The Things You See

Sunrise

Baby it's cold Outside edition.

Sunset.......

Icons

Of the North

Of the Sea

Of the landfill 

Of dawn in Winter

The Things you See

The Frost is on the ......

Slumpkins......

Duck, Duck, Goose

The Optimistic Gourmand

How do I eat thee?

Let me count the ways

I love thee from thy barbels to thy tail fin

My beak can reach when fins are out of sight

For the ends of being are all about good taste

Get in my belly!

I shall but love thee better after swallowing.....

Cheer Up Though

The weather is fine for birding even when it's not so fine.

The Things you See

Snow clogged soybean fields, not looking good for harvest any time soon

At least this corn is in....

It's still November

There appear to be a lot of new horses in the Amish world this month. This driver
is braced this way because this pair nearly leapt out into the road seconds before this
and then they wanted to take off down the hill. A few weeks on that manure spreader and they will have a whole different outlook

I think of it as the mirror month of March...opposite ends of winter but so alike in fluctuating ambiance and frequent changeability. However, March is closing in on spring and the good days can only get better.

It is well above my pay grade to tease the rarities out of flocks like this
unless they are close enough
and the light is good enough
to get decent photos to look at later

With November you know that the nice days are just teasers, lulling us into a false sense of comfort and joy, while the weather gears up for lots more misery.

November is not my favorite month atall, but the drive to get outdoors and look for birds has rendered the iffy weather and short, gloomy, days a lot more bearable.....

The nigh horse in this pair is pretty hawky too. Didn't much like
the look of us.
Which I suppose is understandable, dangerous characters that we are.

Got Atmosphere?

November does....

So Cool

Red-throated Loon

Today I received one of those dreaded letters from the eBird reviewer. I had yet again misidentified a bird. I am pretty careful to run anything I am not sure of past an ID group or two, so it doesn't happen real often.....still.....I hate to make mistakes.....(and I appreciate the nice folks who keep eBird honest and try to let my mistakes serve as a learning experience for me.)

However, sometimes I see something that looks a little different, pooh-pooh myself as overthinking it, and list it anyhow.

This time I photographed a loon out on the river by the confluence with the Schoharie and called it a Common Loon. It actually looked a little different to me, but it was in eclipse plumage and I have been wrong thinking commons were something more uncommon all too often. Saw the darned thing four or five times over successive days and photographed it, but discarded the pics as too low quality. It was a lo-o-o-n-g way out in the river....

Comes the letter. The bird was a Red-throated Loon, a lifer for me and the first county record. I'm kinda kicking myself that I didn't go with my first impression and put it up on What's this Bird? to be sure what it was, but on the other hand I am just so darned excited that I can live with getting it wrong. In fact, happy dance....literally.....Hope we see it again

ScarySpace

Cyberspace is like the Wild, Wild, West these days.  Innocent people get caught in the crossfire, causing stress, fear, and sometimes financial damage.

Today we came home to a message on the machine from a close relative about another close family member. Seems this individual was in Maryland and needed bail money. His lawyer told the geographically distant relative not to tell us, but after agonizing all morning he did anyhow. 

For a moment panic coursed through my veins.

But then I thought.....wait a minute....person #2 was just here last night and I know right where he is. He is on the road but he sure isn't in Maryland. And besides he would never not call us if he needed us. After everyone calmed down we agreed that it was a scam. The same thing was pulled on my mama a few months ago saying Jade was in trouble....he wasn't, but he was on the road. Thankfully Liz is pretty much always in touch with him.

Then the mail contained a bill from this company.....it was a very official-looking document, but something about it gave me a hinky feeling. I looked it up, and lo and behold, it's another scam.

We are fortunate to be reasonably up-to-date on the various scams and schemes going around, but not everyone is. I feel terrible about this happening even though there was no way we could have prevented it....anyhow, if someone calls you for bail for an out of town family member, check before you send it.

And stay away from Records Recovery Services.

There's a New Chef in Town

Chef Peggy

The judges at her cooking show

A Very

Happy Thanksgiving to all.....