12 Oakdale

I’ve planned a quiet and relaxed 74th birthday. I’m up at my usual 5:00 AM, made coffee, fed the cat, done my ab exercises. Now time to read magazine articles and learn one more bird order (28 down; 3 to go, unless the ornithology people reconfigure the groups, which they seem to be doing, now that DNA testing is widely available. My next project is to learn the passerine families. Might be possible.) Breakfast, then some yard work to finish weeding and trimming the west poolside bed. The weather has turned coolish, low 70’s, so I don’t have to be out at o’dark hundred. I’m cutting most of the salvias way back, to encourage more flowering. At the same time, I don’t want to cut back too much because all the bees, wasps, and flies still need places to feed. A delicate balance. After lunch of the very last of the Thanksgiving leftovers, we’re going to the Garden Theater in Winter Garden for Moonshine and Mistletoe: An Appalachian  Christmas Tale . My review will be posted later. Then ...

It wasn’t raining when I left the house, however 3/4 of the way through my 20 minute jog, it began to pour. Since there was no lightening, I decided just to slog along even when I got to the 5 minutes of cool down. I was already soaked, so there wasn’t any need to rush. I’m certainly not going to get hypothermia this time of year. In fact, I was a little warm in my long sleeved Goofy race shirt. It has been raining for the past two days. We got 1 1/4” Wednesday and 3” yesterday. Today is supposed to be clear, which the Town of Windermere is certainly hoping. Tonight is Light Up Windermere when they ceremoniously turn on the “seasonal” lights. Not to be outdone, several families in town have already put up and lit their Christmas decorations. What happened to Thanksgiving?  I am quite pleased with my progress with my Couch to 5K app program. Five weeks down, 3 to go, then I plan to run the Santa Twilight 5K in downtown Clermont, December 13th, amid the twinkling lights. Today was th...

A quick trip to California for Bella’s birthday party, flying Alaskan Airlines nonstop out Thursday evening and the red eye home Sunday night. Travel is getting back to normal with some people still wearing masks, most not. I’m just hoping the kid in the seat behind me who threw up was airsick, not contagious. Too late to do anything. On the other hand, if being around 6 kindergartners and their younger siblings Saturday afternoon didn’t do us in, I’d say our immune systems are working fine.  For the party, Mary made mini cupcakes which I frosted. The kids decorated them with sprinkles as a party activity. She also had small white paper bags which they colored on and stuck on stickers for their take-home goody bag. In it, we tucked a paintbrush and their plastic pallet which had held their sprinkles. She’d decided no candy since everyone had so much left from Halloween.  Ryan had planted big bubble wands in a couple of large pots of dirt so they didn’t dump over and lose all t...

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...

I woke up this morning and realized I have nothing hanging over my head. I could work in the yard, get caught up on financial paperwork, or bake bread, but nothing is overdue. Just the steady drumbeat of life. Last week I was crazed with shower preparations, and even though I had a schedule and was really on top of it, I woke up a couple of nights obsessing about all the different tasks. It all got done.  People seemed to enjoy the party, and Spaulding and Molly were pleased. We did run low on bbq and have tons of potato salad and cole slaw left, but that might be just because the guests included lots of young men. * My orange cake was a hit, and my mini cupcakes were delicious. I also made cookie gun almond cookies. I was pleased with the results. This week, I had a Toastmasters speech to prepare for my Presentation Mastery pathway. and one last survey to complete to finish my Engaging Humor pathway. I had been putting the latter off for almost 3 months. Tuesday morning, I got up,...