And The Secret Is...Mealworms! Plus A Whole Lot Of Other Stuff

Sorry about the quality of the photo. It was taken from the back porch behind the screen from a fairly good distance away. These are the two crow couples I am calling George and Martha and Fred and Ethyl. I have read that crows do indeed live together as couples and although I couldn't identify any of them in a line-up of one, I assume these are the same four that come to dine every day. Sometimes there is one other crow and I think that may be a child of one of the couples because I've read that is common, too, for a young crow to hang out with Mom and Dad for awhile. If that one has a name I guess it's Junior.
So a few weeks ago, Steve Reed wrote that he and his husband had started putting a mixture of mealworms and seeds in their bird feeder and that the birds really seemed to like them. I passed this along to Glen who immediately ordered a huge bag of meal worms which came a day or two later. Now chickens will definitely tear up all the mealworms you give them. Happily. So I knew that some birds very much did like them but for whatever reason our cardinals and jays and wrens and so forth showed no interest at all. So here we were with this huge bag of mealworms which I suggested I could grind up and start baking with but, eh...
Nah.

We'd had these two crow couples coming around and they'd yell at me when they saw me on the porch. They'd scream out their caws as if they knew damn well I had food they wanted and that I should get up off my butt and give it to them. 

Hmmm...
Now the crows never go to the feeder. They just don't. I have no idea why. I am definitely not an ornithologist. But one day when they'd been walking around in the back yard and then cawing from the trees right behind the porch, I suggested to Glen that we put some of the mealworms on all of the stumps left by the cutting of the Bradford pears and so Glen tried it. Next thing we knew, the crows were dining  here like this was the Bradford Pear Stump Cafe and mealworms were the daily lunch special. 
Done. Within a day we had regular crow visitors. And if you look up "how to attract crows to your yard" you will find videos and lists of instructions and favorite foods to attract them and all we had to do was scatter mealworms on stumps. Now they scream at me every morning when they see me and I'm sure they already recognize both Mr. Moon and me as the mealworm servers as they watch us closely when we go out and give them their treats. The only thing I really want to see if we can accomplish beyond that is to try and get them to come closer to the house. At this point they'll get about, oh, I don't know, thirty feet from the porch door? I am not good at estimating distances. At all. 
Of course a lot of people who want to attract crows are hopeful that they'll leave them something shiny as a thank-you. A sort of paying of the tab, I guess, or maybe a tip. Their presence is their currency. 
So that's been fun, seeing those glossy beauties doing the head-bopping bird walk in the back yard, politely sharing their mealworms on the flat stumps. The squirrels like them too. 

And that's that story. 

I did more cleaning today and a little more clearing out. And here's the issue I'm having with family photos. 
First of all, I never get good picture frames. I mean, as Jessie says, I get Dollar Store frames. 
I cannot deny this. 
So to begin with, I'm not treating the photos with the respect they deserve. 
But the issue I have is that after a photo has been on display about ten years, you quit seeing it. That is just the way it is. And they collect dust and for some reason they make me feel guilty because, okay, they're dusty and I don't have them in good frames so I am showing them disrespect and that almost translates in my always-guilty brain to feeling as if I'm disrespecting the people in the photos. 
There are a few photos that no, I never get tired of and most of those are on the hallway altar vanity. 
I have pictures on the piano which are really too high for most people to see and some on a little table by the front door that no one ever looks at and quite a few on the sideboard in the dining room but again- hardly anyone ever goes in there as it's mostly just a pass-through room and even if we do eat in there, for some reason the photos just seem slightly invisible. 
And then there are the photos on the mantel in our room. Mostly they are photos of Glen and me being sweet and/or cuddly. In a rather innocent way, of course, but some of them are a little passionate. I mean, we have our clothes on and everything. It's all in the way we're looking at each other. But again- those pictures have been there for twenty years and, well, I was ready to clear them off and just enjoy some space there. Or at least more space. A space I could clean a bit easier. But again- would this create bad juju? And would it be disrespectful to our love? 
Yeah. Probably not. So I consulted with Jessie via text and she assured me that it would be fine to clear them off and so I did and now they're in a drawer in the little chest of drawers I use as a nightstand and I do still have a few things on the mantel (hey! it's me!) but not the clutter. 
Not the clutter. 

