Unlike last weekend, which was a total washout, this weekend has been perfect weather-wise, just like Spring is supposed to be. Yesterday and today I caught up on appointments and errands that got short-changed due to that abysmal weather.
This morning I got up earlier than usual as I wanted to go grocery shopping, followed by a walk at Council Point Park. I was conflicted: do I go to the Park in the early morning when it is the most peaceful, then fight the crowds later in the day at Meijer? I decided that grocery shopping had to take precedence on today’s agenda to avoid the crowd.
But first, I stole a glance out the front door to see if I could see the meteor showers which were predicted for just prior to dawn. Either they weren’t visible, or I was looking in the wrong place as I saw nothing.
I hustled around the grocery store, and after putting everything away, I finally headed out at 11:00 a.m. I drove to the Park since the car was still out and I had already put almost three miles on my pedometer. It was getting warm out and I soon realized, halfway through the first loop, I was way overdressed. I was tempted to go back and leave my sweatshirt cardigan in the car, but I was only here for one complete trip around the Park (two miles), then would head home, so I shrugged out of the cardigan and looped it around my waist.
Just like that last time when I visited the Park in “off-hours” (for me anyway) … it was a different experience. And, once again, I could have skipped toting along treats for my nutty buddies, as they were nowhere to be found. Did they hit up their other benefactors since I was not around when they were on the prowl for treats? I’ll try not to take it personally.
I finished up at the Park, which had many visitors, none whom I knew. I was happy to discover I had over 10,000 steps on the pedometer by the time I unclipped it from my waistband. I think that burst of heat wore me out, but I was happy to sit down here and take a load off my feet and right now I sure am feeling my age. Whew!
Thankfully, I’m not quite a fossil yet, but I do have a rock in my rock garden that looks like it might have a clear imprint of a fossil. For years I’ve fantasized that this rock pictured below contains a dinosaur’s baby toe that been embedded into this plain brown rock for a gazillion years. My boss brought it back from the family cottage in Georgian Bay, Ontario for my rock garden because he thought it was unusual looking. He found it in the water – so maybe it belonged to an ancient sea creature?
Just let your imagination run wild for a minute …
Speaking of old things, and since today is Earth Day, just for kicks, I just Googled to find out how old our Earth is. I wonder if I learned this in Science class all those years ago and forgot? Age is relative, and what’s another fifty or so years added to our Earth’s age anyway, because I had no idea that our Earth is 4.543 billion years old, did you?
I hope our Earth stays around another 4.543 billion years, and, if we give it some TLC, perhaps it will. I try to do my part, even though lately it seems I’m always fretting over my portion of the planet getting battered by space debris, pummeled by meteors and moved by earthquakes. Oh my!
I’ll leave you with this quote by The Bard:
“The earth has music for those that listen. And this, our life, exempt from public haunt, finds tongues in trees, books in the running brooks, sermons in stones, and good in everything.” -William Shakespeare
Happy Earth Day!
[Image of Earth and doves by Finemayer from Pixabay, Creative Commons]
Linda Schaub
WALKIN', WRITIN', WIT & WHIMSY 
Miss Linda…………………………………so our earth is that old?????……………………and I do like Mr. William’s quote……..it makes you think deeply…………..but happy with:………………”and good in everything!”…………………………..
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Ann Marie – I was surprised to see how old the earth really is – I had no idea at all and reading that the earth was 4.543 billion years old … I have no conception of how long that is. To be honest, I would not have even thought one MILLION, let alone that many years old … perhaps it was a misprint? I like that quote as well Ann Marie. At least it was a pretty day for Earth Day. I’d have rather spent more time at the Park, less time at Meijer, but now that chore is over with for awhile.
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That is one very neat rock!!!
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AJ – The possibilities are endless imagining what It could be from – what type of prehistoric creature? Hmmm. It has been too many years since I was in school and learned how old the Earth was – I was astounded. You have a factoid for your students today – they will be wowed as well!
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As I go shopping, I’ve learned to relax from the surroundings and concentrate on the shelves with all the goods. It has almost become like a therapy for me, going to the store and shopping, then I can relax. Before I hated to shop and crowded with people. But it has a downside. I can pass people I know without greeting, because I do not notice them, so they can believe I have become arrogant.😁😁😁 That stone is so cool and very interesting, have never seen any like it.😊
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That’s a good idea John – I hated to pass up a quiet morning at the Park to go shopping, and the crowds get really bad on a Sunday, especially after church is over. Sometimes I walk at this store – it is a large store and has other items besides groceries. If it is really hot in the Summer months, maybe in August and we have our “Dog Days of Summer” with high humidity and temps in the 90s, I go there to walk, just to get my steps in. I like this rock too … I have a small rock garden near the door because grass never grew there and I have this one in the middle … maybe a dinosaur from eons ago?
