Bluebirds

 Mountain Bluebirds (Sialia currucoides)

I cracked the door open and tried out my new Panasonic Lumix DMC-FZ35 (on automatic) today. That phrase is really a mouth full.  Can't believe bluebirds were right here drinking water.  That's a first as far as I know.  I called everyone to the kitchen window (that would be all three of us) and we watched about half a dozen of them all round the water dish.  They're sure flighty little things though.  And so blue! We've seen a flock of 25 or so around here occasionally.  One day a long time ago I tried to follow them with my telephoto, but they were not very still and all I got were blurry shots. I was surprised that the whole time I was concentrating on shooting the bluebirds the Northern Flicker was at my feet.  Unbelievable.  I didn't notice him till he flapped his big wings and flew away.  Shucks.  The cashier guy in automotive at Wal-Mart calls Northern Flickers "woodpeckers on steroids" because they're so big.  Sometimes I'm surprised at the people who know about birds.  I used to laugh at birdwatchers.  I thought birdwatching was completely doofus and felt sorry for the poor people who were reduced to watching birds for recreation.  Little did I know I was the doofus for not knowing how much fun and how rewarding bird watching and identification is.

Son finished 7th grade grammar today.  He got an 84% on the semester final.  He's pretty pleased that he finished way before June.  Now we can double up on history. 

We have a mean horse next door to our baby Bella and she has nipped Bella two times; once on the neck and once on the rump.  Now she has two spots with fur missing.  Her coat is long enough to cover it, but I'm buying some salve to hopefully help the hair grow back well.  The other horse is Dancer and she's gonna have a foal in March.  She reaches her neck over the fence to bite and is quite a mean horse.  I hope she'll be moved soon.  She's mean to all the other horses, not only Bella.

Lunch

 

Cooper's Hawk (Accipiter cooperii) aka Chicken Hawk

It's a Cooper's Hawk.  A young bird.  I honestly think he thought he was super power invisible.  He sat on the top bale of hay and continued eating while my husband walked in and out twice and pulled out two bales of hay.  I was able to stand within four feet of him.  I'd take a photo then look down at the floor and take a real slow step toward him, then take another shot hoping he wouldn't fly off.  I could have tried getting a little closer, but my shot was good enough and I hated to shoo him away.

I thought he was eating a mouse, but when I came back and took the last photos (when I got closest to him) I realized from the feathers it was a bird he had caught and eaten.

Osprey

It was a lucky shot today.  Was disappointed I completely missed the shot of him flying away.  All I got was sky.  He was magnificent. The light was good.  I have a few other images of him, but this is the one closest to him.

It's raining and thundering now!

And I have to go to bed.

She walks with the robins

The weather got cool this evening. There were hardly any grasshoppers and the crickets' singing filled the air. I can understand why the Native Americans consider Bear's Lodge a sacred place. I could hear the wind blowing through the trees and up to the tower. Gorgeous place.

The sun was still shining when I got to the prairie dog town. I walked the trail around the circumference of the town and on the side by the river, Belle Fouche, these four young robins bounced along the trail in front of me. And they didn't fly off when I caught up with them. When I would take a few steps they would take a few hops. It was so cute. We took turns walking that way for what seemed like a long time. They must have wanted to eat the tasty morsels of bugs in the grass because they would disappear into the tall grass for a second and then reappear. Maybe they thought I was the fifth bird behind them and that I was just a really big one!

In any case, me and my camera (poor grammar, I know) were at one with the birds for a little awhile tonight. What an experience.

Sweet driving days

Obama said that it's not UPS or Fed-Ex having problems. It's the United States Post Office that's having problems. Well yeah! UPS and Fed-Ex are privately run. That's what we're sayin'. The government runs the post office. Obama stuck his foot in his mouth there.

I slept really well last night. I think I know why. Brushing the horses for an hour. I think it did me good. Cool, huh.

This picture is a Golden Eagle - a young one, I think.

