Cool and gorgeous

Writing teachers say you should never start a piece of writing by discussing the weather, but today is special. The heat wave broke, it is a perfect sunny day, not too cool, not too hot. The last time I remember weather this fantastic was the day that two planes brought down the World Trade Center, but I think that was just a coincidence and do not expect massive tragedy today - except in the Gulf of Mexico, but that's been going on for months now. Anyway, the park is truly a spectacular place on days like this.

The swan family has found it's home in the sun, or rather in the Lullwater, where the delicious duckweed grows. They don't even mind photographers getting close.

The piles of wood chips waiting to be raked into paths are sprouting mushrooms. JJ was interested but decided they were not edible after all,. I wonder if they are edible for humans. Hard to know with mushrooms. We used to have a mushroom identification book written by someone who tasted them all. Fascinating descriptions of exactly how sick he got from eating some of them - very specific as to pains, bodily effects, etc. Sadly, the book has been either lost or misplaced - we have a lot of books, and they seem to get camouflaged on the bookshelves every so often. Anyway, those descriptions were graphic enough that I only eat mushrooms from stores.

There are more boards piled up under the bridge. Repairs? Still hopeful, although Anne says that machinery pictured previously was trimming trees, not fixing bridges. Love our network of observers who can enlighten each other!

Progress at the Park: The east end of the Lake has been dammed up with blue plastic and wood while they've been building the new skating rink. Looks like they are filling in the drained part over there, suggesting that the new rink and plantings might actually be ready soon. Of course, I'm being hopelessly optimistic. Probably stems from today's Yahoo news - a prototype of a flying car is being tested. When I was a kid, flying cars were ALWAYS a part of the future, so I feel the future has arrived.