As I think you may know, I am a friend of the flora and fauna. My husband had an Aunt named Flora - I was a friend of hers, too. She was a lovely person all around.
In particular, I'm a fan of birds.
Not all birds, but most of them. I mean, there's not a bird that grosses me out in the same way as possums do. Probably because no bird ever died on my doorstep.
Anyway, even though we don't feed the birds at the moment, we still see a lot of avian activity at my house.
I'll start with the biggest news. We have an owl. And more to the point, we finally solved the mystery of "what bird is making that kooky noise"?
Last year, when I would go out at night to take the dog, I'd hear this kind of eerie warble - and I tried and tried to get my bird identification app to recognize what kind of bird it was. It kept trying to tell me it was a loon, or a woodpecker, or a snipe. I would then look those up, listen to their call, and realize that my app was wrong.
Then, a few weeks ago, the bird came back, and once again, I tried to get my app to give me a hand. Last week, the app suggested titmouse. And that's where I got the clue that would get me to the truth. In looking up the titmouse, it mentioned that their call can sometimes be confused with the call of a screech owl.
BINGO.
Here's the noise, in case you're curious. Specifically the tremolo, not the whinny.
So, anyway - bingo. I haven't been able to see the bird, but I can hear it, and I know that it must be pretty happy to be sticking around like that.
In other news, there's a woodpecker that hangs out in the backyard, pretty much "yelling" at the starlings who dare to light near him. It makes me laugh. I can't tell if the woodpecker is being a jerk, or the starlings are a nuisance or maybe both.
But basically, mating and nesting season is underway, so it's super birdy in our backyard. Lots of fun!
Now, in other other news, we are in week one of Spring Forward, and it's kind of kicking my butt - specifically in the mornings. Doesn't help that my husband is on a new schedule, and we're having to use a lot of the same spaces at similar times. When our schedules were a little more set apart, I had the freedom to decide I didn't want to get up for another 30 minutes with no real consequence. Ah, marriage. I'm sure it'll be fine in no time, but for the moment I'm exhausted for the first hour or two each morning.
One kind of nice benefit of the new schedule is that I have time to start on dinner early before he gets home. Which takes me back to Covid times, when I learned to roast an eggplant. I might need to do that again soon. Get some more tahini. Anyway, I ended up make some jerk pork stew earlier this week - it was crazy hot - but pretty tasty. And of course, we're headed to prime fruit season. Well, Farmers' Market season.
Now, this is not directly related to the time change, but I've been having some crazy dreams. In them, my parents are both alive and dead - meaning, they're here for a visit, but I know they're also really dead. Schroedinger's Parents, if you will. But I'm updating them on what we have done in their absence. And of course, people from my childhood and adulthood are wandering in and out of the dream in both factual and dream context. It's a lot. No wonder I'm exhausted!!!
I am in the process of planning Mom's Celebration of Life, and I know that is dredging up a ton of feelings. And those feelings have to go somewhere, so...
It's supposed to rain pretty much all day tomorrow and that really suits me. I love a good stormy day - it's perfect for Trader Joe's runs, being a slug, and catching up at home.
The first time I heard a screech owl in our backyard it really freaked me out. It sounded like a crazy person in the woods. Now I like hearing them, and barred owls which we sometimes get around here, and great horned owls. Although my favorite is the black vulture that sounds like a dog. I was walking through the neighborhood and heard "Woof! Woof!" I turned around expecting to see a dog and there were about a dozen black vultures in someone's front yard. This is definitely a strange time of year. It's almost eighty degrees now and supposed to get down to freezing next week. That alone can prompt some strange dreams but you're also processing a lot of feelings. And that's okay.
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This is definitely a strange time of year. It's almost eighty degrees now and supposed to get down to freezing next week. That alone can prompt some strange dreams but you're also processing a lot of feelings. And that's okay.