The Nature of Things

Truthfully, I do not have a Buff-bellied Hummingbird in my backyard, although some of these tropical hummingbirds do make it this far north in their wanderings. But in fact, seeing a Buff-bellied at the Estero Llano Grande State Park on one of the good days for birding last week was one of the highlights of my vacation. The Buff-bellied is noticeably larger than the hummingbirds that I am most used to seeing - the Ruby-throated , Black-chinned, and Rufous . It is 4.25" in length and has a wingspan of 5.75". The most obvious thing about the bird, other than its size, is that bright red, slightly curved bill. That is a field mark that you just can't miss and you can see it with the naked eye from a good distance. It leaves no question about the identification, which is always a good thing.  Here is a closer view of bird. They are uncommon within their limited range and are most frequently seen at feeders and flower gardens. This feeder was set out by the staff at the visit...

Okay, I missed Bloom Day for reasons that I explained yesterday , but I came home from my vacation to find a few new, as well as some old, blooms happening in my yard, and today I thought I would share a belated personal Bloom Day with you.  It's impossible to share blooms with you these days without also sharing pollen. Our air is yellow with the pollen of our many pine and oak trees. You'll be able to see a dusting of it on some of these blossoms. The 'Mabel Bryan' camellia is in full bloom. The 'Climax' blueberry is also full of its bell-shaped blossoms. This little pink allium is just beginning to bloom. The ancient azalea in my backyard has just begun to open its flowers to the world. 'Spring Bouquet' viburnum is blooming.  The primrose has a very long blooming season. Carolina Jessamine lights up the yard with sunshine even on cloudy days. The little violas that have bloomed all winter continue blooming as spring approaches.  This is 'Peggy Mar...

Did you miss me? Well, maybe my most devoted readers - of whom I have one or two - might have noticed an interruption. Last week, the hubby and I went on our "spring break" trip to The Valley, which is what Texans call the region around the Rio Grande River as if it were the only valley on Earth. The Valley is a favorite destination for birders from all over the world and I had hoped to happily spend the week seeing lots of colorful and maybe, with a little luck, new birds that I had never seen before. Mother Nature had other plans. Of the eight days that we were gone, it rained on five. Birding was next to impossible. There were really only two days in which we finally were able to be in the field looking at birds. Those days almost made up for the rest of our spoiled trip, and, in the next few days, I hope to share some of my pictures of the colorful birds I was able to see with you. We got back home late Saturday afternoon. Saturday night, I had another nasty surprise. Dur...

I am a devoted birder so I am always up for a good book about birding. Here's one about an Australian "big year."  ~~~~~ Big Twitch: One Man, One Continent, a Race Against Time: A True Story about Birdwatching by Sean Dooley My rating: 3 of 5 stars The record for a "Big Year" in Australia was 633 birds.  That was before Sean Dooley decided to spend his year breaking it.  Not only did he want to break it, he wanted to annihilate it.  He set himself the goal of seeing and identifying 700 birds from January 1 to December 31, 2002. It helped that he didn't have much of a personal life at the time - no family, no significant other, no one to slow him down.  No 9:00 to 5:00 job either.  He was a comedy writer in real life, but that wasn't requiring much of his time and effort just then.  He was able to single-mindedly devote himself to his obsession. This book tells how he did it, with all the ups and downs along the way.  He had a lot of help from fri...

I read The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society in the politically charged summer of 2009 when tea partiers were assaulting our ears with their rants about "taking back" the country. That was on my mind when I wrote this review. ~~~~~ The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society by Mary Ann Shaffer My rating: 5 of 5 stars This is a wonderful book!  I was engrossed from the beginning. It is a story, as most of the world probably knows by now, of Guernsey during its occupation by the Germans during World War II and what happened in the year after that occupation.  It is an uplifting story of how art - in this case, literature - can keep the human spirit whole even in the worst of circumstances. It is a love story of a woman, a London writer, for people she has never met and then, when she does meet them, how that love grows into a love of their place and their way of life.  It is a love story, too, between a man and a woman - a love that grows so silently an...

One of the weirder reading experiences I had in 2009 was The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis. Not really my cup of tea. ~~~~~ The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis My rating: 2 of 5 stars This is a weird little book.  Now, I have never read any of C. S. Lewis's fantasy works that serve the cause of Christianity, so maybe, in fact, this is right in the mainstream of those other works, but, to me, this was just a far-out and contrived piece of literature that didn't seem to have much real purpose. Okay, the premise is that Screwtape, a senior devil in the service of Satan, is writing this series of letters to his beloved (?) nephew, Wormwood, who is something of an apprentice in the art of tempting a human "patient."  Screwtape gives him a constant stream of advice about how to be more effective and how to get around all of the Enemy's (God's) defenses of his subject - who is a Christian.  Perhaps it is because I do not find such creatures as Screwtape and Wormw...

I had long wanted to read The Egyptian and in September, 2009, I finally got around to it. It was an interesting read and, once again, I reviewed it on Goodreads. ~~~~~  The Egyptian by Mika Waltari My rating: 3 of 5 stars I have long had an interest in the history of ancient Egypt, particularly the Amarna period when the heretic pharaoh Akhnaton attempted to overthrow the ancient gods of the land and replace them with the One God, Aton.  It was a turbulent time when blood often flowed in the streets, a time that was rich in drama on many levels. "The Egyptian" is set in that period.  It is presented as the "autobiography" of the mysterious Sinuhe, a man of uncertain origins who rose from poverty to be the physician to the king. Before he attained that high position, he traveled throughout the Mediterranean area, to Syria, Mitanni, Babylonia, and Crete.  During his travels, he treats the sick and learns form other physicians and his renown grows.  He also gath...