July 26, 2009

Small Town Snapshot Sunday #19

It's Small Town Snapshot Sunday! Read the rules and get the banners here. Be sure you include the link to your post at the bottom of this entry and also, tag your post "stss" or "small town snapshot sunday" so people can search for it and find you! THE LINKING MECHANISM IS AT THE BOTTOM OF THIS POST. PLEASE LINK TO YOUR ENTRY TODAY, NOT YOUR MAIN PAGE! Also, please be sure to link back to me so people can go check out all the other people who are playing. That's part of the fun, the small-town-hopping! If you can't get yours done exactly on Sunday, you can always backdate it!

This week Julius and I went out to do our Small Town Snapshot Sunday together! He took some of his own shots with our backup camera which I will post for him on his blog (which he rarely updates even though I bug him about it all the time and which will result in him needing a lot of therapy eventually).

I had to drive through this land for work. It's a managed timber area that has been harvested and replanted.

All along the sides of the road were blackberry bushes which are very hard to find these days but were plentiful along the roadsides when I was a kid. Too plentiful, in my opinion. In the summer I stayed with my grandmother while my mom worked and she was always giving me an old plastic ice cream bucket or a gallon milk jug with a hole cut in the side (handle intact) and would say, "Go pick blackberries so I can make Grandpa some cobbler!"

Back then nobody told you to wear sunscreen and I'd burn to a crisp and then have to endure her putting vinegar compresses on me later when she realized I was lobster red.


And I don't even LIKE blackberries. Or blackberry cobbler.


Did you know that chiggers love hanging out in the blackberry bushes? Also, being scratched up by blackberries is one of the more painful types of skin abrasions I've ever had. Also, snakes like to hang out in blackberry bushes because rodents like to hang out in there. So I guess the chiggers like the rats and the snakes like the rats (and birds). Blackberry bushes are an ecological extravaganza.

Strangely, Julius doesn't really care for blackberries that much either. I think because we've not had much success hunting for them. I have a client who has a beautiful thornless blackberry bush and we've grazed there before. One of the better batches I've had. I took a cutting home with me and killed it within a week. I wanted to plant them as a border between me and the fourplex next door to cut down my view of the transients while I'm Rob is washing dishes.

Julius was an enthusiastic photography buddy!

I, however, am sometimes lazy. I'd been in and out of the car so many times by this point I just tried to be creative from my seat inside the car.

And I actually took this one without looking. I leaned over the passenger's seat across Julius while he was shooting one way and I shot backwards the other way. Not bad, considering.

This was an old gas station that's no longer in service. It was surrounded by piles of firewood and old tractors. Someone had piled a few watermelons here with an "honesty pay" bucket. I love honesty pay vendors. There is one I pass frequently that sells honey and pecans. I always wonder how it works out for them. Well, I hope. I'd like to have continued optimism about the world in that way.

We didn't buy any melons because... melons can't.

While I was out taking pictures I turned to see Julius taking a brief... respite. Just in time to see the big arc fly by the window. It was impressive. When I showed the picture to his dad he didn't think it was as funny. Maybe because Julius peed on his door. I don't know why he has to be so uptight about a little thing like that. I mean really!

I hope you're having an awesome Sunday no matter where you are!

8 comments:

  1. LOL love the pee shot :-p I just got done finally being able to upload my 400+ pictures I'd taken during our no electricity adventure and have some great ones I'll post for this inna lil bit. I missed you Wendy..I love ya girl ♥

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  2. Hi Wendy! Oh. man did your blackberry comments bring back memories!! Isn't it strange that when old (er) people hear the word blackberry they still think of fruit, plastic milk jugs and scratches, and younger people talk about bandwidth and apps. I loved those summers at my grandparents' farm, with the watermelons (we went in my grandfather's truck to the field and picked them out ourselves), the catfish (we caught them ourselves) and the back porch sitting in the cool of the shade trees. Those were really good times. Thanks for bringing those memories back for me this morning!! Have a great Sunday!

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  3. I always enjoy the Small Town Sunday Snapshots, being from a small town myself. But this is a fav. I have been a crazed blackberry picking lady this month. I learned how to make Blackberry jelly and couldn't make enough to please myself. So after three Saturdays fighting the heat, the bugs, and the briers... I had to finally promise the family that yesterday would be the last this season. :)

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  4. I went blackberry picking with a friend of mine one year. She knew of some briers growing in some ditches not far from us. Some crazy old lady drove up to us and threatened us if we didn't leave saying she owned the road and the ditch. She seemed crazy enough that we didn't want to mess with her. :)

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  5. Wendy, I was able to post again this Sunday. Thanks for sharing this idea with other. I love the shot of Julian. My boys are finally potty trained and have discovered the joys of peeing outside as well. I love the expression on his face!

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  6. Wendy, Love your small town snapshots. Lunchtime on Mondays is a blast for me, your pix & stories plus post secret are my favs. A true fan - Alli

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  7. Wendy these are some great shots. My grandmother and great aunt always went blackberry picking early in the morning and afterwords my mammaw would fix some bb cobbler. I never liked it though but my mom could have lived on the stuff. love the shot of the barn in the car mirror and the one just after. have a great day.

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