So there's no point lingering overmuch on the thoughts accompanying the latest statement by the World Health Organization that the world may very well have to become accustomed to coping with the novel coronavirus that has caused the present global pandemic, in the event that no really effective and safe vaccine may, after all is said and done, ever materialize. Despite the hundreds of research projects and trials taking place worldwide. The takeaway is that ever-resourceful and innovative human beings will find ways to get around and outsmart the constant threat that COVID-19 represents.

This is all part of the natural order of things, one can only assume. Nature at its most challenging. After all we have had, time and again, to cope with the occurrences of natural disasters like volcanoes, hurricanes, earthquakes, tsunamis, torrential mudsliding rains, as well as manmade disasters the most prominent of which is mass forced migration caused by constant conflicts along with the fears associated with the potential of nuclear warfare and we're still -- by some miracle of perseverance -- here.

We go on with our lives and we hope for the best, balancing the shadow of such concerns in our consciousness while forging lives that afford us as much satisfaction and pleasure in life as possible. And we have a debt to nature for much of the good things available to us as well as the concerning events troubling us. 

When we made our way this early morning into the ravine with Jackie and Jillie stopping briefly by the banks of ripening blackberries and thimbleberries, they linger expectantly around my husband influenced of course by the routine he has established of plucking ripe berries and sharing them out to our little dogs. This morning, I showed Jackie a few ripe thimbleberries attached to the slender wand holding them fast to the shrub and he nonchalantly plucked each one on his own.

This is another wholly overcast day and we expected rain to descend at any moment, but it held off fortuitously until our return back home. But it had rained during the night and lovely pearl droplets of rain still clung to the bright pink flowers of the Himalayan orchids that we passed. We enjoyed a long circuit through the forest. In the distance we could hear crows mobbing and cawing. In all likelihood they were harassing an owl; had they been closer we might have had some success in locating the owl perched on an extended tree branch. 

We heard nuthatches and chickadees closer at hand, busy flitting around, in and out of the firs and spruces. And we saw a surprisingly large number of squirrels rushing about, and chasing one another. This cooler weather, temporary though it may be, along with shorter daylight hours is triggering behaviour in the squirrels written into their DNA to prepare for oncoming winter.

After breakfast, I decided to pre-prepare dinner. Nothing I like better than putting things together for dinner, refrigerating it, and when time comes around to eat, it's pretty well all done. I made blini filling them with a cottage cheese combination, so that at dinner time I just have to do them on either side in butter and serve them hot and fragrant (cinnamon), as well as a bean/vegetable salad in a vinaigrette dressing, and we'll have fresh Ontario plums sliced for dessert. Done!

In the afternoon, taking advantage of the cooler weather, not to stress the plants, I went out to water some fertilizer into the garden pots. Not that they look as though they need it, but they've been flowering for months and could use a little pick-up. And it salves my conscience to feel that I'm not ignoring their needs. After all they work so hard giving us pleasure in their flowering cycles month after summer month; beginning in spring, ending in autumn.