the year's project part 2

Pictures, please! I just planted 2 more little N.M. Agastaches in my front yard. Glad you had a good vacation and are back.

I will post pictures of the yard when I catch up enough to take them. As for the vacation, I was flying past Las Vegas when I remembered my camera was sitting on my desk. Took a couple with the cell phones but will have to extract them to post.

Welcome back! too bad about the pictures but I bet you had a great time during all the moments you would have been taking photos.....

I see that I have to get the camera from work again. I must take a picture of the "Gaurdian". The hummingbird that sits outside my door all day long gaurding the Agastachies!

Do you think it will gaurd me from all the bears?

I have closed my solid front door instead of only the screen door. Too many bear droppings around the house! I just don't like the idea of having to use my .44 magnum loaded with violent animal rounds. These rounds could easily go through my neighbor's walls.

What can you do when you find a bear turd on your front porch? Or worse, I woke up in the early morning the other day thinking that something was rattling the front screen/glass door.

I don't like my sleep to be interuppted, but a bear rug sounds cool along with a fulll freezer.

Sonny

A client from Alaska said they use hair spray cans with bacon wrapped around them. Bears do not return after biting into one of those. Haven't tried it myself but they said it works every time.

I have been gone awhile, not from my home, but this forum, and am going to have to do some catching up. Had my grandson here for a month and have been quite distracted, in a good way.

Welcome back, Dave who is Dave, and Mulch! That is funny that you said "Mr. Savage" Dave, he's my father... I kept my maiden name. Mr. Down, my husband, has taken too many pics of me that I don't like (or maybe it's seeing myself aging a bit that I don't like)...

anywhooo, the dancing wasn't pretty (on my part) but it was fun. If I can get my friend's video to work and if I can download it here, and if it's not waaaaay too embarrassing, I might post it.

Brenda

Welcome Home Dave who is Dave and Mulch ^_^

Howdy, Mulch!

Oh, post it , Brenda! I don't think any of us are getting any younger. Except Benjamin Button. That was a movie character who aged backwards. I didn't see the movie. Must've seen a preview. It struck me as annoying! l.o.l. Hi, Mulch. Glad you had fun with your grandson. But, we missed you. I like your practical bear solution. There was plenty of bear poop on trails and near the campground on our recent camping trip. They are just out and about looking for goodies. I'm talking about black bears, not grizzly bears. Yikes! Black bears are not my favorite animal to have stumbling around my tent at night either. We were very careful about food and used unscented soap, shampoo and lotion when we showered. I slept with two clean sauce pans by my pillow to bang around to make noise if I heard a bear. Which is kind of a joke, 'cause I sleep through almost anything!

Yes, post the pics Brenda. We are all getting older. Be proud of having successfully navigated life this far!

As for Mr Savage, you are a Savage and he is your mister. Works the other way too for you being a Down. I think its much easier legally to keep your name, but when you marry you adopt something from your partner.

In my avid backpacking days, we used to keep firecrackers in the tent at night. Just in case. Never used 'em, though.

When I was working in Yellowstone, I got my hands on the incident report for a certain young Swiss woman's death. I had always wondered why she had been killed by a griz in her sleep. The press had reported that she had "done everything right" (although solo backpacking in griz habitat is not something I would do). To my amazement, the incident report stated that rangers found a chocolate bar in the tent.

Conclusion: the Park Service was keeping things from the press.

I'm sorry, Dave-who-is-Dave. If it ain't fairies, it's the dang bears!

I wanted DH to become a dahlianut but he wouldn't :(

Food anywhere near your tent is a no no no no no no. We used to camp on islands and have the 'kitchen' at least 50 feet from our tents. Fish were cleaned on the far side of the island from camp. Dang bears used to swim out to the island when they smelled fish cooking.

Dahlianut: We don't get to pick how/what our spouses absorb from us and we only have partial control over what we absorb from them. Its all innate. Gotta pick someone you like cause that is what you are going to get.

I don't get why you apologizing picante. Bears vs. fairies? I do agree that the Forest Service is not 100% up front with their communication regarding bears. They don't want to scare people away from Yellowstone. I think it would be better if people were a little more scared. The situation there with bears not being afraid of people and the people not being afraid of the bears is not a good one. I'd also like it if I didn't have to reserve a campsite a year or two in advance.

