Sunday Morning Symphony

A burro brays in the distance, a cow lows softly to her calf. The Little Wind River is roaring and the wind chimes in half an octave higher-then subsides, geese honk alarms at the neighbors, sheep are chatting to each other, songbirds sing soprano, Mourning Doves coocoocaroo, a Pheasant calls, a Raven flies- wings beating whoosh, whoosh, whoosh, the seed pods in the Elm tree rattle, a car goes by at its leisure, an Appaloosa drums the ground once and blows wind over rubbery lips. These sounds after thirty-five years are in my soul.
Music to my old ears.

The bird feeder went in yesterday and fell over in the night. I live on a moraine. I relocated it farther down the hill, raised it with a three foot pipe, and wired it to a fence post. I sat back this morning, coffee in hand, and waited...and waited... and waited. Finally I had a diner but it was shy and stayed on the other side of the feeder. I could see its busy head and a tail feather. It left and I scurried down the hill and applied duct tape to the tray and some feeding holes on the far side. It came back and I caught a glimpse and took some pictures. In the house with the pictures blown up, I don't have any idea what kind of bird it was. It is colored like a juvenile Meadowlark but it has the wrong beak.

The finch feeder got no action. Half of the lower pasture disappeared overnight. The Little Wind River is out of control. I am perched on a hill and the deluge that would reach me cannot be imagined. The sloughs are filled. Honey went down there this evening and what she is used to walking across had some depth. She looked at me as if to say "what the ...? Then she played in it. Had a ball.

It was not all bird-watching or dog-watching. I went through two sets of trimmers on the weed-whacker mower and now I have to get more to continue but the critical parts are done. A headache started up but I slept it off in about thirty minutes. I made a pot of Galician Wedding Soup and dinner, using up a package of chicken breasts that needed to be used up. Played with the hound and she came to snuggle and put her head on my shoe as I sat fixing the mower. She is getting downright chummy.

Greg's dog JJ got run over by an ATV but gets to come home tonight-with pain killers: Facebook news. I sent a note. Rene continues to make good progress. He feels good and his speech is improving daily. In Palm Beach news, Rush Limbaugh, the man who knows best how to run the country, married for the fourth time-a woman nearly half his age. I think she married him for the money unless she is really into turkey wattles. Elton John did the music-for a cool million.