BAD NEWS

2012 Eagle Cam Web Log
February 27, 2012
Our latest news from the nest is that the surviving chick did not make it, so we lost both chicks to what appeared to be an eagle intruder. We've seen individual adults leaving the nest on and off, but it's not clear which adults have been visiting.
We know it's sad to lose the second eaglet, but since there's a good chance the chick was injured, we think it was a merciful thing that it did not survive, especially if the parents are dealing with another eagle around the nest.
Some of you who were with us during the 2004-2005 season remember Craig Koppie, a raptor expert with the U.S. Fish and Wildife Service. He was the one who helped deal with the George and Martha eagle drama at the Wilson Bridge and other raptor events in the Washington DC area. He's also the person who climbed our Eagle Cam nest in 2005 to take one of our chicks to Vermont for the eagle restoration project in that state.
The staff at Blackwater Refuge have asked Craig to review the video and stills and offer a biologist's opinion about what might have happened at our nest. We're waiting to hear if Craig will have time to take on this task, but we're hoping he does, since he's familiar with eagle aggression and how these types of incidents are increasing as the bald eagle population grows and eagles are vying for prime nesting spots and mates.
We've decided to keep the cam offline for just a bit longer. We will be bringing it online again soon, but we hope you'll understand our decision. We do have a good bit of news in that we're being allowed back into our old PC room this week (the room that was damaged by the rain), which means we should be able to bring the Osprey Cam online soon.
Cam watchers have asked if we think our eagle couple might lay more eggs this season. It's rather late in the season for new eggs, so we don't expect them to produce any more at this time.

EAGLE BABIES

Just a quick update... just caught a couple cool pics of the babies having breakfast this morning.

FIRST GARDEN UPDATE FOR 2012

FIRST GARDEN UPDATE FOR THE YEAR!!!! Can you imagine? At 72 degrees today, I could not stand it any longer... I have cleaned out the Pea Patch. Frank pounded in a couple metal fence posts for me and the strings are up. I am tired of rotting wood posts, and amazingly the metal posts cost less than wood when you figure they won't have to be replaced in 2 years. But best of all, the weeds are pulled (mostly turnip greens) and the onion bed is clean and ready for the onion sets I bought last week. Sweets. Then, since I was already in the same area, I cleaned up the small asparagus bed and the strawberry patch. Figured I might as well, I will be too "stove-up" tomorrow to do it anyway, plus, I was already sitting on the ground (not intentionally) so I might as well keep pulling. Once I managed to get up, I was not going back down... 'course, the trick was getting back up!

It was, or is, difficult to remember it is February. The daffodils are blooming. The forsythia is showing color. The roses have their baby leaves... sigh.
The birds are starting to make their nesting sounds... seeing and hearing robins don't mean much. I have a small flock that winter here. They have had an easy winter. The snow geese are on the move again - huge flocks have been flying over. When I say huge, I am talking thousands Really. They make so much noise, it is easy to keep track of them. The ponds are snow white, some of the fields are white... I am not a farmer, so I think it is beautiful. I understand not everyone feels this way. But they don't eat any of my crops. If I had to worry about that, one goose would clean up my garden in short order! But, It feeds us... and I still find it exciting to go out in the yard and pick something I am going to eat for lunch or dinner... or pick berries for my cereal. No chemicals, not even any chemical fertilizers, and my cow manure comes from field grazed cows... remember? Like they used to do? Cows in the pasture? What a novel idea. Home grown food. Not crap from China or some other country with worse rules than we have, and folks, we have bad rules when you consider GMOs, pesticides, herbicides, and tons of chemical fertilizers. If you are close to my age, you will have noticed food just doesn't taste like you remember it from when you were a kid, does it? Even many of the tomatoes from farm markets taste like cardboard these days. Why? They have been genetically modified so they look prettier, grow bigger, ripen faster... Didja ever notice cherry tomatoes are sweeter than regular tomatoes? The goal is not to take all that flavor and stretch it into a huge tomato, so it is sweeter. Now the big thing is grape tomatoes. They grow fast, are harvested in weeks, and have tough skins so they can stand rough treatment without bruising. But how do they taste to you? Lots of chemicals in those tiny red things.

I am keeping my eye on the weather forecast. Mid 70s tomorrow, but probably rain. If I can move and it doesn't rain, I will get another area ready. Then Sunday, highs in the mid 40s.

