Category Archives: Whatever

Pastimes, Whatever

April foolishness

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I’ve been waiting to receive something appropriate to share for April Fool’s Day from one of my email buddies, but they haven’t come through yet. Last year Michelle sent me these crafty photos of ways to torture your coworkers while they’re away on vacation. Yes, it’s an old post, but worth a laugh today at least.

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Speaking of foolishness, I bought this carton of Easter-colored birdseed eggs and hung them outside today just before it started to rain. I’m sure the house sparrows will appreciate all the millet while it stains my sidewalks. Of course I had to buy them (not!) because the sign above read, “Easter’s not just for the bunnies – think about the birdies, too!” – well, so I did and didn’t think about it until after I saw what I had paid for them. I’m a sucker for cute and useless bird stuff.

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I got pulled over by a policeman for the first time in fifteen years today. I was making my usual frantic last-minute dash to arrive at the bird observatory on time. No I wasn’t speeding! But my car was throwing sparks because the cover of my catalytic converter decided today that it was tired of hanging on after months and months of rumbling and plunged itself to the pavement and dragged along in plain view of the policeman. I was just picking up the phone to curse at my husband because he’s put off fixing it for months when the cop turned on his lights to pull me over. I thought for sure he’d give me a ticket for being on the phone while driving. He actually asked me if I realized I was dragging something. Hello? You don’t think I could hear it? He was very sweet though, and assured me that my car probably wouldn’t catch on fire so long as I was careful. He even got down on the pavement to have a look. When did they give badges and guns to fifteen-year-olds? Goodness, I feel old.

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So, the day at the bird observatory was very quiet because the weather was cold and damp today. But I finally have a co-conspirator (fellow volunteer) to keep company with after years of volunteering alone on Sunday afternoons. Hi Pat! The two of us were like caged lions waiting to be set loose to see the Osprey flying by outside the windows as they go about their courting and housekeeping in their bayside nests. We closed up shop a little early today and took a short walk together to visit one of the ponds on Sandy Hook where black-crowned night herons like to hang out. We only saw one way across the pond, but like a true shutterbug, Pat was snapping away with her camera. I hope we’ll find an excuse next month to do that again as I’m sure the Hook will be much more birdy come the first week of May.

Whatever

Confession time

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I have phone issues. More specifically, phone company issues. I’ve just finished writing out the monthly bills, and among them was a $16.52 check to AT&T, who is our long-distance provider. I don’t need long-distance service; in fact I haven’t placed a long-distance call in the last three months, at least. So why am I getting a bill from AT&T for $16.52?

Non-usage.

AT&T makes me pay them $5.00 a month plus taxes and surcharges because I don’t use their service. Isn’t that un-American? Unpatriotic even? Sneaky and underhanded? Like bad business?

The last time AT&T decided to charge a monthly non-usage fee I called them and signed myself up for a plan that avoided the non-usage fee by paying 25 cents a minute on any long-distance calls. 25 cents a minute is a lot to pay to call my brother who lives in the next county (somehow considered long-distance), but I went along with the plan to avoid paying for something specifically because I was not making use of it.

Now AT&T has decided to charge me 25 cents a minute on any calls I do make, or the monthly $5.00 non-usage fee – whichever will put more money in their bloated pockets. Is At&T that desperate for money?

Dissing AT&T feels sort of like sacrilege to me. My father worked for them for his whole career. My brother worked for them for his whole career until they layed him off as my father lay dying (nice – thanks AT&T!)

Part of me feels silly for fussing over it at all. I pay three times that amount for a cell phone I hardly use – mostly for calling my brother (to avoid that 25 cents a minute charge) and for emergencies – but it’s the point of the thing, you know?

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My other brother, Brian, the real writer (and poet) in the family has finally decided to stop lurking and left a comment (and a poem) on this post the other day. Have a look!

Whatever

Word cloud 2

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I posted one of these last year around this time and thought I would try it again to see how it had changed. The idea is that it analizes your blog and lists the most common words in the *word cloud*. The nicest change since last year is that I see many of your names there. Thanks for your continuing friendship.

In case you’re feeling mindless also and would like to give it a try – click here.
Whatever

Don’t like the weather?

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Not much to say today, but I do have an addition to the list of things I love about my job. The weather for the last week has been unseasonably warm; near to 70 degrees on Wednesday. But late yesterday a cold front came through and it’s been raining ice and snowing all day today. The view outside the copy room window at the office was very wintery: I often stand at this window and watch for a Great Blue Heron that visits our *pond* – usually there’s a few Canada Geese and some Mallards. Last summer we had a bunch of baby snapping turtles dig their way out of the banks of the pond and under the chain link fence that surrounds it. I was talking about the weather, wasn’t I? See how easily I get sidetracked by birds! Anyway… so it was very cold out today. Winter on the outside.


But inside it was a balmy 81.5 degrees! Yesterday it got up to 84. A summer’s day to go with my coworker’s tropical postcards there in the background. It’s so nice to be dressed for the winter weather and have to sit at your desk and sweat day after day! I love it!

