Outdoors at Brookside – early March 2016

After walking through the conservatories at Brookside Gardens, I walked on the boardwalk toward the Brookside Nature Center to see if the skunk cabbage had appeared. It had not but I did see a very weathered stump and the bald cypress knees were more obvious than they are in the summer when foliage hides some of them.

There were crocuses beginning to bloom. Do you see the bee in the upper left? The day was not too cold for the bees to be enjoying the few flowers that were blooming.

Back into the main part of Brookside Gardens – I noticed bulbs beginning to come up. Are these daffodils?

Snow drops were already blooming.

The seed pods from last summer at the very tops of the crepe myrtles in the rose garden were almost glowing in the bright sun against a very blue sky.

There were other bulbs blooming as I started back along the path between the visitor center and the conservatory.

And then the witch hazels in bloom. They are the earliest tree in our area to actually bloom. Some of them don’t jettison their leaves from last season before the spring blooms emerge!

Gleanings of the Week Ending March 5, 2016

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

How Forest Loss is Leading to a Rise in Human Disease – Zika has been in the news lately – but there are other diseases associated with forest loss as well: malaria, dengue fever, Chikungunya, yellow fever, and Ebola. There is building evidence of how and why it happens.

New interactive guide tells the story of forest products in the South – Many years ago, I worked for St. Regis Paper in Texas before they were bought by International Paper – so I read this article with interest to see what has happened to the industry in the past 30 or so year. The guide is located here.

Invasive Plant to Avoid: English Ivy, Barberry, Butterfly Bush, Winter Creeper, Daylilies  - I liked these articles because they provided alternative to these invasive species to use in landscaping. I still have daylilies that I’ve had for years but I’m not going to be containing them rather than propagating them!

Spruce Tree House to Remain Closed at Mesa Verde National Park – Sad that this is closed. We probably have some very old slides from our vacation to Mesa Verde in the late 1970s that I should retrieve from storage!

Consumers have huge environmental impact – Thought provoking. The site for the EUs Glamurs project is here.

7 Resources for Natural History Nerds – Don’t let the initial picture stop you from looking at the rest of the article – it is only a lizard. These are impressive resources. I knew about only 2 of them before seeing the article. I’m bookmarking this article.

Getting the Word Out – More scientists are realizing that it is part of their job to get the interesting aspects of their work out to the public as part of modern instantaneous news. The public is demanding timely information on cutting-edge science!

Five Close Encounters of the Crocodilian Kind – The pictures are good….and the crocodilians are from around the world.

Lead, Plumbosolvency, and Phosphates in the Environment – A well written explanation of how water-works can go very wrong.

The Scale of the Universe – I’ve started taking a Big History course on Coursera and this one of the resources in the first week’s module. Scale is always a challenge and this site does a reasonable job in visualize the very small and the very large.

We have snow!

It snowed overnight – one of those easy-to-deal-with snows that makes the trees and lawns pretty but leaves the streets and sidewalks clear. I started taking pictures before it was really light because there was a light rain already trying to wash it all away.

The bushes that overwinter with their leaves leaned over with the weight of the snow but not enough to break. This one is beside our porch.

The cherry tree is lightly flocked.

On the deck – the juncos can’t find the seed bowl under the snow; they appeared to be waiting in line for the feeder.

The heated bird bath that I had been considering putting away for the season but decided to clean and put in fresh water yesterday - is rimmed with snow.

The turtle sandbox that serves as my mint garden on the deck in the summer is hardly recognizable.

Is this our last snow of the season? Probably not – sometimes we have snow in April here. But we are close enough to the end of winter that I am enjoying this one as if it might be.

Brookside Conservatories – March 2016

I enjoyed walking around Brookside Gardens earlier this week – the warmest day of the week (sweatshirt weather, breezy, sunny). I started out in the conservatories. There was eye popping color right as I walked in – purple, green and white.

And orchids with their complex blooms. It is always a celebration of the relationship between flowers and pollinators when I photograph orchids at close range. This one even has fuzz on the runway to encourage the insect to move in the right direction!

Some plants have flowers that grow as mini-bouquets or globes of color. This is an orange and yellow version.

