A Day with a Dayflower

Here are a series of three versions of a vibrant blue dayflower found while hiking through the Voorhees Nature Preserve in Virginia in mid-August of 2022.

We were deep in the woods and it was a bit dark at times, so I wasn’t sure these would come out. The first is more of a closeup in shade with soft colors.

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A Day with a Dayflower

Ten seconds later I made the next frame a little further from the flower. We can see the sun made its way around any clouds and branches and created dappled lighting on the forest floor in the background.

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Dappled lighting on the forest floor

After four seconds the sun was once again hidden, creating the darker background of the final photo.

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A shaded forest floor

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Quarterly Look Back - 3rd Quarter 2026

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Looking back at the third quarter of 2026

And here we are, at the end of the 3rd quarter of 2026. What began as a fairly slow and comfortable quarter, with time for hobbies and activities like reading and watching movies, quickly ramped up in the second half. Life is like that, with its ebbs and flows, and there are times when we need to buckle down and focus on responsibilities knowing that someday later there will be some downtime. I’m finding it helps to look for and appreciate the positive elements when busy, to enjoy what we have even though we may feel we’re struggling to fit everything in. Slow down just enough to realize there’s some beautiful scenery passing us by as we drive from one location to another. Just learning to see and appreciate that scenery can help make for a better day. It doesn’t always work, and I quite often fall short, but it’s worth the effort to try.

Anyway, on to the look back for the third quarter of 2026.

Photography

As with the previous quarter I’ve not gotten out photographing very often, and yet there were still some nice photographic opportunities. National Geographic chose to publish one of my photos in an online travel article about the C&O Canal National Historical Park. Middleburg Life chose to publish one of my photos of a beautiful church in The Plains, Virginia, in their September issue, and we had a nice conversation about working together in the future. And an author chose one of my photos of a stained glass window in the National Cathedral for a future updated edition of her children’s book. Thanks much to the people behind each of these groups, I truly appreciate your support.

Below are the blog posts I published this quarter. Please take a look back at any you missed or would like to see again.

Mostly Photos

Two Views of an Old Railroad Bridge Over North Fork Shenandoah River

Village Cemetery — Stark, New Hampshire

Museums

Strasburg Visitor Center and Museum (Virginia)

Techniques

Motions of a Great Blue Heron at Great Falls

Trip Report

Harpers Ferry, West Virginia — Lower Town in the Rain

Reading

I finished fewer books this quarter, and if not for audiobooks I would have finished even fewer. As someone who was once very skeptical of audiobooks I now finish more of them than paper and ebooks combined. They’re a perfect way to experience a book when driving between locations. I still prefer old fashioned paper books, but I’ll take what I can get.

In the non-fiction front I’ve been reading books about retirement and finished a pretty good one this quarter. And I’ve been reading and thoroughly enjoying Ryan Holiday’s Stoic Virtues series. Last quarter I hadn’t read any classics, so I made sure to include one this quarter, choosing The Man in the Iron Mask. I picked up The Pohaku from the new releases section of the library. And I’ve been reading and loving Christopher Ruocchio’s epic science fiction series, The Sun Eater. And any quarter is a bit brighter with the laughter from a P.G. Wodehouse novel, this time Uneasy Money.

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The books I consumed this quarter (paper, ebook, and audio).

Here’s the full list of books read in the 3rd quarter of 2026:

Empire of Silence (The Sun Eater #1) by Christopher Ruocchio (2018), Tax Planning To and Through Early Retirement by Cody Garrett and Sean Mullaney (2025), The Pohaku by Jasmin ‘Iolani Hakes (2026), The Man in the Iron Mask by Alexandre Dumas (1850), The Lesser Devil (The Sun Eater #1.5) by Christopher Ruocchio (2020), Courage is Calling: Fortune Favors the Brave (The Stoic Virtues #1) by Ryan Holiday (2021), You Only Live Twice (James Bond #12) by Ian Fleming (1964), The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova (2005), Unfinished Portrait by Agatha Christie writing as Mary Westmacott (1934), The Second Death of Locke (The Hand and the Heart #1) by V.L. Bovalino (2025), Uneasy Money by P.G. Wodehouse (1916), Discipline is Destiny: The Power of Self-Control (The Stoic Virtues #2) by Ryan Holiday (2022).