The summertime is even better because I can go to the office and freeze my ass off! I have this pretty blue serape from Mexico that I wrap myself in for the summer months because it’s usally about 50 degrees.

I’m trying to be funny, but I sense that I’m not fooling anyone here. So I’ll end this with an invitation to any of you that are suffering through the last few months of winter in the frozen north to come and visit me at work someday. Whatever the weather, you can count on the opposite once you step inside. I’ll be the one alternately fuming or freezing in the back corner.

Snapshots, Whatever

A found poem

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“Have you forgotten
that you can never
be caught
if you still
hear
trees crackling
and growling
if you can hear
the one
dit of gravel
fall over
the other
dit of gravel
in the wind,
if you can still count
the red berries
on the bushes
and divide
by the number
of birds
in the yard,
if you can recollect
that you
are descended
from some
grove
that no longer
stands,
a ground
you came from
still
run through
by El rio –
abaio rio,
the river
beneath the river
that surfaces
in the most
surprising
places?
You,
who were washed
in a magic
hearing
water
born
with a bowl
curved
inside
your belly,
there
gathering lightning,
gathering rain,
forever filling,
and forever
emptying out.
Where does
the breath go
when it is not
being drawn?”
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I’ve put off posting this *found* poem for a few months, hoping that I might be able to first come up with the author’s name, but I haven’t been able to find any source for it. Maybe someone out there might recognize it.

I found it hanging in a coworker’s cubicle – a photocopy of the typewritten poem that was given to her on a retreat years ago. She doesn’t recall or never knew who the author was, but “The Cairn of Recollection” was handwritten across her photocopy. Searching for that as a title didn’t produce any results.
Birds, Whatever

A stinker

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I can’t tear myself away from the coverage of Anna Nicole’s funeral long enough to put together a proper post tonight. Instead I’ll just pass along this link to Laura at Vitamin Sea. She’s in Florida and shares Mary’s affinity for GB Herons. I think she may even call them stinkers too. Someone turned one of her very nice photos of a GB Heron into a painting and she’s sharing the finished artwork on her blog today. She also has a link to the artist’s site and there’s more nice things to peruse there. Have a look.

I took this awful photo towards the end of January; pulled off to the side of the road *a la Mary* and tried to keep the big lens from shaking too much while I hoped that someone wouldn’t crash into me. It could have been a really nice pic if I’d had a tripod, but setting that up surely would have scared him away. I love the way the telephoto lens distorted the background – too bad all my shaking also totally distorted the bird too. It hurts my eyes to look at it for too long, sort of the way looking at Anna Nicole’s pink-draped coffin all day hurts my eyes. Anyway, I’m just noticing that this guy had his pretty breeding plumes on in late January – what’s up with that?

Whatever

Let it snow!

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Like a little kid I’m hoping for a snow day tomorrow. I have to say this quietly because if my husband hears me, he’ll get angry. He can’t enjoy the snow the way I do; it just means working all night for him. Right now it’s snowing those huge wet flakes that make me want to run out and play. I tried to take some pictures out the back door, but they didn’t turn out so well. Instead I added some *digital* snow to this image from last weekend. Sort of a neat trick that I learned and have been playing with for the last hour or so.

I know you’re all sick of the snow, but would you sleep with your pj’s inside out for my sake? Maybe put a spoon under your pillow too? Anybody know any other snow superstitions I can try out?
Note: The *unsnowy* image was part of this post if you’re curious to see what it looked like before. What do you think?
PSA, Whatever

Hug a bee (or a moth, or an ant or…)

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Pollinators are an essential part of a healthy ecosystem and play a significant role in the production of more than 150 food crops in the US. Wild and domestic bees do the majority of the work to provide us with apples and almonds and cranberries, but other invertebrates like butterflies, beetles, and flies, as well as vertebrates like birds and bats also play a role. In addition to increasing the productivity of food crops, pollinators are also responsible for the survival and reproduction of many native plant species.

It’s easy to appreciate the beauty of flowers, but I’m fascinated to consider the myriad ways that flowers and pollinators have evolved together to ensure that plants produce offspring. The challenge to plants being that they’re stationary and can’t wander off to a singles bar on Friday night to be fertilized. Instead, they entice pollinators to come to them with scent and shape and color.

Populations of native pollinators are declining for the same reasons we know to affect other wildlife: habitat loss, pesticide use, pollution, poor agricultural practices, introduced species, etc – we’re all familiar with that list. It’s important to make people aware of the problem and the ways that they might help to mitigate the damage we do. I’d imagine that most flower and vegetable gardeners have some experience with pollinators, both positive and negative. It’s the people who have never grown a tomato or who are convinced that *nature* is out to get them that could benefit the most, in my opinion, from a basic understanding of plant biology and how it affects the food on our table and the landscape outside our front door.

The image above is the new *Pollination* stamp series from the US Postal Service due out in June of this year. “The intricate design of these beautiful stamps emphasizes the ecological relationship between pollinators and plants and suggests the biodiversity necessary to ensure the viability of that relationship.” A sure way to dress up the monthly bills.