Ash throated flycatcher

 

Shine On Brightly

Last call at the Donnyland Corral

Past time for Donnie to ride into the sunset. Not so much a circular firing squad, the GOP is now engaging in full scale cannibalism. 

So far the orange one has shivved Republicans Gov. Ducey in Arizona, Governor Kemp in Georgia, Georgia's Secretary of State Raffensperger and Wisconsin's Robin Bishop, all loyal followers who both voted for him and supported him in the recent election.

No friendship is too important, no loyalty so dear that our President will not try to destroy if somebody  gets in the way of his current grift.

The FBI, the DOJ, Cybersecurity Chief Chris Krebs and countless other loyal followers who have stood in the way of the Grand Delusion and called bullshit on his fraud claims are now suspect and part of the great conspiracy in Donnyland. Claims which were never brought up in court by the way because not even a Trump lawyer would risk their reputation by making them in Federal Court.

When asked how Trump could lose the top of the ballot and so many Republicans were elected down the very same ballot, his lawyer Jenna Ellis claimed that they were presumably in on the con and had obviously paid someone off.

All those people who maintained that he would kill his own grandma, screw his own mother and kill his own children to get what he wanted don't appear to be too far off the mark. How many more loyal Trumpers are going to receive a knife in the back before this thing is finished?

Exploding Whale 50th Anniversary, Remastered!

The Sound of Silence

Looking back

 

I needed to meet with a client in Escondido on Saturday to finish some business.

He lived close to the first subdivision I ever built with my father, Lindsley Park. Started it in 1975.

It was a large project, four or five phases and I was an assistant superintendent, working under my boss at the time, Lou Orrantia.

My father was the developer. It was a low to moderate income subdivision, my dad's bailiwick, building houses that people could afford to live in.

I learned a lot the two years we built that project. It was a P.R.D. and had a large park on top. One of the streets is named for my late sister Amie.

I decided to visit the other day after meeting with my client, see how the houses looked and how tall the trees had grown. That was one of our signatures, building around parks. Always love checking out the foliage.

Anyway, I built and bought my first house there, think I paid 22k. Sold it for a hefty profit and bought another one in our next tract in Carlsbad three years later.

Lindsley Park was one of our most basic tracts and I went in with trepidation. How would it look? And you know what, it looked pretty good. I stopped a person or two in their driveways and introduced myself. They loved their house and liked the neighborhood, congratulating me. Made me feel good. Thinks looked worse in my memory.

Afterwards I drove up Washington, a street I haven't driven east on in a while, past the old Rubes and stopped at a place that advertised birria, Mariscos Mazatlan. I ordered the birria de res. Fair but not overly impressive. Lousy service but the place was clean and the food a seven.

Then I drove over to Lake Wohlford and took a couple hikes. Saw the osprey pictured above. Not a whole lot more. I actually got lost on the backside, lost my trail and had to walk on the road to get back to my car. That was interesting.

I was looking for bald eagles but found buzzards instead. Some days are like that.

Not much else to report. Worked in the garden yesterday and binged the rest of the Umbrella Academy. 

Caught this picture of an acorn woodpecker in Dominick's palm tree this morning with the zoom.

Happy birthday, dad

 Happy birthday to my late father, Amos Sommers.

I took this picture of him and my stepmother Shela in a remote Masai village in Northern Kenya. He would have been 94 today. He was exactly my age today when I took this shot back in 1989. He produced so much, had an incredible amount of accomplishments in his lifetime.

The Dirty Knobs

Mike Campbell released this a week ago. Leslie and I were once lucky enough to see the Dirty Knobs at the Belly Up. I believe it was in 2001. I have looked at the setlists for the three times they played there and can't find our show which included rollin and tumblin. They were all in Tom Petty's band moonlighting for a gig. Great show.

Consent to Search

Lexophilia

 Thanks to Bob Schmid for sending me this:

Lexophilia 

 

"Lexophile" describes those that have a love of words, especially in word games, such as: "To write with a broken pencil is pointless."

 

An annual competition is held in New York Times to see who can create the best original lexophile.

 

This year's submissions:        

I changed my iPod's name to Titanic. It's syncing now.

England has no kidney bank, but it does have a Liverpool.

Haunted French pancakes give me the crepes.

This girl today said she recognized me from the Vegetarians Club, but I'd swear I've never met herbivore.

