One reason I love Julie Zickefoose

For those of you who don’t read Julie’s blog, first I have to say “WHY IN THE HELL NOT???” and second, she put up a post this morning that may help us find a good home for Boomer.

Sunday sketches

conspectus \kuhn-SPEK-tuhs\, noun:
1. A general sketch or survey of a subject.
2. A synopsis; an outline.

On days that I do absolutely nothing, I feel a lot of pressure to come up with a post that won’t put you to sleep. So I came up with a post with my sketches…that have not a single iota of talent, but may make you smile. My sketches of some of the events from this week:

(My finding what may or may not be a snow goose)

Now, wasn’t that fun?

That’s all it takes

 

I had an education program way out at Chilo Lock #34 park today, one of my favorite birding spots. After the presentation, I was showing some of the kids my Party Favors (heads, feet, wings and feathers) when out of the blue, there was Katdoc! She lives pretty close to the park, and came down to see my program! Now, how cool is that? (Thanks, Kath)
We were talking about the peregrines that are seen at the dam down the road, and Kathi told me not to bother since she had just come from there and she didn’t see any.
I took her word for it, but as I was nearing the dam on the way back, I just had to turn in, just to have a peek. And I am so glad I did!
Behold: A Snow goose. Life bird #117.

I couldn’t even believe my eyes. It was hanging out with a flock of Canada geese, and I was pretty far away, so I almost didn’t give them a second glance. But I had the scope with me, so I set it up in the lee of a tree (the wind was of the type that slices through you like frozen razor blades) and aimed it at the geese to practice. And there it was.
Thank goodness there was a birder down the way, and I walked down and introduced myself (turns out that he had been at my program) and asked him to look at the goose and confirm it.
Thanks, Steve Wagner!
We don’t get too many snow geese around here, just isolated sightings here and there. And I found it all by myself.
*Boom shaka laka laka* Boom shaka laka laka*

When I got home, Geoff suggested that we all go get some dinner and decided on Burger King since it has a playground for the girls to burn up their energy. We rarely get to go out to dinner with all four of us present, so it was a nice change…I love my family.

And for some reason, Geoff and I were enticed to climb the jungle gym and go down the slide.
(I remember Geoff saying something about what a good blogging opportunity it was…that did it) This was no ordinary slide: It was in the shape of a corkscrew and was pitch black inside.
Geoff was brave…he went down head first.

I was yelling and laughing so hard, I couldn’t sit up. I thought it would be a simple, short slide just a “whee!” and that’s all. Well, this damn thing went on and on and I couldn’t see where I was going and I was all like “Aiiiiiiiiiii!!”

Have I mentioned that I love Flickr?
I made this movie poster last night:

Click on the picture to go to flickr and enlarge it. There’s quite a cast of characters listed…hopefully you can read the fine print.

As far as my last post:
Thank you for all of your supportive words and encouragement. Sometimes, that’s all it takes.

Feelin’ better, bald eagle, why it’s good to be friendly with other birders

Did I see the bald eagle?
We will get to that in a minute.
First, there was a lot of mockingbird attitude going on in the front yard today.

Dude was all over the suet.
He was not a happy camper when the starlings moved in.

“Back off, you stupid starlings!”

“I mean it!!!”

“OH, I don’t THINK so…”

“Okay, okay, we get the hint!”

“I rule this suet, because I am Mr. Yellow-Eyed Fluffy Pants.”

“And I want THAT berry right THERE.”

“What a beautiful specimen of my species I am.”

Meanwhile, over in the crabapple, a cardinal dozed off…if you look close, you can see his nictating membrane.

Over in the back yard, I saw snow shadows. See the snow by the fence? The trees shielded it from the warm sun, and voila..snow shadows.

A flock of robins were tossed the leaves under the maples. I thought I would help them out by sweeping the leaves away from the base of the trees. They approved.

Now, onto the eagle: This is not an eagle. Just a red-tailed hawk.

I used my temporary scope (I so don’t want to give it back) to check out the action at the gravel pits. I saw:
Coots
Ruddy ducks
Redheads
Buffleheads
Ring-Necked ducks
A female American wigeon, I think…some birders have seen a Eurasian wigeon here, but I was too far away to really be sure.
While scoping, a car pulled up behind me. A fellow birder came up and asked what I was seeing. She asked if I was looking for the eagle. Turns out that she had just seen it about 2 miles down the road. Hopped in the car and went searching.
Did I see the bald eagle?
YEP.
Did I get a picture of it?
NOPE.
Damn. I will try again.

Happy Groundhog Day/Full Moon.