I took two views of this flower group – from the side

And then straight down into the flower.

Then there were mounds of small yellow flowers too.

A subtler beauty – a leaf floating on top of the water in the pool – with roots underneath. It’s a good visual for the concept of water tension.

I missed reds until I got a little further into the conservatory. These flowers looked best before they were fully open.

I experimented with some images of ferns growing over water in the Conservatory’s stream. Do you like the seeing the larger view

Or the zoomed in version? I think the zoomed in version looks more painterly.

Tomorrow’s post will feature the outdoors part of my walk at Brookside Gardens.

Zentangle® – February 2016

My Zentangle-a-day goal was very easy to meet in February since I didn’t travel way from home and didn’t have many other commitments. I learned the Molygon pattern (upper right tile below) and proceeded to use it throughout the rest of the month.

I often decide that I like to use just one color. I experimented using a label for a tile this month – too glossy, won’t do that again.

I occasional get in the mood to use black paper and gel pens…but not frequently. The biggest tile of the month was the back card stock weight from a pad of paper I used up. The 3.5 x 3.5 inch tiles are still my favorite size.

I found a package of file cards – lines on one side and white on the other. They make for an odd tile size; I don’t have another use for them so I’ll continue to use them but I won’t buy more.

I’m also using up some very old colored pencils – a set that my husband had in high school that are probably 40+ years old. Sometimes I get in a mood to not use any color at all!

But then I swing back to color – sometimes extreme. There is definitely a link between Zentangle and the popularity of adult coloring books! I don’t think I will ever buy a coloring book since I enjoy the Zen aspect of drawing patterns. Adding color is just an extra step

 It is true that I don’t fill in the patterns with as much tangling if I am in the mood to add a lot of color.

Sometimes alternating layers of color become a theme.

Sometimes developing something mostly round (mandalas) is a theme.

Sometimes almost round shapes remind be of shields. Botanical themes pop into my tiles frequently.

Toward the end of the month – I made more tiles without color. Looking at them now they could use some additional shading but – for some reason – I didn’t take the time.

--

The Zentangle® Method is an easy-to-learn, relaxing, and fun way to create beautiful images by drawing structured patterns. It was created by Rick Roberts and Maria Thomas. "Zentangle" is a registered trademark of Zentangle, Inc. Learn more at zentangle.com.

Learning Log – February 2016

There are so many ways that we learn new things. Since I started logging something new I learn every day – I am more conscious of how varied what I’m learning and the way I am learning it really is.

Observation is a way to learn new things. Birds were very active in February in our area and two ‘new to me’ observations were mourning doves making and geese climbing from open water up onto ice!

Experience. Several items on my learning log fit this category: 1) I started experimenting with not wearing my glasses and discovered that I rarely need them when I am working at my computer…and the neck/shoulder discomfort I had started to feel sometimes later in the day has completely disappeared. 2) Another learning experience this month was having a thyroid nodule biopsy; it was not bad but I really am not keen to have another one. 3) I learned to use a laminator (to make a tree identification guide more durable). It isn’t a big thing but was ‘new to me.’

Books. I started looked at the Hathi Trust collection of online books; there are so many items there is it overwhelming; botanical prints are my first ‘theme’ for browsing. On the physical book side, I read several books about Wild Life Refuges and have already started applying what I read to vacation planning; we’re going to visit the 4 National Wildlife Refuges on the Eastern Shore (of Maryland and Virginia) in March: Eastern Neck, Blackwater, Prime Hook and Chincoteague. In the Internet Archive arena my theme for browsing in February was ‘wallpaper’ with particular focus on wallpaper catalogs from the year I was born!

Udemy’s Photography Masterclass: Your Complete Guide to Photography). I finished as much of the class as I was interested in. I learned a few things but realized that I am spoiled by the quality of the courses I’ve taken on Coursera and Creative Live. The 4 Udemy courses I have taken are just not up to the same standard in terms of production or content.

Coursera’s Soul Beliefs (Unit 1). I finished the 11 ‘weeks’ of lectures for this portion of the course and will start on the Unit 2 lectures in March.