THANKS, I NEEDED THAT

THIS HAS BEEN one of those days... on top of several other days. Been too busy for my body to be happy, and this morning started out cold and out doors, down at the Train Station talking to a mason about a little more work... then discussing what we are going to do inside... you can keep up with the goings on at the station on the SPOTS blog. Anyway, I got home, cold, tired from working in the woods the past 3 days, and had to deal with 6 phone calls... more work... more scheduling. Tell me again, why do they call this retirement? oh, right... I was tired of working, and now I am re-tired all over again. duh.

Anyway, I finally got to checking my non-urgent emails... and my dear neighbor sent me a laugh or two. Thought I would share them with you! (with apologies to blondes, rednecks and idiots...)

Different Ways Of Looking At Things

Two guys were discussing popular family trends in sex, marriage, and family values. Bill said, “I didn't sleep with my wife before we got married, did you?” Larry replied, “I'm not sure, what was her maiden name?”

A little boy went up to his father and asked, “Dad, where did my intelligence come from?” The father replied. “Well, son, you must have got it from your mother, cause I still have mine.”

A doctor examining a woman who had been rushed to the Emergency Room, took the husband aside, and said, “I don't like the looks of your wife at all.” “Me neither, doc,” said the husband. “But she's a great cook and really good with the kids.”

An old man goes to the Wizard to ask him if he can remove a curse he has been living with for the last 40 years. The Wizard says, “Maybe, but you will have to tell me the exact words that were used to put the curse on you.” The old man says without hesitation, “I now pronounce you man and wife.”

Two Reasons Why It's So Hard To Solve A Redneck Murder:
1. The DNA all matches.
2. There are no dental records.

A blonde calls Delta Airlines and asks, “Can you tell me how long it'll take to fly from San Francisco to New York City?” The agent replies, “Just a minute.” “Thank you,” the blonde says, and hangs up.

Two Mexican detectives were investigating the murder of Juan Gonzalez. “How was he killed?” asked one detective. “With a golf gun,” the other detective replied. “A golf gun! What is a golf gun?” “I don't know. But it sure made a hole in Juan.”

Moe: “My wife got me to believe in religion.”
Joe: “Really?”
Moe: “Yeah. Until I married her I didn't believe in hell.”

A man is recovering from surgery when the Surgical Nurse appears and asks him how he is feeling. “I'm O. K. But I didn't like the four letter-words the doctor used in surgery,” he answered. “What did he say,” asked the nurse. “Oops!”

While shopping for vacation clothes, my husband and I passed a display of bathing suits. It had been at least ten years and twenty pounds since I had even considered buying a bathing suit, so I sought my husband's advice. “What do you think?” I asked. “Should I get a bikini or an all-in-one?” “Better get a bikini,” he replied. “You'd never get it all in one.” He's still in intensive care.

The graveside service just barely finished, when there was a massive clap of thunder, followed by a tremendous bolt of lightning, accompanied by even more thunder rumbling in the distance... The little old man looked at the pastor and calmly said, “Well, she's there.”

AN EASTERN SHORE SNOW!

AH, YES, THIS IS MY kind of snow. Here for breakfast, gone by lunch. Fun to see, exciting coming down, little kids go to bed dreaming of making snow men, snow puppies, snow anything... but, well, it was more like thick slush. Way too wet to pack into anything. The water content was .67 inches, so we did get a good amount of wet-stuff, but with the temps never getting below 35 degrees, most of it melted as soon as it hit. These are white camellias on the bush to the right. If we had had today's temps with that snow, we would have had 2-3 inches of white stuff waiting for us. It is 29 right now. (Supposed to make it up to 70 by Thurs!) It did bring a load of birds to the feeders and brought this little fellow back to the redbud. See the snow on the branch???? Look carefully or you will miss it! BTW, this posting is just for certain people who asked to see our great snow!

FOOL PROOF!

