So

  You’re just bipping along being a long-billed thrasher. 

Pecking some seeds off the ground. 

And suddenly you get mugged by another thrasher. 

 

And then he’s gone. 

Shades of Inspector Clouseau and Cato.

Z-Triton

 

 It’s a bike.  It’s a boat.  It’s an RV!

It’s a Z-Triton.

https://z-triton.com/

 

What the

 

The Russian invasion of Ukraine is described as the first act of its kind since World War II.  One country invading another.  The entire west is united in opposition.  Just like WWII, right?  We’re cutting off all ties.  We’ll do anything to stop this Russian aggression against a peaceful sovereign nation.  Except that we’re all members of the same world banking software.  Careful.  Don’t want to disrupt that.  Our economies are intertwined.  We in the U.S. are not going to fight directly, like we didn’t at the start of WWII either, but we’ll help Ukraine fight all we can, as long as we don’t disrupt anybody’s financing.

 And fuel.  Pretty much the entire Russian economy depends on trading their oil and gas on the world market.  Western Europe gets a lot of its fuel from Russia.  All of Western Europe is resisting Russia, while Russia is selling them fuel, and they’re buying it.  If the Russians couldn’t sell any oil and gas, their economy would collapse in a heartbeat, but our energy usage is intertwined too.  Careful.  Don’t want to disrupt that either.

 In spite of the repeated references to World War II, and in spite of the fact that it probably feels like WWII in Ukraine, from here it looks like a very careful dance, with guns and bombs.

Orchard

 

Remember the pictures of the new orchard I sent out a couple weeks ago?  They spent the time and money to put a bag around every tree! 

It’s a Rio Red grapefruit orchard.  I checked it after the freezing cold weather we had recently, and the trees all look fine inside their protective bags.  Once they get established, it will be another whole round of expense to cut all those bags off, unless they’re designed to deteriorate after a certain amount of time.  (Mission Impossible?  “This message will self-destruct after…”)  Big investment, anyway.

 We can see an example of how that big investment might pay off though.  Three years ago, I sent out this photo of a new citrus orchard down the road from us that impressed me with its precision.

 I doubt it’s unusually precise for an orchard.  They probably all line up that well.  It’s just a symmetry that appeals to me.

 Well, in the three years since I reported on that newly planted, but unprotected, orchard, we’ve had a couple of freezing spells and a couple floods.  The combination of those back to back events did a number on the trees.  Now that orchard looks like this. 

Can only tell it was ever an orchard by looking at the layout.

Facebook

 

 

I haven’t looked at Facebook in years, but apparently Facebook is looking at me.  I got a friend request from myself!  I’ve heard that others are also getting bogus friend requests from me, so please feel free to ignore me or unfriend me.  And No, I’m not stranded anywhere, I don’t need you to send me money fast, and I don’t want to know your social security number.  :)

 Steve

 

 

Sandpipers wind gauge

 From our kitchen window.

Calm.  Comfortable weather.

Wind from the north.  Cold and dry if it’s not raining. 

Wind from the south.  Warm and humid. 

National Butterfly Center

One of our favorite places to walk.  (There are a lot of favorite places to walk here.)  It is a renowned refuge for butterflies, and it attracts lepidopterists from all over the world.  And it’s birdy.  There is a nice bird feeding station always worth sitting at for a while.

 Location.

https://www.google.com/maps/@26.1780397,-98.3660025,2150m/data=!3m1!1e3

 It’s that narrow strip of land that extends south, across the levee, to the river.

 It’s currently off the walking list though.  It had to close until further notice.  Online conspiracy theories have declared the Butterfly Center to be a cover for human smuggling, sex trafficking, and the exploitation of children.  Now protesters are showing up with guns and making death threats.

 https://www.nytimes.com/2022/02/06/us/butterfly-center-texas.html?campaign_id=9&emc=edit_nn_20220207&instance_id=52392&nl=the-morning&regi_id=118955267&segment_id=81890&te=1&user_id=854ad0c7b32e280541aa78fe49f883d3

 I know some of us are compelled to do crazy shit, and each one of us might have our own opinion about what constitutes crazy shit, but really, butterflies?  Can’t we just leave the butterflies out of it?