Coming up in March – there are already some other types of learning coming up: travel and ‘live’ classes.

The Participatory Patient

I am past the stage in my life that I accept everything a doctor tells me without question. I’ve come to realize that they are specialized and trying to meet patient expectations that can vary considerably. There may be some patients that always want a medical procedure or drug to solve a perceived problem since that is what my doctor seems to expect of patients. My expectation is just opposite; I want to avoid drugs and medical procedures unless absolutely necessary - where it is very clear that the benefit to me is greater than the risk (both short and long term).

I like the standards of care but expect that they are tweaked with data from my particular test results. And I expect the doctor to be current on the recommendations from analysis of similar situations (i.e. the big data of medicine) and be able to clearly explain their rationale for me.

But it is hard to be a participatory patient…and hard on doctors to with new studies coming out all the time and not necessarily in their area of specialty.

The situation that started my thinking about this was a recommendation that I get an ultrasound guided needle biopsy on a thyroid nodule. I did a search and discovered that my nodule was the minimal size for this recommendation. When I met with the surgeon, I brought this up and he admitted that it was ‘low risk, low value’ but recommended that I go ahead and have the biopsy before the nodule got bigger. I acquiesced – but it was marginal.

The procedure was done and then the results came back via the surgeon’s office a few days later: the nodule is benign and I was told to have another thyroid ultrasound in 6 months. In checking the literature, I discovered that new guidelines re thyroid nodules came out from the American Thyroid Association in January of this year…and their recommendation after a ‘benign’ cytology from a biopsy is 12 months for a thyroid ultrasound.

The net of all this is - if I don’t challenge the doctor’s recommendation the ultrasounds will be done more frequently than the guideline and that increases the cost to me (both in $ and time) and to my insurance company.

Now I’m beginning to wonder about the timing of a lot of diagnostics and checks. It is hard being a participatory patient!

Ten Days of Little Celebrations – February 2016

Here are my top 10 celebrations for February – there was a lot to celebrate in this winter month:

There were a lot of birds to celebrate through my office window –

The crow with a glint in its eye,

The pileated woodpeckers in the forest,

And the mourning doves that were around frequently including a pair that mated on our deck railing!

I also celebrated good results from medical tests on myself and a family member (that counts as 2 celebrations!). Even when the majority of tests result in good (or benign) findings, there is always worry that builds and the relief translates into a little celebration when the results come back

Every time I wear my new fern imprint jewelry (ring, bracelet an earrings) I celebrate – savoring the living ferns I remember and the event where I made the purchase.

I also celebrated Christmas again every week that I work the cuddle socks one of my sisters gave me as a gift! They are indeed warmer than regular socks and comfy without shoes.

There were outdoor activities to celebrate too –

A walk around the neighborhood in the snow,

A sunny day walk at Mt. Pleasant farm (even though it was cold, breezy, and muddy), and

The birds on the ice at Centennial Park.

Gleanings of the Week Ending February 27, 2016

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

Keep off the grass – Some areas are better as being grasslands than forests…and our planet needs those grasslands!

Dodos might have been quite intelligent – It turns out that Dodos has brains that were the same size as pigeons relative to their body size…and they had relatively larger olfactory bulbs so they probably had a better since of smell.

This bus-size whale is even more unusual than we thought – Omura’s whale devours tiny shrimp-like creatures plus large mouthfuls of ‘dirty water’ (that includes fish eggs and plankton almost invisible to the human eye. They sing a low repetitive melody for an hour or more. What will happen to these whales when the oil and gas exploration gets underway in the area where they live. Is the technology good enough to keep the petrochemicals from leaking into the water?

Reflection – Another photographic project idea!

Collect psychology classes lack curriculum about disabilities – A study pointing out that classes intended to focus on interactions with people of all types have a hole when it comes to people with disabilities – particularly physical disabilities.

Total Solar Eclipse – August 2017 – Planning ahead. It doesn’t happen very often and the path for this one is a diagonal across the continental US.

