Catching up

The last couple of days haven’t been very exciting, so I’ve taken a little break from blogging.  Didn’t do much of anything besides laundry on Sunday because of the rain, it rained a good share of the day an Monday, and today it was back to painting posts. 

Notched 21 more posts on my paintbrush this foggy overcast morning, which brought me up to a total of 180 posts so far.  It was pleasantly cool, but muggy, this morning, and I enjoyed seeing my friend the young bald eagle as I stroked along.  Little chickadees, nuthatches, and American goldfinches were flitting about, with a background music of honking Canada geese and trumpeting swans.  There was also the winnowing of the common snipes, and the screech of a red-tailed hawk.  A symphony of natural sounds so much better than a blasting radio.

Fall may be approaching, but there are still some asters and Canada thistles in bloom to keep the bees busy.  I’m sure my friend Marilyn could tell me what kind of bees these are, but I sure don’t know.

By noon, I was done with painting for the day.  My right shoulder has been bothering me some, and I asked my doctor about it while I had my physical a couple of weeks ago at Mayo.  I suspected bursitis.  The Doc agreed, and asked if I’d been doing any repetitive activity with my arm.  Duh!  Painting 180 posts might qualify?   So, I’ve been doing some arm exercises, and mostly painting with my left arm.  I guess I’m not too old to become ambidextrous. 

In the afternoon, I decided to restock all the kiosks with refuge pamphlets, and found this bunch of red dragonflies.  There are lots of different kinds of dragonflies, but this is the first time I’ve seen a red one.  I like those red and blue tags on its wings.

“Emma the Hunter” was on duty this evening as we sat outside.  Notice the thirteen lined ground squirrel in the bottom right of the photo.

It was stuffing its cheeks with seeds that had fallen from the Hard Rock Bird Café.  If you remember, Emma had actually finally caught one of these guys last week.

      With a renewed sense of victory, Emma remained as still as a statue as the interloper came closer.

Can you see how stock still Emma remained as the ground squirrel got closer and closer?  All that moved was her head a bit.  Kind of reminded me of a stalking cat.  Don’t worry, the squirrel finally got smart and ran away… just in the nick of time.  I’m sure my vigilant companion will be back on duty again tomorrow.

As for me, I’ll paint a few more posts in the morning and then do a new chore in the afternoon.  I’m sure you can’t wait to hear what that will be. 

Thanks for stopping by… talk to you later,  Judy