I know a guy who's addicted to drinking brake fluid, but he says he can stop any time.

A thief who stole a calendar got twelve months.

When the smog lifts in Los Angeles U.C.L.A.

I got some batteries that were given out free of charge.

A dentist and a manicurist married. They fought tooth and nail.

A will is a dead giveaway.

With her marriage, she got a new name and a dress.

Police were summoned to a daycare center where a three-year-old was resisting a rest.

 

Did you hear about the fellow whose entire left side was cut off? He's all right now.

 

A bicycle can't stand alone; it's just two tired.

The guy who fell onto an upholstery machine last week is now fully recovered.

He had a photographic memory but it was never fully developed.

When she saw her first strands of gray hair, she thought she'd dye.

Acupuncture is a jab well done. That's the point of it.

I didn't like my beard at first. Then it grew on me.

Did you hear about the crossed-eyed teacher who lost her job because she couldn't control her pupils?

I stayed up all night to see where the sun went, and then it dawned on me.

I'm reading a book about anti-gravity. I just can't put it down.

The Catholic Court

An auto de fe in the marketplace. Burning the heretics - After Fleury

I used to be happy that I lived in a democracy.  It appears that it is quickly turning into a theocracy before our eyes. We got a taste of it last week when witnessing the new shift in our Supreme Court, which ruled that legislatures' attempts to limit the reach of a grave pandemic ran afoul of "religious liberty."

This sort of ruling is not just endemic to our country, we are seeing similar actions by theocratic governments around the world, like in Poland. The Catholic government recently issued new and very draconian abortion measures that have been met with mass protests in the streets.

On 22 October 2020, Polish Constitutional Tribunal found that abortion in the case of severe fetal defects is inconsistent with Article 38 of the Polish Constitution.

The chief justice, Julia Przyłębska, said in a ruling that existing legislation – one of Europe's most restrictive – that allows for the abortion of malformed fetuses was incompatible with the constitution. After the ruling goes into effect, abortion will only be permissible in Poland in the case of rape, incest or a threat to the mother’s health and life, which make up only about 2% of legal terminations conducted in recent years.

When the clergy runs the show, troubles soon follow. There have been similar rulings in America of late, in Colorado, Louisiana and most notably Tennessee, where legislators passed a stealth bill five month ago outlawing abortion at six weeks that has been recently ratified by a Federal Appeals Court.

It bans abortion outright for juvenile women in state foster care and bans abortion if sought because of a Down’s syndrome diagnosis, or because of gender or race. There are no exceptions for cases of rape or incest.

Gov. Lee celebrated Friday's ruling on Twitter, writing, "Every life is precious and every child has inherent human dignity."

"Our law prohibits abortion based on the race, gender, or diagnosis of Down syndrome of the child and the court's decision will save lives," the governor said. "Protecting our most vulnerable Tennesseans is worth the fight."

Call me old fashioned but I tend to trust women in these matters. While I would personally disapprove of  terminating a life because of gender or race I do have a problem forcing a mother to not only carry a brain damaged child to term but to raise and care for the child for the balance of their lives. It sounds easy until you have to do it, I am sure. Some are admirably up to the task. And some mothers are clearly not capable, financially, emotionally, or otherwise. To force this duty on them for the rest of their life seems cruel and barbaric to me. And oftentimes, sadly, the progeny becomes a ward of the state.

We currently have the most religiously unbalanced court we have ever had. Six Catholics, one lapsed Catholic/Episcopalian and two Jews. This clearly does not represent the heterogeneous religious or spiritual views of our country. The GOP, principally Mitch McConnell and Larry Leo and his Federalist Society cronies have done a remarkable job stacking the courts with right wing evangelicals. Thanks, Jim Comey. Without you, none of this would be possible.

Look for more edicts that seek to force our justices' inherent and holier than thou religious beliefs on our society as a whole. They are human and it would be impossible not to. So look for puritanism to win the day, in the near term at least.

Would be nice to have a Buddhist, Methodist or Unitarian on the court or god forbid, even an atheist or two. But that is not the hand that we have been dealt, we instead essentially now have the Catholic court and I personally look towards its future rulings with dread.

The late Philip Roth on Trump

 From the New Yorker, January 30, 2017.

