Day trip on high

 

Friend's granddaughter and a little waterfall by the Blue Ridge Parkway

Teresa captures a shot of the little waterfall

Used as my header, Tanbark Ridge Tunnel is just to the right of this cascade

Not a great selfie at all!

Looking out the window of the little store at Craggy Overlook...toward the northwest. Unfortunately the bushy foliage obscures this view from the walkway. You can sometimes see I-26 going toward Tennessee. The Craggy Gardens picnic area is still not open.

The Parkway Map with road closures still due to Hurricane Helene in Sept. 2024.

If you enlarge you might see 2 towers in the distance to the left, on Mt. Gibbes next to Mt. Mitchell, which I don't think is visible here.

Our lunch overlook, higher than  Graybeard Mountain. The Graybeard trail starts near home, in Montreat, and the mountain is easily seen from Black Mountain and Lake Tomahawk.

Next week I hope to go up to Mt. Mitchell for a picnic. Highest mountain east of the Mississippi, as I've mentioned before. It's about the same altitude as the place in Colorado I hope to move to.

A neat split rail fence with Graybeard Mountain beyond...not sure which peak however.

The yellow area to right on I-40 (east of Asheville) is Black Mountain. (I think this map calls it 73! which it never was, but was 70 before interstates!) Anyway, if you see the words National and Forest you can find Mt. Mitchell State Park halfway between them. I'm enlarging this from a topo map that was for sale at the information store at Craggy Gardens.

This gives a better idea of where the Parkway has overlooks. Many times I'll just go to Tanbark Ridge Overlook. That's I-40 going left to right along the bottom of this view.

When the power of love overcomes the love of power, the world will know peace.

JIMI HENDRIX

Where on the earth are we?

  

Sharing with Thankful Thursday!

Austrian artist Heinrich C. Berann

Closer to home, my neighbor across the way has lots of pretty plants.

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Adventures of inner ear, in all likelihood:

Yesterday I talked with my Care Coordinator, Rob, about my scary dizzy episode in the middle of the night before. I went about the day until around 3, when I called him, thinking I needed it in my chart at least. I drove just fine to pick up my lunch, and even did a bit of photography up in Montreat (those will be part of blogs probably.)

Rob said it would be a good idea to have neurological signs/symptoms checked out so I got in to see my Doc. at 4:10.

On the way I backed my car into Peggy, my landlady's car, however, which was parked in a no parking zone, and I was coughing so didn't look fully and see it. So I stopped and found out it was her brand new car. Yikes. She said her husband would be quite upset. Then we did the exchange of insurance info while she was trying to make me feel less stressed.

I explained I was on the way to the doctor, right across the street, about vertigo last night. I didn't have it now.

Went to Doc. who said I was ok, all systems looked good.

Came home to find the police were by Peggy's car, talking with her. She said her insurance wanted a police report. I got out and went to explain that I had been the one who hit her car. They got my particulars, but never heard my side of things, and then gave me a form with a number on it for getting the accident report, which may cost $5.

I had called my insurance while waiting to see the Doc. and they said they'd already had a call, (probably from Peggy, and hung up since by then I was being weighed.)

BUT my nurse said I should be sure to tell the insurance that she had been parked illegally...that that might make a difference.

I didn't get a chance to say a thing.

I lost my first come/first serve disabled parking spot too, so had to park way up the hill and walk down. That means the next time I drive, I'll have to climb the hill.

And thankfully I can go on the picnic at the waterfalls today, with someone else driving!!

Some maps and thoughts

Beauty today: climbing roses

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I like maps! The reality of climate change came home for us in the inner United States just 7 months ago. Back in 2007 when I retired, I thought the mountains of North Carolina were relatively safe, compared to say, Florida where I lived then, or the eastern states in general. At least for climate change issues...good clean air and water, just a few thunderstorms, maybe a few days with snow. Boy did things change last year!

How about a huge map of the eastern USA and parts of Canada from Oct. 21, 2024?

Just last year, following the tropical storm aka Hurricane Helene on Sept. 27, there were weeks of clear skies and warm days following (as shown in the weather map above). I live right at a little dark smudge in western North Carolina. Dry weather was somewhat helpful as recovery efforts helped find people and things which had been washed away by the floods and mud slides. We were cut off  by having all major highways also damaged either by mud slides or the lanes of asphalt washed away. 4 days after the storm rushed through the area we were able to go south on one interstate, but not north, east or west yet.

For 2 weeks there was no electricity in the Asheville area, and for much longer there was no drinkable water...though the brown stuff that was full of sludge was ok to use for just flushing toilets. It wasn't until November 20 the water engineers (including the Army Corps of Engineers) figured out how to give us drinkable water, due to the extensive turbidity of clay particles suspended in our nearby reservoir. 

We could again shower in our homes, and wash dishes. Many of us had become so used to bottled water for all purposes, we kept drinking it. It was really cleaner than the tap water still. I gratefully had some respite in South Carolina with my cousin John, and then in Pittsboro NC with my friend Martha until we had electricity again in Black Mountain.

Americorps volunteers taking applications for FEMA aid at the Swannanoa library.

