Extra Socks

It’s a good thing that we have more than, say, 5 pairs of socks each, ie. one pair for each day of the work week. No, we would never survive on that measly amount of foot undies. Not only do our socks get more dirty than our other clothes on a regular basis, sometimes (often) requiring a second wash in hot water and bleach – we are a house full of sock-footin’ kids (and mom) -  but they also tend to be the main cause of ‘go back and change’. More so than any other bit of clothing. You know, water spills, you go to clean it up, you step in the wet… etc. Socks are trouble. Also, as anyone who washes clothes can tell you, socks have a bad habit of not sticking close to their battle buddy. They routinely split up and head off on their own adventures. This is dangerous. They get tossed under dressers, lost in sheets, tucked into shoes, left behind inside pant legs, you name it, and that’s only what might happen on the way to the washing machine. They must still, eventually, negotiate their way BACK, hopefully in sets of two, to the sock drawer.

Well, I don’t mean to alarm you, but we have discovered another startling explanation as to why socks go missing. Beware, you might have a Ninja lurking about in your house:

As to why Ninjas need socks, we have a theory. Our Ninja uses the sock as ‘bait’. She could run off with her prey and play with it in private, if that were her goal, however, we believe the sock is not her intended target. Rather, she makes a point of innocently running back and forth with it, in front of her siblings… with nary a “Nyaah! Nyaah!” or “Neener Neener!” to be heard, because, of course, a Ninja assault must not be predicted or noticed, until it is too late.  Eventually, a brother or sister will succumb and chase the Ninja, thinking to pounce and chew on her while she is distracted with her sock … and will learn the hard way that this was her plan all along. Ninjas are always training.

note: One good thing about our Ninja, is she often returns the socks to where she finds them, when she’s done with them… as she did with the one in this clip!  (After using it against Pumpkin, that is). A good Ninja also takes care of her weapons.

Temple Of Artemis (etc.)

I apologize for disappearing. Our internet connection has been… well... LAME is a polite term for it. I am not even sure this will post, but I’m going to try anyway.

More photos from our last trip to Jerash.
Looking at these, I am again struck by what a beautiful day we had for the outing. The air was so very clear. The hills were covered in lush green. And the afternoon/early evening sunlight was the perfect highlight.
The Temple of Artemis - not the destroyed Temple that was one of the 7 Medieval Wonders of the World, but the one in Jerash - covered a large area and was located on steep terrain. A lot of stairs. My knees had started the day in a bad mood, and by the time we came to this portion of the site, they were creaking and wobbling something fierce. I still pushed through and climbed here and there, but did not get to explore most of this complex. Not yet.

Honor found an interesting chamber – I didn’t let her go in too far. There are areas with unmarked holes and we couldn’t see anything under all this lovely greenery!

The sun was starting to set and the rock simply glowed when studied at certain angles.
  Some of the stairs I mentioned – the rest of the group had left me behind, to limp along slowly(!), but Honor stayed with me.

A view from the Temple, to the modern city of Jerash.

More of those many stairs. I didn’t actually make it up this flight so will have to keep wondering what is up there until a later visit. Instead, I turned around here and rejoined the group going back down. Our friends were visiting, whereas we will be here for awhile, it was good to tag along and visit while we played tourist.

Back at street level, looking up at part of the Temple.

More  of the front of the Temple. As we had approached this Temple from the side – the colonnade runs directly along the front here – it was difficult to get a photo of the whole face of the complex. I might have to try wandering off-road, to the south of the Temple, next time.  



It is grand. Magnificent. This must have been absolutely beautiful when it was new. Despite the weathering and passage of time, it is still beautiful.

More "up". Reports from those with better joints say that there are even more stairs beyond the crest here.

How did the builders manage to get those huge stones all the way up there??


Of course, ‘backing up’ off the south-east? of the road to get a wider shot, might be tricky. There are walls and other obstacles across from the Temple too. We’ll have to see.

And then someone decided it was time to strike off again, to the next stop on our adventure. We hopped back down onto the stony colonnade, and marched off toward the North Gate.
“Come on mom!”


UPDATE - After more studying of a map, it appears that what I am calling the Temple of Artemis is wrong. This whole area is a series of buildings and temples around the Temple. Forgive me - there is just so much!! It's overwhelming! I definitely need to go back with a book, map, (there is not much in the way of signage out there) and sufficient time(!), so I can get all these amazing buildings straight in my head! This is a 'learn as I go' project.

Not just me

I thought the rains yesterday were heavy, but I’ve been out of wet weather so long, I assumed that I was just easily impressed. But it wasn’t just my imagination. Yesterday’s rains were newsworthy.

The Jordan Times reported flash floods around the country that trapped people, caused accidents, flooded homes, and even required the evacuation of 150 tourists out of Petra. This wet weather is supposed to last through Thursday – hopefully in a less extreme state. The good news is that this is a lot of water heading into the reservoirs!

It appears that the weather was worse elsewhere – or perhaps the weather was the same, but the effects were worse. The news states that 7 people were killed in flash floods in Egypt, roads washed out, houses washed away, etc. Scary.