“I was born in 1933,” he continued, “the year that F.D.R. was inaugurated. He was President until I was twelve years old. I’ve been a Roosevelt Democrat ever since. I found much that was alarming about being a citizen during the tenures of Richard Nixon and George W. Bush. But, whatever I may have seen as their limitations of character or intellect, neither was anything like as humanly impoverished as Trump is: ignorant of government, of history, of science, of philosophy, of art, incapable of expressing or recognizing subtlety or nuance, destitute of all decency, and wielding a vocabulary of seventy-seven words that is better called Jerkish than English.”

Starship

In 1971, Blows against the Empire was the first rock album ever nominated for a Hugo Award in the category of Best Dramatic Presentation. The Hugo is the most prestigious award in Science Fiction. Although the album received the plurality of the vote among the five nominated literary works, the majority of voters elected not to issue the award that year. Probably felt weird giving it to a piece of music. Too bad. Besides Paul and Grace, lots of guest artists on this work including David Crosby, Jerry Garcia, David Freiberg, Bill Kreutzmann, Graham Nash, Joey Covington, Mickey Hart, Peter Kaukonen, Jack Casady and Harvey Brooks.

We could use a Paul Kantner today. Weird voice, mediocre guitarist, great mind. I miss the guy.

Deer on canyon rim

This is a shot I took in August of 2007 at the Grand Canyon. I was amazed when the buck decided to pose for me on the canyon rim. This was shot right after sunrise. They were doing a lot of burning at the time and the canyon was full of a thick haze. I was using a very antiquated Nikon D40 camera back then. The camera's resolution was a whopping 6.1 mexapixels.

I really did not know what I was doing with a digital camera and this was one of the first, if not the first, I ever had. Shot at 1/125th, ƒ5.6, iso 125. I was using my kit lens, the 18-135mm nikkor at 44mm. That was actually a great lens and the pictures I took with the lens camera combination still hold up today.

Don't ask me why I wasn't at ƒ11 because I don't know at this point. Incompetence maybe or perhaps I had no time to do anything but click. Maybe the background smoke was just too thick? I will take it, in any case, warts and all. And I think the composition is good and that will take you a long way. I like how the antler tips break the plane of the canyon rim.

Remember, better to get a decent shot than no shot at all. I have tried to work on the photograph but the inherent limitations in the original capture make it unfixable. No problem, it is what it is.

Thanksgiving bounty

We had a lovely thanksgiving feast, with our friend Don. Quite traditional. Leslie did her normal salt dry brine on a relatively small thirteen lb. turkey. She made her orange cranberry relish with the whole orange thrown in, peel and all. Sour dough stuffing with water chestnuts, mushrooms and Italian sausage. Potatoes and homemade gravy, green beans, celery root salad and pumpkin pie. 

It was really delicious, the bird was moist and cooked to perfection. Every single dish was perfect. 

Some of our friends went a more non traditional route. Like Ron and Lena. 

They made a beautiful grilled shrimp scampi.

They drank down the delicious victuals with a nice prosecco.

What a lovely meal they enjoyed!

*

Big Dave has turned into a master smoker over the years. Here is a portion of the scrumptious looking smoked salmon he and his family feasted on up in Burlingame.

*

Brigitte and Morgan live up in the Olympic Peninsula. They also went a non traditional route. Their neighbor shot a deer and shared it with them and they went to town. Brigitte and her mother are german and they are both fabulous cooks. They made an epic meal for the ages!

1st course: Hand formed venison sausage seared in bacon fat. Served with hot beercheese dip, Bavarian style pretzels, gourmet mustards, sauerkraut and pickles.

2nd course: Top round & bottom round venison cuts with root vegetables, slow cooked ten hours & served with crusty German Bread from neighborhood bakery and cucumber salad.

3rd course: Bacon wrapped venison backstrap. Served with mushroom gravy and traditional sides of sweet potato mash, green bean casserole and stuffing and a side of homemade apple sauce.

Dessert was her homemade apple crumble and a pecan pie made by a local diner. 

She has been dehydrating lots of apples from their Agnew Farm.

She made apple sauce in individual ramekins to accompany the medallions, she says per my suggestion, which I vaguely remember making.

What I would give for a taste of that venison... If you can top this meal, please send pictures!

*

I would finally, be remiss, in not thanking RoxAnn for making us the homemade persimmon apple and coconut cranberry cookies last week.

I was supposed to share the tin and in my gluttony they somehow never made it home so she brought more over.

