Day 19.288: Exile #2's Sunday Column #566

Exile #2 writes...

With just over a week until the midterms, our media and our mailboxes have been inundated with ads for the upcoming elections. We have received summaries of our voting record along with the encouragement to vote again. We have had flyers and visitors to the doorstep. The younger exiles have received particular attention, and even some handwritten notes, but today, friends from our nature group handed round perhaps my favorite piece of election merch so far. Penzeys Spices, doing its part for the Democratic Party, have been distributing spice mixes with the exhortation to “season liberally”. Each packet comes with a little lesson in civics and the potential to create something delicious. Who wouldn’t vote for that?

Day 19.287: Morning at the cemetery

Exile #2 and I seized the day with a pre-breakfast walk at the cemetery today. Here is some of what we saw in the morning sunshine:

We saw some birds too - a good variety albeit nothing very unusual. I'll save them for another day.

Day 19.286: Apple tasting

Our nature group has been studying a type of tree each week this year. This week it was the apple. I found some on a tree near work to taste and brought a few home for Exile #2 to try:

Verdict - small but reassuringly apple-y. 

Day 19.285: Feeder visits

The first visitors to our restocked bird feeders were a tufted titmouse and a black-capped chickadee - to no-one's surprise. Before long we added a few more species. Here are a couple:

American goldfinches

White-breasted nuthatch

We still have a couple of weeks before we start reporting on weekend visits when Project FeederWatch starts up in November.

Day 19.284: Wordless Wednesday: fall

Day 19.283: Fall fast forward

With my weirdly busy travel schedule over the last few weeks it seems like the season has sped by. Here is how it seemed to go for me:

I noticed that the leaves were starting to turn

Then they were all red

Then most of them had gone

Blink (and go away for a week) and you’ll miss it!

Day 19.282: Hello halo

We’ve had a few days recently with the high ice-particle clouds and sunshine needed to generate solar halos and sun dogs. This example was from my early-October boat trip.