But, there is no rhyme or reason to this season. I listened to the weather before my morning departure – 55 degrees F (13 C), so I dressed for 55 degrees. The weatherman even said it was coolish out due to yesterday’s gloomy day. However, I cast off my hoodie, tied it around my waist, then rolled up my sleeves halfway to the Park. Whew, that sun was hot, or was it just my imagination? Nope, I arrived at the Park and, just like me, I saw several other women walkers, their hoodies looped around their waist and in short-sleeved shirts.
When I returned home, the weatherman said “we’re in for a spike in temperatures because the temps will climb to 80 degrees (27 C) and now the high angle of the sun will make it very easy to get sunburned, so be sure to apply the sunscreen.”
In my mind I flashed back to my teen years and cautions by my mom like “don’t lay out in the sun – you’ll end up looking like a prune when you’re older” or “if you get a few more burns like this one, you’ll look like old shoe leather – neither your grandmother or me laid in the sun and we have skin like a baby’s bum.”
So … ask me if I laid out in the sun anyway? Yes, I did and maybe you ignored that good advice too? I ended up with a few really bad sunburns from parking myself in front of a sun lamp or baking out in the backyard. I was, and still am, fair-skinned and I even conceded “you were right Mom” while she slathered on the Noxzema medicated skin cream to tame that burn.
Bathing beauties.
It’s okay to laze around in the sun if you’re a Snapping Turtle – after all, you waited through that long, cold Winter while burrowed down in the silt, deep below the Creek, dreaming of the day you’d come out to the cement landing and bask in the sunshine.
Perhaps my best advice to mother and daughter turtle is to at least apply a little zinc oxide to those perky noses!
Linda Schaub
WALKIN', WRITIN', WIT & WHIMSY 
These days you have to dress for almost anything! Soon it will be consistently warm (hopefully).
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I said to a woman walker this morning that I need my mother to dress me like when I was a little kid – she seemed to get it right. I feel like we were so cold and chilly here for such a long time that I’ve not acclimated to warm weather … there was no gradual warm-up like we usually get and this past Monday, I left the house in a Winter coat at 44 degrees. We have a beautiful day tomorrow and up to Sunday night, then a storm. Three days in a row – we must be living right.
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It really has been a glorious day. A while ago we were in the field at the farm and my husband almost stepped on a painted turtle because the grass is so high he didn’t see it. He picked it up a we took it to the pond. I’ll probably post pictures later.
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Yes it was a glorious day Ruth and I hated to come home this morning after my walk. Usually the turtles (both snapping and painted varieties) just sun themselves on the fallen logs, but this large and small one were content to stay there in the sun on the cement landing. They often move when a human is near, but they just stayed put.
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Linda,
The turtles are gorgeous. I am glad to see pictures of more animals in your posts. We had a small turtle come under our gate in our house back home when the roads got flooded in the rains that often happens in tropical countries. We know there is a turtle around when the dog starts barking a peculiar bark because his nose can’t do anything to that tough turtle shell.
27 degrees C would be good temperature for us. We would not get sun burned. I am glad the weather is turning around at long last.
Susie
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Glad you liked the turtles Susie … that is the first time I’ve seen them on the cement storm drain as they are usually on the logs across the Creek, but I can’t see them clearly due to the bushes along the Creek banks. I did a double take when I saw these two and couldn’t help wondering if the small turtle was one of the ones that hatched last Fall –
do you remember when we had the post in early June of the turtle digging a nest for the eggs, then we awaited the hatchlings 90 days later? I think we have a few more weeks of geese and goslings, then they will go to a bigger park while they await their flight feathers to come back. Every June/July the geese and ducks moult so they go somewhere safe with water, food where they can make a hasty escape to the water should there be a land predator. I’ll write about that happening in the next week or so. After they leave, it will be just the squirrels and birds in this Park. The usual parks I go to are still flooded in some spots and we have some gusty east winds this weekend so a warning has been issued by the weather service that this is going to bring more water up onto land for Lake Erie Metropark and Elizabeth Park where I often go (remember how Elizabeth Park was swampy a few weeks ago with the fisherman on the boardwalk – it still looks like that, there was a picture in the online newspaper yesterday). So, I will explore a few more parks for more critter pictures, weather permitting.
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And Grady too if possible- please !!
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I will Susie – I see him sometimes and pull out the bag but he won’t come to see me. Makes me sad as I did not stop feeding him except I was afraid he’d be run over by a car after the bully squirrel kept taking his peanuts.
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Loved the turtles! I have never seen one close up. Today was gorgeous – sunny, a refreshing north breeze. I tried sitting on the deck but needed a sweater. I wish it would stay like this. …except the deck and lawn are littered with maple keys from the wind…..I don’t think I’ve ever seen as many as this year, and I’m tired of sweeping them off. I must have something weatherwise to complain about!
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Thanks Joni – glad you liked mother and daughter (or maybe father and son) and they usually sit on the logs to bask in the sun – first time I’ve seen them on the landing and they didn’t plop into the water as they sometimes do when they see me taking pics of them on the logs. It was just gorgeous yesterday and today as well, some rain and maybe a thunderstorm (nothing severe) tomorrow and into Monday morning. We had a pretty good week weather-wise, only the one rainy day and I walked after work, so not too bad. We have a lot of maple trees in the neighborhood (front yard … back yard is elm trees and one maple) but we used to have way more maple trees until 1990 when they did a huge sewer project and pulled up the sidewalks on the opposite side of the street and damaged all the roots and most of those trees either died or have few leaves now. It seems to me that the seeds go in spurts … a lot one year and not as many for a few years and then repeat … I heard that a long time ago or maybe my mom heard it and told me about it because I also whined about them. I have the elm seeds everywhere too and they get in the mulch and rocks and sprout tiny weeds.
