I have a catalpa tree in my backyard. Every year sphinx moth caterpillars hatch from eggs laid on the underside of the leaves and consume every leaf they can get to. Every year I spray malathion on the underside of the leaves my sprayer can reach, thereby saving the lower leaves on the tree. Every year the Springidae eat all the upper leaves down to the nub. Then, with luck, if the tree survives, it regrows its leaves and the stinkin' caterpillars do not return.
You can see that the leaves closest to the ground are larger than the new ones sprouting from the upper limbs. The thing is, every year I fight to keep that tree alive because I like it and because I am at war with those caterpillars. But since I really like working catalpa wood so much perhaps I should just let nature run its course and end up with a ton of nice, aromatic wood to work with.
That is a bowl I turned last week using some catalpa wood I got a couple of years ago - it really is nice to work with, even if the aroma is a bit, shall we say, distinct. Not in a bad way, just that you know when you have been working with it.
We have been getting some weather - shocking, right?
That's our sunset on the 25th.
A storm blew in the other evening and looked like this:
And like this:
Pretty dramatic stuff, with lightning, thunder, flash floods, the works.
As for being productive, last week my productivity was thwarted:
I used black locust wood for that piece - a wood favored by boat builders far and wide.
Click to embiggen any or all of the photos.
I must say I listened to a lot of bad versions of that dance before remembering that Lenny was the man. It requires a quick tempo and emphatic brass - ferners don't get it.
