FPS, Cattails, and Time

Dear Maria,

Here we are, on the cusp of October. Can spring be too far behind? Thank you for alerting me to the fact that I will have to step over Santa’s elves to get to the Halloween bat mobiles at some local stores. I apparently need some serious seasonal adjustment, or a marketing degree. The disgruntlement? Oh, I’ve got that down.

Got home last Friday from a visit with my parents in Greenville. Only two observations about the drive home—one, a convoy of trucks on hills is a no go, and two, a lot of folks are texting, a lot. Maybe we should change the speedometers to read feet per second instead of miles per hour. I know, I know, I have carped about this idea before.

The problem is that around town going 40 seems not very demanding, and who is going to be driving a distance 40 miles at that speed? On the run to Publix?

Okay—a red-bellied woodpecker just landed on the feeder. That looks absurd, and the chickadees on the lattice next to the feeder seem stunned. The doves will have plenty of seed to peck at on the ground.

I’m telling you 58 feet per second on the readout might give some pause texting-wise. People understand a second and understand a foot. Especially when tailgating ten feet behind the traffic ahead. Or driving in a tight pack of traffic. Nope, can’t think of a way to talk about this problem without sounding like a scold, but when I see children in the car with a parent whose head is down—well, makes me more than a little crazy inside.

Over the past few months I have been taking a slower route home from Barnes & Noble because the view of sunsets is better. Costs me 5-7 minutes according the Google map directions. I can live with that. I have noticed that near the entrance of a trucking company along my drive there is a retention pond that over the summer added cattails along its banks.

Maybe a case of things that can be noticed at 66 fps rather than 95 fps. Plus or minus the five minutes or so. Time to rustle up lunch.

Hope all goes well for you and yours,

srk

P.S. Max just flushed four doves when I released him into the backyard.