all done, yard work, misc photos

Ta da!

I put it all together Friday. I think the next one will be a yellow trumpet flower but I’ve also been thinking about mushrooms and lichens. I’ve been considering butterflies but haven’t yet managed an image in my head of how it might look.

Saturday morning was definitely a little chilly. Still in the 70s late morning but low 90s predicted for the high. I got outside and took the little electric push mower, and by little I mean a 14” cutting swath, and the 100’ heavy duty extension cord across the street and mowed as far around the house as my extension cord will allow. Joe and Mary, the couple that do the mowing and trimming over there, haven’t been here in at least four weeks. They’re old like me and Joe’s been saying he’s going to retire every year but he keeps on going until lately. He’s having some pain in his hip and can’t stand long to do the trimming or use the push mower for the areas his zero turn can’t get to so this may be it for them. My grandson will mow but he has to bring his zero turn mower over from his house and it can’t get in the small spaces around the house and trees and shed and septic system with it. Anyway, it took me three sessions to get the front and sides of the yard around the house, having to take breaks to prevent heat stroke and had to peel my clothes off when I was done. Back on Sunday to finish the yard in the back and to trim some lower branches off one of the catalpa trees in the front and the sycamore in the back because I’m tired of bonking my head when I walk under them. That took me two sessions and by the end of day Sunday I was tired. Took a cold shower, fixed a cocktail, and plonked my butt on the couch.

I have some tree trimming to do over here at my house but today, I’m just taking it easy. You may remember that months ago a friend who is writing a book on pate de verre, the lost wax glass casting process that I used to do, had asked to use some of my images as illustrations (among many other glass artists) and has asked me to proofread the entire document before it goes to press. So I have that to do spending an hour or so a day on it.

My grandson Mikey stopped by this morning with Paisleigh and Harrison. He was waiting for a customer to bring him a truck though with Robin in the city at her part time job and Paisleigh out of school this week, he won’t be getting any mechanic work done today at least. This is a new school break, calling it Fall Break instead of just getting Columbus Indigenous People’s Day off. So, Fall Break, Thanksgiving Break, Christmas Break, Spring Break; when do these kids go to school?

Some photos have been piling up…Mikey and Harrison head to head, Harrison working on a car just like his daddy.

My current resident wolf spider.

Heard a tinkling sound and looked up to see this anole on one of the ornaments.

The yellow bells and banana trees over on the shop property. When individually planted there was plenty of space between them but now they have grown into each other. 

The pink trumpet flower vine/shrub is blooming

and a black swallowtail.

object #12, more progress, caterpillars,

Another installment of My Life in 100 Objects. At some point in my childhood, our parents gave my sister and me soft bodied clown dolls. Mine was in red, Pam’s in black. I don’t remember how old I was and I don’t remember being overly attached to it, I don’t remember dragging it around with me wherever I went but for some reason, I still have it. Of all the stuffed animals that lived on my bed, only the clown survived. Here he is, object #12, a little tattered having lost his felt hands and feet but still with me.

I’ve been working on the heron shadow box. I’ve glued the spacers to the backs of the heron and cattail pieces, I trimmed the background and glued it to a piece of foam core the same size and then to the cardboard that fits the entire opening in the back to hold the background in place but inside the box. Next is to glue the individual elements to the water background and when that dries slide the whole mess into the shadow box from the back and if my spacing worked out, the heron should be 1/4” from the glass.

I spent about an hour Wednesday futzing around with a piece of stainless steel wire. There was no way to support one of the cattails with a foam core spacer and even though the paintings are on a double thickness of watercolor paper, I was afraid that with time it might sag so I cut a length of wire, straightened it making sure it would lay flat (one tiny micro bend at a time and eventually a hammer). When I was satisfied with that I stuck one end of the wire in the foam core and glued the wire to the paper (on the right).

Now we’re going to play a game called ‘what color is that?’. Back in my river guide days two of the other guides would play this game, one would point at something and ask what color is that. Just plain red, blue, yellow, green, orange, purple would not suffice since there are many different variations of the six main colors of the color wheel. Forest green, aqua, burnt orange, fuschia, pink, marigold, etc. When I bought my new sheets I described the color XXXXX but now that the sheets are on my bed they don’t look that color at all. So what color is this? I know what color I think but I thought I’d throw it out there and see what the peeps think.