I surrendered them quickly to my wife to relieve myself of any possible temptation.

They were wonderful! 

The Raticans went traditional as we did.  

Looks like a lovey table.

 

They brined a bird and then barbecued it on their Kamado Grill. The rest of the plate is pink tahitian squash from their garden, a family recipe lime jello salad, Brussels sprouts, cranberry, mashed potatoes and stuffing. Yum!

It was accompanied by a lovely Syrah from Brick Barn Winery. She reports that it was a delicious dinner. I hope that yours was as well.

Soon Leslie will start on her post holiday turkey barley soup. The stock is already simmering!

Renee's bird

Rossi family thanksgiving in Rockridge with duck (and Gary)

If you have a picture of your feast that you would like to share, please feel free, never too late.

That creep was me

It was a slow day at the store for Leslie. I watched as the woman drove up in the nice blue BMW convertible. When she got out I thought I knew her, the wife of a friend, but there was no reaction back and I realized that I had once again been fooled by a similar shaped head and a mask, no big and a common error in these days of Covid. I watched her enter my wife's store, which is next to mine.

A few minutes later I walked into my wife's shop to tell her something and I got a very subtle go away hand signal. No problem. I scrammed.

Later I returned after the woman left, with package in tow. Leslie confided in me that the woman asked her if she saw the creepy guy outside. That creepy guy was me. I suppose Leslie could have said, "Yes I know, the guy, I sleep with him, in fact I am married to him" but she needed the sale. And I am a creep on occasion, let's face it.

So she said something akin to "No, he's not a creep. He's okay, he's a high end art dealer, he sells beautiful silver and high end paintings." She couldn't spill my identity because she needed the sale and didn't want to embarrass the lady. I took a quick personal inventory. Homemade haircut, not professional but not in any means terrible. Woolrich pendleton with Anthony Cullins/Brett Stokes t-shirt below a la Jimi Hendrix. Blue jeans might have been a little stale. Mask could certainly have used a washing. Aging hippie gone to seed. But a creep? Who knows? Maybe I just had that deranged look.

Sorry to scare off the paying customers in any case. You might want to hide the children.

Blows against the Empire

 #DiaperDonald

The Zombies - Whenever You're Ready

Step up your game.

I called Lena today and she asked me why I hadn't started pitching the Blue Heron Blast reader's best of the year photo challenge. And you know what, the truth is that it completely slipped my mind.  But there is still plenty of time. If my math is correct this will be our thirteenth year.

I know the dreaded year 2020 was as cockamamie as it gets. Lena has a word for it that I am not yet at liberty to share. But as Hunter Thompson once said, "when the going gets weird the weird turn pro." Send me a shot that has meaning for you, or no meaning, maybe it is pretty, perhaps it shows your rapier like wit, or maybe it just looks good over the couch, frankly I don't give a damn. Send me something and I will put it up there. As always, a painting is fine too, whatever the hell you want to do. 

I'll even take a poem, but only in iambic pentameter. 

By the way, you guys are slipping at this. You used to take it seriously and send me great shit, lately honestly, you've been just a little bit lame. I don't care if they are technically good but it will be helpful if they say something. Seriously, a surfeit of technical brilliance will be penalized and cell phone shots are just fine. Honestly, they make my shots look better.

Time to represent. And if you're going to send me a sunset it better look pretty freaking amazing, like the dawn of time or armageddon or something like that or you will get the hook, plain and simple. Just warning you. 

Avalon

Green Heron, San Luis Rey

 

WAR

Thanks to the good guys

Good article at The Hill thanking the most recent Republican defenders of democracy. I have often thought the same thing lately. 

The political pressure on these people was enormous but in the end, they did the right thing.

The Georgia Secretary of State and others like him have been an important firewall and show us that people who respect law and truth live on both sides of the ideological spectrum. 

We were perilously close to slipping into darkness.

I am so very thankful that such people still exist. And that the petulant grifter family will soon leave the stage and crawl under a new rock.

I have a lot to be personally thankful for this year. I came through another cancer scare, my family is healthy, business is good and I have a wonderful wife, family, friends and doctors. 

And many faithful Blast readers. I hope that all of you have a wonderful Thanksgiving too. 

Baby, Let Me Take You

Flying the coop

As if they haven't done enough to ruin the environment and give industrial despoilers carte blanche, in a last minute gift the Trump administration won't require polluters to guarantee funding for toxic waste cleanup.

