Category: Life

FaceTiming with the bird. 

Today was another lovely day in Palm Desert.  Irene and I took a long walk this morning and found two geocaches along the way.  We all had massages this afternoon and then grabbed a bite to eat while watching the end of the Seahawks game at a restaurant nearby.  We won!

Back at the house we did our best to finish off all the food and wine we had bought for the long weekend.  We stayed in the hot tub again looking at the moon and stars til we were pruned.  

We also face timed with Keeto, a first for both of us.  Goodnight birdie!

Where two deserts meet. 

We visited Joshua Tree National Park yesterday, drove the entire length of the park, from south to north, and stopped to explore all of the varied terrain and plants.   The park is ruggedly beautiful, and marks the intersection of the Colorado Desert and the Mohave Desert.  


We had a blast.  And took a bazillion selfies.   I’ll share some photos, but also wanted to share this cool interview I found this morning…. it’s 10 minutes long… of Steve Averill, the guy that designed and photographed the album art for U2’s album The Joshua Tree, which is celebrating its 30th birthday this year.  I think this guy has my dream job.  🙂

A fine example of the namesake of the park, said to look like Dr Seuss trees:


Amazing rock horizons:


Skull Rock, spooky!


Another peek from beneath the rocks:


I love exploring new places, and I love hanging with my girlfriends.   A perfect day.  

Desert fun.  

I’ve met up with Irene and Linda, two girlfriends from high school, in Palm Desert for the weekend.  We are having fun catching up on three decades of our lives while enjoying this beautiful oasis.  

This is the view from our patio. Lucky us.  This is looking east across the Coachella Valley towards the Little San Bernardino Mountain range.  


This is the same view, later last night as the full moon was rising.  

DOWO.

With the Cooper’s hawk flying through regularly, my backyard bird activity has dropped significantly.  But the resident Downy woodpeckers are not phased by it.  I have at least one male/female pair.  They frequent the feeder all day, every day.   This is a photo of a female downy woodpecker (DOWO) on the finch feeder.  They love to pick the sunflower chips out of the mix.  Downy’s are notoriously difficult to ID versus the similar looking, but larger, Hairy woodpecker species.  In this photo, though, you can see a couple of the markers that confirms it is a downy:  the relatively short beak, and the black flecks on the outer white tailfeathers.  Here’s a link to Audubon guidance on differentiating the two species.

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Drats.

It took four and a half years, but yesterday I spectacularly broke the screen on my phone (heavy sigh).   Interestingly, the touch screen capability still works.  I have it in a baggie, so that I am able to use it without cutting my fingers, until I can get to the Apple Store.

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Autumn rainbows.

Yesterday was the autumnal equinox.  It turned out to be a lovely evening for a beer can regatta on the lake.   I took Nirvana out with Lori and Kurt as crew.  Marty took Stand by Me out with Monte and Kevin as crew.  There were four other boats as well.  We were treated to a pretty double rainbow as a rainstorm skirted us to the southeast.   When we crossed the finish line in fourth place, it was against the backdrop of a beautiful sunset.  A fun sail!

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Photo credit to Lori.

Junkmail from the grim reaper.

This was addressed to me, in the mail yesterday…

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… and Monte got one addressed to him for cremation services.   I guess we are in a new demographic.   :/

 

Who’s here?

Keeto often asks us, “Who’s here?”   Well, this morning, when I opened up the blinds to look at the back yard, I was excited to see a flock of baltimore orioles in the bird bath/fountain that I put out in the spring.  There were many more in the trees above, taking turns bathing.   The orioles are currently migrating south for the winter.  In the spring, on their way north, I only got a moment’s glance at a single male baltimore oriole.  Today though, I got to enjoy them for about 15 minutes.   And then, poof, they were gone.   I hope they remember to stop here on their way back next spring.

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Suit up. 

We enjoyed a lovely Sunday and  Monday on the lake.  We met up with Marty & Sue and floated in the marina, then set anchor in the cove.   It was a perfect holiday weekend.  

We made it home with plenty of time to clean up, eat dinner, visit with birdies, and participate in my fantasy football league’s draft for this season.    It’s ON!

Messing with my mojo!

Since coming home from our road trip, I have noticed a marked decrease in my backyard birdie population.   I suspected a hawk was the reason.  And today, sure enough, while sitting out back I saw one swoop through the backyard scattering the few birds that were at the feeders.   Later in the day, the hawk flew in again and perched on an oak across from me for a few minutes.  It is huge.  I believe this is a juvenile Cooper’s hawk.   Cooper’s hawks and sharp-shinned hawks, both accipiters, are very hard to distinguish from one another.   Based on field guidance I’ve read online (e.g., here, here, here and here), the overall size, head shape, tail shape, thick legs, and breast streaking lead me to lean towards a Cooper’s ID.  Either way, it’s a beautiful bird, but I wish it would find another yard to terrorize.  I miss my abundance of birdies.  

September morn’.

As I walked into the kitchen this morning for my second cup of coffee, this glowing orange zinnia caught my eye, backlit by the rising sun.  

Good morning!

I’m no expert, but…..

We are back home in Austin.  A lovely place to be.  For the last 2 days, though, the power has been out at the house. 


I took a look at the power pole today.  And…… I see that the transformer is not hooked up to the transmission line.   At all. 

I’m no expert, but I’m gonna say that maybe that is the problem, and a hopefully quick fix.  

Back to black.  

We returned last night after our extended Eclipse 2017 trip; we took the opportunity to visit family in the area while we were up there.  We drove 19 hours straight across five states, and got home a little after midnight.  We wanted to get home to check on things, given Hurricane Harvey’s arrival the night before.   I’m thankful that the only bad thing so far is that our power is out.  I’ve no idea how long it will take to restore.  But it’s not a big deal for us; it’s nice to be home. 

This is a view of the sunset from the highway outside Dallas last night.  I’m praying for the folks on the Texas gulf coast and southeast part of the state.  

Eclipse day 2017. 

We’ve wandered a bit and saw some interesting things today.

We hung out at a park in Cross Plains, Tennessee with a couple hundred other people on the line of totality for the solar eclipse…

Some enterprising kids recognized it as a business opportunity…

Of course, we bought some.

And I took some pictures of the amazing display in the sky above…

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It was an incredibly amazing experience.   I’m looking forward to the next one in Austin on April 8, 2024!