This is not a cupcake.

Posted on by

Photo #478: Cupcake ElkLocation Taken: Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming
Time Taken: October 2012

Well, I covered my random occurrence this week yesterday, leaving me with no idea what to talk about today.

So I’m going to talk about cupcakes.

The picture above is not a cupcake. Knowing the difference between a cupcake and an elk is very important. If you think I’m not being serious, imagine what life would be like if you couldn’t tell the difference.

Cupcakes are small cakes, usually round and heavily frosted on top, but not on the sides, unlike larger cakes. Elks are not frosted at all, unless it’s a cold wet winter. Then they frequently have a bit of frost on their fur.

Cupcakes are very sweet. Unless it’s one of those joke cupcakes made of meatloaf and mashed potatoes. Those are not sweet. I do not know if elk are sweet. I have not licked one.

Cupcakes are frequently served at offices, parties, and office parties. I do not suggest bringing an elk to your next office party. They are tough to serve in individual portions without highly irritating the elk. This is never a good idea.

I don’t eat cupcakes. They’re too sweet for me, and I’d much rather have a bunch of carrots or something peculiar like that. I also don’t eat elk. There’s too much hair in the way when I try to bite down.

And that is all I know about cupcakes. Or at least all I care to know about them. I care more about elk, but I don’t feel like listing all the things I know about elk. It would take too long.

  

It’s amazing what people can overlook and forget about.

Posted on by

Photo #477: Mill FrontLocation Taken: Savage, Maryland
Time Taken: April 2012

I saw an odd thing when walking back from the Savage Mill (pictured above) today.

There was a plastic bottle of Salad Topping just sitting there. Well, Salad Toppins, to be exact. Just a container of mixed seeds and crunchy bits, two thirds full.

It was sitting on a curb, just hanging out, with no one (aside from me) nearby.

It wasn’t even a curb by the large grassy areas, where I could perhaps believe it was left accidentally after a picnic in the summer sun. It was right by a staircase up a steep slope, a decent distance from where anyone regularly hangs out.

My first thought was it might be full of birdseed, since there were some little brown finches puttering around near it, but nope, just regular Salad Toppins.

I haven’t the slightest clue why anyone even brought a container of Salad Toppins to a fancy shopping center like the Mill. I have even fewer ideas why it was left behind, and in such a peculiar spot.

I do wonder how many people passed it by without ever noticing that something so odd was by their feet.

  

I’m not sure if the focus is a bit off of the green cones, or if they’re just that soft naturally…

Posted on by

Photo #476: Non-Pine ConesLocation Taken: Gros Morne National Park, Newfoundland
Time Taken: July 2012

I haven’t a clue what this plant is. It’s got pinecone-like cones, but those are most decidedly not pine needles. And why it has both brown and green cones, that’s a mystery too.

It does add a nice contrast though, between the hard-edged brown cones and the soft-edged green ones. Add in the jagged edges of the leaves, and this plant is full of interesting textures and shapes.

Which, of course, is why I took a photo of it.

  

The Rich Red Land of Prince Edwards Island

Posted on by

Photo #475: PEI LighthouseLocation Taken: Off the eastern coast of Prince Edwards Island
Time Taken: July 2012

Prince Edwards Island is the smallest of the Canadian provinces, one single island in the Gulf of St. Lawrence. It is a pretty large island, though, and an unusual one.

It’s also, by far, the most domesticated place I’ve ever been.

It’s covered with farms and small towns, with tame little forests scattered around. Even the National Park on the island is just a coastal park, with most of its attractions being historical sites and beaches. The largest city is really quite small, only about 35,000 people, with no skyscrapers and a downtown that could fit in any farming town anywhere on the continent. Everywhere you go, you see people or their works, quite different from the wild unpopulated forests of Nova Scotia’s Cape Breton Island, just 40 miles to the east.

It’s the soil, really.

Seriously, you see that deep rust-red color in the picture, in the cliff underneath the picturesque lighthouse?

That’s a sign of dirt that’s just chock full of iron. And that iron gets into the potatoes and other crops grown on the island, and it gets into the milk and cheese produced by the local cows, and it gets into every other thing grown on the island in general.

And it makes them all taste really really good. They’re also healthier than otherwise identical products made elsewhere, thanks to the nutritional benefits of iron. But mostly the benefit is in the taste.

The best potatoes I’ve ever had were grown on Prince Edwards Island. If you’re used to fast food fries, you tend not to think of potatoes having a taste beyond blah, which admittedly works quite well when fried. But these potatoes didn’t need to be fried, or covered in gravy, or smothered in butter. They worked quite well on their own.

The best ice cream I’ve ever had was also made on this island, though only some of the benefit is from the local milk. Cows uses an absurdly high fat content, and a very slow mixing process that gets as little air into the ice cream as possible. That means just one spoonful of their ice cream is more flavorful than a scoop of regular ice cream, and just about as filling. But the extra iron helps form a firm base for the flavor to work off of.

So with all the benefits of crops grown there, I guess its no surprise that the island is covered in farms, making the most of it all.

It did seem quite odd after a week filled with multi-hour boat rides and a long drive across the mostly-uninhabited central portion of Newfoundland, and then bam, civilization. It was almost creepy, really, in that “this is not how the world was” sort of way.

  

Can you even see the lighthouse at the end of the road?

Posted on by

Photo #474: Lighthouse CliffsLocation Taken: St. John’s, Newfoundland
Time Taken: July 2012

I love places where the bones of the earth stick through to the air, proud rocks showing strong in the sunlight.

It requires a hard rock, one that doesn’t weather away too easily, and it requires the vegetation to be kept small, so it doesn’t hide the stone.

In other words, it has to be either too arid or too cold for the trees to grow tall. This is the latter, and my preferred of the two. Here, the plants are strong and green, providing a fantastic cover for the cliffs along the sea.

The grass keeps the rocks from wearing away quickly in the frequent rains, and the cliffs protect the harbor from the storms that bring the rains. And the small lighthouse stands strong to show the ships in, barely visible against the grandeur of the stones.