While the taste of spring is all over the place, the smell of smoke and sight of it on the horizon from West Texas fires filled the air on a strong North wind from the passage of the cold front in and during the first bells of the day and throughout the daylight hours. The storms all moved along the cold front North and East to Minnesota. There were only very light showers, although, I am taking the morning weatherman at his word because all I remember is hearing the air conditioner come on a couple of times during the night. The temperature actually rose over night until the passage of the cold front. So, we were able to dodge a bullet on the tornadoes and strong thunderstorms.
It was a few minutes shy of one o'clock before I was able to leave the house. With the beautiful sunshine, but North wind and much cooler temperatures, I dressed in layers. And, as expected, I was peeling off the top two layers as the afternoon wore on and the sun beat down on my back. Yesterday, I was in shorts with and a T-shirt as the temperature hit 83-degrees. It's been a weird winter and the spring has started out that way, too! In fact, maybe that is why my days have been unside down and right side backwards of late.
The Creighton University women's rowing team has been at White Rock since Monday and will be here until the competition race with SMU is over by noon on Saturday. The lost a coupe of half day practices because of high winds earlier. I got a chance to talk to the bus driver that I have chatted with for a couple of years. He was telling me that he is about to retire and that this would be his last trip down here. His wife will be retiring also, he said. But it isn't to be precluded that he is going to set on his Iowa porch and watch the corn grow. He has a business plus he has a farm, he also manages a farm that is in the family and he plays golf. I have always enjoyed talking with him because he has a since of humor like I do.He doesn't worry about things that he can't control, like me and he has that same viewpoint that I learned from my dad that has a bit of sarcasm at times. Of course, the secret of that is knowing when to use it and when to keep quiet. I'm going to miss his visits to White Rock.
From there I made my way to Winfrey Point, parked overlooking the lake
and ate my Fuji apple. It would tide me over until dinner. Then, as a
final check on wildlife, I found the Bard owl and the nesting pair of
Red Shoulder hawks. The female red shoulder was on the nest again and the male did
bring here a bit to eat. There were two more photographers in the area
that drifted over. But my images of the day are new growth for cards and
marketing pieces and the cute Bard was actually caught sleeping with
his head dropping. I had been a bit worried about him falling out of the
tree, but then I saw those massive hooks embedded into the bark of the tree. Better the tree bark than in skin, that's for sure.
Click on any image to enlarge all three.
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| A wasp nest already underway for 2017 with a wasp working on the nest. |
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| A beautiful Ukulele. The man strommed a couple of cords. The sound was ever so mellow. |
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| An there sits the Bard Owl fast asleep! So cute. Animals are just like us. Or, we are very much like them. There are still people who think that they aren't like us at all. Pain, Blood, Hunger, Life, Death. I sure can't tell the difference. To me, animals actually help us understand who we are more than anything else on this planet. |
