Another Monday Miscellany

We had heavy cloud cover yesterday morning, with just a small break on the eastern horizon. The sun rose like a huge orange-red balloon in the break, but the clouds stayed a pewter grey; by 8:30, all the clouds had dispersed. Today is cloudless (at the moment) and the sun was a glistening ball of silver-orange fire as it rose. We had a low of 57 last night, while Gunnison, on the western slope, had a low of 33. And yesterday evening and this morning the eastern Colorado plains were pummelled by rain and hail - several towns near the Kansas border received between 1 and 2 inches of quarter-sized hail. My kits are outside, getting wet tummies and toes in the grass. I'll have to round them up about 9 to be ready to go to Walt and Sophie's for the next few days. - Oh, and I took two quizzes on Facebook, the social networking site, last night; according to it, my true Hippie name is Meadow Lotus Song, and my true Native American name is Moon Willow.

Let's see... what else is going on... Zenyatta kept her winning streak alive, winning her race on Sunday by a head, and now has a 12 race win streak. ... A colt in his second race catastrophically broke down on the Polytrack at Del Mar yesterday; the colt that broke down tossed his jockey, Alex Solis, away from the other horses. Captain Cash ran into and over the colt, and tossed his ride, Aaron Gryder, into racing action. Both jockeys are reported to be well. The colt was destroyed when it became apparent that he had broken both left legs; Captain Cash was taken away in the horse ambulance and reportedly has a foreleg injury. ... Virginia has acknowledged it's second recorded case of Eastern Equine Encephalitis for this summer - neither horse had been vaccinated against the disease. The first was a draft-cross in Chesapeake, the second was a 4-year-old miniature mare in Suffolk. Please, if you own any animal - cat, dog, horse, whatever - please have all recommended inoculations! ... Nephew Mike's lady was released from the hospital yesterday afternoon, into the care of her Mother, a Registered Nurse. Allison is on a regimen of blood-thinners. ... And the Tidewater Oyster Gardening Association (in the Chesapeake Bay) would like you to think about the following information:
**Adult oysters filter up to 50 gallons of water a day, removing algae and sediment that negatively affect waterways. **Oyster reefs provide habitats for more than 300 different plants and animals in the Chesapeake Bay. **Volunteers in the Chesapeake Bay Foundation's oyster gardening program grow approximately 300,000 oysters per year for restoration. **The three-dimensional nature of oyster reefs vastly increases the surface area available to not only oysters but other plants and animals that depend on hard substrate for all or part of their life cycle. **
Oyster gardening accelerates the growth rate of oysters better than raising the marine mollusks in their natural environment. This is important because the larger the oysters, the more eggs they produce a 3-inch female can produce 30 million eggs; a 3.5-inch oyster can produce twice as many. **Oyster gardening helps restore oyster populations in the waterways in which they are grown because they spawn before the foundation collects and transplants them onto a sanctuary reef.

Have a wonderful week!