My sister had planted some pipevine and every year the pipevine swallowtail butterflies would lay eggs and the caterpillars would decimate it. I’d been seeing an occasional pipevine swallowtail over the summer

image from Florida Butterflies group on FB

and keeping my eye on the pipevine which to my dismay seemed to be completely ignored. Until yesterday when Paisleigh freaked out about some weird bugs. Turned out to be pipevine swallowtail caterpillars, must have been 30 or more swarming what was left of the pipevine. Very happy to see them.

another sign, a little rain, more arting

Thanks for all of the support showered down on me. They are just a blip in my rear view mirror accompanied by two handed one finger salutes. Board members have been deleted and blocked from my contact list and the one ‘friend’ blocked on my FB account. If any of them come across my last post and get their panties in a twist, like Ms Moon said…fuck you, fuck this, and fuck the fucking horse you rode in on. I will not be volunteering for any other church supported program. I can do some volunteering at Hesed House which really is more my kind people. They provide programs and resources to the community free of charge, a connected learning center for students teaching coding skills and helping people get their GEDs, and the fabulous market where they source local and organic food products and a whole range of art and crafts made by locals. Unfortunately, most of the events I could help with are in the evening which is not a good time for me but I’m sure we can figure something out.

So onward into the future.

I think I’m done with the heron.

I’ve cut it out and am now working on the spacing but I’m not sure I’m going to construct it the same way as the previous shadow box. Or I might. The shadow box is still 1/4” too deep for just the three layers of this one (the robin one had four layers). I tried making each of the three cattails a different height but I didn’t like it, too much distance between the heron in front and the furthest back cattail. So now I’ve got all the spacers done, I’ve solved the depth problem, and the only thing left to do is put it all together. Here’s all the elements sans spacers.

Another sign of the changing season, I face east sitting at my desktop writing or reading and the sun has now moved into that space where as it rises it shines right into my face in the morning. As soon as enough leaves fall, it will cast prisms of light all over the walls and ceiling from the crystals hanging in the windows. Correspondingly, the setting sun has moved out from behind the trees and house on my west side (a few minutes later the setting sun was a ball of fire just above the horizon just to the left of the trees on the right).

We’ve actually gotten a little bit of rain, not nearly enough though, not enough to heal the cracks in the ground or lift the burn ban, but I was amazed at how quickly everything greened up. And the mornings have been cool enough to keep the door open and get some fresh air in the house for a couple of hours anyway. I did get all my little broccoli and cabbage plants in the ground, planted two short rows of mustard greens and a six pack of kohlrabi seeds. I’ll need to thin out the mustard greens when they get a bit bigger, same with the kohlrabi.

The rain also brought out a whole new oxblood lily bloom. and a new flush of yellow rain lilies.

drama, so much damn drama

Image by Yellow Cap Data (Flickr)

It has come to my attention that I inadvertently misrepresented the funds used for the new flooring at SHARE. The grant was specifically written to improve infrastructure and when asked if it could be used for food the company offering the grant said no. So it was use the grant for its intended purpose or not get it at all and the new flooring is nice, well, except for the carpet which is still ugly.

So if I gave the impression that SHARE would choose new flooring when it could be buying food with that money, let me say that would never happen. SHARE does great work in our community providing the less fortunate with food and clothing.

This will be the last time I write about SHARE though. One of the board members read my September 5th post about getting the new flooring and grant money (I did not know when I wrote that that the grant was specific to improving infrastructure) and took issue with that particular sentence. (I have since deleted that sentence.) Apparently this woman also cherry picked something from another post about people (me specifically I guess) taking stuff home that was donated and she made sure all the other board members were shown these excerpts and were properly outraged. I was making SHARE look bad. I never took anything donated by HEB or Walmart, all the day old bakery products and produce and prepared salads and stuff, that I wasn't allowed to take. We volunteers were encouraged to take what we wanted of that stuff by the director because this stuff in on the edge or just past when we get it and wouldn't last another week even if we had room in one of the refrigerators. Many of the volunteers took stuff including the particular board member crucifying me. Anything I took was either handed to me or at the end of the day after we had served the last client and it was take it or it would get thrown away or given to another volunteer for chicken food. 99% of the stuff I took at the end of the day was given to a neighbor who has custody of three of their young grandchildren. They think my writing about that made SHARE look bad but I didn’t write anything that wasn’t true. If I made SHARE look bad by writing about that then the problem wasn't me. 