Along the way

 

Now we’re back home in the Valley at Sandpipers. 

Don’t you hate it when

 

…that other guy makes fun of you by mimicking everything you do?

 

It’s that time of year.  The homeland must be defended.

We can wash the cardinal spit off the side mirror later.

Now we’re in Pipe Creek in the Hill Country outside San Antonio.

https://www.google.com/maps/@29.7222455,-98.9405003,13.25z

 

Tonight

We have a water view. 

We’re at Lake Casa Blanca State Park in Laredo.

 https://www.google.com/maps/@27.5371284,-99.4352829,15z

 

This is the site we’re in.

 https://www.google.com/maps/@27.5356853,-99.4367449,66m/data=!3m1!1e3

 

 A cactus wren singing, The fragrant huisache trees in bloom.

They’re almost “knock you over” fragrant while walking past.

 We’re not right on the water

…but we can see it from here. 

Trails through little forests. 

Open scrub. 

And some of it looks like African savannah. 

 

Black-throated Sparrow. 

 

A Crested Caracara. 

And the south end of White Pelicans.

 

Our yard at Falcon State Park

 

 

 And the intruder. 

A javelina lusting after the bird food cannisters I have on the picnic table.  Javelina can make a mess out of a camp if there is food to find. 

This one got a little belligerent when I went out to chase him off.

 Those bumps on his face behind his nose.  That’s where the tusks are.

 

Falcon State Park

 

 Change of scenery.

 https://www.google.com/maps/@26.5843002,-99.1478973,15.25z

 This is the site we’re in this time.

 https://www.google.com/maps/@26.5871225,-99.1497425,68m/data=!3m1!1e3

 

Here is what it looks like tonight.

 

As the full moon rises. 

 What the... 

Really?  Fox Farm Microbrewed Fertilizers and Handcrafted Soils?  In Texas?  Not just in Texas, but in the Rio Grande Valley?

 

Maybe in Austin, or Seattle, or Portland, but here?

From the archives

 

 Me in the back yard in Seal Beach with my pet rat Jimmy on my head.

 

Me, squeezing out through the door of my fort with brother David poking his head up out the gun turret of his fort in the background.

 

Back then, a lot of stuff came in wooden crates.  I remember what good scooter fronts wooden apple crates made when we nailed them onto 2x4s and sacrificed a roller skate by separating the two halves and screwing them to the bottom of the 2x4.  A couple stubs of 1x2s mounted diagonally on the top for handles and we were good to go.  I remember going to a tennis court to ride our scooters.  It makes me squirm in discomfort now just thinking about rolling our metal wheeled skates on a tennis court surface, but come to think of it, it wasn’t a sophisticated surface then, it was just cement troweled a little smoother than sidewalk cement.

 

And rabbit hutches in the background.  I guess that wheeled thing is a large tricycle.

Texas

 

 

Still 15 counties to go.

 That might not seem like much, but for comparison there are only 15 counties total in all of Arizona. 

I folded some laundry

 

Took part of it into the bedroom to put away in the dresser.  Remembered I was going to change the bed.  Forgot about the rest of the folding on the front room table.  Stripped the bed.  Took part of the sheets in to put in the washing machine but there was already something else there from yesterday.  It was damp and a little smelly.  Thought about putting it in the dryer, but there were still clothes in the dryer, so I picked those up and carried them to the front room.  Judy couldn’t find her glasses, so I put the folding down so I could help.  I remembered she has gone outside a little earlier, so I went out on the deck to look.  It was nice out, so I sat down in the sun…

 

There are so many things left undone.

Killdeer

 They’re found on golf courses, fields, even parking lots. 

It’s a shorebird but it doesn’t need a shore. 

In fact, it makes its nest out of stones, in gravel.

(Not my photo this time.)

 

It’s a member of the plover family and it looks and acts like a plover.  It can be around water, but unlike all the other plovers, it doesn’t need to be.