Day 18.170: Hot spot

Reduced to six humans and two dogs, we decided to try to beat the heat of the day by visiting a local birding preserve as early as we reasonably could. 

I have some photos of what we saw but no way to transfer them until I get home tomorrow. 

The area (RSPB Otmoor) is rather remote and has a fairly significant hike-in - unfortunately along some rather exposed and shade-free lanes. Suffice it to say (for now) that we saw some birds but failed at beating the heat of the day. 

The rest of the day we took it fairly easy - except for putting the world to rights. 

Day 18.169: Family gathered

Six of us staying in a lovely house near to Oxford for a couple of days (my dad, two sisters, two brothers-in-law and me) but for a while today we had eleven here as we were joined by my two nieces, their significant others and my great-nephew.

We missed the rest of the Exiles, my nephew and of course my mum who would have loved today’s gathering. 

Day 18.168: Reunion

The main reason for my trip was an unofficial college reunion. There were two parts - a picnic lunch in the University Parks and then a dinner in a central Oxford pub. We had fifteen at each but eighteen different people in total. Many of us hadn’t seen each other for around 30 years so it was lovely to do some catching up!

Day 18.167: Travel

I spent a good part of the day embarking on a solo non-work trip. The longest leg of which (Boston to London) looked something like this:

At Logan airport 

America!

Leaving Boston

Somewhere over southern England

London 

Day 18.166: Nature walk sightings

I'm posting this with a time delay early in the day because of some travel later.

Here are various things we saw on our regular Thursday morning nature walk - back at our traditional cemetery location.

Bald eagle

Northern cardinal

Porcupine - we discovered they go down trees this way - "feet-first"

Common yellowthroat

Gray catbird

Yellow warbler

Flowers in the tulip tree

Spreading dogbane (with some ant visitors)

This is a swelling caused by a fungus - ash rust

Pileated woodpecker

American robin

Juvenile eastern bluebird

Red bellied woodpecker. We saw a young one but I wasn't able to get a picture. This is probably its dad.

Eastern phoebe

Great egret

Spreading dogbane

Whorled loosestrife

Timothy grass

Deptford pink

Common selfheal

Japanese tree lilac 

Day 18.165: A nice bath?

Exile #2 spotted several crows in the heat of the day yesterday - it seems that they were probably anting - we all cope with the heat differently I suppose.

Day 18.164: Too hot for ME?

It was hot here today:

I coped OK but it was hotter than we’re used to in Maine. 

Day 18.163: Some visitors

There's a lot going on the world, but our corner of it has been fairly uneventful for a few days, so here are some recent photos of bird-feeder visitors.

Young bluebird. I took the photo to confirm this.

Exile #2 spotted a relatively unusual turkey visit

Is it a purple finch or a house finch? It's a house finch.

Day 18.162: Exile #2’s Sunday Column #528

Exile #2 writes...

While Exile #1 was off filming the dance show, I stayed home to drive some of the other Exiles around and to cook some food for friends who’ve just had a baby. It was a little more eventful than expected, requiring a last minute dash to the store but all was well in the end.

It’s pretty hot to be dashing around, though, and by Tuesday, it’s going to be in the high 90s - or somewhere around 37. Our new bug-screened back door is helping cool the house a bit but I have a slight suspicion the chipmunks are planning something. One watched me quite brazenly through the mesh as I ate my breakfast this morning. Maybe they’re planning a heist to get my pumpkin seeds…

Day 18.161: Show day

Finally - a dry, sunny, not too hot Saturday. How did I spend it? Inside a dark auditorium for the most part. It was the end-of-year dance recital, and I am still videographer of choice. I kind of fell into it and I'm never quite sure how we got here, but it's a challenge I mostly enjoy twice a year (a small winter show and the big summer show).

It seems I have successfully done my task for today by capturing and then backing-up the video files. The majority of the work lies ahead with the editing, but the stressful part (there is really no way to recover if I fail to get the footage) is over.