FEMA took my application, by the way, and I didn't see any help for all the groceries I threw away when the refrigerator stopped working. Though I told them repeatedly what I'd said in my first interview, that I'd had to evacuate to survive with my C-Pap machine, they said I would receive vouchers to stay in motels. I told them by phone that I didn't need vouchers, I just wished to have reimbursement for groceries like my neighbors had received. Then in March of 2025 I finally received a check for $750.  I had to submit a letter verifying that my electricity was off for those 2 weeks, from the Duke Power Co.

Well, that's what happens when you let an elder tell a short story...it can just go on and on!

Asheville is centered in Buncombe County, in the green next to the yellow. Black Mountain would appear on this map in the yellow just below where the red hits it, about where that northeastern Buncombe County line comes north to south across the line of Hwy I-40 going east to west. 

Yellow means frequent 60-70 mph, pockets of 80 mph. Many trees were blown down in town, often across power lines, and often over structures/homes and the town's roads.

Incidentally, the Blue Ridge Parkway has some areas open now in North Carolina (May 2025) but some won't be repaired until 2026.

The National Parks Conservation Association gives a good update of several park areas near my home, The Smoky Mountain National Park as well as the Blue  Ridge Parkway and the Appalachian Trail.  

Here's Barbara Kingsolver's article in Southern Living about her experiences of Hurricane Helene.

So here's a bit of humor that is how we all get through the day often!

Looks like some boys/men had fun refitting that car! Not my photo!

And while thinking about vehicles...

I can finally post this, as most of my readers are now enjoying either spring or fall! Didn't want to encourage too many who drive in the "weeee" method.

Today's quote:

What we are, what we have, even our salvation, all is gift, all is grace, not to be achieved but to be received as a gift freely given.

Desmond Tutu

Sugar Creamer set, thrown and altered, glazed in electric kiln at the community studio, 2014, Black Mountain NC, by Barbara Rogers

Sharing with My Corner of the World

Moving about over the face of the earth

  I enjoyed seeing the map showing ancient rulers of Europe and the Mediterranean.

The connection is (not about rulers, though that's pretty big in conversations these days) but about how we human move about and deal with changes all around us! Civilizations, cultures, immigrants...it's been happening since the beginning of time.

And another map which shows the peoples who lived in North America before the western Europeans arrived. 

So here's a map showing the routes the various visitors from European counties took into the Americas.

Locations of Stone Circles and Henges in the UK & Ireland - just so you don't think I'm totally 

Ameri-centric. But I'm sorry this was such a pale photo-map...a bit hard to see where what is.

No idea how to pronounce, but it is preferable to Gulf of America (as Trump wants to change it.)

And this is the Dymaxion Map...which shows the land masses in proper sizing...as opposed to the more popular and inaccurate Mercator maps.

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OK, back to real life. Today I'm thankful that the cold front which slammed into our area with heavy winds on Sunday as I was writing this, didn't bring snow as had been forecast. However, you never know, as of then it was due on Wednesday which was yesterday as you read this.

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Sunday I got into a cooking frenzy...I want you to know my usual meals go from refrigerator to microwave...so there I was cleaning some baby bella mushrooms, cutting up some garlic, and sauteing them all in butter. It smelled so good. So how about making it into a soup, I thought. I hunted around in the pantry and found some vegetable stock that expired in 2023. It's going to boil, I thought, so whatever might have happened to it will be ok. Then I thought, cream. Nope, didn't have anything but 2% milk. I put 2 cups in anyway. Thickener? There was this expired container of mashed potatoes. 

DO NOT USE THESE! I was innocent of what would happen. Science came along and smacked me upside the head. The potatoes were runny, so I gently stirred them into the soup mix. No problem. No chunks appeared, so I got bold and poured the rest in. I sure didn't have any other use for them, so thought they might make a nice body for the soup. I sprinkled my favorite spices and some dried onions (since I didn't want to cut a whole one which might be too much for those baby bellas.)

Then there were little blobs that formed throughout the soup. They were like little pieces of tapioca, which for all I knew had been hidden in the potatoes which had stopped having any firmness to them already. But nothing, stir stir stir, would get rid of the little blobs. And they were noticeable when I tasted the soup. Yuk.

OK, maybe I can blenderize them away. So slowly poured hot soup (without mushrooms) into the glass blender, tried low setting, no help. Tried the highest setting. And the blobs were gone. Of course the soup was now aerated with plenty of tiny air bubbles. I poured that first batch into a container which would go in refrigerator. Then did another batch. Let me just say by the time I got to the lase of 6 batches I tried using a colander that had a bigger bottom than the top of the blender...so soup ran down all the outside as well as inside, and the mushrooms I'd been trying to save were covered with little blobs...so that wasn't working.

I just blenderized the mushrooms too. Once I was trying to let some steam escape from the blender, and whirring at the same time...so it splattered mushroom soup all over the place. So that had to be cleaned up. 

I finally had all the soup turned to aerated liquid without any blobs, and I served myself the last cup. Of course lots of the seasoning was in it...whew, lots of flavor. But I ended up with 2 quarts of my own creamed mushroom soup!

Now if only I had someone to do the dishes....