I have wanted to bring up something for quite a while. I have had a post in draft mode for ages, but haven’t posted it because it didn’t feel right.
Lynne brought up her past use of antidepressants in a comment last night, and I love her for it. I know you all like me, so I feel safe in talking about my mental health.
I have been in therapy off and on since I was 13. First it was for motivation in school (IQ tests to show that I definitely had the brains, and realizing that I was just not being challenged enough) and a few years back when I was pregnant with Isabelle, a new therapist. He did nothing for me. Then, 3 years ago I found my soul-mate therapist. She has seen me through my Dad’s passing, my anger, my depression.
I have been on antidepressants for 2 years now, and it seems to be working…except for the times that I react in ways that are not appropriate for the situation. I don’t let these feelings out when I am away from my family, such as at a RAPTOR program or out in public. My safety zone is my family, and unfortunately my family also takes the brunt of my anger. I am not abusive, I do not hit, but I yell and I say things in ways I don’t mean. The meds have reduced my depression and it feels great. (It looks like I have needed this for years, since high school)
Where does all this stem from? Partly, a chemical imbalance in my brain that I can’t help. And partly, a crappy relationship that nearly squashed my self-esteem. When I was 16, I was dating a 22 year old man. Why would a man want to date a 16 year old? You can figure that out.
I wouldn’t get into details. I will just say that he was not a nice person. He was mean and abusive.
That relationship colored every other one to come along. Thank goodness Geoff is understanding. He obviously saw past all my baggage to look into my soul and saw the small, undamaged part of me. He taught me that I was worth loving.
The only thing in the way of me becoming the person I really am inside is that the meds and therapy aren’t helping 100%. My therapist wants me to see someone else, to determine if I have “soft bi-polarity”. Lovely. I don’t think I am, but everyone I have told about it has NOT been surprised. I am not the type you see on TV shows…I just have mood swings from Hell. I am not Mother of the Year sometimes. I am not the wife that Geoff deserves. But I can be. I feel it. I want that.
So there you are. I’m not perfect, and I don’t think anyone expects me to be. But I could be happier. You guys, who read my blog, see the side that I truly am, the ME that shows up in small bursts. The loony, fun, sweet Me. I want to invite her to stay forever.

If you haven’t tried flickr yet, I strongly urge you to do so.  Tired of Blogger’s uploading crap?  Go to flickr.

I made this little thingy on one of flickr’s associate sites,  Big Huge Labs. (Thanks, Laura!)

I will be switching over to this blog soon, I think.  Now that I have flickr, it’s a breeze to put as many pictures as I want on here.

But for now, I will keep playing with this one, and still be posting on the old one.

A blog so nice, I named it twice!

Friendship prayer

Friendship prayer

Originally uploaded by susangetsnative.

I love FLickr and Flickers

I was good today. No below-freezing treks through an unknown bit of forest. All I did was drop the girls off and go to a park and sit in my car, returning RAPTOR calls.
I was so goofy last night. If I left a nonsensical comment on your blog, I apologize. And hopefully I made you laugh.
Word of the Day:

conflate \kuhn-FLAYT\, transitive verb:
1. To bring together; to fuse together; to join or meld.
2. To combine (as two readings of a text) into one whole.

Princess Dirty Face. She had snuck into the Cheetos while I was passed out on the couch this afternoon. This is one of her birthday presents. An Ariel (Little Mermaid for those of you without little girls in your life) wedding gown with a hoop skirt.

I have seen both yellow-tinged and orange-tinged male house finches at the feeders this winter. This one is leaning on the orange side. Red feathers are an expensive feather to grow if you are a bird, and the redness of the bird is in direct correlation to the fitness of the bird. I read an article today that suggests that orange and yellow house finches may be related to the occurance of avian pox in the population. Interesting.

“Nobody knows…the trouble I’ve seen…nobody knows…my sorrow”

“Peek-a-boo!”
I had a bit of joy arrive with a female yellow-shafted Northern Flicker.

I have always seen them in the backyard, grabbing ants from the base of our trees, but today was the first time I saw one at the suet feeder. Interesting fact: They have barbed tongues, to help them lap up ants. Yummy. And for Laura, our Spanish guru: Their name in Spanish is
carpintero alirrojo.

Fat Flicker.

They are so utterly gorgeous. This was the first yellow-shafted I have seen, also.

Those yellow feathers were mesmerizing.

She got spooked by the ginormous flock of starlings that wanted a piece of the suet too. So she sat on our sidewalk and glared at them.
But flickers also make me sad.
October 19, 2004 was the first time I saw a flicker in our yard. It was also the first time my Dad had ever been admitted to a hospital. And that was the day he died.
So when I see a flicker, I go back to that day, talking on the phone with my cousin Mary Lou, telling her about Dad going to the hospital because he had a fever. I was looking out the kitchen window, all excited about seeing my first yard flicker. And about 8 hours later, Dad was gone.

And just to end this post with a little brevity:
“A towhee says WHAT?”

I will be copying this post into my other blog to see how it goes.
What is keeping me from going back over there for good is the fact that some of you couldn’t view the WordPress blog. If you still can’t, let me know.

test upload

Testing

My last post here for awhile

 

 I had started this post last night, and didn’t want to scrap all the work it took.

 

Another try at fussing with photos.  Yesterday, while entering a park in Camp Dennison (Thanks, Katdoc, for showing me where the “legal” birding area was) I noticed a strange sound when I walked.

*Crunch…flippety-flippety…Crunch…flippety-flippety*

I looked down and the sole of my boot was slowly vacating the premises.  Good thing I had another pair of shoes in the car.

After all the healing this tree has been doing, why would someone carve the words “HOW DO I LIVE” into its tender inner skin?  I guess the dork was trying to be deep or something, but I think a person who does this needs a class in silvaculture.

I uploaded Firefox, because I heard in one of the forums that  it might work.

Back to Blogger…damn it.

Until I figure all this out…

…I will be posting back at Ye Olde Susan Gets Native.  I have lots to say and show you, and I can’t stand not blogging freely like before.  I haven’t even visited all of your blogs lately and I have a lot of catching up to do.