FDA to test for glyphosate in food – Finally! When Roundup first came out we used it to kill weeds growing in the cracks of our sidewalk. It was never sprayed close to anything we were going to eat. But now, because food crops are engineered to not be killed by it, it is sprayed on food crops like soybeans and corn…so it goes into our food system. It’s a little scary that the study was not done before now.

Antarctica could be headed for a major meltdown – The last time Earth’s atmosphere had about the same amount of carbon dioxide as it does now was about 16 million years ago…the temperatures were 10 degrees warmer and the ocean levels were 50 feet higher. And we have some observations that indicate that the ice shelves of Antarctica are melting rapidly: 7 of 12 ice shelves on the Antarctic Peninsula had collapsed over past few decades.

Elementary School Lessons about Fossils and Rocks – I’m always on the lookout for one page references and this resource includes a good one for rocks (here).

Share your Field Notes: Nature’s Notebook – A citizen science project about phenology (the timing of natural events like blooming flowers and migrating animals…a great way to spend time outdoors and contribute valuable observations to science.

Zooming – February 2016

Birds dominate the zooming post for February. There are a lot of clips of the heads. If you want to see an enlarged version of a collage – click on it and a window with the enlarged version will appear.

In the first collage, there is a female cardinal, a male house finch, a pileated woodpecker (from the top of his head), a titmouse and a male cardinal.

Next up is a dove, a crow, velvety buds of a Princess Tree (one of the few botanical images), a robin’s foot – missing a toe, and a blue jay.

The swish of color at the top of the collage below is a blue jay flying away. The blur of color appealed to me. There is snow in a Crepe Myrtle seed pod, and a robin.

The last one is for fun – showing a dove showing off what is under its wing…and a dove blinking. In the lower right corner is the empty ‘nests’ of bird’s nest fungus.

Centennial Park in Winter

I posted yesterday about the Canadian Geese at Centennial Park. There were other things to see as well. There were gulls on the ice and swooping down for fish in the open water part of the lake. Feathers littered the edge of the ice. This Ring-billed Gull (juvenile) was close enough and stood still long enough for a portrait.

There are quite a few crows around too….cawing attention to the themselves!

There was a tree that had had a large branch cut – probably last fall. It was one of the more colorful natural elements on this winter day. The asymmetry of the cracks caught my attention as well.

This is an example of a not-so-good picture being good enough to identify the birds: a female and male Bufflehead. They are small ducks that winter in our area. There were at least 3 of them feeding in the lake while I was there but they were clearly at the limit of my handheld ‘zoom’ capability.

The mallard ducks were closer. The male was swimming along the edge of the ice (notice the feathers on the edge of the ice)

And the female was a little further into the lake. The pair meandered through the Canadian Geese without harassment.

I took a few ‘intimate landscape pictures: the rocks near the boat launch with a remnant of snow and last season’s plants gone to seed,

The empty nests of Birds Nest Fungus in the same location I photographed them last spring full of ‘eggs,’

And a collection of hardy plants encircled by roots of a tree holding the soil above the level of the path.

It was a warm afternoon for winter…but still cold. And we probably are not done with winter yet. None of the deciduous trees around the lake looked ready for spring and the ice on the lake shows bright white in the background.

Centennial Park’s Canadian Geese

Earlier this week I made a ‘field trip’ to Centennial Park. It was chilly but sunny – I wore a hoodie rather than a coat. There were parts of the lake that still had ice. The Canadian Geese were active – sometimes sedate

And sometimes honking loudly (not the tongue!).

But most fun to watch was how the geese climbed onto the slushy ice from the water. Their strategy is to push themselves up on the ice as far as they can, roll to one side to get a few more inches onto the ice – far enough to have their legs on the ice so that they can standup and immediately take a step forward then preen to get the ice out of their feathers. The second bird used the same strategy then added a huge wing flap and shake at the end before strutting off. Enjoy the geese climbing onto the ice in the slide show below!

More on what else I saw during my Centennial Park field trip in tomorrow’s post.

Beautiful Food – February 2016

So many good things to eat – even in the winter time. We have it so much easier than people did 100 years ago!