Tomorrow we'll be in Wyoming, but not quite to Devils Tower! We drove 6.5 hours and we're at the tippy northeast end of New Mexico. It's higher here and cooler and hillier, but still arid. Beautiful.

I didn't sew because after dinner I was sleepyish.

He said

This morning when I took lunch to my husband he called me his little dumpling. It made my day.

We went for a family drive in the evening. Our son's friends went to the movies in Cruces but our son doesn't care for movies. (He'll only watch mostly old ones, classics, except the Stooges aren't classic are they?) His other friend was gone to a birthday party. We had to think of something to do with just us. We decided we needed to go on a drive - to get in shape for going to Wyoming on Thursday. Haha!

Then we saw a place in the lake where a lot of white cranes were feeding. They were so pretty.

A bit of flu

This week our son brought home the stomach flu. Everyone thought it was a toxic reaction to blue-green algae in the lake. Two kids even had an official report written up by the park people to record their illness. I was sure he had the blue-green algae, cyanobacteria, illness too. We were calling it the Elephant Butte Puke. But. What? Then my husband got it, then I got it! It wasn't the water; it was the flu! And an ugly flu it was. Who needs to hear the flu described? I don't. You don't. We all know what the stomach flu does.

Terrible sighting today. We saw a roadrunner eat a Gambel's Quail chick. Horrible. I hope I never see it again. Actually, I think he killed it quick, but it was awful to see. I feed the birds birdseed. I'm not putting out any more birdseed until the babies are bigger. It was awful. I know it's nature doing its thing, but I love the baby quail. They're precocial you know. That means that as soon as they're born they can walk and talk and eat. If they're altricial, that means they're hatched bald, blind, can't walk and have to be fed by their parents. The photo is a baby and a male, daddy probably. See the baby's plume? It's flat on his head. It doesn't stick up yet.


I made a daisy chain bracelet. It's kinda cute. It was going to be an eyeglass chain, but it was coming out too short for that. It's not really made right, but no one has to know that but me. Don't click to enlarge. I need to wax my armies.

I'm slightly annoyed. I went to Classmates.com and added my grandbaby's pic to my profile. What do I see? A guy that I liked added his profile. He was such a nice guy and treated me so well. Hhmph. Does he write me? He does not. You know what I'm sick of. Guys who can't write three decades later because their wives will not like it. What kind of marriage is that, I ask you? My husband doesn't mind if I email a guy that I knew in high school. It's not like I'm leaving my husband. It's not like I'm in love with anyone except him. I think something is drastically lacking if a person can't even write a person from years ago without some kind of weird jealously thing going on. That's just weird. Isn't it? Or is it me? Could be me ya know. Wouldn't be the first time I'm the weird one. Sheesh. I don't know why I bother having good memories about people. I should just throw them all away. They're not worth anything to anyone except me anyways. On the other hand, could be they simply have no inclination to write and that's not necessarily good, bad, or indifferent. In which case, then I'm really full of myself. That's even worse.

On the up side. What is the up side? I gotta think of one. Oh, on the up side, I'm washing my hair tomorrow. And I wore a Jackie Bun to church last Monday night. I was pleased with how it came out. In contrast, I have to try a lot of times to get my Hypno Bun to look like I want. I guess tomorrow is measuring day. I forgot about it till just now.

Bird

Pyrrhuloxia, male
Easy to remember name: Gray Cardinal
Species: Cardinalis sinuatus
Location: Elephant Butte Lake, NM, USA

We have five of them! There's a mama, a daddy, and three babies. I think this is the daddy bird because he has the most color.

I raked our rocks and pebbles into a design. It doesn't show much. Maybe in the morning light it'll show. I told my husband to tell me in the morning if he sees it.

Took our son to the doctor. He couldn't hear out of one ear and turns out it was wax build-up. The doctor got quite a bit out. He cleans his ears well and I couldn't see the wax myself, but it was stuck in there all right. He was on the brink of crying because you know how it hurts to have your ears poked.

