Energy Crisis

 

The Electric Company was billing us faster than we could pay.  We’ve been terrible energy hogs; even when we aren’t here.  We used 4,500 kilowatt hours of electricity in one month.

 

We asked neighbors about their usage.  While we were using 4,000, they were using 400.  We went outside and watched the (virtual) disk on our electric meter spinning way faster than it should.  Repeated calls to the Electric Company got a guy out to test the meter today.  The meter didn’t pass the test.

 

We have a new meter.  In the first half day since, we’ve used 4 kilowatt hours.  That’s more like it.

 

Crisis resolved.

 

 

Enrique lives!

We had that record cold snap in January. The temperatures dropped into the twenties and stayed for a while. Too cold for many of the plants here; many didn’t make it. It looked to be too cold for Enrique as well; all his leaves turned brown and dried up. No more juice in those leaves. We thought we were going to have to replace Enrique when we got back from The Valley, but no! While we were gone, a new leaf sprouted. Who cares if all the old leaves are dead if Enrique can sprout new ones?

Yeaa. Enrique lives.

Travel Day!

 

All the way from The Valley back to Port Aransas.  150 miles.  North on Highway 281.  Through the border check point (50 miles north of the border) for illegal drugs and aliens.  They didn’t find any.  To our benefit, they determined we didn’t have any *without* having to search through every cabinet inside and out this time.

 

Right after the border check point is the Highway 281 Rest Stop.  It’s in the median between the northbound and southbound lanes of the highway.  There are large oaks, picnic shelters, tables, paths, old buildings, and scrub forest on either end.  We always have to stop there and take a quick walk around for birds.  Later in the year we would get a good Tanager or Oriole.  This time we got some usuals: cardinal, green jay, titmouse, yellow-rumped warbler, ruby-crowned kinglet.  We got a blue-headed vireo too; our first for the month (on the last day of the month).  Now, starting tomorrow, we’ll need one again.

 

We drove on.  We turned right on Highway 44 and watched for Mountain Plover in the plowed fields, but we didn’t see any.  We turned right on Highway 358, South Padre Island Drive (SPID) and drove through Corpus Christi.  Nice and familiar.  We watched Oso Bay and Corpus Christi Bay appear on the navigator map and in front of us.  We crossed the big bridge; the one over the Intracoastal Waterway; Snoopy’s Fish and Chips below to the right.  We didn’t stop.  We turned left on Highway 361 onto the island.  There is still standing water and White Ibis in the roadside ditches.

 

We went south for the winter.  Now we’re back.

 

Life on the beach.

 

 

Ruby crowned kinglet

It’s hard to take a good picture of a ruby crowned kinglet. They’re tiny little birds; about the size of a hummingbird, and they flit about. Constantly. If you have a camera with a significant shutter lag, like I do, you get a lot of pictures of where the kinglet just was…

Here’s the best we’ve been able to do so far…

If you can get one while he’s *really* agitated, you can see his red crown.

Great blue heron

Immature hawks

Immature hawks all tend to look alike. Here is one on a wire. From the face and chest patterns we thought it might be an immature gray hawk. Because of the tail length though, we settled on immature Red-shouldered Hawk.

Wednesday

A cold night; in the thirties, but back to warm sunny weather today. I got to go back outside to exercise.

Curve-billed Thrasher.