Two things happened to inspire me to start this blog. First, a dear old friend (whom I have known for exactly two months) started one, and second, my brother-in-law is going on a nature field trip to California for three weeks.
Well if my friend can start a blog so can I. I am not sure what I am going to say here or why I am even doing this, but here it is. A warning in advance, dear reader, it is written for me not you. So why not just keep a journal on my computer like I used to? Why air my fetid thoughts in a public medium? Maybe there is some vain hope that some one will read it and find something moving, although I doubt that. My old journal? I don't even read it.
So how does my brother-in-law's trip influence this? Why would I start a blog because he is going to California to look at some birds and wildflowers? We were chatting about his trip and he said that he was going to see such and such here and this other thing there and so forth. We were talking quite a while about different places in California and what he expected to see at each place. Finally I asked him, considering everything that you may see, how many new species of living things do you think you will encounter? He replied 300, and he is not joking or exaggerating. 300 new species (for him) in three weeks. In my entire repertoire of living things, I could probably reliably identify 100 species, of everything, for the entire world.
300 new species! I have a wild flower growing out in my back yard, in the steep part that I have grown too decrepit to maintain. I decided, OK, if he can get 300 new species in 3 weeks, at least I can ID the wildflower in my back yard. It took 15 minutes to find the field guide, and another 15 minutes to find the flower. Garden phlox, an escapee. Quite beautiful, quite fragrant, and quite common.
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