Two and a half weeks after this board member got everybody riled up the board met on Monday morning and in a near unanimous vote, they kicked me out. I didn’t find out about any of this until Monday afternoon when the director called to tell me I was no longer allowed to volunteer. I was kind of shocked speechless at first and asked if it would matter if I apologized and wrote a post clearing any confusion about the grant and the flooring. She said she would talk to the board members Thursday and let me know. But, you know, I had all night Monday night (couldn’t sleep because my brain would not let it go) and all day Tuesday to think about this. And this is what finally dawned on me. 

I have volunteered there for 6 years. I showed up every week, I did my job, I didn't take anything I wasn’t given or allowed to take, I never once was rude or dismissive to any of our clients, and I got along, I thought, with the other volunteers. The board and maybe even other of the volunteers had been chewing on this for two and a half weeks. Not once did a single person consider me friend enough or had the common decency to come to me and express their concerns about some of the things I had written or even just given me a heads up that the knives were out. I was never given a chance to apologize, edit my posts, or otherwise try to make amends. I had no indication from anyone Thursday of last week that things were amiss and four days later they stab me in the back. Silly me, I expected better from a group run by churches, from religious people I have worked with for six years (and they wonder why church attendance is down). Aren't they supposed to be all about forgiveness? 

I don’t know who they think reads what I write anyway. No one in Wharton reads it, even though I do post a new entry on FB I’m only connected to two people in Wharton on FB, one of whom is the board member that instigated my removal. She sent me a friend request shortly after she started volunteering and I accepted. Had I known more about her at the time I would not have.

So, yeah, I no longer am allowed to volunteer at SHARE and I don't think I would go back even if they changed their collective mind. No one cared enough about me to come talk to me before they cast me away. I don't know how I get over that. How do you work with people again that voted you off the island. I have to say though that the director stood up for me, she tried to calm them down at the meeting and then talked to them again on my behalf to no avail and she hated having to tell me of their decision.

 

signs, signs, everywhere are signs

First was the noticeably shortening days, baby anoles started hatching, then the pampas grass bloomed, the colorful tallow leaves falling one at a time, oxblood lilies, then the yew trees dropping their seeds, the acorns starting to fall, now the pecan tree leaves are drifting down along with the crepe myrtle leaves and the oak leaves, the sun shifting position on the horizons, my street in shade by 6 pm instead of 7:30.

Now if the temperature would only catch up. Saturday morning was very pleasant, maybe even bordering on a tad bit cool. Left the backdoor open while I went out first thing after feeding the cat, the dog, and meds, grabbed my shovel and dug out all the nut grass in preparation of adding the garden soil. I had thought to plant broccoli and cabbage there but after I dug out the nut grass I looked at the sky mentally tracing the winter path of the sun, looked at the the expanding banana trees behind the bed and wondered if this spot was going to get enough sun. So I dumped the bag of garden soil in the 4’ x 4’ raised bed in front of it instead and worked it in. By then any hint of coolness was gone, I was starting to sweat so I came in for coffee, email, blogs, and breakfast. I think I’ll plant the broccoli and cabbage in the 4’ x 4’ and carrots and mustard greens in the other. I still have another area to work the composted manure into for more broccoli and cauliflower and the kohlrabi seeds I bought. Saturday morning after I came in the plan was to add the second bag of super soil and plant the 4’ x 4’ raised bed early evening. At 6 pm, I looked out there and…nah. I’d rather fix a drink and sit down with my book. I did go out and get 6 more little broccoli plants earlier in the day.

Apropos of nothing, whoever owns that house on my east side has still not shown up to check it out four weeks after the tenants moved out. Thought you’d like to know that.

I did work on the shadow box a bit on Saturday. I painted a new water background because I couldn’t decide about the one that was blue and white. I did a second one with two blues which makes it darker in the back. Now I need to paint the heron head and put it all together and decide on which water background I want to use. I’m ready to get this one done.

Sunday was another coolish morning so I got out as soon as cat, dog, meds and spread more super soil and composted manure in one area or another and got my first six broccoli plants and eight cabbage plants (two of the cabbage plants had a second little plant that may or may not make it) in the 4’ x 4’ raised bed. The planting guide said 12” - 24” apart, 12” if you wanted small heads, which there are only two of us so ok, 12” apart it is. Now I’m visualizing grown plants and maybe that isn’t far enough apart. 

