Category: Corrales

Challenges

Timothy Price53 Comments

There seems to be all kinds of challenges in the blogosphere, mostly photo challenges, and writing challenges. Here are a few challenges I recorded.

The first challenge was the song that started out as a drum track that Joel put together. He sent me the track and gave me the challenge to make a song out of it. I laid down a bass track, followed by a rhythm guitar track. I made up a vocal track on the spot, so I have not written down the lyrics, then I laid down the lead guitar track. One take for each track. I named the song  Joel’s Beat.

 

The second challenge was when I was finally able to get my car washed (car washes had been closed under the lockdown). I washed my car and what did I get? Dust and muddy kitty prints all over the lid.

IMG_6403

 

The third challenge was for Big Baby Owl who had flown over to another branch on the cottonwood tree, then decided to climb the trunk of the tree to get up where Mama Owl was perched high above her. Big Baby Owl climbed and climbed, flapped her wings over the more difficult parts, and finally got into a fork in the tree about 10 feet from Mama Owl. She looked up at Mama Owl and Mama Owl flew off. Big Baby Owl was devastated. She just stood in the fork of the tree with her head bowed (click on the photos for an enlarged slide show).

 

The fourth challenge was photographing black Irises that are bleached purple in our intense sunshine. The irises look almost black to the naked eye, but properly exposed photos show how purple black really is.

 

The fifth challenge was doing super wide-angle photos of Spunk and living to write about it and post the photos.

 

Landscapes and Art Gown Trees

Timothy Price61 Comments
IMG_6294
Sandias with a wild sky at sunset.
IMG_6325
Art Gown model Dale’s Peachtree.

You can visit Dale’s blog at https://adelectablelife.com/

IMG_6302
Cool clouds over the bosque.
IMG_6358
Art Gown Model Marina’s Incognito Peartree.

You can visit Marina’s blog at https://marinakanavaki.com/

IMG_6286
A cloud pierced by a contrail.
IMG_6307
Art Gown model and Art Gown creator Resa’s Cottonwood Tree in silhouette.

You can visit Resa’s blog at https://graffitiluxandmurals.com/

IMG_6341
Clouds before the storm. We had quite a windstorm with a spot of rain about 30 minutes after I took this photo this afternoon.
IMG_6248
Art Gown model Holly’s Tangle-Heart Tree.

You can visit Holly’s blog at https://houseofheartweb.wordpress.com/

Dinnertime

Timothy Price61 Comments
0A6A1413
Owlet out of the nest in the morning

The owlets are starting to get out of the nest. Last night I was checked on the owls well after sunset. Daddy Owl was hooting way up at the top of a cottonwood above the owlets. Soon Mama Owl brought home the bacon in what looked like a gopher. She perched with Daddy Owl for a few minutes before she flew down and gave the owlets the gopher for dinner. The three-minute video below is edited down to two minutes forty-five seconds of owl video from Daddy Owl hooting to Big Baby Owl hopping back into the nest with dinner followed by 15 seconds of credits.

Being well past sunset, I could only see outlines of the owls with my bare eyes. I increased the exposure on the video by two stops which let me at least see when the edges of things looked sharp when I focused on the owls. I had to focus manually and hope for the best. Daddy and Mama Owl were backlit, so the increased exposure was able to get their details pretty well. Once Mama Owl flew down to the owlets, the background became dark. I didn’t increase the exposure further, because the picture probably would have become very pixilated in the darkness. As it is I got the video pretty well focused and you can see some details in the owlets in full-screen.

0A6A1630
Owlet out of the nest after sunset.

Flamenco in the Old Church

Timothy Price40 Comments

While I was looking for the video file for Bite ‘Em on the Old Shin Bone last night to make a few updates to the video before posting it, I found a video of Laurie (Laura de Corrales) and me (El Cheo) performing Alegrías with Pablo Rodarte in a show we did in the Old Church in Corrales in the mid-1990s. Pablo danced Alegrías, Laura de Corrales is the Palmera, and El Cheo accompanied on guitar. I transferred the video from VHS to m4v several years ago, so the image quality is not very good. However, the sound is not too bad, considering.

In preparing for the show, Laurie and I practiced daily, I practiced with Pablo’s other students several days each week, but when it came to Pablo’s performance our practice together consisted of 15 minutes of Pablo doing a quick run-through of each part of the Alegías a week before the show. I simply had to follow all his leads during the performance.

Laurie and I both studied flamenco dance with Pablo, and I played flamenco guitar for many of his dance classes back in the 1990s before we moved to Spain for almost four years.

a18w1281
The Old San Ysidro Church in Corrales
lycfrm
Laura de Corrales dancing Tanguillos. El Cheo providing guitar accompaniment.

Beaver Dam Breaker

Timothy Price40 Comments

0A6A0237
The beaver dam breaker lurking around the corner.

The Conservancy has been at it again, breaking up and pulling the beaver dams out of the clearwater ditch with their evil Beaver Dam Breaker.

Below is a short video a did last night of a beaver sliding into the Rio Grande after cutting some willows to snack on along the river bank. We saw four beavers last night and six beavers the night before last.

0A6A0242
Not a pretty sight.

Hello! Is Anobody in There?

Timothy Price62 Comments

0A6A0524
Is anyone at home?

Our power went out while we were working on our computers this afternoon. Laurie stood up, looked into the sunroom, and said: “There’s the Peacock!” I got up, looked and sure enough, the Peacock was standing on the landing looking through the sunroom door as if he wanted in. After taking a few photos, I opened the door and asked him if he wanted to come inside, but he decided he didn’t want to come inside and ran off. I followed him around the property, talked to him, and got a few photos. Our traipse through the grasses, irrigation ditches, over the shed and through some bamboo, along with our rather one-sided conversation, was interrupted by a gas company tech needing access to our gas meeter that is nestled under a large rosebush.

We both said, “the Peacock” when he was at the sunroom door because the cats woke me up at dawn scrambling over me and jumping off of me to look at the peacock as he walked by the bedroom window. I went out and got a couple of early morning photos of him before he disappeared into the thick underbrush along the south side of the property.

I don’t know who he belongs to. I called a neighbor who called people she knew who had peacocks in the past, but none of them have peacocks these days. Where he came from and how long he will stay is a mystery.

0A6A0537

0A6A0549
A tell-tale tail