So what are your feelings on this? Will my children and grandchildren feel as if I no longer love them? I doubt it. I'm sure they'd all say, "Go for it!" 
But is it de rigueur for parents to display pictures of their family? As I said, some pictures will never be taken away and put in a drawer. I just love them too much and I cannot tell you why I feel that way about some and not others but I think it has to do with the genuineness of the emotions displayed in the photo. A moment captured that tells a story I remember. 
And please, PLEASE do not suggest I find other pictures to replace the old ones with. I honestly have a thing about pictures. And old videos. They make me sad, mostly. Probably sad for the passing of those ages and stages of all of us. The images of people who are gone from us now. 
Also, let us not suggest the magical picture frames that show images caught on our phones, one by one, without ceasing. Those are kind of cool but I'm afraid it would be one more thing I'd spend mesmerized time on. That may happen at some point in the future but I'm not there yet. 
So here's what the mantel looks like now. 

The painting is one my mother's brother did when he was quite young and taking art classes from Frank Baisden. Frank and his wife Katy were amazing characters that I was lucky enough to know in my own childhood in Roseland and Frank was a genuine artist. I've written several posts about him and Katy and there's one HERE if you're interested in it. 
That painting hung above my granny's bed all of my childhood and when she died, I asked for it and it has been in my bedroom ever since. With any luck, it will be there when I die. I love it that much. 

From left to right on the mantel we have a gorgeous doll that May made for me. The detail on her is amazing. She's been on another mantel piece but I want her where I can see her more easily for now. Next is a tiny felted sweater that she made. One Christmas she made everyone tiny sweaters and all of them were appropriate to the one they were made for. Next, whelk shell, Seminole Indian dolls with smaller shells in front of them, conch shell, beautiful ceramic parakeet I scored at Wag the Dog which I love, and a cutting of arrowhead vine in a silver plated pitcher I got at some random thrift store. 
And I feel like that is everything I want right there now. Things I love and will notice because they are newly there. Except for the painting which I always notice and always will. 

This morning I picked another gallon of green beans, remarkably, and about half a gallon of field peas. I need to sit down and snap and shell. I got the guest room tidied up and dusted and actually even rearranged the mantel in there. Sort of. 

Here's what the guest room looks like. 

This picture was taken from the doorway between that room and the dining room. And yes, I should probably get some sort of quilt or bedspread that covers the bottom mattress but really, who cares? Also, that is THE MOST COMFORTABLE BED IN THE WORLD! 
Glen suggested that we should take it to the cabin since we sleep on a different, almost as comfortable but not quite bed. I shut down that shit immediately. 
Oh hell no, may be what I said. 
And here's another view from the guest room, leading into the laundry room. 

It's a rambly old house. One room leads to another, and I walk through them all a thousand times a day. The door you can see the door knob of in that last picture leads out onto the back porch. And although you can't see it, the swing porch leads directly off the guest room as well, that door being just to the left of the head of the bed. The other door that leads to that particular porch comes off my bathroom. 
You could get lost. It has happened. 

We just got a nice little rain, the odd thing being that the sun shone throughout. We always used to say that happened when the devil was beating his wife but I don't like that. At all. 
Even the fucking devil should not be beating his wife. I am glad to step in and say so. 

Pretty little garden spider, aka zipper spider, on the front porch. The golden orb weavers are establishing their webs and territories too. Pictures of those will no doubt be forthcoming. 

There are clean sheets on ALL the beds this evening and I have made my own martini. 

Happy Friday, y'all, and no, I have not answered comments today. Perhaps I shall get around to it later or perhaps not. Sometimes a blogger lady just needs a little break. Trust me when I say that I have read them all and appreciate each one. 

Love...Ms. Moon