The grayness of the day was making me moody. There’s nothing in particular to be depressed about, life is generally good, but you know how it is…the gray…the dank…the dark…you get that kind of hollow knot under your sternum and find yourself drinking tea by the gallon and trying to find something good to brood […]
Monthly Archives: April 2005
A quick little painting, but of course, Deeply Relevant, as I explore the social ramifications of birdwatching-as-hobby, the relation between subject and object, causing us to question the very nature of Art itself, wherein the viewer is invited to question who is the watched and who the watcher, using that universally relevant symbolic language of […]
There’s a new squirrel in town, with some kind of lump. It doesn’t look like a botfly lump. It does look rather painful. It’s on the left side of belly, a swollen round node with dark red skin on top. My guess is “very well-fed tick” but “abcess” is also a contender. I almost got […]
Some bastard gnawing mammal–and I suspect I know which species!–has been pruning my rhodedendron! And trying to bury the evidence! I went out to water it today, and discovered that several of the green branches have been gnawed off, and the heads buried in the pot. Why?! What did the poor innocent rhody ever do […]
So last night, I got stoned and did something I regretted. I watched “Animal X” on Animal Planet. For those who have been spared this horror, I will explain. It’s a…cryptozoology show. Not a good one. One of that crop of unbelievably stupid ghost-hunter shows, where people who would make the average three-year-old look like […]
Shadowrun again today! Woo! Important lessons learned… If you hear a helicopter on the roof, it does not mean “Everybody run in all directions for no apparent reason.” However, should you happen to run into a gift-shop, the uses of a troll-sized “Chicago Museum of Art” T-shirt are many, and include hiding a sleeping mage. […]
The Great Dismal Swamp was cool! And not at all dismal. While it was definitely a swamp, it wasn’t…y’know…swampy in the dripping Spanish-moss and roving alligator sense. It was more like a forest with a flooded basement. Didn’t see all that many birds, but we can chalk that up as much to my being a […]
I wanted to go out on the deck and check the plants, but I am trapped inside. For on the inside of the screen, right next to the handle, is an earwig as big as the Ritz. The sort of earwig that must have roamed the earth during the Ice Age, feeding on…um…Jumbo Earwig Chow […]
Well, it’s official. I bought a pair of binoculars and a bird book. New, not “yanked from the used bookstore.” Actually paid full price for it. And am going on a trip in order to see birds. I have succumbed to birdwatching. It is officially a hobby. The only thing in my defense is that […]
The juncoes have gone, and been replaced by chipping sparrows, although the later aren’t nearly so numerous or likely to hit the feeder. The squirrels are trying to eat the deck railing. This baffles me. They’ve gnawed the corners round. Since I don’t know what they’re after, I can’t exactly stop them, and my landlady, […]