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Today's politics: (yes, I am back thinking, reading, listening, sharing!)

So how do Democrats fight back? If the GOP doesn’t care about the negative impact Trump’s and Musk’s policies and decisions have on ordinary Americans, aren’t Democrats essentially negotiating with political terrorists?

Many demonstrations against Musk and Trump "Not our King" on President's Day, Feb. 17, 2025

 So far we have seen three models of Democratic pushback.

One camp of Democrats appears to think that doing the same thing and expecting a different result is the way to go, clinging to norms that have been shattered by the opposition in hopes that a bygone notion of bipartisan consensus about the importance of public service can be preserved. We saw how this worked out for Merrick Garland the last four years. Majority Leader Chuck Schumer also appears to be mounting a wait-and-see approach in the face of unprecedented, anti-democratic onslaught.

A second camp, represented by a younger cohort of Democrats, wants to counter the GOP blow for blow, trolling back hard in the hopes it will bring press attention to the unfolding national crisis. For example, Rep. David Garcia recently presented a photo of Elon Musk on the House floor as a “dick pic.” And Rep. Jasmine Crockett famously fired back at Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene during a hearing, calling her a “bleach blond butch bad built body.” These are admittedly headline-grabbing moves, which in this attention economy has some real value. They also demonstrate to Democratic voters that someone is fighting back, an important reassurance at this time. But while these counterpunches may feel good in the moment, there is little evidence they actually do anything to make MAGA stop behaving so terribly. If anything, they encourage more bad behavior in an endless cycle. If the other side is behaving like spoiled children, and our side does it, too, the fear is we will be locked forever in a schoolyard fight.

Perhaps there’s a third way, best represented by Secretary Pete Buttigieg’s style of discourse. He combines a willingness to engage and actually listen to the other side with a sturdy defense of Democratic values. Buttigieg is not afraid to go on Fox News and other outlets where Republicans are tuned in. He looks past the bad behavior and taunts of the MAGA right and tries instead to get at the heart of why they feel aggrieved, even when that grievance is tainted with racism and misogyny. He then seeks to find common ground, at least on some level. He always presents a path forward, even if it is an aspirational one, where the two sides can treat each other as people caught in the same dysfunctional system, yet all with a shared need for security, health, and community.

It may be too lofty for these rough and tumble times. And there are few in the Democratic Party who can actually step into this role with the skill of Buttigieg and consistently resist the urge to condemn the other side as irredeemable monsters. Few leaders will bother to try and unpack whatever it is that drives the dangerous nihilism at the core of the MAGA right.

But considering the incredibly high stakes, more Buttigieges may be sorely needed if we are ever to escape the downward pull of Trumpian nihilism.

SOURCE: The Big Picture newsletter  Feb. 19, 2025

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Sharing with Thankful Thursday

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Today's quote: 

Thich Nhat Hanh writes:

“People usually consider walking on water or in thin air a miracle but I think the real miracle is not to walk either on water or in thin air, but to walk on the green earth, dwelling deeply in the present moment and feeling truly alive.”

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Today's art:

Art by Sophie Blackall from If You Come to Earth.1

Our waters sustain our lives.

 Think of where each stream and river empties into the oceans. Then think of all the ones in the world.

  Here OPEN CULTURE offers an article and maps with ALL the world's water drainage!

Here's the one of US rivers.

I have been a member of a network looking at a local watershed drainage basin. Swannanoa Watershed Action Network (SWAN) has some great ideas, like using the Doughnut Economics' regenerative model for various area workshops.

One member (Carlos Espinosa) has been working on a neighborhood at the very highest area of drainage just below the Eastern Continental Divide in Ridgecrest NC, in his organization "Cool Rivers Forever"  Here's the link to his ongoing project there.

Flat Creek flows from Montreat down to the Swannanoa River.

Use the search space to find more of my posts here about the environment, water, SWAN, the Doughnut Economics model by Kate Raworth, and the Climate Conversation Group.

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And a wonderful Banyan tree that survived the fires in Lahaina Hawaii last August...Photo by Mary Foster, current leaf growth.

I ate Sunday lunch at the Coach House with friends, and enjoyed seeing a shark graced with an elf cap, above their Christmas tree!

My favorite walking spot, around Lake Tomahawk, where various families raise their children.

Sometimes there doesn't appear to be any wildlife around the lake.

But while doing chair yoga yesterday, I saw a big bird with a white head land in the top of a pine tree. So I sort of snuck over through the seniors doing the foot stretches to take a phone photo of it, if possible. I could see it's big white head held above the branch it was sitting on, Of course I wanted to think Bald Eagle, but I said I'd settle for an Osprey (though neither are known to be in this area). However, there is a local Great Blue Heron that fishes in these waters...so I'm guessing that's who he was. 

I never lost sight of his white head, on the top branch that's sticking out parallel to the ground. I admit I've never seen a Great Blue fly to a tree and perch, so maybe this was my opportunity.

Sharing with Saturday Critters.

Today's quote:

We cannot have a healed society, we cannot have change, we cannot have justice, if we do not reclaim and repair the human spirit.

ANGEL KYODO WILLIAMS