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is declining to require oil and gas, coal, chemical and mining companies to have insurance to cover major spills and accidents. So Trump's cronies can skate free, as free as Michael Flynn.

“EPA has found that existing environmental regulations and modern industry practices are sufficient to mitigate any risks inherent in these industries,” EPA Administrator Andrew Wheeler said in a release announcing the rule, adding that “the financial risks from facilities in these industries are addressed by existing state and federal requirements.”

Do you know how many times the American taxpaying public have been left holding the bag and having to clean up after these assholes?

Opaquely transparent

 

Ricardo sends a shot from Thailand. Very pretty.

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Michael Reynolds EPA/EFE

It is hard to imagine that an ex mayor of New York and U.S. Attorney, Rudy Giuliani, does not know the difference in meaning between the words opaque and transparent.

What was it he said the other day? "Big words, your honor."

Shocking.

Maybe all the booze and cigars add up in your system and eventually make you stupid or forgetful?

Or perhaps it is a matter of a structural cognitive failure like dementia? 

Sad, the guy used to be pretty sharp once upon a time, or I thought so anyway, now he is sort of a cartoon version of himself. Probably past time to be put out to pasture.

*

Fact check from WaPo:

Add to list

“ ‘In Wisconsin, somebody has to be indefinitely confined in order to vote absentee. In the past there were 20,000 people. This past election there were 120,000...and Republicans were locked out of the vote counting process.’ @VicToensing @newsmax”

— President Trump, in a tweet, Nov. 24, 2020

Every part of this is false, proving once again why none of Trump’s claims about election fraud should be given any credence.

*

Honestie Hodges, the young black girl who was handcuffed by the Grand Rapids Police Department three years ago at the age of 11, has died of Covid. You can help her family by joining me in donating to her go fund me page.

For Buzzy

Your title here

Mystery Train - The Band

Had a crazy dream the other night. Was playing on stage in a bar with Rick Danko, Levon Helm and Robbie Robertson. Upstate New York. The floor of the bar was called big pink. We played three very tight numbers and it was quite fabulous. Very thick and dense. Everybody happy. When this band was on there was no one better. Miss them all very much but especially Rick. Was such a treat when I got to see him solo. Of course Robbie and Garth are still around. Hank and I went to see Rick one night at the Golden Bear I think. We had seen him do a song about a Vietnam guy two nights earlier when he broke it out. He announced it in Huntington Beach and we clapped and then he said that he had never played it before and started goofing on us. But we had seen it. Dumb the things you remember. And dream. But wouldn't mind having it again, seeing them one more time.

Light Chalice - Toadstools, Utah

Hear Me Calling

Alaska awesome

 

Jeff and Gena just sent this video they took today outside their home in Alaska. Jeff said it is rare to see a lynx and even rarer to see two together. I have to get up there one day... If I were you I would mute this. Jeff is attempting his sick rabbit call here and it is not very pleasant. They will probably never come back now.

Slickrock and steel

 

Many are atwitter over the recent discovery of a shiny monolith in the middle of a remote Utah wilderness area.  It was reportedly discovered by a passing helicopter.

A want to be Richard Serra making his artistic mark? Awful lot of work for a sculptor considering the location but certainly possible.

A starseed remnant from a visiting alien a la Kubrick? 

Perhaps.

My first thought was something else entirely. 

Years ago Kerry, Jasmine and I were hiking in the Paria Escalante when we visited Hackberry Canyon.

And I seem to recall Kerry telling me a story of a nazi vault being found in the region in World War II, part of some secret espionage effort. Could this strange steel edifice be connected with the previous Nazi efforts?

In February of 1953, a Utah cattleman named Harvey Chynoweth found the hideout of a german spy who operated in the remote area during World War II while looking for his cattle. His hideout included a cave and a metal structure or vault. His cache included radio equipment, food and weapons. Might he have erected the steel thigamjig as well?

The building can still be found today, at the confluence of the Paria and the Cottonwood River.

Black Hole Sun

Triggered

Man, there I was, just a few weeks ago, writing at a feverish clip and then powie!!!, I hit the wall. Muse evidently took off on the midnight train. No note, no nothing.

Truth is, it's all been said. Don't have much to add at this point. This country is in a bad marriage and we are just waiting for our ex partner to say one little thing and then Whamo! Right in the kisser.

