Summer's spinning out of control!

Okay, I know I'm too busy when it's Friday and I look at my blog and see I haven't posted since Tuesday, and I can't even remember what I did on Wednesday and Thursday. I hate it when things keep me from my blog! Plus I have a hell of a lot of blog-reading to catch up on.

I went running alone today for the first time since we started this in April. (Don't tell anybody, but I love running.) Gordon was acting as duty-counsel in court today, and couldn't make it before the track closed this evening. There was plenty of excitement in the courthouse today. Apparently heat makes people commit more crimes; Gordon was trying to bail out the arrestees until 5:45.  And there was a mini-riot down in the holding cells (where Gordon visits the accused criminals.)  Some guy with anger-management issues actually kicked out a window of bullet-proof glass allegedly separating the prisoners from the lawyers and other staff. Makes you wonder how useful the bullet-proof glass would be if it were actually shot with a gun! 

Anyhoo, off I went to the dome to run. It's not very busy there and at 3 pm, I was the only person who had shown up all day. It does get a little hot and stuffy in there, but not as hot as outdoors. I can't take running in the blazing sun, at least not yet.  

It was nice to have the track to myself, and  listened to tunes on a running playlist I made for my iPhone. I laughed out loud when Muse's Survival came on. It's the official song of the 2012 Olympics and because I haven't watched any Olympic coverage (Owl Wood and I are two of that rare breed of Olympic abstainers!), I'm not even sick of it yet. I am as far from an Olympic runner as you can get, but the song (which seems to be one of those you either love or hate) was strangely motivating. 

I did survive my run, and am still enjoying my endorphin rush, but I'm also bloody hungry so I hope hubby shows up soon and we can dive into the Thai food I got at the Maxville Farmers' Market today. The Glengarry Highland Games are this weekend and we avoid them like the plague. My in-laws are Scottish, my hubby wore a kilt to our wedding, and while a Navy musician, I played next to bagpipers in a massed band many times at the Royal Nova Scotia International Tattoo. On top of that, my parents were English and Irish. There's only so much highland flinging a girl can take, although I would happily visit Scotland again! But the only caber I want to see tossed is my husband's...

ANYHOO! Here are some pics I took the other week and neglected to post.

Polar bear chainsaw-carved by Gerdine Van Woudenberg. I bought it at Art Fayre this year and just love it! Note the book title. :)

The bee-phobic Owl Wood might want to avert his eyes for a moment...

LOOK AT MY BEAUTIFUL BEES!!!

This is what we beekeepers love to see: lots of bees flying in the sun, heading back to the hive with honey and pollen.

You can see there the phrase "hive of activity" came from.

Look at those lovely girls coming and going from the hives!

Here's another lovely girl...

A bumblebee on catnip flowers. All bees go crazy for catnip and other flowers of the mint family.

Incoming!

Three of my hives. I pulled off several boxes this week and extracted a bunch of honey. YUm-o!

And some flowers from my garden...

These poppies self-seed everywhere.

The echinacea is especially popular with the butterflies.

And I have mason bee houses in my garden. I'm not convince I'm attracting any actual mason bees, but I am making some leafcutter bees and I'm not sure what is making the mud nests....

Not a great pic, but the little bee above has a piece of leaf in her grasp.

Here comes another inhabitant!

This box has seen more action this year than ever before. It's quite the year for insects, with all the dry heat we've been having and our crazy, early, hot spring.

Here's a honey bee on motherwort. They go NUTS for this stuff.

And a lily with...

...a fly. Not some pretty bee, but an ugly old fly. I like the juxtaposition of beautiful and icky here.

Have a happy weekend. We have heat warnings issued for tomorrow because it's supposed to be at least 34C with humidex above 40C. All I can say is yuck. But they are predicting much-needed rain on Sunday, and it's supposed to last for hours, not minutes. Fingers crossed, because we're in a drought.