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OMG the memories you brought back! I use to slather my body in baby oil and lay on those foil pads to reflect the sun rays! I even put “Sun In” spray in my hair to bleach it out too! Loved the turtle pictures!!!
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Diane – you’re a few years younger than me, but oh ya … we did all those things and the foil pads … I remember that too. I had raccoon eyes from using the sun lamp one time … red face, white eyes and that was the last time for using it. I put it in the garbage all on my own. Silly girl … in those days, we were just told we’d wrinkle up. I remember “Sun-In” spray but I just bought a bunch of those plastic lemons and squeezed it onto my hair for “highlights” … my hair was long and it got all sticky. Glad you liked the turtle basking in the sun (like we did).
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Miss Linda………………………………..yes it was sunny and quite warm……………………………it’s about time………………….yes it is hard to know how to dress in the morning for our walk……………………your mom always gave you good advice
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I listen to the weather report every morning Ann Marie … and still get it wrong. Today it is warmish out and going in a wooded area so have to wear pants due to ticks. It is about time for warm and sunny weather!
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Oh I am so glad the sun made an appearance for you today x x x
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LOL – those painted turtles were out where I was walking too. And the snapping turtles were ready to lay eggs. They are such funny looking creatures. Great photos of the ones you saw!
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The painted turtles go across the perimeter path sometimes, whereas the snapping just stay on the log looking over at the walkers. 🙂
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Turtles are funny creatures!
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They sure are Shelley. Last June some walkers and I were fascinated by that huge turtle digging her nest – we stood there the longest time waiting to see if she laid her eggs, but I had to get going for work. In the Fall, I waited for the big escape and the hatchlings likely did it in the cover of night.
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I’m amazed that they travel so far from the water to lay their eggs. And that the little turtles survive, so we assume they do!
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I laid out in the sun when I was a teenager too, Linda. That was before I really knew the dangers of sun exposure. We used to slather our bodies with baby oil, spread our towels out and turn ourselves over about every 15 minutes or so. Looks like you are really getting some miles in now!
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Yes there were no warnings about the harmful rays of the sun in those days. We were vain and wanted some color.
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yes that is a good idea but how are they going to unscrew the lid with no fingers? Maybe bite into a tube and poke their little noses in?
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Ha ha – good point, maybe I ought to leave them a squeeze tube with the lid off and they can pounce on it and let it squirt out?
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now I can see a line up with one of them jumping on it with their front legs!
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Those turtles are a resourceful lot aren’t they?
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yes,even more so those Bug’s Bunny cartoons!
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We’ve come a long way in terms of sunbathing! We did the baby oil and baking in the hot midday sun when I was a kid. Always got nasty sunburns because I just don’t tan well. Fortunately we can now slather on the sunscreen and make better choices about when to go outside and avoid the worst of the sun damage. The turtles are cute and probably have built-in protection!
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But back in those days for you and me there were no warnings about sun protection either. It was just the idea of one too many burns making your skin look bad back then. I always burned since I was fair. How did we stand baking in the sun like that Sabine?
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Young and inexperienced foolishness?!? 😉
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Yes I do admit that Sabine. Like most other teens, I followed the crowd to the extent possible. My parents were older when they had me (30 was considered old back then) and, as an only child, they were very strict with me.
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this post got me thinking- I wonder why animals’ exposed skin doesn’t get sun-burned. Hmm. That’s something I’ve never thought about before!
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I never really thought of it either and we have several squirrels around here with mange and they are missing whole sections of their fur, and you can see right through to their skin, which is pink, so having never been exposed to the sun before, I’d think it would be very sensitive. So I Googled and have read articles written by the Smithsonian Magazine before, and this one explains it (if you can fit just a little more biological info in your day). When I read it I remembered that hippos and elephants coat themselves with mud. My boss traveled to South Africa last year and e-mailed all his photos to me and I remember those very same animals taking a mud bath. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/ask-an-expert-do-animals-get-sunburned-28218217/
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Oh that’s so interesting! I’m always up for more biological info! Thank you for sharing with me! I actually do think I remember hearing that about hippos one time too. Makes so much sense !
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I thought it was interesting too. We used to subscribe to Smithsonian magazine for years and they had interesting stories in it. I figured you’d squeeze still another biological read into your day. 🙂 The color info about the droplets was fascinating.
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really is fascinating!!
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I just love turtles, they are so different from anything else. I was never one to just lay in the sun, I was always out doors doing things, and occasionally got sun burned. But I am a hat person in the summer, that always helps.
My husband’s sisters arrived today, they are going through family photos and reminiscing, that is the best way to remember the good times of their Mother.
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I like seeing them lined along the fallen trees in the Creek in the Summer. They line up by size which is interesting … the babies take the cut from the moms I guess. Yes, reminiscing is the best way to remember someone when they are gone, especially after she endured all that pain and suffering.
After my mom passed away, I went through the albums and took out happy pictures of my mom or the two of us and bought frames and put them around the house … that helped to get rid of the picture I had in mind of the last year of her life. Thank goodness for photographs. I wrote a post to that effect called “Photographs and Memories” (I liked that Jim Croce song): https://lindaschaubblog.net/2017/05/14/photographs-and-memories/
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That is what they have been doing also. I will read this post. Jim Croce is one of my favorites also.
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I was thinking about your husband’s family looking over the photographs … since his dad was a portrait photographer (as was your husband), I’ll bet there are a lot of nice photos through the years, nicer than the regular scrapbook or photo album most people have.
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Yes, and it is fun for them to find photos they have never seen before. Great memories.
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