At the art museum

I go to my city's art museum on a semi-regular basis.  I love art, and now that I've started painting after my separation/divorce, I like to look for inspiration.  Sometimes I go alone, but sometimes I go with friends.  One of the great things about my new single life is getting to spend more time with friends.

My good friend and I went to a wonderful new restaurant, just a couple of blocks from my apartment.  I had a homemade veggie burger:

Then, on to the art museum.  They were having a special exhibition, where floral artists are assigned pieces in the collection, and they create an arrangement inspired by the art.  Super fun!

Unfortunately, this was not one of the pieces that had art inspired by it, but: parrot in the museum!

This one made me laugh!  It's in my dad's favorite part of the art museum: self-taught art.

Part of the permanent exhibit: metal birds!  I did buy an outside metal ornament that had a bird on it.  Once it's installed in my garden, I will post it.

Not wanting to jinx things, but I have put in an offer on a house!  It's so fabulous, but if I don't get this house, I'll find another.  This house has so much character -- stained glass windows, built-ins, a fabulous staircase, double door entry (for parrot safety), laundry not in the basement.  The parrots and are tired of living in an apartment, and we are excited to be in our own place where we can be as loud as we'd like again!

The weather has improved, which means I've been bicycle commuting most days.  I had to stop to take pictures of mergansers ("mohawk-ducks" as my good friend Sheila says.)  Unfortunately, all of my closer pictures were fuzzy, and the mergansers all dispersed while I got my camera ready.  You'll just have to take my word that they're not mallards.

Tomorrow, I am running my last long run before my May ultramarathon.  I'm hoping the weather will cooperate!  Last week, during my long run, it started snowing!  In April!  Then, another friend and I (she's running with me tomorrow morning) are going for pedicures.  They will be well-deserved, for sure.  And, the salon is close enough so we can walk and, therefore, drink wine.  So exciting!

Pay attention to me!

After my marathon yesterday (first place in my age group!) I was at home, drinking a celebratory beer, and just enjoying life. Max was wandering around the house.  Suddenly, I felt a gentle beaking on my toe.

She wanted attention!  Right now!

After-work routine

The past few weeks, I've started a new after-work routine with the parrots that we've all come to enjoy.

In my small apartment, I don't have enough room for them to be in a common living room, as they were in my house, which means that they have their own bedroom.  This isn't ideal, as they don't get as much ambient attention when I'm doing things, unless I make it a point to get them out.  Having them all out at the same time in a room without their cages can be tricky, as they start posturing and starting fights.  I need to be on high alert at all times.  This means that I usually rotate parrots (Max and Calypso together; Beeps separately, since he can't get along with anyone) who are out with me.

Once I have a house again (crossing my fingers; in a few months if inventory improves!) they'll be in a common area again so this won't be an issue.  Each bird respects the others' cages, so they can all be out with light supervision.

That was some wordy background!

I have moved a comfortable chair into their bedroom, and I sit there and read for at least an hour while they play.  This reading isn't always the most productive, as they frequently want to interact with me, so my book gets postponed.

I took a few pictures of Calypso's march to attention.  He starts by hanging off of his cage door, to be as close to me as possible.  And super cute, as well.

After a few head scratches, he moves around the same level as I am, making kiss sounds and whistling.  (He continues to be the most photogenic parrot I have known):

Caught in mid-scratch:

Before I know it, he's on the ground, coming over for some more personal attention:

Not to be outdone, as soon as he's on the floor, Max has to be on the floor, too.  I try to keep them on opposite sides of my chair, though yesterday, when I didn't have my camera with me, they were both ripping up the newspaper that's under Max's cage!

Beeps stays on his cage, as when he tries to venture down, Max goes after him.  He's happy, and I make sure to spend time with him everyday in a one-on-one situation.  After over 6 years of living together, I would have hoped they could be better friends!

A video of Beeps.  Every time after I do a certain whistle, he says "Pretty baby!" It sounds clear to me, but when he does this for visitors, they can't understand him.  (ETA: Apparently this video is not working.  Ever since blogger "improved" their interface, I have had trouble with videos.  This has been going on for years!  I will try to figure it out tomorrow.  For now, just imagine Beeps saying "pretty baby!" after I whistle.  This happens twice.)

