Jacumba

Birding dilemma. We put oranges out on the feeder and have been getting a hooded oriole. Then we got another bird, eating the other orange half, a little smaller than the 8” oriole. It’s obvious what it was, a 7” olive bird with black wings, a nonbreeding male scarlet tanager.

Problem is, it’s an eastern bird. We looked in the guide. It’s not supposed to be here. We’ve got an ABA guide “Birders Guide to Southern California”. It doesn’t show as rare on the bar chart. It is not even mentioned on the bar chart. We just called a bird that doesn’t belong here. Problem is, nothing else looks like it. Olive bird with black wings and a stubby bill. That’s the only bird it could be.

We hesitate to be the first person ever to call a bird in a place it has never been before. We’re just not that good (confident) at birding.

Continuing to scan the birder’s guide, I found the “seldom seen, but possible” page. Yes. The scarlet tanager. I’ll go with that. We saw a seldom seen, but possible bird.

Jacumba

I’m really liking the way work is going. From the comfort of the desert wilderness we just did a job in Crested Butte Colorado. We love Crested Butte, but right now the temperature there is in the teens or single digits each night. Not a place we want to be in the coach in November. But the client has an August year-end, so this is the perfect time for them to get their work done. No phone available from here, but with email and fax it went well and finished up today, right on schedule.

We’ve already been exchanging the client data digitally between the coach and the office, but we made a couple improvements in the process this week. Earlier in the week we set up the offsite backup on the internet, so our daily work is protected. Data security at a minimal charge.

Today, we set up the online fax service. I have been able to scan and email anything to a client, but if they don’t have scanning capability they have had to fax their paper documents to the Denver office so Jamie could scan the faxes and email them to me. I haven’t been able to receive faxes because I’m not a stationary target. Traditional faxes want to go through a land-line. The internet fax service provides a toll-free fax number specifically for me, then forwards each fax to me as an email attachment. We just digitized one more step.

I like the way this is going.

Anza borrego

We’re in the southern foothills of Anza Borrego; elevation 2,500 feet; not the central part of the park. We took a drive to the central part, Borrego Springs. It’s a city at sea level, completely surrounded by the state park. Time came for a walk. Combined the walk with a search through the sparse desert vegetation for the LeConte’s thrasher. When I finished the walk, I was in a quandary. I’m supposed to tell Judy if I have chest pains; but I always have chest pains. I’m supposed to tell her when I have unusual chest pain. Our doctor told us the first symptom of heart trouble I’ll have will be exercised induced chest pain. This was definitely connected to exercise. Didn’t hurt at all until I started walking. Of course, there are other issues to follow, but it all starts with telling Judy. I was still working on whether the pain was unusual or not when Judy remarked on how much the air pollution was hurting her chest. That’s why it was familiar! It was smog! Looked across the valley that Borrego Springs is in, and there was a haze.

We are such weenies; just a dribble of smog over the California mountains and it hurts our lungs to breathe. No smog resistance left.

Jacumba

A walk around the perimeter of the campground. The tiny thunder of quail wings as we disturbed the evening wandering of a hundred birds. A lot of energy expended for a flight of fifty feet. Some birds had to escape several times.

The juncos, finches, sparrows, and siskins have discovered our feeders. Cactus wrens. Ladderback woodpeckers.

Life in the desert.

Anza borrego

The job finished up on Friday like it was supposed to. Saturday morning we said goodbye to the couple across the street, said goodbye to Jim and Elle. Said goodbye to Barbara and Wally, and headed west. West on Interstate 10 past the Picacho Peak Ostrich Farm and RV Park. West on Interstate 8. Past Gila Bend and Yuma, elevation 160 feet. This is the first time we’ve been below 1,000 feet since last March. We cross the California border, into the Pacific time-zone, and don’t change the clocks; we’ve been in Arizona. Arizona doesn’t observe daylight savings time.

It has been a strange time-zone trip for us. We went from mountain daylight time to mountain standard, without crossing a time zone, when we crossed into Arizona, so we changed the clocks. Then we crossed from mountain standard to pacific daylight time when we crossed into California, so we didn’t change the clocks when we crossed the time zone. But the funny thing is that we crossed into the next time zone on the same day the time changed from daylight to standard (in California), so we had to change the clocks anyway.

Passed the Imperial Sand Dunes Recreation Area; packed with off-road vehicles buzzing up and down the dunes and a thousand RVs dry camping in the desert. Yuma, El Centro, Ocotillo, right along the Mexico border. We stopped at a quiet place, outside Anza Borrego Desert State Park. No cellphone service, but we’ve got email. We’ll stay here a week.

Tucson

Happy Anniversary to us. November 1^st. We’re starting our fourth year on the road. If you can get entrenched in not being entrenched, it’s happening to us.

Mesquite tree update. It’s an olive tree.

150 rigs checking in today for a motorcycle rally. Tomorrow morning they all take a group ride.

Talking to neighbors here in the park in Tucson, we discover that we’re talking to Don McKee’s half sister, Barbara, twenty years older than he. What a coincidence! We hang out with Don and Barbara Mckee in Louisville for thirty-five years, then we run into Don’s older sister in Tucson. And know what she, Barbara formerly-McKee is here doing? She and her husband are here for the motorcycle rally. Eighty-five years old, and they’re here for the motorcycle rally.

Things not to do while fifth-wheeling. Don’t drive off without the hitch latched in place. If you don’t latch it, the trailer falls off the hitch, lands on the back of the pickup, makes a loud noise, does some damage, and you feel stupid. It just happened to a neighbor of ours this morning. I think it happens eventually to most every fifth-wheel driver.

Had dinner tonight with Jim and Elle, last seen in Colorado, they just crossed the border from Mexico, and we happened to end up in Tucson at the same park at the same time.

Enjoying this life on the road. It’s a trip.

Happy Anniversary to us.

Tucson

Up and gone at dawn. Madera canyon, one of the most highly regarded birding spots in Southeastern Arizona, which is itself a highly regarded birding spot. We’re in search of the Arizona Woodpecker; a life bird for us. Got a flock of wild turkeys. Mexican jays and acorn woodpeckers everywhere, bridled titmouse, white breasted and red breasted nutchatches, various finches, siskins and juncos, and two really cool birds: the blue-throated hummingbird and the hepatic tanager. Neither are life birds, but each one only seen once before by us, so good reinforcement of the life-list. No Arizona Woodpecker though. Now we’re starting to attach adjectives to his name, like we did with that rotten little green bird, the green kingfisher, until we finally found him.

Busy days. Back before lunch; in time for Annie’s grooming and some client work. Yesterday, Judy got the coach washed (I didn’t say she washed it, she arranged to have it washed; and she did a very good job of that), and got the carpets cleaned too. Today, Judy got Annie groomed and replaced the electrical cord between the coach and the tow car (seven pin to four pin), and got some new awning straps.

Now, in the daylight, looking at the mesquite tree overhanging the hot tub, I see something wrong with tree. It has black olives hanging from its branches. Strange place, this RV Park in Tucson. How do you suppose they get black olives to grow on a mesquite tree? And why would they want to do that anyway?