THE BEST $108 I EVER INVESTED had to have been this chain saw. For one thing, it is FOOL PROOF! Which is a good thing since I have been known to hurt myself with tools. This saw comes apart, each section being 4 feet in length. Here I have assembled 2 sections, the third or middle section is on the top shelf of my potter's bench. This saw runs on a battery pack that goes in the handle end, so the blade part is always at least 8 feet away from the hand holding down the run button. That way the user cannot possibly cut off their own toes! It is up to you to stay out of my reach! The chain part is only 8 inches, so one is limited to cutting a branch or tree 4 inches or under. Now how much trouble can one get into with something that skinny? (I am still doing research...) The unassembled saw fits in a neat black canvas bag and the screw driver/allen-wrench fits in the chain shield. These are 7 foot doors, to verify the size of the saw as I usually use it. I am not comfortable with the 12 foot length, tho' I have used it. My problem is not that I am a Klutz... but that I have problems understanding limitations. Maybe it is because I grew up as the only girl for miles in a neighborhood of boys. If they could do it, so could I! As a kid, my step-father always made me help him do things. I learned about making mistakes by watching him rip up more than he fixed. When I lived with my father, he made me help him do things, and with a Master's in Mechanical Engineering, he did not make as many mistakes, and he was a good teacher. He taught me not to be afraid to try things. For example, he made me rotate the tires on my first car before he would turn the keys over to me. That way he knew I would be able to change a tire if I had to - and I had to change more than one! He knew I could not call im and have him help me out as he was seldom in this country, let alone close enough to change a tire for me. 'Course, now I am too old and have no idea how to even get to the so called spare tire. Oh well.
The woods I needed to thin out has grown thick with little trees, honey suckle, VA Creeper and green briars. In another month there will be a fine crop of poison ivy, too. My goal is to get this clean enough to walk thru. So I used my saw to cut down anything small enough for me to cut, and get someone else to cut down the slightly bigger stuff. I want the pine trees to come back in this area, and they are few and far between. So... pile #1... Remember, that saw is 8 feet long, so this pile of little trees is over 7 feet high. Now on pile#1, it doesn't look like much until you notice, some of these trees with a 2 and 3 inch diameter are 20 to 30 feet long! Most of them I had to cut in half just to move them to the pile.... Pile #2...is badly piled... too many trees I should have cut kept getting in my way. It was an unplanned pile, but really high, long and deep. I planned on going back and cutting the few trees holding the pile in place and restacking the trees, but it actually started to sleet. Needless to say, I quit. Besides, I was getting cold. I hate sweating and freezing at the same time, but I am really pushing my body to do this stuff. However, I am determined to be as independent as I can be. I have learned there are not many folks that can be depended on... not even the folks that supposedly make a living doing this kind of work... or the folks that beg for small jobs. So, if I can stand and walk, I will keep at it. Do not remind me that a woman of 68 is not supposed to be doing this stuff. Do not remind me of that wheelchair in the barn.
This is almost what I want it to look like... a few more hours, someone with a bigger saw... another day with the new blade weed-whacker. The string type will not cut thru these vines. That little pile in the middle of this picture is pile #1, so you can see a little bit of how much area I cleaned out This is about half of it. It is raining harder now and is mixed with ice pellets... supposed to turn to snow tonight. That will be good as a nice heavy snow will compact those piles and also show me all the little stuff I missed because of the leaves. Lets just hope we don't have an ice storm because someone always gets hurt. But, a nice clean snow will be good. Actually, I am excited as this was impenetrable last summer. When I get done, I am going to transplant a couple dozen camellias into this area. I want to turn it into a Meditation Garden...

Going back to the price, 3 years ago of $108... when I think of what I pay someone else to do the heavier stuff I can't do at $10 or $12.50 an hour, I have saved a fortune by doing so much for myself.

And a BIG thanks Frank (spaceflighter) for helping me get the chain back on the saw and tightening everything. It took 3 hands and a better brain than mine. 'Course, if I read the instructions, I might have discovered that tension screw... duh. I have been blessed with wonderful neighbors!

THANKS FRANK!

EAGLE UPDATE

PROGRESS!?
02/18/12:In this shot from Saturday morning, it appears there is still a hole in the bottom egg, but the chick hasn't made much progress. Also, on Friday night our father brought the mother a rabbit dinner, which would also indicate that the parents heard a chick coming.

I sure do hope these links will open for you. Mama is still sitting and looking around... Come visit at:
http://www.friendsofblackwater.org/camhtm2.html

MY HERD

WELL, THAT IS WHAT a number of my neighbors call them... Just because they LIVE here, sleep here, have their babies here in my woods, and terrorize people driving past here too fast... really doesn't make them mine. Does it? I was reminded of the wash tub of water I keep out during droughts and the deicer I keep in the ground level birdbath so they can drink when everything else is frozen. Just because I buy bags of apples for them... doesn't mean I OWN them. Anyway, today I saw them visiting across the street. There were 13 in all. I grabbed my camera and tried to stay behind my bushes, (can you see them?) but they got freaked anyway and headed across the street into my woods. How many did you count? Ya gotta look really carefully.

