Day 14.263: Squirrels (half-off or more)

The other day, we saw an unusual-looking squirrel and one of the kids said, "It's the tail-less squirrel" which led to an animated discussion that made it clear that at least two of the kids were familiar with a local squirrel with no tail and one (that we had just seen) that has half a tail.

 
Well, the other day I saw the tail-less one and discovered that it is - whatever the opposite of skittish is - "hsittiks" perhaps (I'm pretty sure that's how language works). It's just as well because the light was fading and I wouldn't have had any chance of getting a photo of a skittish squirrel in the twilight.

Day 14.262: Garden update

There is a definite feeling of autumn in the air. For the first time in weeks, the dehumidifier in the basement is not required to run, and soon we will need to turn the heater on and tuck the guitars away to stop their wood from drying-out.

Meanwhile, we still have produce from the garden - bush beans:

chilies:

even a few tomatoes and runner beans:

and this, although we didn't plant it and won't be eating it:

Day 14.261: Courtyard update

The planting around our new patio has settled in pretty well during its first season:

The succulents in this area have reacted to being planted out by shedding their small indoor plant ways and grown rapidly. In some cases they have changed color or started sending out extravagant runners. It's a very lively corner:

Of course, the real challenge for all these plants will be whether they survive a Maine winter. We will find out in due course.

Day 14.260: Uh yeah - I sure hope it...does?

When Exile #3 is in the car (and not driving), she can be relied upon, when passing a "Road Work Ahead" sign to say, "Road work ahead?" to which she and everyone else in the car responds, "Uh, yeah - I sure hope it does!"

If you don't know, it's a reference to this (from the glory days of Vine and its six second videos).

Of course, this means that we are all more likely to notice these signs than we ever were before.

This sign is currently situated close to our home - I'm not sure what to hope for.

Day 14.259: Exile #2's Sunday Column #363

Exile #2 writes...

We woke to the sound of pouring rain, so we shelved the plans we’d had to go for an early morning walk on the beach. It was raining again as we set out this afternoon for an outdoor event. But with perfect timing the skies cleared in time for us to meet with a couple of our local sister churches for a celebration of new friendships and new beginnings.

There was a short service, followed by lawn games and snacks. Although, one of the smallest of our number was more impressed by the large muddy puddle that had been left over from the earlier showers. She spent a happy couple of hours splashing and wading and getting well and truly soaked but fortunately her Mom, one of the pastors, had a change of clothes for the journey home to the island on which they live. I imagine you have to be even more prepared as a parent when getting home depends on catching the ferry.

Day 14.258: Tax; scheme

We did our UK taxes today. I always dread it, but they are so much simpler than US taxes. It helps that we've got better at knowing what information we need and keeping a running spreadsheet to track it all.

There was a new section in this year's return. Like many sections it didn't apply to us, but we enjoyed the title - Incorrectly claimed coronavirus support scheme payments.

Something about the word "scheme" makes the whole thing seem very questionable, but I'm sure it all makes sense - as much as anything related to the pandemic does anyway.

Day 14.257: Seriously old-school

I think E5N1 was referring to the general look of this shirt rather than the text when he asked this morning, "How old is that shirt?!"

It will surprise no-one that I insisted he tell me the answer to his question.

Old enough to buy itself a beer in all 50 states :)

I normally dress a bit more formally at work, but it's Friday and reasserting my history of software development seemed an appropriate reason to make an exception.

Day 14.256: Beach fog

When we reached the northern end of the Prouts Neck Cliff Walk, and walked up the beach toward Scarborough Beach State Park, we were surprised to find ourselves walking into fog. There had been no hint of it earlier on the walk, and indeed it was quite localized to the immediate coast even here.

It wasn't stopping people from enjoying a late summer swim:

but we nearly lost a dawdling E5N1:

Day 14.255: What is that?

This strange metal object protrudes from the beach (Western Beach in Scarborough Maine to be exact) near where we took the selfie at the beginning of our circuit of Prouts Neck:

Exile #2 thinks it may be in some way related to the addition of sand here (dredged from a nearby river) by the US Army Corps of Engineers in 2004. She may be right, but I've found no convincing evidence one way or the other. It's quite a striking landmark anyway (since scale is hard to tell from the photo, I'd guess it's about 8 feet from sand to top).

Day 14.254: An unexpectedly heavy landing

As we walked along the beach on Saturday my eye was drawn to a seagull descending rapidly over the water. As I focused on it, it landed heavily in the water, just about disappearing under the surface briefly before coming up again and then shortly after taking off.

This was nothing like the graceful dives of the terns, nor like a normal gull surface landing. I had no idea why it had done it, but then it flew almost directly towards me with something in its beak which turned out to be a small crab. After which the battle commenced:

I have no idea what preceded my part of this story - did the gull spot the crab in the water for some reason? Did it drop it or see another bird drop it there and go to claim it before it could sink out of reach? I don't know.

I also don't know what happened after this - but at the time I left to catch up with the others the tide was in the gull's favor.

Day 14.253: Birds around Prouts Neck

The cardinals and catbirds were too skittish to be photographed, but here are a selection of other birds we saw during our loop of Prouts Neck on Saturday.

Double-crested cormorant (swimming):

A gull (unidentified) doing battle with a sea snail - harder to get into than the clams for sure:

A semi-palmated plover - we saw several there:

More cormorants - flying:

One of several small rafts of common eider:

A northern mockingbird (haven't seen one in a while):

Day 14.252: Exile #2's Sunday Column #362

Exile #2 writes...

The changing influences of the rivers, winds, and tides mean that our local beach is often redesigned. The course of the brook that empties into the ocean has a tendency to drift around and the sand itself forms temporary islands and bars.

We saw similar mysterious workings on our walk yesterday. We’d noticed someone clamming out on a spit of sand, having sailed out to it by boat, but when the beach turned a corner we saw a dog running a fair way out across the water.

Looking closer, we noticed there was another sand bar - almost a causeway - joining one headland to another. Although we were pretty sure it didn’t actually reach all the way, it is something we often wish was possible, knowing how long it can take to travel from the tip of one crinkly bit of coast to another!

You can see someone way out on the sandbar near the middle of the photo.

The blue loop is our 4.3 mile walk, the yellow is the approximate location of the sandbar and the red is the shortest dry route from where we were to the other end of it.

Day 14.251: Prouts Neck Cliff Walk

Four of us went to Scarborough to walk the Cliff Walk at Prouts Neck. Exile #4 decided to stay home and do homework - but went out as soon as the rest of us got home to hang out for the evening with some friends.

Here are some general photos from the cliff walk. We ended up doing a four and a half mile loop around the peninsula

It was a very nice walk overall. The cliff walk itself was worth a visit but - maybe we're spoiled for nice places to walk - perhaps didn't live up to the hype or the attention this little stretch of coast gets.

Day 14.250: Fungi and the parasites

Our last two beach walks ended with the loop through the mostly deserted (due to the early morning hours) Ferry Beach State Park. Most of what caught my eyes were fungi:

These last pictures, as regular readers know, are not fungi but parasitic plants known as Indian pipe:

Seeing them along the side of the road made me wonder how they spread until I realized that they are flower plants. Sure enough, these bell shaped flowers are pollinated by bees...

...and form seed heads: