There were critters everywhere this afternoon.
Bunny & mourning dove. Lots of camouflage going on out there.
Bunny. Those cooling veins in its ears are needed today.
But it’s enjoying the bird seed. Who knew? It will have to fight the birds and the squirrels.
Little bastard, perched near the feeder to guard it.
One of the other hummers at the other feeder.
Not to mention to house finches, crows, hawks, ravens, mockingbirds, lizards, juncos…
Filed under Birds, Critters, Photography
I was walking along the backyard sidewalk and saw something moving down by my feet. I glanced down, saw movement, and managed at the last second to shift my foot so I didn’t come down on top of this dude.
I stopped, I froze, it froze, and I expected the lizard to hit Mach 2 getting away from me. Nope, he just sat there for the longest time. Long enough for me to get out my phone, get it turned on, bring up the camera app, lean over, and snap off a few photos. Still no movement by my lizard pal.
No pushups, no movement, no nothing. But it’s missing most of it’s tail, so things have been tough at some point quite recently.
It occurred to me that its pinhead-sized brain was figuring this was it, the big one, that last fatal mistake. It had zigged when it should have zagged and now that ginormous creature hovering above it just inches away (i.e., me) was going to just devour it in one swell foop. It was just hoping that the finale would be quick and painless.
But what do we say to the god of Death? “Not today!” I wasn’t feeling much like eating live lizards, and I was feeling sorry for this little dude who might the the one I saw last week in this same part of the yard – so I just walked away.
Regrow that tail in peace, live long, and prosper my medium-sized lizard compadre!
Filed under Critters, Photography
I get it, I’m a work in progress and always will be. But would it kill anyone to get a small break every now and then to have an idea of where it’s going or what the plan is or how long it’s going to take, or maybe even, gods forbid, get to a point where it’s just okay for a while?
Sorry, a few frustrating things today. Not sure why, when hunting for a random old photo, this one spoke to me.
Filed under Paul, Photography
We had a drought a couple years ago which resulted in there being significant restrictions imposed on water useage, especially things like yard irrigation. We managed to keep some/most of the front yard green-ish, but the back yard got abandoned. Even though we’ve gotten some rain again in the last year or two and the restrictions are gone, the back yard has never come back and is pretty much just hard-packed dirt and bird seed.
The sprinkler system is still there, and even though it doesn’t get used it’s still pressurized, and the sprinkler heads still drip or leak the tiniest little bit. This has led to tiny little oases surrounding the sprinkler heads, where hearty little weeds have managed to eke out an existence. Now they’re blooming.
This makes me think that the back yard could be re-planted with some work – breaking up the hard-packed topsoil, fertilizing, getting some grass seed (or sod if we wanted to be fancy fancy), watering it, and so on. But all of those steps come with dollar signs attached and I would rather save my dollars to spend on The Forever Home and getting out of here and into it. If the landlord doesn’t care, then I’m going to pass as well.
Filed under Castle Willett, Forever Home, Photography
I hear that tomorrow is Easter. Okay.
Not a holiday for me, I’m afraid. I just need to keep track so I know to keep away from crowds going to brunch and flooding the stores looking for lillies and chocolate bunnies.
But sunset tonight was lovely, even without a cloud in the sky. That spectacular gradient as white fades to pink fades to orange fades to blue fades to indigo fades to black, with 100,000 separate shades squeezed in between.
Enjoy your chocolate bunnies. In fact, you can hae mine. I got chewed out by my doctor this week about my A1C numbers that are moving in the wrong direction.
Filed under Photography, Sunsets
“May Grey” (which leads to “June Gloom” here in SoCal) has arrived early. Coastal fog and clouds, often thickening enough to get light drizzle, but never any real rain.
At night, the clouds often allow some moonlight to filer through from above, while also reflecting all of the city lights. Yet you can still see some texture and the occasional hole where a bright star might shine through.
I hear the owls and night hawks and think of how wonderful I imagine it would be to be up there in these clouds and odd light, soaring and diving, drifting and coasting on the thermals.
Filed under Photography, Weather
At first, I just saw two or three large feathers on the back porch. No big deal.
Then there were a couple more on the sidewalk. Again, no biggie.
It was only after I had done my lap around the back yard and got back to this point that my brain started to register all of the other feathers, well hidden by their coloration matching the dirt. Aside from the two on the sidewalk, how many can you find on the dirt? (I’ve got eleven so far, but every time I look I seem to find more.)
Now that my stupid brain knew what to focus on, I started spotting them all over a circle about ten feet across. Sometimes when this happens I see far, far more, but I think it depends on whether the mourning dove was in the air or on the ground, how high the hawk or owl was diving from, and whether the predator ate here or just made the strike and then took its meal off elsewhere to eat or feed its chicks.
The tiny, fluffy feathers all around the right side of the sprinkler head at the bottom were the confirmation for me. The bigger feathers can sometimes shed naturally, particularly if one of the big, fat mourning doves goes crashing into the sliding glass door. (They can really make a “thud” that echoes through the house!) But for there to be a handful of those finer (insulating?) feathers from underneath the big flight feathers, something violent needed to happen.
The hawk or owl (and possibly their chicks) eat today, while we’re one mourning dove down. Circle of life and all of that. We have a handful of hawks and owls in the neighborhood – we have dozens and dozens of mourning doves every morning when The Long Suffering Wife casts her bounty of bird seet upon her adoring throngs of feathered friends. (She’s like Snow White out there…)
Filed under Birds, Photography
And finally…breathing room.
That HUGE FREAKIN’ CRISIS has been resolved, all of the data entry and bank reconciliations and reports got done for this morning’s meeting, payroll got done for tomorrow morning (which is why I was suddenly posting something quick on five minute’s notice yesterday), the funeral is over, the family has all gone back home, I’ve got my bathroom back, I had my normal weekly gym session tonight (and I’m sore as hell as usual, which again, is “normal,” THANKS SEAN!), I even got all of my tax backup documents over to our CPA only to find out that because of the fires and the FEMA state of emergency we actually don’t have to file until October, and all of a sudden…
There aren’t any “helmet fires” going on at the moment. (“Helmet fire” is a term used by Mace Curran in describing being a fighter pilot and later a pilot in the Air Force Thunderbirds, where there’ too much life and death, split second decision stuff coming at you all at once.)
No one has noticed one of the funniest things that I’ve ever posted on social media, and while dealing with the helmet fires enough non-critical tasks got shoved on to the back burners to keep me going for a month of Sundays, and some of those could become new helmet fires if not dealt with quickly, but HEY!
This lack of a constant adrenaline flow that resembled Niagra Falls is something I could get used to, I think.
I hope I’m not jinxing anything…
Damn, that was a long few days.
Here’s the stuff of life:
Caffeine. Taste. Mmmmmmm.
Had a medical professional today on the phone tell me that I needed to drink water instead. She lost me, right there and then.
Filed under Paul, Photography
They’re everywhere. Just in case the hummingbirds aren’t happy with the standard fare in the feeders.
Filed under Flowers, Photography
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