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Hi, I found your blog through Twitter. Fellow walker here! Thanks for sharing the pic of your rock. It IS unique and sounds special. Do you have any other posts about your rock garden? Sounds like a neat concept.
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Hi – thank you for your comment. I’ll bet you saw my post the other day on “Walk with a Doc” – I looked around here to see if we have such an event, but all the scheduled times to do the “Walk with a Doc” are in the early afternoon – no weekends. I love walking and finally it is getting more Spring-like here in SE Michigan. We have had a brutal Winter and it languished long into Spring. My rock garden is very small and probably 8 rocks, if that many. It is outside my Spring door and there is an aluminum awning that shades the area and for some reason no grass grows right there. It always looked bad, so I started collecting some rocks many years ago to make it look better. That is an unusual-looking fossil rock, and part of the reason I used the picture is because a fellow blogger here is really into fossils and dinosaurs and a few weeks ago, he did a post about some dinosaur teeth that he bought online (yes, you can buy such things) … they were all black, didn’t look like teeth and I commented that I had this rock which looked like a fossil – dinosaur toe and told him I’d get a picture and use it in an upcoming post, and figured Earth Day would be as good a day as any to do it. I did one other post about this rock, but no picture – I’ve been blogging for five years and in the first year I just did short paragraphs and no pictures … I’ve evolved a bit more since then. 🙂 I have known people through the years who have elaborate rock gardens and plant flowers in between, or even different kinds of non-invasive ground cover, and this works well if you have large trees with roots which don’t allow grass to grow or trees shade the grass too much. Good alternative. Sorry, I don’t have more pics: https://lindaschaubblog.net/2013/06/26/268/
The photo of the dinosaur teeth in Tom’s blog is found here: https://tom8pie.com/2018/04/01/pristine-perception-and-proto-primate-jaw/
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I’m going to do an update on the rock we discussed yesterday and will post it here later tonight and will forward it to you at Twitter as well.
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Hope your weather is better than ours here in SE Michigan … another dreary and drizzly day. Here is the follow-up post Michelle … I just tweeted it to you as well. I thought you might be interested in what a fellow blogger determined this fossil to be: https://lindaschaubblog.net/2018/04/24/tuesday-musings-47/
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Love that fossil rock! Good grief what an old earth we have -in a good way. I feel my creaky Dino bones too. Fun post. Xo kim
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Glad you liked it Kim – I feel like that sometimes after a long walk … maybe I overdid it, but once the weather cooperates I try to get the most out of it. Hope you are feeling better every day.
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I collect fossils locally and, in later years, purchased fossils. That fossil that your boss found is an orthoceras fossil, a cephalopod from the Ordovician or Silurian period… over 400 million years old, when Ontario and Illinois were all underwater (in a huge ocean). Orthoceras was a type of squid with a straight cone shell. We have some (in quarries around here) that were over 20 feet long and over two feet in diameter; too large to remove! I have some nice smaller ones and fragments of the big ones! http://myfossilfind.com/tag/illinois/
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Tom – all I can say is wow! I always thought maybe it was something special, but didn’t know it had a name and it was that old – 400 million years old is pretty old. Thanks for identifying it. Maybe I should pull it out of the little rock pile and put it inside the house … of course, it has existed all these years safely so what a few more years? I will look at your site … just took a peek and am ready to head out on a walk right now. Got here later as I’ve been doing Windows updates. Thanks for the info … have a great day.
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🙂 I’ve got a big one safely sitting out of the weather on our covered porch, by the front door. I have a number of the straight ones indoors, that are mostly small, and fragments of some big ones. There were also coiled ones, ammonites, that i found (that are large and impressive)… and they are really cool! 🙂
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This rock’s been in this small rock garden about 20 years, but maybe I should move it out of the elements, now that I know it is “genuine” and not just an “imagined” treasure, like you have done with your big one. That is very cool! I shall tell my boss about what he gave to me next time I have him on the phone. Thank you again for looking at the fossil rock and your insight. I looked at the link you sent as well and those chain-like imprints on those rocks. I wrote a follow-up post today about it, as well as a craze that appears to be in Year #2 for painting/hiding/re-hiding painted rocks with sayings and pictures on them. I found many last year, and re-hid them for others to discover.
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