12 Oakdale

Saturday, we drove the Lake Apopka Wildlife Drive after our stint as ambassadors there, in hopes of seeing an American flamingo, one of the many that were driven north in front of Hurricane Idalia back in August. Some made it as far as Wisconsin. We didn’t see the reported flamingo, but spotted 3 purple swamp hens, lots of galinules, blue wing teals, a black crown night heron, and great egrets.  Camping at Bahia Honda this week, it dawned on me that perhaps flamingos had been seen in the Keys. Yes, down Indies Road on Summerland Key. We decided to look on our way to Key West. As we slowly drove down the gravel/shell road with houses on our left and mudflats on our right, we begged any white bird off in the distance to have a tinge of pink. We looked and looked, creeping along. Then, I realized there were 3 flamingos were right next to the road. Duh. After taking some pictures, I did a little flamingo happy dance. They were not impressed. We enjoyed them for a while, then travelled ...

My latest toy, and perhaps birthday and Christmas present, is a Haikubox * , “the smart device that brings you real-time alerts sound recordings, and loads of information about your birds.” With the huge popularity of the Merlin app since it added sound identification of birds, of course someone decided what we birders needed was a continuous monitoring of our yards for birds. Et violà, the Haikubox was invented. Made in Sarasota by people from Cornell. They were right. I love my Haikubox. It sends me alerts to my phone of all the birds in my yard. The screaming red shouldered hawks I hear, and the migrating warblers up in the trees that I’ll never see. Haikubox records them all. Some I’m on the lookout for: ruby throated hummingbirds, Eastern bluebirds, and brown thrashers. I’ve disabled the alerts for cardinals, Carolina wrens, and blue jays since they are around all the time.  Spaulding said it was the lazy birder’s friend. According to him, now I don’t even have to go outside t...

17:24 was my pace at the Run Among the Lakes 5K here in Windermere, my first race in 9 years. Another of my “seemed like a good idea at the time”, back when I signed up. I have been trying to walk more ever since I got such a dismal score on my Dexascsn bone density test. My back and hips are none too good, my femores, especially the left, are osteoporotic. Meh. I thought the challenge of a 5K would spur me on. Grant and I strolled occasionally around the neighborhood, but it was so hot, I didn’t have much enthusiasm to do it often. I also walked inside once or twice a week, in the air conditioning, following a YouTube video. I thought I’d been making progress, until I hustled along the sand blocks of Oakdale Street to a meeting at Town Hall. (The block in front of our house is one of only a few streets paved in Windermere.) My hips were really sore after that. Perhaps I should walk the course a couple of times before the race. My first time was at a 22:21 minute per mile pace. At leas...