I enjoyed stir fry slaw this month. It was a quick meal-in-a-bowl for a winter lunch. I simply stir fried apply, broccoli and frozen cranberries in a skillet…added a heap of savoy cabbage and some sliced smoked turkey…added a bit of General Tso’s Sauce at the end. The red of the cranberries and apple skins adds just the right spark of color.

Hearty soups are also a favorite for winter lunches – another meal-in-a-bowl. This month I made mushroom soup. It is easy to make and beautiful too!

• Cut up fresh mushrooms, sautéed in a little olive oil.
• Put in beef bouillon and water…dried onions…ground up dry roasted soy beans (I just processed them in my small food processor)…soba noodles.
• After it cooks about 4 minutes add almond milk.
• After the soba noodles are cooked (it usually takes a total of 5 minutes, but read the package) – pour into a bowl…drizzled pumpkin seed oil…and scatter some pumpkin seeds.

This is a high protein soup with mushrooms, dry roasted soy beans, and soba noodles.  The drizzle of pumpkin seed oil – dark and rich – and the seeds on top add to its appeal.

Now for a snack: blue corn ships with hummus. I like the color contrast. It is very easy to eat too many so I always prepare the number that I want to eat on a plate – and don’t go back for more!

Egg casseroles are becoming my favorite beautiful food to make, enjoy for one meal…and then several more. I usually make the 4 serving size and include whatever is handy in my refrigerator. The baking dish I use is the perfect size and has a lid so I can easily store the left overs in the refrigerator. Note: I am lactose intolerant so am using non-dairy products, egg casseroles can obviously be made with milk and cheese.

The general recipe for this one:

• Whisk together 4 eggs and a scant cup of almond milk.
• Add broccoli (processed in a food processor), dried parsley, dried onion (and any other seasonings desired). Whisk.
• Cover bottom of baking dish with non-dairy cheese substitute. Pour egg and vegetable mixture over the cheese.
• Sprinkle pumpkin seeds on top.
• Bake for 15 minutes at 425 degrees F and then for 30 minutes at 350 degrees F.

The green and yellow/gold colors are cheerful on a winter’s day – even if it is very gray outdoors!

I really am enjoying the cook that I’ve become... or maybe what I truly enjoy is evolving the way I prepare food to appeal to the taste buds and the eyes! The other requirement is that it be good nutritionally too.

Natural History of a Place

I went to Belmont Manor and Historic Park in Elkridge, MD frequently enough over the past year to observe it in every season. Last summer a large English Elm on the front lawn of the Manor had to be cut down (Dutch Elm Disease). I took this picture shortly before it was cut down - the picture taken from an angle that the dead part of the tree didn’t show too much. A month later the tree was gone, the stump and exposed roots dug out, and new sod put over the wound. A month later and it was hard to tell where the tree had ever been. The episode stirred some thoughts about the natural history of a place and the significance of our actions on that.

The English Elm was planted – a non-native to North America. Whoever made the decision to plant an English Elm may have been wise in the end because this one lasted longer than most of the American Elms against Dutch Elm Disease.

The pond further down the hill was probably dug in the 1980s. It was probably always a wet area. There was probably a vernal pool there in spring. Lots of wood frogs would have successfully laid their eggs there and new frogs would have emerged. Now the pond has fish – that eat frog eggs.

In the 1900s – the area in front of the house was open. For some of those years it was pasture for horses. The forest would have been different. At the beginning of the century there might have been American Chestnuts in the forest. They would have been noticeable for their size and their nuts would have been gathered every fall – by people and squirrels (and other animals too). There is no tree that has quite filled the niche of the American Chestnut that was wiped out by the mid-1900s by the Chestnut Blight.

Earlier in the 1800s, many of the trees would have been cut for fuel. There were a lot of ironworks. There were massive erosion events when the forests were cut and the Patapsco River – downhill to the north of Belmont – received a lot of sediment changing it from a navigable river to a shallow, easily flooding river by the early part of the 1800s.

Prior to anything being built on the hilltop where the Manor House is today – the area was forested. The chestnuts were the big tree and the Europeans were impressed by the richness of the life in the rivers.

There is so much that we did not preserve…and that we still don’t quite know how to sustain.

