Seed pods!!!

For those of you who know little about seed pods, let me just explain that often on plants, the fruits will turn into seed pods. Think about those giant brown things that fall off of Locust trees. Those are seed pods. In a way, fruits are also seed pods, but just seed pods that come with something delicious to entice animals to eat them and spread their seeds with special fertilizer (i.e. feces). Both of these pictures are seed pods lacking fruits... the top image spreads seeds because the pods dry, and the seeds fall out and are scattered onto the surrounding ground. I thought that these were exceptionally beautiful... their amazing jet black color is extraordinary!

This one was a real amazing surprise. I was picking a seed pod to show Tilen, and I accidentally touched the top part of this one here- to which the seeds were literally shot out as the pod coiled.

Oh nature.
I love you.

No Joke. Saw This Band Live.

Posdraveljeni!
Hope all is well! A few nights ago, I went to a concert with my friends here. Many villages have parties put on as fundraisers for the village volunteer fire men. I went to one in Otavice.

Now, when I was told that I was going to this village, I was also told I would learn to dance the polka with my friend Rok. Ok... that sounds like a blast. Generally, I am an old woman and very much enjoy doing things where I am the only one under the age of 40. What I was not expecting was that everyone there would be under the age of 40, and that everyone would know how to sing and dance to polka. It was incredible. Nearly everyone that I danced with would sing along with the words as we flew around.

We literally polka-ed the night away. Sun down to sun up. This band did not know how to stop. They kept finishing sets, and everyone would yell for encores... and then they would deliver! But not just a simple few songs, they would play again for an hour. This lasted until 4:30 am! My feet were cold, my legs exhaused, my stomach hungry... but my heart was so content. Thank you, super young polka band. Thank you, Slovenia.

Faces...

I think that you should know this face...

And this is a view from a research attempt in Maribor... about halfway up to the start of the downhill cup.







Anica! My "aunt". This is the wonderful woman that has taken me in as a guest and faux-daughter. This is the woman that rides her bike with me to Blate, and who has taken it as her personal responsibiltiy to find my plant, even if she doesn't really know what it looks like... this is also the woman who washes my underwear and then hangs it out to dry where lots of people can see it. This is different than America, where people hide their underwear... but you know... its ok. Needless to say, I love her.




These are the Cerknica people that I stayed with! The man on the right is my grandmothers little brother, and his wife Olga is on the left, with Tina next to me. Wonderful people.










And HERE is Tilen with Špela, his girlfriend. This is in front of a park and lake near their apartment. These are the wonderful people who have gone out of their way to make sure I am taken care of, even though they have an entire month of exams to work on. I could not have any more fun with them, they are incredible.





This is not everyone! I have no pictures of the people in Blate who are also so so wonderful... but I will take pictures soon.
Love from Slo.

If you can't beat em...

Živijo homies,

I hope that life is going well there in the states! Things are good here... just spent the weekend in Cerknica with my grandmother's brother and his family. It was really fun to look at pictures- my favorite was definitely a beautiful one of Slava standing by all of her siblings while they were kids. It was in the bedroom I stayed in. I also spent several hours looking at the rest of the pictures they had. I did not know the people in them, but they were very excited to show them to me.

The weather really has been exceptional for a large part of my trip, though it rained the entire time I was in Cerknica. I still managed to study a population of garlic mustard, saw a castle, and accompanied Tine on his chores:

Tine loves his cows. They are his sons, they are his friends...
Now, I do like cows, but I don't really like milk. There are things that milk goes well with... brownies, chocolate chip cookies, cocoa powder, Austrian parties (for those of you with facebook access, feel free to view the album "I can't spell things in French" for more information on that reference). And there are things that milk does not go well with... mostly everything else, including Wetzel.

Still, I wanted to accompany Tine doing the things that he loved, so I learned how to milk the cows. Unfortunately, there are no pictures, becuase Tine and I could not really communicate so well, but you just have to believe me. I extracted about 3% of that milk from a cow.

In addition to joining the Slovenes in their farming hobbies, I stumbled upon this the other day: those of you who know your extreme mountain sports, will recognize this as the downhill mountain biking World Cup, taking place on the very mountain in which I was searching for my plant in Maribor, Slovenia. No plant, but I think that accidentally coming across the world cup (and getting in for free, mind you, since I just happened to be in the woods) was still a very good way to spent the afternoon.

So in short, I am all about joining the Slovenes... meeting them where they are.
This is why I have started smoking.

Even in Paradise There is Death.

I have certainly been surprised at the number of dead animals I have seen while biking and hiking. Rats, mice, birds, cats, and then just regular 'ol roadkill. This was the first little guy that I found. Rest in peace, hun.



















Then I came home and I drank tea out of this mug.

Too much.

?

Hey folks,
I don't really know what happened with the alignment in the last post (not tech-savvy), but instead of spending my time fixing it, I decided to just add a couple more pictures.

Welcome to a short scrapbook of confusing things:

















Ok, first of all: WHAT?! This is the ENERGIZER BUNNY! What the hell is going on? Does Energizer know?!!













































Now this is a fine house in the woods, who could it belong to? Ah, but of course.

PICTURES!

Just a few... more to come!


This is one of my favorite places to ride my bike. It is still inside of Ribnica, though almost at the base of Velika Gora. Beautiful? Why yes, I think so.








Kočevje






My chacos at the Croatian Coast



Alliaria petiolata (at the right)
NOT to be confused with wild garlic.
3 populations down, and I am comin' for more. I will find you.


Sveta Ana (left)... where one of my populations is. Look for the church on the mountain!




And this is Ribnica! My beautiful village, complete with my Canadian friend.