And of those, my favorites were:

Empire of Silence (The Sun Eater #1) by Christopher Ruocchio

This is one of the best science fiction novels I’ve read in quite some time. It’s a slow build, telling the story of Hadrian Marlowe, born to nobility but unsuited to its demands, as he narrates his past experiences from some time in the future. Many times he mentions terrible events in his future that we’ve yet to read about, foreshadowing what’s to come. I love how the story is told, and I love the story, itself. It’s the beginning of what will likely be quite the epic saga. And the audiobook is expertly narrated by Samuel Roukin.

The Lesser Devil (The Sun Eater #1.5) by Christopher Ruocchio

This is a novella that falls between books one and two in the series. It takes us back to Hadrian’s home world to see what happened after the events from the first book that led to his departure. It focuses on his brother, Crispin, who we see in a very different light from the first book. I found it just as well told and just as well narrated as Empire of Silence. I can’t wait to start book two.

The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova

A perfect homage to Bram Stoker’s Dracula, it delves into real history, mythology, and fantasy, extrapolating from Stoker’s story and bringing us closer to modern days. It’s structured very similar to Dracula and takes place at various times with a different cast of characters in each time, all related to one another and slowly stitching together the pieces of the story. Dracula has always been a favorite character and novel of mine, so I thoroughly enjoyed how The Historian perfectly follows that tale. I also enjoyed how the title can be interpreted in various ways, which become more clear as the story progresses. Justine Eyre and Paul Michael did fantastic jobs narrating the audiobook.

Movies, Shows & Anime

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Movies I watched in the 3rd quarter of 2026.

I watched a fair number of movies at the beginning of the quarter, but none at all in the second half.

My favorite movie of the quarter was probably Hi-Five (2025), just because it was a lot of fun. It’s a Korean film about a group of unrelated people who’ve recently had organ transplants, and discovered they’ve suddenly acquired some new power. Eventually they get together and everything becomes clear, but there’s plenty of action and comedy along the way. As I said, lots of fun.

I also thoroughly enjoyed Ordinary People (2018), a Korean film starring Ma Dong-seok, who I’d known from his great performance in Train to Busan. He moves to a small town to try to keep a job as a school coach, but he discovers some trouble in the town and he can’t just look away.

Greenland (2020) was an enjoyable take on an end of the world sort of movie where a killer comet is heading towards the planet and we get a view of how things might unfold as governments, and one family, attempt to secure their future.

I had a pretty good time with the rest of the movies, as well.

Music

It wasn’t intentional, but all three pieces of music I picked this quarter are instrumental, with the first two featuring acoustic guitars and the last a piano. They are also all on the softer side, no metal this time around. 🙂

Mike Dawes - Belle Insomnie

A beautifully soft and melodic song with Mike Dawes’ signature style and sound. This is exactly the sort of music I’ve been drawn to often of late. Softer, calming, taking me somewhere else for a brief period of time, a moment of peace and solitude.

Rodrigo y Gabriela - Monster

This song has a bit of tension that weaves its way into the initially soft and peaceful sounds, perhaps something of a slow return to reality. I really enjoy the artistic style and progression of the video. It almost mirrors the musical journey from something of a dreamy elsewhere to the slow return of a more clear reality.

Tony Ann - Lost (Live Performance @ The Hit Factory)

And to wrap it up we have a wonderful composition and piano performance by Tony Ann. This one also weaves a bit of tension into the otherwise peaceful sounds. It’s amazing how music, especially instrumental, can create so much mood and feeling, can create story, without the need of words to guide us through the journey.

