboretum .  It is a kind of hybrid between some of the pond ideas that I've been filing away AND the bowl/fountains that I've posted about, too.  This one has a nice round elevated bowl that is perfectly level and lets the water roll off into a concrete bowl that has flagstone ringing it.  This is a kind of interesting approach, but I wonder if having something like this that has A LOT of turbulence in it (water fall) limits the fish you can keep in this?  Maybe they're smart enough to head to the calm waters?  But, I also like