You paint lovely pictures with words. Thank you for sharing.

So beautiful. Are you single and are you a good cook? Steve S.

She has a hubby Steve. You're so cute! I hope you find someone as wonderful as Suzy.

I too noticed the shorter days, redder evenings and how it "felt" like Thanksgiving. This is my first Thanksgiving without the little one and I have been dreading it terribly. This morning the wind (Hurricaine Ida remnants) was whipping it up and the leaves were swirling round me while the light hit the buildings in that cooler autumn way that they do. Someone, somewhere, was off in the distance cooking hamburgers. In the morning? Yep, hamburgers. I thought, oh this feels just like a football game as I hearkened back to high school. I wished LF and I had the day off and we had a kite. Crisp wind, crisp apples, crisp days. I love the coziness of the darker nights. I'm sure I'll tire of it, but for now it is like a snuggly blanket. People are retreating into their homes, but they're lit so beautifully. I'm talking about the glow of table lamps visual through gossamer curtains. I have seen some holiday lights, but I didn't mean those, yet. It's almost time for family, food, and fun! I can use some fun.

I love your rambling threads. They make me want to ramble a little myself.

As my Henry dog and I take our morning and afternoon walkabouts, I grow somewhat melancholy when I see the
red and yellow leaves tumbling down. Those from the yellow sweet gum look ever so much like stars lying on the grass.
The mockingbird eyes me from the nandina as we pass. The robins are feasting on the beautyberries. The hummingbird feeder hangs unused. Twice I have seen bluebirds checking out my bluebird houses--looking over next year's accomodations perhaps? The oak tree has dropped a bumper crop of acorns this year. Henry gets agitated because the squirrels are having so much fun playing chase through the tops of the trees. Several salvias continue to put on their show even as Thanksgiving is on the horizon. We enjoy the lovely severe clear autumn days while we can partly because we have had enough rain this year to make up for the 20+ inch deficit that last year's drought left. It has been a wet one. This brings me to thoughts of grandson in the Navy at Norfolk doing watch in the pouring rain there. Most of these things remind me that the year is fast coming to a close--another year of our lives gone.

Still rambling on a Sunday morning.
Chilly nights, white roof-tops. I started wearing the down-jacket, Taschi is wearing her little jacket - though she hates it, it is more comfortable for her little body. She is so frail, my 14 year old companion.
Ralph, the horse, is wearing his blanket also.
Have a very nice surprise: the baby chicks I acquired in June have turned into pullets, then hens and started laying. I know they will quit as the days turn darker and nights longer, but it is so nice to have fresh eggs.
The cats come in early now and don't try to dash out into the night when I put Gussie into her "den", they know that it gets cold and that there is nothing to hunt.
Between the wood-stove and the afternoon sun coming in the West and Southwest windows, the house stays warm and cozy.
This coming week we have been promised a couple of gully-washers, I am hoping they will start the creek running and fill the pond. It's been raining a bit the last couple of weeks, light rain, saturating the soil, so the puddle will convert into a pond as soon as the waters start running.
We used to wait for the salmon to run then, but they are gone, haven't seen one for years.