This Sunday is Pack Day for the Graths. Sarah and I were up and outdoors with the birds. Sunday breakfast was next. Then we all lay around together in a heap, watching part of a TV special on Harry Houdini (which brought to my mind THE AMAZING ADVENTURES OF KAVALIER AND CLAY, by Michael Chabon, one of my very favorite books, so special that just thinking about it as we watched escapist Houdini brought tears to my eyes). Now it’s Dog-and-Dad time while I do laundry, and then the pack will launch into the day’s adventures. The sky is blue, the sun is shining, the birds are singing their little hearts out. I need to order more copies of the NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC FIELD GUIDE TO BIRDS OF NORTH AMERICA (highly recommended by Kay Charter of “Saving Birds Through Habitat”) so I can have them before next weekend. It’s that time of year.
Postscript: I wrote the foregoing before leaving the house this morning. Later, in the Big Outside World (bow-wow!), we picked up a Record-Eagle, and there, in an article on pileated woodpeckers, Kay Charter had mentioned me and my bookstore by name! Thanks, Kay! What a coincidence that she should mention me in her article the same day I mentioned her in my blog. And I’m especially pleased to learn that I can go back to my original pronunciation of ‘pilliated’ for that bird’s name. The newer way of saying it was driving me nuts!
I'm adding a permanent link for Saving Birds Through Habitat. Look to the list at right.
2 comments:
Thanks for highlighting the Pilliated and the reference to the Record Eagle article. It brought back to memory my forgotten pronounciation of the bird's name. I used to always pronounce it "pile" but now I have taken the more commonly traveled road and pronounce it "pill." I think I'll go back to "pile."
We enjoy the bird and the artistry it has left behind on our seven foot stump on the north side of our farm.
It also brought to mind that we have not yet visited the bird sanctuary, even though we pass by it regularly. I think that I'll correct that situation very soon.
Happy Spring and save a mushroom or two for me.
Z
z, we are moving in opposite directions: you from pill to pile, I from pile to pill. If we pass each other, will there be that sound like two whistling trains? Is there a relativity lesson in this? I am leaving this comment on 5/14, having just posted a bright but sad little goldfinch photo. Others remain to swoop and sing.
Post a Comment