FIRST CROCUS

WE HAVE HAD an extremely mild winter here, so far, at any rate. The ground got dusted with a little snow once or twice - if you slept in late, you missed it! That is part of what I love about the Eastern Shore. One snow fall per winter to satisfy that need to see the white beauty of Ma Nature and that is enough... but not enough snow to have to drive in it. Works for me! Anyway, it has been a very mild winter, as I said. The first crocus is up and blooming. The daffodils are about to show color. And the forecast is for some cold weather ahead. And "It always snows on the daffodils!" So we shall see. But that is OK, I need to stay inside and get some cleaning done. However, the garden catalogs are rolling in... sigh... so I spend my time planning, itching to go buy some lumber and make myself another stand-uppity garden, skinnier but deeper. Maybe 2 of them, one each for my onions and carrots. Maybe another 4x4 to transplant my strawberries into... Where will I put my tomatoes this year? The cucumbers...

It may be chilly outside, but my brain is thinking SPRING IS HERE!

TWO EGGS (over easy!)

A number of you have asked if we have any eagles this year... the answer is yes, in fact, quite a few it seems. At Blackwater, we even have 2 eggs... saw the Mama roll them over, real easy this morning. Unfortunately, I canNOT get the picture to post in blogger - but if you really want a copy, let me know. I have it in my email. Go figure.
OR, you can visit http://www.friendsofblackwater.org/camhtm2.html and keep track of them yourself!
Happy birding!

TODAY'S MEETING with TIM KAINE

FORMER GOVERNOR TIM KAINE came to town today... we had a Meet and Greet lunch at the Sage in Exmore. He met with a packed house - not even standing room! The intro speaker was Senator Ralph Northam. Kaine is running for Senate. Governors are allowed only one term here in VA - otherwise the man would still be in office! Tim and Frank Moore, DemCom president for Accomack County. Tim and Luz, the liason with the Hispanic community; with Aşir; Tim, guess who, Luz, and Ralph.

FAIRY HOUSE Part 2

BOY! YA GOTTA KEEP YOUR EYES OPEN! Rake away some leaves and what do you know!?!
And I was told there is another Fairy Garden a few hours north of here, near Wilmington, Delaware: MORE ABOUT Enchanted WooodsTM:
Discover the magic of a fairy-tale garden with a visit to Enchanted WoodsTM, a unique children's garden at Winterthur. In a three-acre plot of the Winterthur Garden, the fairy folk created a magical landscape for children of all ages! Canopied by majestic oak trees, Enchanted WoodsTM has been taken over by the woodland fairies who live here and is transformed into a place of enchantment, mystery, and discovery. From the Tulip Tree House to the Faerie Cottage, children will find a new world to explore.

FAIRY HOUSES

DO YOU HAVE FAIRY HOUSES on your property? I bet you do! Fairy Houses are famous in Maine where they even have special celebrations for them. I was cleaning up out in the yard today - it is 60 degrees!!!! and the last week in January, and I noticed a fairy house over where a mighty maple once stood. It took very little work to enhance the "property." A few pebbles here and there, a little vine hand rail... and a few flowers (bottom 1/3rd, middle) from the rosemary in my herbal windowbox... yes, it is in bloom again! This box sits next to the house under the kitchen window. I have an old piece of plexiglas bent over it to keep the frost off (or snow should we ever have any this year.)

As kids we knew about, and often made, Fairy Houses when I lived on Peaks Island. We would pretend to suddenly find them and show them to tourists. Sometimes we would charge a nickle! LOL! Hey, in those days, you could buy a popsicle for 5 cents! Even today, there are Fairy House tours on some of the islands and even a 3 day festival at Boothbay at the Coastal Maine Botanical Gardens, usually held in early August.

Mackworth Island lies just outside of Portland but feels like it’s miles away from the city. The small island is circled by a lovely coastal walking trail. About halfway around the circuit is a charming woodland fairy house village with views out to Casco Bay. Some of the houses are built against trees and stumps, while others are freestanding upon the thick, soft cushion of pine needles that cover the forest floor.

The Mackworth Island permanent Fairy Houses Village was established by local families in cooperation with the State of Maine Bureau of Parks and Land and the Governor Baxter School for the Deaf.
This superb village has been established for several years and gets more magical all the time! It is in constant use all year round (weather permitting.) We used to make mini-igloos in the winter!
The village is a 10 minute walk from the parking lot around the island to the north side. The island is accessible by road, but parking is limited. Mackworth Island is located in Falmouth, just off route 1 heading north from Portland.
The official Fairy Houses Village sign reads:

“The village provides fairies with cottages during their visits to the island.
We invite you to visit the village and admire the creativity of the builders. If
you are so inclined, you may use your own imagination to expand the village or
provide needed maintenance to the existing cottages. Thank you for treating the
island with care and respect.This helps to keep the fairies coming back!”

