Over the Mountains and Through the Woods...

Ok…not really on my way to grandmother’s house, at least not yet. But I thought I’d post some pictures I took in the past couple of months. Including some videos.



The first set are from a park Statler and I took Dad to. It was Father’s Day, and instead of watching a movie, since there weren’t any movies either one of us were interested in, we decided that a nice walk around a national park would be a far better time! I treated Dad to breakfast at a diner, and Statler made a rather untraditional picnic lunch. No, while others at the park were having hamburgers, hotdogs, and fresh made salsa (Dad watched this one Hispanic lady make a whole meal from scratch, enthralled with the way she cut the veggies up without even looking at what she was doing.)…we had some mustard chicken with flatbread, fruit salad, and some kind of grain that I can’t name at the moment. My memory fails me too often.



Either way, it was rather yummy and we had a grand time hiking, taking pictures, and eating healthily.



This here was a bug nest/burrow of sorts. Don’t know if it was a beetle, bee, or spider, but something black and fuzzy with multiple legs was crawling around there adjusting the purple fuzz! Statler might have gotten better pictures of it.



Speaking of spiders, the town I live in is swarming in them, and I think they’re getting ready to kill me. I’ve got a nest in my mailbox; I think I’ve figured out their plan. The eggs have hatched, and they’re tiny little buggers. The way I see it, they’re trying to gain entrance into my house via my mail, and once they’re all in, they’re going to swarm all about me and kill me in my sleep! Assuming the kittens don’t get to me first…



















HI DAD!







Ok, these next couple of photos I took while gazing up at the clouds out on Karper Road. Who doesn’t like a good cloud picture right?





But wait until you see the beauty I captured here on video! I’ve never seen a rainbow so big in my life, that I can remember! But what makes it more amazing to me is the time of day it was, at sunset! I texted a picture to friends and family, and got a reply from my coworker how she and her husband were looking at it to! They were generally in the same area as I, but it was still just truly amazing to see!





Oh right! So there’s this tree I like to climb on my friends’ property. One time after swinging down from the branches, I happened upon a pretty white gypsy moth that was hanging out on the trunk!



It’s not very often I want to get up early in the morning, but earlier this weekend I had decided to get up at the crack of dawn to take a looooooong walk down one farm road, to another, and to one I regularly walk back to home. Basically, think of it as a two hour walk around the block. XD It was great, because I got to get some beautiful shots that you can only get at sunrise, as well as made some new friends!



So I’m photographing these horses while they graze, admiring how the sun shines on their coats when one looks at me and decides that it’s going to come over to say hi. Well, maybe not so much as say hi as eat the flowers nearby and unload the end product from its bowels, but I decided to take it as a way of saying hi. Then the next thing I know, another horse looks at me and the other horse and is all ‘Well, I’ve got to check this out as well’. The next thing I know, most of the herd is coming over to say hi and graze nearby, all except one that decided it was content on the far side of the field. XD



I had even taken a video of the whole lot of them, but somehow…it either didn’t save or I accidently deleted it without knowing it. Sad, I thought for sure Animal and Mama Karper would have loved to see it.

























So later on, I come across a cow farm! Now, since I’ve moved from Upstate NY, I’ve refused to believe that cows exist in any other state. So I decided a good 10 years ago that these here are not cows, but pigeons that have been cleverly disguised with highly sophisticated holographic imagery! And now you’re asking why I’m so bent on believing such foolishness! Because Byrne Dairy Milk does not exist anywhere outside of NY State!



Yes. It’s already been established that I’m a nutcase. But I was raised on Byrne Dairy Milk, and one of my dad’s high school friends declared that I wasn’t lactose intolerant, but I was simply allergic to any other milk that wasn’t Byrne Dairy Milk! Of course! That makes logical sense now! Quick! Move me back to my home state so I don’t have to drink Lactaid anymore and return to my beloved Byrne Dairy Goodness!



ANYWAYS! These pigeon/cows had the same reaction to me as the horses did. One looked at me, and decided that the area I was standing in was far more interesting and tasty to graze in than where it was earlier! Though, I think with the cows, it was a general consensus that my hat was so weird that they needed to get a closer look to make sure that there was someone beneath it.



I have a Chinese straw conical hat that I wear on my walks when it’s too sunny out. The Karper’s neighbor likes it and said he kind of wished he had one. And when I wore it to the park on Father’s Day, my sister even said she wanted one, despite how weird Dad thought they were. It’s actually kind of nice, and I get a ton of weird looks from the locals because of it. ^_^

Elderly Man…

…heh…he’ll get the joke.

Though really, my dad isn’t elderly. Far from it, having survived a heart attack and does his best to walk every morning, test himself on the fitness trail at the local park, and continues to work and play with his trains; along with help me go about maintaining a house.

For those who don’t know me, I’m a Daddy’s Girl! I adore him to no end! Why? Because somehow he understands me enough to make me laugh at my own quirks. He’ll occasionally call me his son, vaguely due to the fact that in high school I picked up a nickname of the male gender; because…well…I’m not all that feminine personality wise! When he bought the women in his family porcelain pendants, he was so dead one with the dragon (as I’ve seen them around before but couldn’t decide which one I wanted if I ever could afford one) that I haven’t taken it off since. And though he occasionally forgets that I understand logic and physics (a class I should have taken in high school instead of chemistry), it’s fun to see the delight in his eyes when he’s reminded and reiterates how I’m not all that girly.

