Last week Doggo and I ran the trail camera trapline to so what's up in our summer woods. Wouldn't you know it, they've finally and at long last made an appearance.
We've had solitary hens...
We've had solemn long bearded gobbler bachelors processions....
We've had roving gangs of juvenile delinquent jakes...
And now there was this. Whew!
Brood flocks of hens corralling their clutches of poults. As a die-hard turkey hunter it is always encouraging to be witness to a successful graduating class....
Kermesse, or kermis, or kirmess,
is a Dutch
language term derived from 'kerk' (church) and 'mis' (mass) that became
incorporated in French and English. Its origins are originally
associated with the mass said on the
anniversary of the founding of a church (or the parish) and in honor of
the Patron Saint. Such religious celebrations were regularly held in
the Low Countries, in Central
Europe and also in Northern France, and were accompanied by feasting,
dancing, drinking
and sports. The
Dutch-American Village of Little Chute, Wisconsin, has celebrated Kermis
annually since 1981 with a street festival. The Wallonian settlements in
Door and Kewaunee Counties have celebrated Kermis with traditional
Belgian dishes and events for as long as anyone can remember.
Traditionally, Kermis around here stretched over several
calendar weeks as each small settlement - Namur, Brussels, Rosiere,
Little Sturgeon, Forestville, Lincoln, Duvall and Casco celebrated the harvest and the life-giving bounty of food.
The 2026 Belgian Kermiss Festival took place Sunday at the Belgian Heritage Center in Namur. This historic harvest festival dates all the way back to 1858. This event serves as the center's largest annual fundraiser; plus it's a terrific way to get your Booyah fix.
The historic church, school and convent serve as the repository preserving the history and culture of the largest Walloon Belgian settlement in the United States.
Anyway, there were demonstrations featuring old school mechanized farm machinery powered by early gasoline engines. Cool stuff.
But this caught my attention.
Driven by the power takeoff on a modern Deere tractor this is technically a diesel-powered ice cream maker.
Apologies to the late great Tom Clancy. One of my beloved and favorite authors who penned the classic alternate history novel; Red Storm Rising. Get a copy as it has it all; radical Islamists, communists, submarines, nukes, Russians swarming thru the Fulda Gap into eastern Europe and a cold war turned hot. The first time I picked it up I couldn't put it down.
Shortly after COVID and early into my retirement I was invited to join a private Face Book group that discussed, argued-about and otherwise carried-on adult-like exchanges covering current affairs.
Regrettably, it seems to have become dominated by one or two particular individuals who have become the masters of cut-and-paste posts. By that I mean cut and paste social media meme's and other similar material. On rare occasions some of it might be substantive; but most of it is click bait. They seem intelligently clever-enough and capable of producing original content so I don't get the emphasis on cut and paste. But that's none of my business; C'est la vie.
Early-on in my experience on that particular site much of what one individual had to say had to do with Marxists. Everyone had to be on guard and extra vigilant about Marxists. Apparently they lurked everywhere and were out to somehow make mischief, meddle in our governance and otherwise topple American society as we knew it.
I was extra vigilant to be mindful of their potential to live-up to their reputation as No-goodniks. The dogs and I looked for them daily while on our walks. I looked for them in town, at the library and at the grocery. I searched everywhere for these Marxists; even in the woodpile. And in the end never found one. At a minimum you'd think the dogs woulda flushed at least one stinkn' Bolshevik. I came up with nothing. Sigh.
Now it seems I have to be on high alert for Islamists. Apparently, everyone has to be on guard and vigilant over the creeping spread of radical Islam and the looming imposition of Sharia Law. Considering the level of hysteria you'd think if I drove to Green Bay to go to Fleet Farm I would pass a forest of minarets on the trip.
Between you and me the Belgian community I live in is Christian; mostly in the Roman Catholic tradition of the Christian faith. There is one Lutheran church just down the road in neighboring Kolberg; where German immigrants settled.
Yet not a single solitary mosque.
