The Nature of Things

TO ALL MY WONDERFUL READERS:

A roundup of the week's news of birds and the environment (better late than never edition) : American Goldfinches in their winter dress visiting my backyard thistle seed (nyger) feeder. I'll be reporting goldfinches and all the other birds in my backyard for next weekend's Great Backyard Bird Count . I hope you'll consider participating and reporting the birds in your yard. *~*~*~* What had seemed like a reprieve for the rusty-patched bumblebee when President Obama gave it protection under the Endangered Species Act near the end of his presidency looks like it may be snatched away by the new administration in Washington that has put a 60-day pause on federal regulations not yet implemented. Sixty days from now may be too late for the bumblebee which is near extinction. *~*~*~* Birds like the White-eyed Vireo that depend upon a healthy understory of brush in forests are harmed by an overabundance of white-tailed deer in those forests. The deer devour the brush that t...

The Goodreads monthly newsletter came out this week. Each month they have a poetry contest and the newsletter features the winner. This is this month's winner. I'm not familiar with the author but her poem touched me with its simplicity, a simplicity that masks a profound understanding and insight into people. It's the kind of insight that might easily be gained by an observant bartender or waiter who sees people in situations where they have "nothing to gain." It is then that their true selves emerge.   The Things I Learned as a Bartender  by Tricia McCallum (Goodreads Author) There is no such thing as the perfect martini. Jazz musicians make lousy tippers. A couple can walk in fighting and after two shots of tequila hold each other for dear life on the dance floor like they did in high school. A woman doesn't notice her date's drink order as much as how he treats the waitress. No matter how cool the pickup line women want kind. Even with nothing to gain ...

This book has been published in the U.K. with the title The Blot , which actually seems a much better title than A Gambler's Anatomy . In backgammon, which is the preferred game of the main character in the book, a "blot" is a piece that stands alone, vulnerable to attack. Alexander Bruno, the main character, adopts that term to refer to something that has gone horribly awry with his anatomy. There is something growing in his head, between his eye and his brain. Something that shouldn't be there. It is a tumor, and when we meet Bruno for the first time, in Berlin, that unnatural growth is just about to land him in the hospital after he suffers a kind of seizure while he is playing a high stakes game of backgammon. Bruno is a professional gambler. He travels the world, winning large sums of money from rich amateurs who are sure that they have what it takes to beat this professional. He has been inordinately successful for a long time, but then, in Singapore, his luck t...

We're celebrating our older daughter's birthday this weekend, so, even though I do plan to do the "This week in birds" post, it will be late - on Monday. The weekly poetry post has already been set and scheduled so it will be published Sunday, as usual. Happy weekend! And happy birthday to Susan!

I've never actually thought of reading as a revolutionary act but perhaps that's what we have come to in this time of know-nothingness. At least someone in San Francisco seems to think so . A mystery benefactor there has been paying for copies of 1984 by George Orwell, The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood, and In the Garden of Beasts by Erik Larson to be given away to interested readers with the admonition "Read up! Fight back!"  On Friday night, 50 copies of 1984 were bought from Booksmith, a bookstore in the Haight-Ashbury district, and placed on a table with a sign reading: "Read up! Fight back! A mystery benefactor has bought these copies of 1984 for you if you need one." The books were quickly snapped up, and then the anonymous donor bought copies of Atwood's and Larson's books, which also quickly disappeared. The bookseller has said that this random act has inspired others to follow suit in this "fruitful, constructive form of r...

Plants that looked entirely dead in the middle of January are now waking up and showing signs of life once again. The old azalea didn't die back, of course, but it did lose some leaves. Now it is beginning its bloom cycle, which always starts at the bottom of the shrub and works its way to the top. The split-leaf philodendrons that were a pile of black mush after our January freeze are now coming back, putting up new leaves. The yellow cestrum lost all of its leaves, but now the new ones are coming on. The lemon grass clumps all died back to the ground and I pruned off all the dead leaves with a hedge trimmer. Soon you won't be able to tell that it was "dead" in January. Milkweed, slowly coming back. It can't be fast enough for the butterflies. I'm going to need to get some new plants from the nursery to fill in until my old plants can regain their growth and their blooms. White mistflower, coming back strong, after losing all of its leaves to the frost. Both ...