Life

The first part of the quarter was fairly calm, but the latter portion had two family health situations. My brother underwent spinal surgery and was restricted in the things he was allowed to do while he recovers and the spine heals. And at the same time his cat, Jinx, was in a very bad way. After taking her to the vet we learned she had both an infection and a thyroid condition. So she needed antibiotics and daily thyroid medication. So I’ve been going over to their place each day to medicate Jinx and assist with anything else I can. On a positive note, both my brother and Jinx are doing well and recovering nicely.

My father and I still get together each week to go somewhere, though we’ve had to keep the trips shorter so we can get back to medicate Jinx. For several trips we’ve gone to some of our favorite farmer’s markets. It’s been corn season and Miller Farms Market, along Orange Plank Road in Locust Grove, Virginia, has some of the tastiest sweet corn around, so we’ve filled several 5 dozen bags throughout the quarter. And Woodbine Farm Market, along Route 48 in Strasburg, Virginia, is always a great place to stop for various vegetables, apples, fresh made pies and the best cookies around (unfortunately they lost about 90% of their apple crop this year due to a very hard frost at just the wrong time earlier in the year, and because the apple trees only bloom once a year, that was that).

The coffee journey: At the beginning of August I attempted to roast a small batch of beans from Ecuador. I don’t know exactly what happened, if it was the different elevations where the beans grew, different processing, or just some issues on my part, but this one didn’t go nearly so well as the beans I roasted from Zambia. The roast time was getting long and the beans were changing color nicely but I hadn’t heard any sounds that indicated first crack. I got nervous and instead of risking a darker roast I dropped the beans too soon, so they were very underdeveloped. It was a long while before I managed to make the time to try again. I split my remaining beans from Ecuador into two small batches. I turned up the gas to try to get the roast going faster, but kicked it up too much (especially given the smaller batch size) and ended up with too fast a roast and not enough development time so the beans lacked flavor, though I definitely heard a very audible first crack as the beans began popping almost like popped corn. For the final batch I ended up between the previous two, though still a faster roast than I’d been attempting. There was some decent flavor to this batch, though I don’t think I really hit the potential of the beans. Needless to say, I found these beans from Ecuador very challenging to roast. I currently have four more bags of green beans, from Ethiopia, Kenya, Cameroon, and Uganda, and I look forward to what I’ll learn roasting each of them. Thanks much to Carrie of Bluemont Coffee for all her support and our coffee conversations.

And I think that seems enough (or perhaps more than enough) for my own quarterly look back. 😃 How was YOUR quarter? Did you do anything new? What were your enjoyable moments? Let me know in the comments below.

Thanks so much for reading, and for all your support throughout the quarter. And now on to the final quarter of the year!

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Strasburg Visitor Center and Museum (Virginia)

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The entrance to the Strasburg Visitor Center and Museum

In a previous post we toured the Strasburg Museum in Strasburg, Virginia, which included a fascinating and eclectic look at artifacts collected in the town. Today we look at the museum within the Strasburg Visitor Center, which takes a wider view of the entire area and how it fits within the history of the country.

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Naturally, there is a lot focused on the Civil War, but the history of the area extends further back to Colonial times. And of course, there were people living in the area before the colonists ever stepped foot on North America, so there are also displays with artifacts from native peoples. One highlight is the long hand painted mural along the back wall that was created by local artists. It steps through many moments in the area’s history.

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It’s a small museum, but very well laid out with plenty of educational and interesting displays. And the displays are spaced apart nicely, making them all very accessible and accommodating multiple groups of people without folks getting in each other’s way.

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The Visitor Center, in addition to any number of items available for purchase, even contains an active bee hive in the corner which has an entrance of its own to allow the bees access to all the flowers planted just outside. There’s also a small park on the premises with a Civil War trail.

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A small park outside the Strasburg Visitor Center with a short Civil War trail

The Strasburg Visitor Center and Museum is well worth a visit if you’re ever in the area.

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