See; the Supremacy Clause guarantees there will never be the imposition of Sharia Law. Or Catholic Canon Law or Judaic Halakha Law for that matter. Perhaps they haven't read the Constitution? But I digress.
Naturally, for my social-media soaked acquaintances there has been the recent rise of Democratic Socialists; who they dismissively refer-to as Communists. Democrats are thusly Commies.
I happen to know a great deal about this subject because I am a child of the Cold War. I don't scare very easily and and certainly Socialists and Communists don't scare me a bit. That's because my formative years included a steady diet of the Red Baiting and Red Scare tactics. So, on top of the clutching of pearls over radical Islam I gotta feeling that between now and the midterms we're gonna hear more and more about communism than normal; most of which will be child's play compared to old school, cold war-style, red-baiting.
For what it's worth, Bernie Sanders and candidate for governor Francesca Hong got nothing on this. And she lost the primary.....
Adult male orioles are incredibly early migrators which would explain why I haven’t spotted one in more than three weeks.
They’ve left the females and fledglings behind for a few weeks to finish growing and fueling up.
Anyway, earlier this week I spotted a couple of females (or fledglings) eyeing-up
an empty feeder. The feeders are empty on account of yellow jackets and
other hornets. Besides, with wild berries ripening and insect
populations peaking visitors to the feeders have slowed.
I asked someone who knows more about this than me and I’m told that here in Northeast
Wisconsin, the local breeding Baltimore Orioles are officially
concluding their season right now, and the birds I am seeing are likely
preparing to leave this week.
I think they're gone!
Best practice is to leave only small amounts of jelly out to avoid spoilage and keep the birdbaths clean and fresh.
I should expect some Canadian oriole stragglers passing but to expect warblers and other Neotropical migrants for a while.
We're leaving the welcome mat out for a while.
Selected photos were taken over the last seven days.
Badfinger was a British rock band that recorded and
released four consecutive hits between 1970 to 1972 - Come and Get It (written
and produced by Paul McCartney), No Matter What, Day After Day (produced by
George Harrison), and Baby Blue (written by Pete Ham and produced by Todd
Rundgren).
As the tale goes it is said that Ham wrote the
song about a woman named Dixie Armstrong, whom he had dated during Badfinger's final US tour.It was the group's last
Top 20 single, peaking at number 14 on the Billboard Pop Singles chart.Forty years later the song reemerged to new
fame and recognition when it was featured in the series finale of AMC's Breaking Bad - a
reference to the distinctive blue methamphetamine produced by Walter White.
Exceedingly nice cover by Stephen Cummings and Isabella Manfredi with the RocKwiz Orkestra...
The Perseid happens to be the most spectacular Meteor
Shower of the year for the Northern Hemisphere. The Perseid presents a high
rate of meteors every year and it occurs in August when you can go out for an
evening under the stars and swat mosquitoes.
Orbiting the sun every 130 years the largest object known
to repeatedly pass by Earth is the Comet Swift-Tuttle.The nucleus of the comet is about 26
kilometers wide.1992 was the last time
it passed nearby Earth during its orbit around the sun.Swift-Tuttle will return after we’re all dead and
gone in 2126.
Nevertheless, because Earth passes through the dust and
debris it leaves behind every year - it creates the annual Perseid meteor shower –
and we have regular reminders.This year
should be a good year.
click on the sun to enlarge
Watching the meteor shower is actually observing the
pieces of comet debris heat up as they enter the atmosphere and burn up in a
bright streak of light.In outer space
this debris is referred to as meteoroids.When they enter and burn-up in Earth's atmosphere they're referred to as
meteors.If a piece makes it all the way down to Earth
without burning up, it is called a meteorite.Most of the meteors in the Perseids are about the size of a grain of sand but if you’re lucky a few might
be the size of a pea or a marble.
The
Perseids will be active from around August 11 thru the August 13.
Maximum activity is predicted to occur on the early morning of August
12,
when rates in excess of 1 per minute may be seen from skies without any
light
pollution.
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