We’ll see. I have six more broccoli plants, different variety so I’ll plant them in a different spot further apart. I set up the sprinkler to water the little plants in and then it was time to go in for coffee and brunch. Checked the raised bed after 30 minutes. I hadn’t watered that raised bed once I pulled out the green beans and tomato plants from spring and that dirt was so dry it actually repelled water. Stuck my finger in the dirt to see how deep the water had gotten. Fair right under the sprinkler, only about an inch everywhere else so I let the sprinkler run for another 30 minutes and checked again and still dry about two inches down so had watered pretty thoroughly along all four sides. And now it’s all in the sun so maybe I’ll get the rest of the broccoli and some mustard greens seed in this evening which is one of those things that sounds doable in the morning but by 6 pm…see above. Actually, I did get the rest of the broccoli in early evening. 

This morning I went out to check on my little plants, stuck my finger down in the raised bed in various places and still bone dry! I wasn’t kidding about that dirt repelling water so I supercharged about a dozen spots with the sprayer on the hose. Then I planted two short rows of mustard greens seed in the bed behind it.

I did start on the heron head yesterday. Started with the eye as I figured that would be the most difficult so if I was going to have to try again I’d rather not wait until I’d done so much work on it. It’s ok, not as crisp as I would like. I’m trying to convince myself it’s fine, that no one, once the shadow box is put together and hanging on a wall, is going to zero in on the eye. Worked on it more today.

Photo at the top…the heat and drought tolerant plumbago is in full bloom. Yesterday while I was working out there pipevine swallowtails and black swallowtails were all over it. No picture because I didn’t have my camera but also because they were in constant motion.

 

busy week

You will not be surprised to learn that I did not get my plans for the weekend done. I did get dirt and plants and some seeds (but not all I wanted) on Saturday and then Sarah and I went to get mani pedis (more sparkling toes!). I don’t get polish on my fingernails because I don’t like the way it feels and yes, I can feel the polish, it feels like my nails are suffocating. Doesn’t seem to bother me on my toes though. Or maybe it’s because for all my working life I worked in an etched glass fabrication studio and always kept my nails extremely short, and now that I’m retired, gardening and maintaining a bigger yard I still prefer very short nails. And fake nails? No way. I don’t see how people function with those long fake nails. 

Sunday mornings are even longer than weekday mornings and while I did get one bag of good expensive garden soil carried out to the bed I want to start in, it was already in the sun by the time I did that and nut grass has sprung up in that newly weeded down to dirt bed so that has to be dug up first. And did I mention it was already in the sun? So, yeah, nothing more got done. Monday morning was a bust because I had to leave early because Robin had an appointment to finally get her driver’s license. She needed to use my car because it’s legal and everything works so I followed her and Sarah to the DPS and she passed. Then she and Sarah continued on to the city where Robin is going to start working part time and I came on home. 

I had my annual eye exam Monday afternoon. My insurance requires a referral for a specialist and since I go to an ophthalmologist and not an optometrist I need a referral. I called the referral department two weeks in advance of my appointment to give them plenty of time to send it. Last Friday the doctor’s office called, they hadn’t received my referral yet. Called the referral department, oh yes, I see you called on the 9th, don’t know why it hasn’t been sent, I’ll see what I can do. Monday morning, still no referral so I called my PC doc’s office, explained the thing to them. Oh, yes I see your doctor has authorized it, I don’t know why it wasn’t sent, let me transfer you to the referral department. The eye doc’s office finally got the referral an hour before my appointment so I didn’t have to reschedule. Vision hasn’t changed, right eye cataract hasn’t changed much so no surgery yet, dilated my eyes and they look healthy she says. And then yoga that night.

This has been an incredibly busy week for me. Monday was a long day. Tuesday was grocery shopping for the week and then my night to fix dinner which only gives me a few free hours in the afternoon when it’s too hot to work outside. Wednesday I had my 6th month check in with the EP. I go prepared with a book because I know I’ll be waiting about an hour (no loud grumbling from others waiting this time). On the way home I stopped by CostCo to return the shoes and then did some shopping. I had cut the mailing label off the bag they came in and stuck it in the box. The nice lady thanked me for bringing that, makes it so much easier she said. Then when I was ready to check out I got in one of two lines and it turned out to be the self checkout line which I had never used before. An employee had scanned my items while I was in line and when I got to the check out I didn’t quite know what to do. The employee told me to scan my card and then scan my items. So I did. Got to the line to exit and the woman counted and counted again and finally figured out I had been charged twice for every item so anyway if was all straightened out but it was mid afternoon before I got home. I skipped yoga class that evening because I just did not want to get in the car on the highway again after only being home for a couple of hours.

