Freakin' OW

My Mom offered to have Isabelle sleep over tonight, so we headed over. The girls and I went on a quick nature walk (Mom's place is like a nature preserve).
We found this...stuff...on a tree near the pond.
I don't know where to research on the Web to figure this out. Fungus? Flower? Parasite?

Moth with a snout
(I have to get to a library...thanks, Nina... and get some field guides)

I thwarted a pair of HOSP by removing their nesting material from one of Mom's bluebird boxes. I showed the picture to Mom, and said, "Take that, you little ba*****s". And Mom said, "Awww...". I told her to buck up and not feel bad for them. You can't ALLOW HOSP to nest if you find one. Period.

Hackberry Emperor

And now, two quizzes...not for prizes, because I don't have anything you would want:

Can you spot Isabelle?

What is this?

After leaving Mom's, I took Lorelei over to Lake Isabella.
The indigo bunting was there to greet us. I swear, where have they been for the past four years? I never saw ONE until this year, and now they are everywhere I go!

A cute white guy with dark tick marks

The Little Miami always has something floating in it. But since the drought is upon us, the water level is very very low. This bunch of wood has been mostly under water until today. I was able to get close enough to photograph it.
"Colonial"? A boat? Outhouse?

Laura suggested a good website to me a while back for wildflower ID's, but every flower I find seems to be absent from the list.
This is growing where the water usually is...vast, spreading swaths of it.

And then, it was back home again...

The momma robin is still sitting, but it's getting close.
"Can't you see that I am invisible?!?"

Here's where the OW comes in...
I was walking the perimeter of the yard while Geoff lounged in the grass and Lorelei was on the swing. Nellie has a favorite ball that she takes out every time we go in the back, and I was kicking it for her to fetch. Now, Nellie has a very annoying habit of standing directly in front of the ball when I kick it, but I can usually get it above her head so she has to run to fetch.
I was wearing my Mudd sandals.
*Go ahead and imagine scary, horror-movie, about-to-die music*
I kicked the ball, and as I was swinging my foot back, Nellie put her face right in front of my foot.
I ended up kicking Nellie straight in the head, full force (I can kick hard...I used to play soccer...but not in sandals).
I yelled "OW!" so loud, it echoed all the way down the neighborhood and back.

I saw stars. Really. Flashing spots in front of my eyes.
I limped into the house, cleaned off the blood (the impact took a layer of skin off my third toe) and put ice on it.
Considering how fast and large it swelled up, it's probably broken.
But I knew, from working for a podiatrist for 5 years, there's not much to do about a broken toe except for taping it. It's called the "Buddy system". You use the other toes as a splint and tape the injured toe to the others.
So I have a nicely wrapped purple sausage on my right foot. It HAD to be the right foot, didn't it?
And the kicker is (HA! Made a pun.) that tonight is a "Rodent Run" at RAPTOR that I said I would help with. For the uneducated, a Rodent Run is when some volunteers drive up to Kalamazoo, MI in a pickup truck to a lab/research facility and transport a whole truck bed full of mice and rats for our birds. (This facility also donates to zoos, etc.)
When the truck returns, we separate the critters into smaller bags and put them in the freezer.
When the call came in, I had to withdraw my help. I am staying home with my foot up, blogging.
And you missed out on pictures of freshly dead rodents! Sorry, guys.
One of the reasons it's cool to be married to Geoff:
We get samples from companies that he writes about for Entrepreneur, etc. We get big baskets of chocolate and wine at Christmas, and we also get stuff from Samuel Adams, which I may be diving into later:

We are keeping it for medicinal use. Promise.