The grosbeaks have arrived

The grosbeaks have arrived.

This one likes the suet.

In flight

in flight

hanging upside down from the suet cage

Notice the Carolina chickadee in flight in the lower right. Look at how wide his wingspan is.

The female is on the left; the male is on the right.

A welcome harbinger of spring

Senseless tragedy at Virginia Tech

I'm from the DC suburbs of Northern Virginia, about 4 hours from Blacksburg where the shooting deaths of 32 innocent occurred yesterday at Virginia Tech. I've visited Blacksburg many times and took both my kids there on pre-college tours. My son attended two years at Radford, only 15 miles from Blacksburg. Virginia Tech was my second choice for college - I attended William & Mary.

So it's not THAT close to home,
but it is WAY too close to home.

So many unanswered questions.
Who did this and why?
Why did the university seem so slow to react?
Could anything have been done to end the rampage sooner?
Should we tighten gun-control laws?

Each of these questions and many more will be asked and answered over the coming days, weeks and months.
But none of the answers can provide true comfort for the families of those murdered and injured.

When something like this happens, it causes an immediate reaction of disbelief and shock.
It's Kubler-Ross' five stages of grief, each of which we must endure after any trauma.

I feel the sense of shock now,
as the sun rises to begin a beautiful spring morning with a bit of chill in the air.
Reminds me of 9/11/01, a beautiful fall day,
another day of tragedy
that lead to much greater tragedy than even the 19 guys with box-cutters could have hoped for.

Why do we react in such a way?
Do such events awaken in us the slumbering realization
that we too are mortal,
and that our time must come one day,
that life is temporary,
but death is permanent?

Springtime in Nashville

I took these pictures a couple of weeks ago on my lunch break at the Bicentennial Mall near downtown Nashville. Since Blogger will not position my captions correctly, I'm going to describe the pictures up front.

- A dogwood tree frames a distant view of the Tennessee Tower.
- It was a perfect day for kids to play a spirited game of Frisbee.
- Redbuds are my favorite springtime tree.
- Pieces from the Parthenon renovation are placed around the park.
- Blooming azaleas up close
- Younger visitors the world, which is suspended on water. I doubt they notice the irony of the nearby picture of the A-bomb - signifying the end of WW II. Let's hope this generation can make a better world than mine.

Wild turkeys in the front yard

I stood on our front porch yesterday morning and snapped these pictures of a wild tom turkey in our neighbor's front yard. The sun had just risen and was backlighting his feathers from my perspective.

He follows his flock of females around, spreading his feathers as if to impress them. Most of the females appear to pay no attention to him.

He is part of a flock that lives in the 150+ acres of woods and fields behind our house. Sometimes at sunset we see the huge birds jockeying for roosting positions in the tall trees, and we often observe 12 or more of them in the woods. They particularly like to scavenge for birdseed that falls from our bird feeders. They sound particularly comical in the woods, as if they are telling jokes. A long period of silence will be broken by excited gobbling, as if one of them has told a good joke.

Blue volunteers of spring

I'm following the lead of Prairie Bluestem, who always posts such beautiful pictures of the area surrounding her home. These little blue flowers have escaped the bed in which they were planted years ago in our front yard and now make their appearance a little farther out in the yard each spring. Unfortunately I must mow them down soon.

Brilliant morning sunshine welcomed me streaming from my office door the other morning.

I love ironic juxtapositions like this picture of the Municipal Auditorium that I took the other day. On the left you have, "Acquire the Fire - Branded by God," and on the right you have, "My Chemical Romance." I wonder how well the fans for these disparate events would mix.

Springtime maliase

Something about the beginning of spring usually finds me in a funk.

Why is that?

I know there are lots of things I should be doing - like landscaping, transplanting azaleas, planting dogwoods and redbuds and sealing my deck.

Then there are the inside jobs - straightening up my garage, building shelves, cabinets and a workbench.

And then there are taxes. Ugh!

Outside Nature is putting on Her best show of the year,

and inside I'm stewing about this stupid little job that must be done every year.

Every year I find a million excuses to not get started on taxes.

I discover boxes of old photographs I've had for decades,

I find songs I need to learn,

I find TV shows I must watch,

and places I must visit.

I absolutely dread taxes.

But when they're done,

as they always are,

the huge weight is lifted from my shoulders,

and I can get on with my life

and enjoy the coming of spring.

Old pictures

Last night I scanned a few old pictures from my childhood.

Here I am in 1950 at age four squinting in the bright sunshine reflecting from newly-fallen snow.

Here I am at seven years of age in the summer of 1953 with a box of Boston Terrier puppies that our dog Penny had.

In 1954 at age 8 with my sister Mary on Skyline Drive, which was an afternoon's drive from home outside of Washington, DC.

Easter, age 8 (1954) with my Granddad Bill (dad's father), his wife Edna (my dad's mom died in 1933), my mom, sister and of course our Boston Terrier Penny.

I was pulling my sister on a sled in the winter of 1954.


Here I am 1959 at age 13, the completely gawky nerd that I was then when dressed up for church.

But here I am at the same age looking much cooler.

At age 14 with my sister and dad after a big snow.


I was still pretty gawky by age 16. Here I am at Easter 1962 in the company of my Aunt Mildred, my mom, my mother's mother and my sister.

A twinge of sadness

XM just played "Dressed up Like Nebraska," by Josh Rouse.

My second wife Nancy got that album for me,

maybe in 2000,

but I didn't care for it,

so she returned it.

She contracted leukemia in the spring of 2002

just as spring was waking up the flowers

and died in the spring of 2003

just as her last spring was waking up the flowers.

Hearing that song just now gave me a twinge of sadness.

It's a Monday

It's a Monday, for sure.
Daylight Savings Time change meant less sleep than usual.











Wifie is on her way to spend the week with a good friend in Memphis.
It's a beautiful day in Nashville,
and I have absolutely nothing to do.

Well, I do have some projects to work on,
but none of them are "critical,"
and everyone else in the building is doing other things.

So I'm cruisin on a Monday morning,
listening to XM Satellite Radio on the computer,
hoping wifie is having an enjoyable and safe trip,
looking forward to Jazzercise tonight,





knowing I have to learn some songs this week
and knowing I'll have my cat Roger to keep me company.

Nashville Lawn & Garden Show

The day was initially warm and windy, sunny and bright with puffy white clouds chasing across the blue sky. It became increasingly cold and grey as the afternoon wore on, and by late afternoon we saw snow flurries.

We drove down to the Nashville Fairgrounds and visited the Nashville Lawn & Garden Show, where I took these pictures:








This one ended up looking pretty funny, although when I took it I did not notice the man sitting behind it. It looks like he's sitting in the fountain.



The animal rescue people were there.


We saw a beautiful collection of flower arrangements, complete with lighting to show them off.


A most unusual vase!



Another unusual vase.