There are four bunnies outside my window now. I see two quail making their way over here. They see the seed I put out a little while ago. In a few days bet I'll have lots of quail to watch.

I had a pretty good day. Today I feel like I'm getting better finally, again. Warning: reference to a bodily function follows. I had a normal bm today. Woohoo! Party on! One does not appreciate the fine mechanical aspects of the human body until it does not work right. Then, you appreciate it. I am so proud that I noted it on our wall calendar. Haha! How's that for no more shyness about bodily functions. I had some discomfort, like how it feels when you have a low tummy ache from the flu, so I took it easy because I must still be wimpy. I would like to exercise, but am afraid it will exacerbate things, so I will wait. I hope and I pray tomorrow will be a good day too. Two good days in a row. If I have a third it will be a new record.

Tuesday

It's a Guinea Fowl. Took me two weeks to figure out what it was and it was my mom who told me. About five of them were alongside the road. They're a poultry bird. Poor things. They have a beautiful partridge body and an ugly ol' vulture head. They weren't shy at all.

I've felt fine all day, though somewhat lethargic, so I'm worried tomorrow will be a bad day. We'll see.

I raked the site today and it looks nice. I was inspired by the lady next door named Ann who said she lost two inches from her waistline working here raking sites! She's 70 years old and you'd never know it by looking at her. And she had the most beautiful southern accent. I say had because they left today. Continuing on their travels.

In New Mexico it's too dry for green grass lawns. Everyone has rocks. Many people rake their rocks. Crazy, I know. But for a campsite it really does look nice to pull in to a neatly raked site. It looks clean and fresh and inviting. As I was raking I thought this could be like a total meditative practice. Yes, little Grasshopper, it can. At Huntington Gardens in San Marino there was a Japanese Zen garden and the sand was raked into a wavy design and they rake it into different designs on different days too. I could do that! Wouldn't it cool to pull into a specially designed design in the rocks of your campsite? Oh this has potential. They might come out and see me and ask me how I came up with this idea and they'll want to put a photo of my neatly raked unique designs and patterns in the newspaper with a special inset picture of me. It'll be like those posters where you have to stare and stare to relax your eyes and see the picture. Other people would want to do it too. Pretty soon people in town would do it. Maybe it would spread all over New Mexico. And I would get all the credit for this amazing concept. Maybe my idea would jump continents and Australia will do it too.

But the Japanese already got whole the raking idea in about the tenth century. Details, details, ruining my daydream.

Egret

The stately great egret (from San Diego). He's not a snowy egret because snowy egrets have yellow feet and are smaller birds. The great egret has black feet.

And he did some preening and had an itch to scratch.


I finished one Russian leaf today! It's pretty and it has potential.

Nuttaller's Woodpecker

There's a family of three in our campground!

Ducks

Baby wood ducks.

Cooper's Hawk

Photo taken 4/9/08.

All stretched out like that it looks like he belongs on a rotisserie. (Kidding!)

Today I received a great compliment.

I have met a lot of people (he means in a certain town) including you and (his friend's name was here though she and I are only acquainted) that live by the love and grace of a higher power, and not just on Sunday mornings.

Wow. Rock my world. I feel that it doesn't show enough and I think I am always not quite good enough. I'm going to try harder.

Sandhill crane in flight

We went to Bosque Del Apache National Wildlife Refuge this afternoon. It was cold with temps between 47° to 54°. Windy too. But I was a trooper and braved the bad weather. I haven't been taking many pictures of late, so I was like Shaky the Moyle (on Seinfeld). I got all excited seeing the birds, pointed my camera, and couldn't focus for diddly. I'm taking picture of open sky and blurry birds! My husband was patient and gave me enough time to keep trying. I want to go back. I need to go back! The sound of thousands of snow geese is incredible.

