Greening up steadily here now.

Photo copyright Aji, 2023; all rights reserved.

It's a strange day today, a mix of wonderful and notsomuch. You can see the haze at the horizon in the photo up there, a mix of dust and pollen and the smoke that the north wind drove down here yesterday from that wildfire outside Pueblo, Colorado. It's cold and the wind is rising, but it's greening up steadily here now. 

Today is also the anniversary of the departure of our spirit dog, seven years ago. On that day, we had a foot of new snow by midmorning, and all of it was melted by noon. No snow here this day, but official weather warnings about the risks attending our now too-rapid thaw and runoff, and the possibilities of flooding that may result. We also have extreme fire warnings for this week, because while we have wind today, Tuesday through Thursday are supposed to bring WIND, all caps, the 20-foot winds that, at a velocity of 50 mph, are so very deadly and destructive. No sparks, people; no smokes, no butts, no chains, no power tools, and no freaking flames for any reason whatsoever. [Someone, of course, will start something; they always do. Last week, there was apparently some new colonizer up the highway a mile or two from us setting fire to their entire yard, ON PURPOSE, while we have these winds and a 1,200-year drought. It never fails.]

This morning we had a visit from yet another bald eagle, circling over Pueblo Peak, this one virtually full-grown ("virtually," because head and tailfeathers were all solid white, although the body was not yet 100% brown). I think it's the fourth distinct bald we've had come to visit this spring, and we've never seen so many here before. They don't like being this close to human habitation, so sighting them now is undoubtedly not a good thing, at least in terms of environmental balance. But for us it's a gift. This one was missing a large chunk of feathers out of its right wing, so it's tangled with something recently, another bald or maybe a larger golden, or something on the ground with teeth. 

I spent yesterday starting to catch up on chores around here, and today will be more of the same. I have a buffalo/vegetable stew already simmering in the crock pot, so dinner's covered. I also finally got the descriptions done this morning for Wings's three newest piece that I've been promising for day, so they're up on the site; hopefully there'll be a collective post here in a bit. Laundry and a few other things first, though. In the meantime, all of our links are here; BIG emphasis on sales for now, because while we've got payment #1 on this year's taxes in already and I think will be able to send prepayment #1 on next year's later this week, I'm back to needing to bring in roughly one sale a week to cover it all:

• Sales here; 
• Testimonials here; 
• Amazon wishlist here (new priority, because this week I've been forced to eliminate another staple from my diet just to function rather minimally, and someone mentioned that perhaps our old non-stick pans, which are in fact long since well beyond their useful date, are making the matter worse, so there's a non-PFAS replacement set at the top that would help with cooking/cleanup/my hands/my illness; and yes, the Zero-Odor sprays are still useful right now, although these days it's dusty dogs, not wet ones); 
• Patreon here;
• Ko-fi here.

There's lots of fabulous work on the site, so please share all of the links. 

All content, including photos and text, are copyright Wings and Aji, 2023; all rights reserved. Nothing herein may used or reproduced in any form without the express written permission of the owner.