Spied these two moths on one of the yew trees Wednesday. They were about 14” apart. They are female (brown) and male (yellow) Io moths (automeris io), part of the silkworm family.

Yesterday I was back at SHARE after being closed the last two Thursdays for new flooring. The vinyl in the back food area is nice, kind of a gray marble/stone pattern, but the carpet is hideous. Kind of a red and gray stripe pattern in blocks that turn 90˚ from each other. Really ugly but I had little time to even think about it because this was probably the busiest day we’ve ever had except for maybe one Thursday before Thanksgiving. We had 56 food orders, mostly bigger families. Since we were closed Jan didn’t order very much from the regional food bank, she hadn’t shopped locally, and we hadn’t received any donations. We ran out of one item and at the end of the day we are very low on many others. We have an abundance of eggs though because we still have to get our monthly donation whether we are giving them away or not. I was so tired when I got home but I went to the local yoga class anyway since I had missed the night before. Stephanie asked us if we wanted high energy thumb up or low energy thumb down. All eleven of us went thumbs down. 

So now today, this is the first day of this week I haven’t had to rush my morning to get somewhere or do something and wouldn’t you know this morning was really kind of pleasant, would have been perfect for me to get out there first thing and dig up the nut grass and spread and turn in the good garden soil. So did I? Fuck, no, I was enjoying my not rushed leisurely morning.

* Picture at top…Philippine violet. 

 

osteoporosis, rat killing, books

Wednesday I created a Feedly account and transferred my blog list over there since Blogger had become unreliable. So, of course, the next morning, guess what? Blogger had finally refreshed the blog roll on my sidebar and the reading list on the dashboard. Damn, if I’d know that’s all it took I’d have done it days ago.

Nothing has happened in my little world since I last published Tuesday. I have some pictures to share but first a little health reporting. You might remember I had my 6 month check up with the PC doc. We talked about my latest dexa scan results for osteoporosis. It’s been three years since my previous scan and most my numbers are stable, my lumbar spine improved, total left hip essentially no change, left femoral neck worsened (T score went from -2.9 to -3.1 but the Z score did not change). So we talked about the meds, how they work, how common are side effects. For those of you who don’t know, the standard treatment for osteoporosis is bisphosphonates like Fosamax that work by preventing your body from breaking down old weak bone faster than new bone is made. That’s how it increases density. I questioned the effectiveness of this especially since some women on these drugs still suffer fractures. Bones may be denser but they aren’t necessarily stronger to which my doctor replied that old weak bone is better than no bone. Ok, she’s got a point there. I also questioned whether taking calcium was really helping since calcium alone does not build bone. Other nutrients are required to convert calcium to bone and brought up all the various supplements advertised that claim to build bone for people when nothing else worked (and of course the only place you can buy them is online from a single vendor). She said there is no clinical evidence that supports their claims. I asked whether there were any drugs that stimulated bone building not just prevent break down (break down speeds up, bone building slows down in women after menopause). And, yes, the injectables do but most insurance companies won’t pay for that unless you go through the bisphosphonates first but that they also interact with other drugs like the one I take for my thyroid. Well, I have no intention of taking the bisphosphonates, the side effects are awful, I believe they are more common than they tell you, and women are still suffering fractures. So she’s sending me to an endocrinologist for a more specialized look.

In the meantime I continue yoga, keeping limber, maintaining balance (falling being the number one reason bones break), and strengthening my muscles to help protect my bones. They also tell you that walking or running or dancing or jumping, anything that causes impact on the feet and hips, stimulates bone growth. I’ve read that just doing so with your normal weight may not produce any benefit because your body is used to your weight, that you need to do exercises that target specific areas or activities (as noted above) with added weight, gradually increasing the weight over time so as not to suddenly add ten or more pounds to already weak bones. Granted, this info is from trainers who want to sell their exercise instructions and routines but it makes sense. I’m not interested in joining a gym and certainly can’t afford a trainer so I bought a weighted vest. The vest itself weighs four pounds and came with six additional one pound weights that slip into pockets on the vest. Right now I’m only wearing the vest with no additional weight when I walk the dog and I’ve added side leaps and walking lunges with the vest on. I realize it may have no impact on bone growth and it will take six months of gradually increasing the weight to see any possible improvement but the vest cost less than $40 and while it may not help, it can’t hurt. 