When he saw me taking pictures of Beeps on his cage, Calypso had to climb to the same spot on his cage for attention:

However, he didn't do anything exciting enough to warrant a video!

With Calypso off of the floor, Max flew up to her favorite spot: the arm of my chair, where I scratch her head while reading:

I am currently reading "In the Garden of Beasts" by Erik Larson.  It's about the American ambassador to Berlin during Hitler's rise to power, prior to World War II.  It's non-fiction that reads like fascinating fiction.  Highly recommended!

Tomorrow I am running a marathon.  I have not been doing much speed work, so I am not anticipating that great of a result.  Additionally, the weather forecast is not fabulous.  It will be that terrible in-between weather that is so difficult to dress for!  I am maintaining a good attitude and determined to have fun, even if I'll be slower than last year.

Massive update! Things are fantastic!

Tons of embarrassment over here for it being nearly two months since my last entry! I'm not going to even attempt to make excuses, but I will promise (again!) to try to do better. I know I am sad that I don't have a nice record of this past year.  Because it's been fabulous!

Winter, on the other hand, has not been fabulous.  I saw way too much of this:

Which made running quite difficult.  I still managed to (mostly) get my miles in, but they were slower and slippery-er than I would have liked.  Luckily I have some great running partners who help get me out even when it's cold and windy.  I'm running a 50K with some friends in about 6 weeks, and we have a marathon next week, so those races will test my winter running preparedness!

Here's a look at the path on which I walk home from work on occasion.  Proof that I was not the only one out there on this wintry day:

Almost home!

I love this time of night, when everything looks so magical:

Work is going really well.  It's still more hours than I would like, but nowhere near as bad as it could be.  I've made some fantastic friends, and will celebrate my one-year anniversary there in about two weeks.  I'm up on a high floor; here's a picture of my building enveloped in fog:

I would have taken a picture out of my office window, but all you would have seen was white.

The parrots are still doing well, though I have been remiss in photographing them!

I had a box on my dining room chair that I was planning to use to send a care package to a friend.  Max had other ideas, as she jumped in and started ripping up the box.  I did remove her as soon as I took this picture, as I do not want to encourage nesting behavior in her.  Perhaps she was trying to teach me a lesson about procrastination.

Max is as sweet as ever.  She still gets jealous of the caiques at times, but she loves to follow me around the house, like a dog, shouting "HELLO!" whenever we enter a new room.  It melts my heart every time.

The caiques are also thriving.  I hear frequently from Stella's new owners, and she continues to do very well there.  Rocky is also very much loved and hopefully in his forever home.  Of course I still feel guilty that I wasn't able to be that forever home for the two of them, but I know they are in better situations than they would have been had I tried to keep them.

On a personal level, it is tricky trying to balance social outings with making sure the parrots have enough time with me.  Since they go to bed rather early, I'll frequently head out after they are asleep.

I'm looking to buy a house!  After owning one for 12 years, adjusting to apartment life has been unpleasant, to say the least.  Especially with the parrots, as I'm always worried they'll be too loud and I'll get kicked out.  So far, over a year in, there have been no complaints.  Anyway, I have a very narrow geographic range where I want to buy, and there hasn't been a lot of inventory.  I'm hoping that more will come on the market as it warms up, and we can be in our new place in the next few months.

I almost put in an offer on one, until I discovered there were major structural problems with it.  I'm now trying to decide whether I like another house enough, despite its flaws (one bathroom, small kitchen, baseboard heating), to make an offer.  That one has a perfect location and tons of charm (built-ins, original wood in perfect condition, butler's pantry.)

On a totally unrelated note, I was at a running social last week and they had the cutest spring cupcakes:

As for the dating scene, I have decided to take some time away.  Too many guys wanted to be in an instant relationship (though I do have some funny stories that I will post here at some point) and it was really starting to stress me out.  We have been on two dates!  Stop asking me when we can go on a weekend away together!

