Category: Animals

Comics Connoisseur

Timothy Price3 Comments

ComicsConniseur

 

Apparently Stretch is becoming a comics connoisseur from Laurie reading Tintin while we waterboard him (subcutaneous fluids for renal failure) every night, because when I went back out to the kitchen last night after he thought we had gone to bed, I found him reading the funnies that Laurie had left on her book holder. He was so engrossed that I was able to sneak a photo before he noticed me and slinked off, looking a little embarrassed.

When the Sandias turned pink at sunset, I decided to try a panorama through the bare cottonwoods. While I was photographing the mountains, a great blue heron landed on a cottonwood between the irrigation and clearwater ditches, affording me the opportunity to get a pretty clear photo of it. When I was going back inside, Puck had all his attention fixed on something. I couldn’t see what it was, but he was so concentrated that I snapped the photo of him. The shutter clicking interrupted his concentration, he glanced at me, then started looking around as if he was trying to find the object of his attention, scolded me with a few choice meows when he seemed not to see it again (I assume he was saying “nice going stupid ¡#%&^@$*! photographer”), then he jumped down off the railing and came inside with me. When I went out a little later, I was able to get a detailed shot of the moon in the clear, cold, winter sky.

 

PinkSandiasCottonwoods

 

TheHeronInCottonwood

 

PuckOnRail

 

Moon

 

Lions and Tigers and Bears! Oh My!

Timothy Price5 Comments

Lion

Laurie and I volunteered for Family Promise at Central United Methodist Church this afternoon. Family Promise is a ministry where various churches take turns hosting homeless families for a week at a time while the families are getting housing. Church members volunteer to help by bringing food, or staying and doing things with the families, or staying overnight or driving family members who don’t have cars to work and school. The local denominations participating in Family Promise include the mainline Protestant churches — United Methodist, Lutheran and Presbyterian — Catholic churches and Synagogues.

If you are asking “What’s with the lions, tigers and bears then if we helped with family promise this afternoon?”  We took the families to the zoo. Besides the obvious photo ops, we had a great time, the Albuquerque Zoo is in good shape, the animals are healthy and they seem to be as happy as they can be for being in a zoo.

Tiger

PolarBearWet

Sealion

SnowLeopards

ThreeGs

Owls

SillyBird

FeedingDucks

Dry Iceberg

Timothy Price5 Comments

DryIceberg

 

Today I ended up with a mix of flowers, a sparrow, and a couple of experimental shots with pearls. The dried iceberg looked like a painting in the late afternoon light, and the flowers on the table were vibrant in the afternoon sun shining through the bay windows. While I was out walking around the yard before sundown, a sparrow kept flying around behind me and landing in a nearby tree. At one point I was standing in the shadow of the black bamboo, and the sparrow flew out of the tree, made a U-turn, and flew right back towards me, and almost flew into me, swerving around me at the last moment. I was dressed in black, standing in the shadow of the black bamboo, so I think it actually didn’t see me until it almost flew into me. After that, it sat in the tree across from where I was standing and gave me mad dogs.

 

BrightFlowers

 

Sparrow

 

PearlsFlower

 

Pearls

 

 

 

 

Lights, Action, Birds

Timothy Price1 Comment

BlueLights

We went in to see how Tristan organized her study space when we dropped her off after school late this afternoon, and I noticed the lights in their stairwell made a very nice design. Sophia always does the same pose whenever she sees a camera — a kind of pensive, sultry look — and René, the Eclectus parrot former known as Joey, is looking really good these days.  Tristan said she noticed that René is not the brightest bird on the block, but then she is comparing him to her African Greys. Most parrots have intellects comparable to 2 to 3 year old children; whereas African Greys have intellects comparable to 5 year old children. So while most parrots are very interactive, inquisitive, and can often mimic people very well, African Greys can actually reason with you.

Sophia

Rene

Black Cats on White

Timothy Price11 Comments

Puck On White

We had to wash our down comforter, and we haven’t put the pink cover back on it, so the black cats have been really enjoying laying around on the clean comforter, napping hard to get it dirty again. Before we got the comforter dry, we had wooly, “cat magnet” blankets on the bed which Rosencrantz, Guildenstern and Diné enjoy lounging around on.

Tuesday morning the analog thermometer read -12 degrees F and our pipes were freezing up. Wednesday morning dropped below zero as well, but to look at it optimistically, it was only half as cold at -6 degrees F.  The weather widget is forecasting a low of only 18 for tonight — one can only hope — but it really means our low will be around 8 maybe lower since the temperatur is already down to 10.  The high for tomorrow is supposed to be 46, which may well happen — a heat wave.  I’m still waiting for global warming to kick in on our property, because it just does not seem to be happening for us.

Guildenstern and Rosencrantz On White

Guildenstern, Rosencrantz and Dine On White

Loads of Dirt

Timothy Price6 Comments

DSCF5729

 

The morning light was quite nice on the flowers in the bedroom. The temperature sensor for the weather said it got to 3 degrees F this morning, but the analog thermometer hanging next to it showed -2 right before sunrise. The weather widget is forecasting a low of 4 degrees for Corrales tonight, so the temperature is sure to fall below zero, even on the digital sensor.

Puck brought in 4 loads of dirt throughout the day. One reason is that Laurie cleaned the house yesterday. Another reason is that we have lots of fine dirt exposed from the trenches for the electrical upgrade. Once we are all done with the upgrade the power pole, wires and light in the photo of the Sandias will be removed.

On the “affordable health care” front, my annual blood work that was $98 last year is $350 this year — the same tests by the same lab.

 

PuckDirt

 

DSCF5742

 

IMG_5980

 

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Storm, Stew & Rosencrantz

Timothy Price8 Comments

RosencrantsEyes

 

A storm system is moving in and the temperatures are dropping rapidly. The weather widget is forecasting 6 degrees F over the weekend in Corrales, but since it’s always 10 to 15 degrees lower at our house, we may see sub-zero temperatures over the next couple of nights.

Rosencrantz gave me mad dogs when I told him the temperatures were going to drop below zero, and Laurie is making all the stews that feature in our latest fine cooking so we will at least have a variety of delicious hot stews to help us weather the cold. Rosencrantz was a bit of a skeptic when I told him he could have some stew to help keep warm.

Our electricity went out for about 40 minutes or so last night. We used the black-out as a good excuse to run to the store, so we didn’t have to go in the morning.

 

Storm

 

Stew

 

RosencrantsEyes1

 

Candles

 

 

Fogged Up

Timothy Price5 Comments

GuildFog

 

When I came into the warm house after being out in sub-freezing temperatures, the lens on my camera fogged up, giving me the perfect fog effect on Guildenstern laying on my equipment bags. After the lens cleared up, I got a photo of Guildernstern trying to camouflage himself on the bags, but his yellow eyes and white whisker gave him away. Rosencrantz, Guildenstern and Diné rang in the New Year all snuggled up on the bed.

 

GuildCamoOnBags

 

LetSleepingCatsLie