Thursday was the coolest day since last spring. I don’t think it even broke 90˚ and we got a little shower earlier and when I went over to feed the kitties it was drizzling. Would be nice if that was the start of lower temps but we’re headed back into mid 90s tomorrow and for the foreseeable future with the attendant humidity. Went out to run some errands earlier, or as my mother would have said, do my rat killing. First to the Evil Empire for more AC coolant for the car and a coupe of prescriptions for Marc and more watercolors for Paisleigh as she’s pretty much used up the ones she has and a coloring book. Also got another pad of watercolor paper for me and a new set of sheets. These are 600 thread count Egyptian cotton discontinued and on sale for less than $40 in a soft sage green color. Hard to pass that up since I did need another set of sheets. Then off to Hesed House market for local lettuce, honey, eggs, and cornmeal. This weekend the plan is to get more compost and prepare the beds for planting, acquire plants and seeds, and maybe even get something in the ground. It’s still really too hot for winter vegetables but if they aren’t in the ground soon there won’t be enough time to produce before we start getting freezes. And there’s a super niño this year which means a colder wetter winter for us.

Now some pics…I’ve seen quite a few fritillaries this year (picture at the top), in another subtle sign of the coming shift of seasons the tallows are starting to drop their colorful leaves whereas before they were just dried up brown from the heat and drought.

Saw this walnut sphinx moth hiding in the not yet blooming mist flower,

these guys were on a thin althea branch. The bigger one was chowing down on a leaf.

A cascade of rangoon creeper flowers.

Two book reviews to end.

A Box Full Of Darkness by Simone St. James - Siblings Violet, Vail, and Dodie grew up in Fell NY, a town where strange things seemed to be the norm and most particularly in their little neighborhood and house. Born to emotionally distant and generally unavailable parents with no other children in the neighborhood, the three Esmie children relied on each other even though none of them shared the nightmares and visitations they suffered. They knew Violet sees ghosts but she never told them about Sister who menaced her constantly, nor Dodie about the waters that rose and in her room at night not Vail who would be awakened by a light and figures peering over him. When their mother appeared one day with a baby, their little brother Ben became their world but then Ben disappeared when he was six during a game of hide and seek and never seen again. Whatever glue held the family together dissolved when Ben disappeared. Within two years the house was abandoned, and two decades later both parents deceased and the three siblings scattered barely remaining in contact. Then one day Violet gets a call from the landscaping company hired to maintain the yard of the family home. They are quitting the contract, he can’t make any of his workers go there again. What did you see, Violet asked. A little boy, he said come home. And so Violet contacts her siblings and the three return to the family home to finally find the answer to what happened to Ben. A nice little haunted house/ghost story.

Solo Leveling 1 by Chugong - Translated from Korean, this is the first of 8 books in the English release, 14 in the original Korean edition. It’s like a video game or graphic novel in book form. There is also a comic series and two Netflix features, one animated, one live action. Jinwoo is a level E Hunter, the lowest and weakest Hunter level. Gates open to dungeons and the hunters have to go in and kill the beasts therein and kill the Boss of the dungeon before they enter the world. After the Boss is killed the gate will close and the hunters have an hour to get out or be trapped in the dungeon forever. Jinwoo is on a hunt in a double dungeon, the inner dungeon of which is a temple, with giant statues that attack the hunters. There is a plaque with three commandments and Jinwoo figures out how to follow the commandments and survive. He manages to let the 8 surviving hunters escape and then inadvertently completes the third commandment and is rewarded by a mysterious System with the ability to change his status as a hunter, something no other hunter can do, hunters are awakened and your level is your level for life. Jinwoo is trying to keep his ability a secret as he continues to level up but when he is the only survivor of several hunts with higher level hunters people are starting to take notice. This is written as if it is a video game with all the grunts and various noises written out. It was ok, just not to my taste and definitely aimed at a younger audience. I won’t be reading any of the others.