American Craft Show in Baltimore

Yesterday we made the trek into Baltimore for the American Craft Show that was held there this weekend. We had heard about it from the artists (2400 Fahrenheit) we’d purchased some pieces from in Hawaii. There were an overwhelming number of beautiful things at the show: glass, clothing and accessories, jewelry, wooden art and utensils, metal pieces…I am pretty sure that even though we tried to be methodical and go down every aisle the we missed some of it.

Jewelry seemed to have the most booths. I got a set of copper jewelry (cuff, earrings, and ring) from a Baltimore artist – Allison Fomich. She does botanical motifs so I’ll probably buy more pieces the next time I happen upon her at a local event.

The red and black earrings are from a west coast artist --- they are more 3D than most of my other earrings and they are colors I wear frequently.

The last item I got was an eyeglasses case. My husband was always irritated when my old case snapped shut so he is the one that strongly suggested this fabric case that will be silent!

Of course – we had some narrow misses on more expensive items (larger art glasses pieces). We didn’t find a piece that we both agreed was the perfect one for our mantle.

On the way home I took a picture of a clock tower than I hadn’t noticed before – probably because I have only been taking pictures from the car window recently. It is the Bromo-Seltzer tower and was built originally opened in 1911. It was the tallest building in Baltimore from then until 1923! Check out the Wikipedia article about it here.

Gleanings of the Week Ending February 20, 2016

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

Snow Rollers – Snow balls formed via weather conditions rather than human hands!

Humorous Charts and Graphs Show What Being an Introvert is All About – Lots of fun….and oh so true! The graphics start with one about the ‘perks of being an introvert.’

Recovery: Saving Lake Sturgeon, an Ancient Fish with a Bright Future – A little bit of history… and the potential of surviving… for this fish species that has been around for a very long time.

Mammography: Is Every 2 Years Enough? – Netting out what the most recent studies have found. But will doctors and mammography centers go with the recommendations? It seems that some mammography centers might be financially motivated to continue to push annual mammograms for everyone – even those over 55.

New study finds clear differences between organic and non-organic milk and meat – This is a study from the UK but the results would probably be the same in the US. I already buy organic dairy and meat… and appreciate that research about the nutritional value fortifies that decision!

The Fungi Within – This article includes a nice table of fungi frequently found in the body. It’s interesting that there are so many and that most of the time they don’t cause us problems. But do we always recognize when they are problematic?

‘Ecologically diverse’ breast cancers more likely to be deadly – Most of the time diversity is a good thing…but not when it comes to cancer. It appears that the general rule that ‘diversity is good for survival’ is true for cancer ‘systems’ too.

Mind and Matter – From the author of a book on the topic. Many patients supplement what their doctors are telling them with other resources…and maybe this is an area (the role the mind plays in our health) we should include when we visualize the educated patient of the 21^st century.

NASA Releases Retro Travel Posters Playfully Encouraging Space Tourism – Fun!

Images of Sound Waves in Water – A little like kaleidoscope images…except with sound waves.

February Sunset

I haven’t caught a good sunrise yet this month; the mornings seem to all be full of this clouds or so clear that then sunrise is uninteresting. But there was a colorful sent set last week. The back of my house faces west and the winter sunsets can be seen through the bare branches of the forest trees. I can catch the sunset from the deck but the view is better a story above the deck through my office window. That was my vantage point for these pictures (another advantage of the office is that I don’t have to bundle up against the February outdoor temperature!).

The color goes in opposite order to the sunrise ---- blazing oranges

Fading to pinks and then reds as the day fades into dusk.

Pretty soon the trees will begin to get leaves and the view from my house of sunrise and sunset will not be as spectacular. I have another month or so to catch the color.

Different in 2016

Now that we are more than a month in to 2016 – I am getting serious about what habits I want to tweak this year. They are a little different than a ‘resolution’ or a goal because of the way I am thinking about them as habits. Habits are the things I do almost without thinking and there are strategies for changing them that apply.