It wasn't as awesome as last year though. That's a terrible thing to say, eh? But there were more birds last year. I suppose they're there this year too, but a lot of the lake is frozen. Strange, because the weather hasn't seemed that cold. But where it was frozen the birds were quite far away. Too far even for my telephoto lens.

Son had an amazing sighting this morning - four bobcats playing on the ice that had formed on a small lake outside the park. He was riding with one of the rangers in the truck when they spotted them. What luck. Who gets to see one bobcat let alone four, let alone playing on the ice in plain daylight. They stopped on the side of the road and watched until the bobcats wandered into the brush. Couple nights ago my son and I saw three big, healthy raccoons trying to get in the garbage bin. They ran across the street in front of us as were driving by. In three years we've never seen raccoons here. Oh and tonight on my way home from church I saw a big, white owl take off from the top of a stop sign where he was perched. The first time I saw him last year I about jumped out of my seat - he startled me so. This year I noticed that I hadn't seen him and I wondered if he was still around. Guess he is. He must have a wing span of four feet. Huge.

Cooper's Hawk

The week-end is over. But tomorrow we're going to Cruces so it's not a normal workaday day for us. I hope to buy some cowboy boot patterned fleece to make a blanket for my nephew. That's the last of the blanket notions and fabric I'll need for the year. And we have to get candles and styrofoam to make our Advent wreath on the cheap.

I didn't get anything done today except for a giant nap after church. I did a big, loud WAAAHOOO in church in support of my pastor's wife this morning. She did today's sermon in her husband's place because he's in the Philippines for the week. He spoke at a pastor's conference and helped feed kids who live at the dump and is visiting orphanages. The U.S.A. stinks in a lot of ways. It's far from perfect and wrought with social and financial problems, but there are no children living at the dumps eating garbage to survive a day at a time. We were hoping to go to Mexico this year, but stories about brutal attacks on tourists has quickly changed our mind. I wouldn't even go down with a group of campers now. Bummer. I think we'll go to Grand Canyon, the Tetons, and Wyoming this year. We think fuel's going to be high so we won't be venturing across the continent that's for sure. Can't afford long travel days at $4.00 per gallon fuel.

Got a pic of that raptor that likes to prey on my po' wittle quail. He's young. Very beautiful bird. I caught sight of him while I was sitting at the kitchen table. Went outside and walked a wide circle round him trying not to annoy him. I've never seen him on that pole before.

Wanted to get a hair pic, but it hasn't been washed for a few days and I kinda want to measure after it's washed and dried. I'm over 40" finally, I know that. Woo hoo! I'm still not classic length though. My bum is so low. Maybe if I squeeze my cheeks they'll go a little higher and I can say I'm classic. I'll try that.

Sparrow in the Massachusetts sun

Goslings over there

I saw them today and yesterday. Sure would like to get a little closer. I saw a robin's nest today too.

Wore my hair in Dorothy braids. The kind where you make two French braids with the braided parts about four inches long and the rest is a pony. I wore them to the front. Then the long part was in my way so I wrapped the ends around my head. Now I look like a washer woman. But I don't do floors anymore. I used to wash the tile on my hands and knees because a mop does not do a thorough job you know. Now I do a quick sweep and my husband waxes the fake wood in the kitchen. It's about 3'x3' in area.

Bought our curriculum for next year, so that's done. Finished a science project with predictions and observations about decomposers this afternoon that went well. I mean, our son did. He got an 83% on the first half of his end of semester grammar test. The second half of the test is tomorrow.

I'm frying chicken now. I don't have Crisco though so it might not be very good.

Great Blue Heron

Next to the lagoon at Dead Horse Ranch State Park, Arizona. He's better than my others. The first blue heron I ever snapped was in December of 2005 and I didn't even know what it was. Kara identified it for me.

Ruddy duck, male

It looks like he's looking right at me but he's quite far away.

Photo taken April 9, 2007
Santee Lakes Regional Park
With my trusty little Olympus

He's a Ruddy Duck

If you swim around the lake with a bright blue bill people will notice.