I LOVE MY DAD! And I have some really fun memories that even revolve around his previous birthdays!

I spent my first summer as a SCAD student at home with my parents. By the time Dad’s birthday came around, I was working the graveyard shift at a nearby gas station. It was pretty fun, despite being left in the sub-station making coffee and muffins in preparation for the morning rush that I was normally gone in time for. I had worked the night before and into the morning of his birthday, and had asked for his birthday night off so I could enjoy the day with him, Mom, Statler, and Kermit’s godparents at…HERSHEY PARK! Why there? BECAUSE WE LOVE ROLLERCOASTERS! Mom doesn’t, but Dad and his girls do! OH THE FUN!

So I get home from work at around 6am, wonder into my room to find…!!! A computer game I had been obsessing about (I can’t wait for Dungeon Siege 3 to come out next year!) all summer and a DVD drive for my computer! That’s right! Dad gave me gifts for his birthday! How awesome is that?! My friends still can’t figure out how that works, but I’m not going to question it. All I know is that when it comes to his birthday and X-mas, all he ever wants is to spend time with his daughters. No other gifts really matter as much.

Excited about the DVD drive because I had gotten a movie that I couldn’t watch because…I didn’t own a DVD player; I accidently woke him up trying to install the damn thing into my computer. Sadly, I couldn’t remember how to open my computer to install it. He had been hoping to wake up to find me playing the game so he could watch me play it…just to see what it was like, but of course…that wasn’t the case. “Go make breakfast and I’ll have it up and running by the time you’re done!” The computer was put back together and the game was up and running like I said it would be! And I was overjoyed when I got to get past the part where the DEMO I had normally stopped me. Basically, my convincing argument for getting the game: I work overnight hours. None of my friends are up that late to chat with, and I don’t want to keep you and Mom up watching TV. What better way to keep my sleeping schedule in tact by playing a video game on my nights off?

Now, I know what you’re thinking, as my sister didn’t understand why I worked the night before Dad’s birthday and not ask for it off along with the night after. I didn’t want to risk for asking for too much time off then. Heh…I knew what I was doing. Basically I took a catnap on the drive up to the park (hour long), to which we went around riding roller coasters, including a kiddy one that was like taking a trolley around a western themed area that helped to settle our stomachs for lunch. Seriously…it was that tame. Then there was the original Mighty Mouse that Mom rode because it didn’t have any loopty-loops; she can’t handle the good stuff. And after some disappointment in waiting in line for a coaster ride that had been on and off all day, they went to ride the teacups with Mom and then drove home. Hour long actually dead asleep nap in the car again, and then I was up all night playing my game. That’s right! I had the college student stamina back then to endure being up over 24 hours, take a short nap, and stay up another few hours…all to spend time with my dad and play a video game! WEEE!

But the best birthday was his 60th! It was the first time visiting my current home town, seeing their new house, and going to the local tavern. And the way Mom set it all up was amazing! Two weeks earlier we were all in NYC to watch a Yankees game for the last time in the old stadium. Dad with all three of his daughters, one of which lives in NM while I was living in GA, so he really didn’t expect to see either of us for his birthday. The boyfriend at the time and I drove up with the cats, cause Mom said we could, with the money she gave us to cover gas and food.

Before that, she had been emailing a close friend of Dad’s about coming up to visit, and he, the Giant Leprechaun, changed the title and format of the email to make it look like he was up and coming for a visit, kind of like a last minute decision. There’re plenty of Civil War battlefields to visit in the area, and he and Dad are into the history of it all, so it made sense. Dad was excited; he got to hang out with his buddy for his birthday. Passing the house in the car, GL parks it up the street and meanders into the yard…knocking on the door when he says Mom through the window. So he and Dad go to the tavern for a drink and don’t get home with his car until JUST after me and the bf start unloading ours of the cats and luggage. “What a surprise! What are you doing here? And you brought the mangy beasts?!” “Mom said we could!”

We were in the middle of talking about something in the living room…as we normally do…later that evening when the bf goes to put a can in the recyclable bin out back. As Dad has his back to the doorway, and the bf just so happens to be out back in time to let her in, Kermit quietly sneaks in with her newest baby...who is sleeping so he’s obviously not loud enough to draw Dad’s attention. She stands there for a minute or two before announcing her presence; to which Dad nearly has a heart attack! It surprised him so much to see my sister there, because she lives so far away! Again, Mom fronted the money for her plane ticket…just to have the three of us there for his 60th! Statler picked her up at the airport and let her borrow one of her cars to drive into town.

The following day, GL, bf, and Dad go walk Antietam Battlefield and later go to the tavern again for a beer and oysters. On and on Dad talks about this Beer Tasting Dinner that they occasionally have and how he’s never been to one but they sounded great, with good food and beer from all over the world. Five course meal cooked fresh with produce from the local farms and a different kind of beer to compliment each course. Oh! I can’t remember everything we had, but the dessert was my favorite! Flakey kind of pastry with cream and fruits! I wish I could have it again…

Low and behold, the next day, for Dad’s birthday, more people show up by surprise, and not only that…they’re there for a BEER TASTING DINNER Mom had arranged for the big day! He’s declared it the best birthday of his life. Mom really outdid herself this time around, with all the surprises and having his daughters there to share it with. Hee!

Happy Birthday, Dad! Can’t say today is going to be as good as two years ago, but I’m sure you’ll love it either way!