The most significant one I am changing (not the optimism) is to stop drinking soft drinks entirely. Late last year I stopped using artificial sweeteners (and didn’t start using sugars) except for those in the Diet Pepsi. It’s time to stop the soft drink habit both because there is no nutritional benefit (and may harm), they are some of the heaviest items in my grocery bags, and the plastic bottles are a significant contributor to the recycle ‘trash’ bulk. I tried the strategy of just stopping suddenly and that didn’t work very well. I fell off the wagon after a few weeks. Now I am color coding the days on my calendar: red if I have a soft drink, green if I don’t. We’ll see if that works. Concurrently – I am developing drinks (water with a little black cherry juice is my current favorite) that I can have in lieu of a soft drink. So I am applying habit changing strategies:

• Make is conscious rather than automatic by calling attention to it (color coding my calendar)
• Develop a substitute habit (another drink choice)

Another habit that I am changing is when I wear my glasses. I have worn glasses or contact lenses virtually all my waking hours since I was in third grade. In the past few years, I have noticed that I am very comfortable reading on my tablet without my glasses. Just recently, I’ve discovered that quite a lot of what I do on my computer can be done without my classes. I tried it because I noticed that I was holding my head at an angle (to look through the part of the lenses for the best computer distance vision) that lead to quiet an ache in my neck and shoulders by the end of the day. The neck and shoulder problem is totally resolved by not wearing my glasses as much when I am at my computer so – we’ll see if I continue to like using the computer without glasses…. or whether I get some glasses specifically made for use at the computer.

Giving up soft drinks and not wearing my glasses as often are going to be challenging…just as breaking any long duration habit always is. I don’t think I could tackle 10 things like this…but 2 – I should be able to focus enough to change these habits.

A Walk in our Snowy Neighborhood

Earlier this week, we had a few inches of snow on the ground. We knew the temperature was warming enough that it would melt on its own the next day so didn’t bother to shoveling the driveway. We took a walk through the neighborhood instead.

I thought this tree with snow and cut branch took in the look of a pig face! When I looked at the picture on my monitor I noticed that the branch – that had only been cut last summer – had already dried out and darkened. The reddish layer already had cracks too.

The fire hydrant was clearly visible but I thought the uneven layering of the snow on the top made it look different than the actual shape of the metal underneath.

The water retention pond was not all snow covered. The ice from the earlier – very cold – days was beginning to melt.

My favorite picture of the day was the crape myrtle pod full of snowflakes…crystals still intact.

Bird Photography through a Window – February 2016

It’s been a good month for bird photography through my office and kitchen windows. There are several kinds that visit daily. The male cardinal is so brilliantly colored that he always stands out. He is bigger and quite assertive about keeping the juncos at bay when he’s hungry. He’s too big for the feeder so he hogs the seed bowl when he is around.

His mate is the same way.

The blue jays visit the maple tree

And the bird bath. The jays are noisy so I usually have plenty of warning that the flock is passing through. The bird bath is popular when it is very cold because it is heated and probably the on only liquid water around.

The dove come in pairs…and sometimes larger numbers. They like both the seed bowl and the birdbath but sometimes sit on the deck railing and look out over the yard. There was one odd instance when the dove turned around and appeared to be watching me cook dinner through the kitchen window.

The robins have been increasingly common at the bird bath. Previously I saw them in the yard occasionally. One afternoon when the snow was melting the robins were having a feast of worms that must have been close to the muddy surface.  This particular robin has come to our birdbath several times. Can you spot what distinguishes this bird? (Part of the left foot is missing.)

I see the crows frequently and sometimes here them. They sometimes flip debris from the gutter over my office. They very seldom sit anywhere that I can photograph them. This one seemed to be posing for his picture.  Note how different the feathers on the head are from those on the back and wings.

There are others that are less common. A pair of pileated woodpeckers came through a few times this month. They stay in the woods behind the house.

We sometimes see house finches but the juncos generally drive them away from the feeder.

The same is true of the titmice.

A flock of red winged blackbirds came through early in the month. At first I thought they were something else because they were not all black. But I did notice the red and yellow patches. It turns out that these are immature males!

Some of them were blacker…and more mature.

Cowbirds also came as a flock and gobbled up most of the seed in the bowl. There are still some around but not as many at one time as that one cold afternoon. No other birds could get close to the bowl.