Think I remember the therapist telling me and my then wife at the time, in the most Viennese of vibrato, Mr.and Mrs. Sommers, you are trapped in vhat vee call the dark dance. Try to arrest the downward spiraling motion before you are submerged into the swirling whirlpool and plunged into the black hole or singularity where your specific gravity will equal the wreckage of a thousand dying stars ✸. Note: we didn't.

Everybody is so angry right now, why get aggrieved, why pour gasoline on the fire? We all know what is happening out there and everybody needs a serious time out, from whatever side you hail from. Stop this victimhood competition, the constant desire to tell the world how awful the other side is.

I have received several letters about Gavin Newsome going out and eating at the French Laundry, how dare he, while we lock down? Frankly, I don't care, I don't care about Pelosi's ice cream either. The autocrats always behave by a different set of rules. Big whoop. You are mad and you want to lash out. I get it. I've been mad for four years too. But let's argue about issues of substance, not pistachio ripple and muse bouches. I know, politicians are hypocrites. But that runs across the political spectrum.

*

Saw that Cuomo lost it today over a seven thousand person Satmar orthodox wedding in Brooklyn. Good for Cuomo. How many superspreader weddings does this make now? But it just goes to show that big city folk are every bit as stupid and ignorant as their red state country cousins. The yids should know better. But they don't. It is their religious liberty to get sick and if they do, it is god's will, yada, yada. Just not fair to all the rest of the people they come in contact with, in my eyes anyway. Or the doctors and nurses that have to save their sorry asses.

Of course a popular right wing angle these days is that we are all going to catch it sooner or later anyway so why fight it? I, being Mr. Positive, am not willing to concur. I will engage in some big time virtue signaling here and say, I try to wear a mask in public. And wash my hands. And not be part of big microbial confabs. Or Rose Garden swearing ins. Look at the partisan numbers, the party that thinks it is all a big hoax and won't wear masks is not doing so good with the Senator count, crass as it is for me to be keeping score.

Anyway Shawn, that is why I have been relatively quiet, birds and baskets, ptooey on the rest of it. Wake me when it is all over.

Molly Tuttle - Lodi

Happy Bobby!

I obtained a wonderful estate this week which includes this beautiful apache basket. The smile is quite real!

San Elijo redound

I had an early afternoon meeting with a client so I thought I would play a little hooky and get a walk and some photographs in yesterday morning. 

I called a few friends and we decided to meet up at the San Elijo Lagoon Nature Center and then explore a little more of the newly opened trail system. 

Properly masked and distanced, of course.

It was a great walk. I felt so elated reaching parts of the lagoon that were heretofore unreachable for me. 

We explored some inner areas and walked under the railroad trestle.

I had my walkaround lens rather than my serious cannon so there was a limit to what I would get photographically but I don't like carrying the heavy 400mm ƒ2.8 when I don't know how far I will be walking.

We actually saw quite a few raptors, the osprey above and this large kestrel to our right among them.

Never saw the peregrine yesterday.

This red shouldered looks like it might be eating a potato bug.

He was way out of range, even with my 600mm zoom.

Lots of shore birds of course as well. 

Like this long billed curlew with its long and elegant beak. It is in the sandpiper family. It is not that easy to tell a curlew from a whimbrel but the head markings are different.

The newly dredged lagoon's water looks much clearer than in the past. Place is much improved in every way.

A snowy egret in situ.

I think this guy is indeed a whimbrel.

I showed you a snowy egret before, here is the larger greater egret. It doesn't have the large puff of hair behind the head.

I thought I saw both a reddish egret and a tri-colored heron across the way but was too far to get a decent shot.

Might have been a little blue heron too.

We later ran into a group of birders that confirmed my sighting.

The zoom gives nowhere near the optical quality of the prime but as you can se from this shot of the black phoebe, it will work in a pinch.

We watched a northern harrier flying low and gracefully over her dominion from a bench in the center of the estuary.

Saw many of my eponymous namesakes like this fellow here. It was a perfect morning, great weather. Everybody was enjoying the place, from hardcore birders to a flotilla of moms with strollers and babies and dogs in tow.

Hummers too but a bit out of range.

I think the rarest find might have been the pectoral sandpiper we saw but I am not really up on my shorebirds. 

Don't yell at me if this one is misidentified, the birders noted it and they may have been talking about an entirely different bird.

End of report.