I’ve had the feeder up for over a year now, some of the same birds have been coming by for a long time. They are used to seeing me mostly obscured by the monitors, but they do know me by sight. When there are hungry baby birds in the nests, the traffic to the feeding table is amazing to watch. The chickadees are pretty much tame.

As readers know, from time to time, I put up props such as small trees or an Easter basket, and I shoot the birds as they fly in to check out the new things. This results in a lot of fun for birds and photographer alike. But lately, I’ve been too busy to pay much attention to this.

There was the extended stay by the team of plumbers. Then the complex task of taxes, which seem to get more so each year. While I still put out bird food, it has been seeds on the old feeding tray and a dish of soft suet.

The birds seem to be troubled by this. Few are showing up these days, mostly the juncos, but they don’t linger. I inadvertently burned a small portion of the last batch of suet. Thinking their palates might be offended by this, I made a new batch that was just perfect. The juncos come by, grab a quick bite, and leave.

This morning, the male wren came by, landed in the nandina bushes right in front of where I work, and gazed in at me. I waved, and went back to my work. When I looked up again, he was staring at me again in what can only be described as a meaningful way.

A couple of hours later, here comes a junco. It heads straight for a miniature fir tree I used as a Christmas prop, and sticks its head into the branches, looking for food. Then it turns around and gives me a look.

Maybe I should design a maze that they have to work through to get to a food reward. One last meeting with my tax person tonight, and I’ll get to it, or something equally challenging.

My once-magnificent arborvitae is turning brown all over. Before the rains come again, I want to do some pruning. The birds say otherwise.

I can see this shrub from where I work, and last week, it appeared that the resident towhees were climbing into the thick ivy next to it. Perhaps that was to trick me into thinking that a bird as big as that could squeeze into the near-impenetrable mass. Today, the female is going straight into the center of the arborvitae with nesting materials.

The wren pair is probably really nesting in the ivy. Mrs. Wren is no longer looking along the patio for food, so we’ll assume she’s sitting on her nest. When I said that most of the birds have disappeared, I meant from the feeding table. All I have to do to conjure up the chickadee pair and the unknown tiny chartreuse birds is to turn the hose onto the plumber-butchered photinia out front. They will happily shower as long as I’m willing to stand there with a fine spray. I’m going to get footage of this so you can see.

There is a hummingbird in the back, but not Sparky. This one is shy, and it might be his missus, or one of his missuses. The blue jays, thank goodness, are not swooping in every few minutes. However, the titmouse comes more regularly, but generally, the juncos have the run of the food.

Sparky, the resident hummingbird, disappeared a week ago. The wren is looking in vain for food in the little prop trees off to the side. Only one chickadee is present, and it seems to be following me around the yard. The towhees are tucking a nest into the ivy on the fence. The juncos are still here, but in diminished numbers. A variety of birds are coming up to the window to check out the remains of the abandoned nest, at least two are yellow-green, but markedly different from one another.

I got involved in a project that did not include shooting video of birds for about 10 days. Therefore, I put out the seeds and suet on the tray used before. Plenty of food. Although the suet mix I managed to accidentally burn a bit of, but scraped that part away. Mostly, I’ve not paid the usual amount of attention. I think they’re confused. The food is right there, out in the open, unobscured by leaves or flowers or anything else.

Thinking Sparky had been eaten, I worried all week, but what could I do? Then I decided to read up on ruby-throated hummingbirds. Apparently, they move on sometimes, acquiring new mates during nesting season. I didn’t recall his going away last year. Then I remembered that I didn’t start taking photos of him till May or June. So he might come back. If he doesn’t, perhaps there will be a Sparky, Jr. showing up one day, full of dash and spunk like his pop. Only takes a few weeks for that nestful of baby hummers to fledge.

I’m happy that so many loans are available to all and sundry. I just wish they wouldn’t offer every one of them through my sites.

My brain knows when I need to get up. I think my body does too, but it’s going, ’seven more minutes’, ah, five more’. Sometimes, desperate measures are called for.

This morning, I found myself in the middle of a pristine ski run. (I don’t ski.) I stood there and thought, ‘All I have to do is get down that hill, get to the lodge, pack and I’ll get home.’ Except I had no skis. No even a snowshoe. People began showing up, including a family of four, who walked right by, but didn’t see me trying to flag them down to use their cell since mine wasn’t working. Some guy skied past on the left.

Then I thought, ‘If I could only get home without having to pack, and endure that incredibly long ride.’

That’s when I woke up. Very happy to be where I was, and needing only to rise and do the usual morning routine. Thanks, brain.

Of course I had to learn more about her after seeing her work elsewhere. She is a scientific illustrator who traveled to areas near Chernobyl to see firsthand the results on insect life in the fallout zone. Here is that portion of her site.

How could I not buy this book after reading this? Illustrations by Cornelia Hesse-Honegger, whose work can be seen here.

As ever, go here to get into the NYT if you’re not registered.

I spent the first years of my childhood in a small Arkansas town, then we moved to one much smaller. My world shrank in all kinds of ways. As I would discover, my older sibs had received a much better education in terms of literature. Before we moved, I used to look through their old textbooks out of boredom as much as anything else. When I found the lit books, I fell into a completely different universe.