Oops I wasn't clear Dave who is Dave. I didn't want DH to actually morph into a dahlianut cuz that would be impossible cuz he is he and me is me. I just wanted him to have a nut name like Hubbynut or Skippernut or NeatandTidyNut or something he liked.

I should think that your DH would have at least one name from you dahlianut. Names are given, so go to it!

LOL, you all! I can't get the movie/pics to work (though I have tried diligently). I think the files are losing something when my friend emails them to me.

Do you have the right codec for the file type your friend is sending? Computers aren't always smart enough to figure out whether you need a new codec.

My D.H. has lots of names I've given him over the years! Mr. Impossible, being one. He has a few names for me, too.

NeatandTidyNut would be annoying.

Okay, what is a codec? Just when I think I'm pretty good with computers, whammo! Here's a codec. Crikey.

It is a key for COding and DECoding video or audio files. Frequently they are used in compressed formats. Without the codec, a file can't be played because the decompression key is missing.

Oooooh! How do I know what I need and how do I get it? He did them on Picasa, I even downloaded Picasa and tried to open them in that... still no video. We're going to their house tomorrow, so I'm going to take my USB flash drive and save them to that and try it that way.

You need to look at the file extension (.asf. .wmv, .mov, etc) to fingure out which codec was used to make it. Then search for "codec" and the extension on google. His camera software probably uses a codec that was installed with the camera software and once it is installed on his computer all of the programs such as picasa and windows media player have access to that codec. He may or may not be able to choose a different file type in his video software (Picasa can't write different movie types).

Here is a microsoft website that has information about most of the common ones.
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx/kb/316992

OMG now we need the codec thingy! Does wizardguy know about the codec thingy??? lisabees MrNeatandTidynut is very annoying cuz he works in the garden without one particle of dust or smidgen of dirt touching him while I am an instant PigPen soon as I step out the door. One of my fav things is to put a muddy thumbprint on the back of his pure white Tshirt then run away really fast and pretend I know nothing ^_^

D-who-is-D, I'm merely apologizing about fairies and bears because they have taken over your thread, although temporarily, as now the thread has been steered over to useful techie details.

Last I knew, you couldn't reserve a campsite in Yellowstone. First come, first served. Unless you are talking about the RV Parks, which are not Park Service facilities.

I wonder if we ought to start calling you "codecnut", as "Dave-who-is-Dave" seems a bit longish and formal at times. Although it could be abbreviated DwiD.

DwiD sounds like a grand wizard's name (and I have long suspected Dave-who-is-Dave is a wizard). Also it would fit in nicely with the the fairy theme of the project.

Katlian, his files are coming through as jpegs, and it seems as if there is only one image. Maybe it's in how he saved them?

DwiD sounds Druidic. A codec sounds computerish.

Even better!

Well Brenda, jpeg is not a movie format, just a picture format (though jpeg compression can be used in movies) so you are only getting one frame of the movie.

Dave was looking a bit wizardish with the beard. Now all he needs is a garden wizard robe with herb and critter and cool rock designs woven into the fabric. Though, I think robes might be a bit cumbersome in the garden and difficult to wash.

Not really. I garden in a cotton bathrobe whenever possible!

Hmmm. Bathrobes are for accidentally flashing the neighbors, which is not what I want to do. Women can get away with it but men get arrested.

I'm not a codec nut. I'd prefer it if there were fewer of them.

D.H. says, " That's the wonder of capitalism. " In reference to codec stuff, not bathrobes, I guess.

OK. Time for more pictures and in my response to saying things were growing and flowering. :)

First on is Liriope muscari (a gift from my x-inlaws whom I kept anyway) along the West side of the house. They needed space for some paving stones so I relieved them of some plants last Christmas.

The next 2 are of Agastache rupestris flowers. The first one is the same plant pictured above but its bigger now with more flowers. The flowers have also changed to a pinker color. The varying flower hue is one of the things I like about the plant.

These are Oranger.

Here's the rows of Agastache - purple flowered neomexicana on the left, orange-pink-lavender flowered rupestris on the right. The smaller plants have basically doubled in size.

Here's one of the Cistus. Its recovered from the "quality" shipping it was put through and has put on new leaves - the green leaves are all new.

Elfin Thyme mounds in flower.