Further north is Monhegan Island.

The magic of Monhegan seems to inspire us to acknowledge the fairy realm by
building little houses. In the island’s Cathedral Woods, tall spruces stand
like the pillars of a grand cathedral, drawing our eyes upward. For a
generation, this moss-floored forest has been the site of Maine’s most
well-known and beloved fairy house village. (Note: Due to too many people
building fairy houses there in recent years and damaging plants and mosses
in the process, visitors are now asked not to build any new houses. Just
enjoy seeing any that you may spot on this enchanted island.)

Next warm day when I have a few minutes (like when does that ever happen?) I really must look around the back 40 and build a real nice fairy house. I am sure they will move in right away! Maybe I can get a little neighbor to help me... Hmmmm.

CAMELLIAS- Aunt Alice

A fellow blogger has a flower on her blog as her ID pic... to me the tiny thumbnail looked like one of my camellias. Bi-color camellias do not have a set pattern, so I knew that would vary. This is Aunt Alice which is in bloom now. Camellias, especially old stock, large bushes, add greatly to a property's value. I have known folks who bought houses and tore them down but kept the camellias on the land... reconfigured their plans for their new house to fit with the existing camellias. Camellias are among the easiest plants to care for. Many of mine are over 10 feet tall now. If you have followed my blog for any time, you will have seen loads of camellias.
There were no camellias - or any other flowers for that matter - on this property when I bought it. Mostly it was covered with huge pine trees that I lost about 10 years ago with an infestation of pine bark beetle. Many of my friends gave me camellias as house warming gifts. What treasures! I brought a few little ones from my previous house, and a couple azaleas. Then, for years, friends gave me bulbs or plants for Xmas or birthdays or just because. Today, many of those friends are no longer here, but their memory lives on as their love blooms in their season. As I walk by, I greet each one by its name and the name of the person who gave it to me and I am reminded of their love. How great is that? I bought Aunt Alice, first because of its beauty, but second because I had an Aunt Alice. I love her dearly. So, how could I resist?
I hope you have enjoyed Aunt Alice with me.
If you have a camellia, never, ever cut it down. Legend is, cutting down a camellia brings bad luck.

FRUSTRATIONS

FRUSTRATIONS... oh shame on me for being frustrated with this computer. This will not be much of a post, mostly it will be to see if I have loaded my photo programs right... I gave all my discs to the computer dude down the street - he makes his living doing this stuff, drives a new Mercedes to prove it - but things are still never quite right. None of my photo discs got installed, for example, and that is just the tip of the iceberg. So, to see if things were working, I went out and took a picture of the pot of pansies (aren't they beautiful? Especially to those of you buried up to your knees in snow or ice today?) I got from Bobbie yesterday... and a shot thru the door of the greenhouse with its heating system on - the brooder lamp on a bucket of bricks. Hey! It works! The ordinary incandescent bulb heats up the metal and the bricks - the bricks retain the heat... and it keeps the greenhouse in the 40s or 50s depending on how bad it is outside. Here on the shore, lots of folks keep their pumps from freezing in the winter just with one incandescent bulb. So I figure if it will keep a pump from freezing in a pump-house outside that is as big or bigger than my little greenhouse, well, it ought to keep my geraniums toasty and my impatiens from freezing... and my other plants and cuttings, too.
Did you notice the size of the daffodils next to the pansies? They are up about 8 inches. This may be a year when they bloom in mid-February.
But, back to the shame on me part. Living in this country, we tend to moan and groan over the most trivial things. OK, let me rephrase that - I tend to moan and groan over stuff that is merely inconvenient at the moment, and forget how darn lucky I am. Here I am complaining about having to load a couple photo discs so I can download pictures from either of my Nikons, and for the moment not thinking about the millions of people who still live without electricity, let alone computers and cameras. Yes, it is hard to believe that such people exist, but they do. Believe me, they do. We are so spoiled here. Even the poor in this country somehow manage to have cell phones, and other devices even tho they do not have decent food on their tables. So, I am ashamed of myself for grumbling about having to install a bunch of discs myself. But then, I paid someone else to get this computer back to where it was - minus the virus - and, well, it isn't. Hard to believe that the old computer was 8 years old before it had to get wiped clean and this one was but 8 months old. So much for McAfee.
I know I am going to have to change my ISP, and I so dread that... mostly I dread trying to wade thru the crap on the phone with Verizon. You would think the phone company would have an easier system to access. Oh how I long for the old days when there was an office down on the corner where I could go and pay my bill in person, add a phone, a new phone line, change a listing, put a phone in another house 40 miles from here, and get a nice visit with the real person doing all this for me. Often Progress ain't! Yet, there are those who have to travel over 100 miles to get to a phone or to a service if they have a cell phone. So, here I am grumbling again in a house with so many phones I can't count them. There is usually one in reach wherever you are. Spend some time in a wheelchair or being unable to get up and walk and you will understand.
So I guess I need to do a gratitude list... not just that my brain worked well enuf to install the photo programs... not just that I own a computer that is working (more or less) - and a camera or two... but that I do have electricity, heat, a roof over my head, food in my tummy, managed to get myself dressed, fed the cats, and got outside to take these pictures. Then I must add that I have a wonderful friend that gave me these pansies... and I can go on and on.
Like I said, shame on me for complaining.