At least five members of my extended family used these books, and on some pages, you can barely make out the text, given the bored doodles, underlinings, the circlings of important phrases. Not one picture of a poet or writer has been left alone. All manner of black eyes, dark blue lips, inked eyebrows, furrows on the brows, crossed eyes, extra hair and eyeglasses embellish the portraits. For some reason, they left the drawing of Gunga Din alone. The illustration of The Lady of Shalott is unadorned. Maybe they just didn’t get that far.

Therefore, not too long after I learned to read, I was exposed to the world of Lilliput, Gray’s country churchyard, Kubla Khan, and the use of ‘Childe’ as a first name. I wondered why Lord Byron had two names. This new universe had a completely different language. I had questions, but no one was around to answer. Being the youngest in a family has its advantages, but I felt the disadvantages far outweighed any perks.

Later on, I found Keats’ The Eve of St. Agnes’ . When you say the words ‘The silver snarling trumpets ‘gan to chide’ in my part of the deep South, you will be speaking the new language, which was frowned upon or laughed at, so I kept silent. But it bounced around in my head, like many of the phrases both underlined and not.

Was literature taught in my schools? We got a brand new graduate from the university one year, and she taught us Macbeth. I think we spent the entire year on it. We memorized some lines, the farm kids complaining loudly the while. Not once during all those years did I hear the name ‘Keats’ or ‘Coleridge’ or even ‘Nathaniel Hawthorne’. Poe maybe, maybe not.

After seeing Bright Star last night, the lines from Keats came back. (The movie is great, btw, but be prepared to get misted up toward the end.) I was too sad to sit through the end credits, and hear the recitation of ‘Ode to a Nightingale’.

But I went to the bookshelf today, and took down one of those old lit books. Thumbing through it, I landed straight in the middle of my early childhood, when I was lucky enough not to have a faculty decide what I should or should not read, or could relate to, or comprehend.

The last time I tried to take a photo with my phone, it was the night of the glorious pink clouds/sunset/double rainbow at least a year ago. Of course, I didn’t get a decent shot. Sunday, I tried again.

On the last day of an estate sale, there’s usually not much left, and it’s all half off. I’m usually on the lookout for interesting vintage cameras, since there is a collector in the family. Generally, on the last day, all the good stuff is gone since eBayers stand in line, and get in during the first hour of the very first day.

But at this sale, the glass case holding camera gear was full. I decided to take pictures and send them to the family member. I took a camera out, and started shooting. A scruffy-looking gentleman came up, and asked if I was going to buy it. I told him what I was doing. He muttered something, then reached in for a different camera.

By this time, I had navigated to a point on the phone camera window that defied logic. I couldn’t see the photo I just took, and figured I had taken about four shots, which needed to be sent. I looked for the family member who accompanied me. He backed away from my request, and then the proprietor showed up, a big guy who wanted to help.

He pulled out his iPhone.

Big Guy: See here? I think it’s kinda the same on all phones. You take the picture, then see, it says ’send’. You press that, look up the address, and you’re done.

Me: I can’t find the send button.

BG: Here, let me see your phone (pushes a few buttons). Darn. Yours is sure different. Let’s start over.

Me (turning off the phone) Okay.

BG (laughing): Heh, so you do that every time something goes wrong, you turn it off? Haw haw.

Me: It gets me back to the beginning which I obviously can’t do from this window here.

BG (puts a camera on a sofa): Okay, take your picture.

Me: Okay. Got it.

BG: See, it says ’send’. That’s all you gotta do. Let me get you another one of these cameras to shoot.

Me: I thought you wanted to keep them in the case.

BG: Naw, I was just worried about that feller. Not you.

When I asked the family collector if he got the pictures, he said no. What he got were a couple of blurry videos. Haw indeed.

One in a fascinating NYT series about city residents.

If you don’t want to register, go to bugmenot first.

All winter I marveled at those who wore sandals in the rain and wind. Those brave bare toes peeked out, and looked awfully chilled. But today, one day after the daylight savings change, it is balmy with a slight breeze.

I bought about $30 worth of seeds a few weeks ago, when it was dreary and gloomy every day. Now that the bulk of my day’s work is done, I’m going out to empty various pots full of rainwater. Unfortunately, during the humongous plumbing project, the workers did something to my main outdoor faucet. After the initial full spray in the face after turning the hose on, now the spigot doesn’t work right. Perhaps the squirrels sabotaged the hose, seeing as how I’m always going after them with it.

Maybe I’ll just take all those seed packets out and gaze upon them.

This was yesterday evening when the birds come by for the last feeding of the day. The wind today was much worse, and I gave up trying to shoot anything. I did learn that hummingbirds keep eating when it rains. Sparky is more skittish now that he is taking an active role in building a new nest, so I didn’t get any footage. He has finally relented, and lets the Missus approach the feeder, but not very often.

Around sunset, it seemed to clear up, so I put out props, wondering where all the birds were. Seconds later, it began to hail.

But the peanut-loving chickadee sidled up on the bushes by the door, all by herself, looking at me expectantly. She has been tending to her nest duties, and has ignored me for over a week. There was a peanut in my pocket, probably smelling like lint, but she jumped over and got it.

Just now, the female hummingbird comes to gather more nesting materials from the old abandoned nest hanging in the bush about two feet away from my desk. Which begs the question, does Sparky have two wives? Or has their nest fallen victim to the horrendous storms of late?

Trying to shoot footage of Sparky today has been fruitless. He is constantly being distracted by the Missus. But I thought the courtship stage was completed. For a while, I thought it was Sparky himself coming to get the nesting stuff, but this afternoon, he was at the feeder while she was pulling the softer stuff off the old nest.