Three in Opus Two

Having introduced a certain famous canine a couple of posts back, I thought I'd add this famous family picture showing Winston engaged, as always, in worshipping his Three Muses.

Michelle, Brigitte, Monique.

The picture was taken in Minnesota Anno Long Ago at the office park where I worked and where we, as a family, often went on walks in all seasons. The place was called Opus Two by its developer, a man with some wit. I got to know him and learned his reasoning for the name of the place. Opus One, according to that gentleman, was what God created. Only Opus Two belong to his own humble self, his first ever venture. It was a great park, as you can see, 90 percent wild, 10 percent occupied by very nice office structures.

The picture was taken again, call that opus two, by yours truly yesterday—to render it from paper to JPG. One finds the strangest things when giving the dying garage its most thorough going-over in this century.

The Hot Ones for the Smart Ones

We planted some peppers; to our shock, they turned out to be very hot. What we didn't know, not until hot-pepper-lover John Magee informed us by passing on this link to an article in the New York Times, was that tolerance for “pepper heat” was a sign of smarts. That John should have discovered this does not surprise us. He tolerates with smiling pleasure what causes ordinary mortals to writhe on the floor...and his smarts are, well, legendary! The article's last line, by the way, is this:

Take heart, chili heads. It's not dumb to eat the fire, it’s a sign of high intelligence.

The wild chestnuts, which my mother told me as a child were poisonous but which, I learned in old age, might not be (or is that just malicious urban rumor?), are there to lend a color contrast only. I picked them on a recent walk as a sign of the arrival of autumn.

Speaking of Famous Dogs...

...who might this one be?

Gorgeous Coleus

Brigitte's wondrous Coleus plants! She began tending this tropical perennial last year; it was rather pretty then, too, but this year, the Coleus wins our first prize for most colorful and striking. The Coleus thrives in tropical Africa, Asia, Australia, Malaysia, in the Phillipines—and in Detroit? So it seems. Unless it's all to do with Brigitte's green thumb.

The plaque above it is worth a closer look too:

We got around to taking the photos of our glorious Coleus just as summer decided abruptly to depart on a hot and muggy day, ushering in an autumn that occurs only every twenty-years: the harvest moon was full last night. And, as a special bonus, we could see Jupiter immediately beneath it marking the six o'clock spot.

Plastered - For a Week

At our house, the plasterers came to repair some damage. Their work was fine, but the phrography leaves something to be desired. Here samples of the damage in part of the kitchen, left, and in the hallway closet, to the right. We've also had ceilings fixed in two upstairs bedrooms, but the damage just did not resolve very dramatically in photographs.

The work lasted for a week. We began on a Sunday burdening our dining room with kitchen goods.

Here is what our poor dining room began to look like when were were but half done. After we were finished, we could barely get in there to take additional shots.

The plasterers were gone by Thursday. Then began waiting--for plaster to dry--followed by painting part of the kitchen ceiling to floor, the restoration of hooks and pictures, and then, as Sunday passed again, beginning moving the furniture back. On the left: the last stage of the Moveout. On the right, the first stage of the Movein.

Post Sewer Recovery Begins

Just received--the first pictures of the post-sewer-installation garden recovery at the Magees.

Monique reports that all this took a huge amount of effort--first of all waiting for the city to finish the job with new dirt and grass seeding. But there was still time enough left over to take Katie on her first-ever canoe trip!

More pictures will follow as the garden gets finished, new decorative stone is laid to make a pleasing border, and the green turtle pump cover blends into a background of plants. But that arch! It's pleasing to behold.

Blue Cats in Hats

Over the last month or so, each time I came into Brigitte’s office wearing my gardening hat, she has wished to take a picture of me. I’m not all that photogenic—but when she looked at me as I sit in the chair I usually occupy, she saw a calendar page showing a much more handsome dude in a similar hat. Now this, now that interfered with actually snapping a shot. But August finally passed, and it was time to turn that calendar page. So I went off to get the camera. Herewith the results. The first picture shows me as I usually sit. The other one is posed—but I didn’t quite match the tilt of the blue dude’s hat myself despite trying very hard.

Katie in Traverse City

A picture that belongs on this blog too—Katie on the occasion when she took us all on a Traverse City vacation. But that was, alas, another year, another memory. Katie-admirers and afficionados of photo-touchups will know why this picture is here.