the LAND OF CAMELLIAS, KITTY CATS, AND POSSUMS

I started this post several days ago... did not get to finish it as the 'puter was in the 'puter-pital for a few days. Now, so thoroughly cleaned that I have to reload everything (and have lost tons of stuff - sigh) it is back. If you have not heard from me - that is why. I will do better after I retrieve your info and a lot of other things.

From last week: I just had a phone call from someone who was complaining about the fog this morning, the frost, the noise the VDOT men were making out on the road, the cat demanding his breakfast, the dog underfoot needing to go out for a pee… We live within 2 miles of each other so I am sharing the same fog, same frost, and even though I do not have a dog, I do have 2 outside cats I have to go out and feed, so I cannot escape the elements this morning. I headed for the door, can in hand, but, instead, rather than taking out a can of food, I turned around and came back for my camera. The sunrise was beautiful thru the fog. OK, not one of those brilliant bright awesomely colored sunrises but it was not all just a lessening of the gray sky, either. If you are a sunrise watcher, you know how quickly the colors change, and indeed the red brilliance had started to soften when I took the time to come back inside and get the camera. In the space of only a few shots, the red was gone and an orange glow took its place. For a couple seconds I was reminded of a forest fire in the distance. Instead, it was sunrise over the ocean. I stood beside the van on the carport – I was still in my slippers – and took these shots while a little cat wound around my ankles telling me he loved me dearly and especially admired my ability to open cans. Please open one. LOL! The other cat lounged sleepily in the heated box and waited, no beggar he! Soon the camellias will be busy with honeybees… Yes, honey bees love my yard, especially in the winter when it warms up enough for them to fly. There are usually a hundred or more camellias in bloom loaded with pollen, a mile from their bee boxes at my neighbor’s to the east. See the frost on the edge of the leaves? It will not hurt the camellias. The winter camellias can survive even a nice snowfall. They do not like a prolonged period of cold like we have had for the past 2 years. I stood there in the chilly morning air, petting the little cat that had jumped up on a shelf, all the better to be petted, looked at the camellias in January, and thought how lucky I was to live in such a place. Sure, I have a bigger house up in the mountains, beautiful scenery, a river with white water 1000 feet from my house… but no camellias. And there it is seriously cold this morning, and a light snow is falling. I am not into driving on icy mountain roads. Lazy, I guess… no longer adventurous enough. Or, maybe I have that wonderful elusive thing so many folks search their whole lives for, move from pillar to post looking for – contentment… happy to be living in the land of camellias, where kitty cats drink out of the bird bath, and possums hang out on the carport.

The end!

ADVICE FOR THE COMING YEAR

As this calendar year draws to a close, we put away our holiday things, and we bid farewell to our celebrations, I hope your new year will be free from conflict, filled with Peace and joy. Put aside your delusions of grandeur, be humble, be understanding and patient. Enjoy life no matter what comes, be it a warm sunny day, snow up to your belly, or crunchy leaves to roll in. Take time to watch the birds, enjoy a good meal. Let life be OK whether you sleep on a catnip pillow or a brick.

It is all good. Take time to meditate.

Avoid showing off… Be modest. Avoid being sent to a corner. Be cool. Take life in stride, both the highs and the lows. Hang out with your friends, sleep overs are always good. And don’t forget to let those very best friends know how much you care!With love from Hadji, Rascal, Punkin, and Spook