After being emotionally and verbally abused for so long, being single and surrounding myself only with wonderful, loving friends has been such a relief.  I do date-like things with them (movies, museums, dinner, concerts, etc.) so it's a lot of fun.

Literally the week before Thomas confessed to having an affair with his mom clone/married coworker, I had ordered a bunch of yarn in colors that complemented his skin tone.  That yarn had just been sitting in a box, until I recently decided that I should make the hats...for me!  Here is the first one:

The time has just been flying by.  I've been in my apartment for over a year now.  I've been at my new job nearly a year.  It's almost spring again!  A year ago, if you told me I'd not only be happy, but happier than I had been in years, I wouldn't have believed you.  And yet, that's exactly what has happened.

Now, back to more regular stories and updates instead of trying to cram two months' worth of activity into one entry!

Another personal update

Time is yet again flying by, and more than a month has passed since my last blog entry.  I just can't believe it!  It's now been over 6 months since I found out about Thomas's infidelity and my entire life changed.

Our divorce was final last month.  The day itself was terrible.  I think that part of me had hoped, until it was final, that he would finally realize what he'd done and do anything to make it right and for us to get back together.  Being in court made me realize that would be impossible.

Since then (it's been about 3 weeks now), I've felt like a huge weight has been lifted off of me.  I am still sad about the way things turned out -- I feel like I wasted over a decade of my life -- but starting to get more excited about my new life.  I haven't even wanted to cry since then, whereas the month or so before the divorce, it felt like that's all I was doing.

Max, Calypso, Beeps, Andreas, and I are mostly settled into our new apartment.  We've been here almost three months now!  Our house is on the market, and there's been some interest, though no offers yet.  Thomas leaves next month for his new job which is in a city about three hours away from us.

I found out I was losing my job right before Thomas confessed his affair, which added to my stress.  However, I have found a very interesting new job -- have been there about 7 weeks now -- which is perfect in every respect except for the longish hours and inability to do personal things (like e-mail and blog) on my work computer.

All in all, it's been a very interesting, and mostly good, few months.  I am trying to look at being single again as a great opportunity to take a look at my life, decide what changes need to be made, and become a happier person.  I've found great solace in my family and friends, who have really stepped up and have been unbelievable support during this terrible time.

I still get regular updates on Basil, Stella, and Rocky.  The first two are doing really well in their homes, and Rocky appears to be happy at the rescue.  He's still looking for a home, and he's so difficult that he might stay at the rescue for quite some time until the right home can be found.  I had hopes that Thomas would take him, but even though he could more than afford to buy a house in his new city where this would be possible, he rented an apartment with a no pets clause.

I've still been running, and last month took first in my age group in an ultramarathon (3rd female overall -- a couple of 20-somethings beat me!) I have a few races scheduled in the upcoming months, and have been training.

I've had trouble finding enough time to paint, but I will get back to it soon, now that things are settling down a bit more at work.  I have no air conditioning, so it's been way too hot to knit, though I have projects lined up for when it cools down again.

I haven't been very good at taking pictures -- I just went through what was on my camera and they were all minute-long videos of my parrots that probably no one else would find interesting, so I'm not going to post them.  I will try to get some new parrot material soon!

Hope everyone has had a great 2012 so far!

Sunday

Sunday morning did not start out well.  I'd been able to avoid Thomas most of the weekend, as I stayed in my room until he left to run in the morning and he'd left for work by the time I got back from my run.  Additionally, he was out on dates with his married mistress at night, so I was back in my room by the time he got home.  The dark cloud of doom and gloom was still present in my life, but not overpowering.

And then Sunday morning happened.

Unfortunately, I was unable to avoid him as he'd gotten up later than usual to run and I had committed to volunteer at a race.  I stayed in my room until the last possible minute, but went downstairs to eat and get ready and he was still home.

Things were not openly hostile until he went to leave and saw that I'd left the key in the front door when I'd gotten back from my run the day before.  This is obviously not ideal, but we live in a very safe place and nothing had happened.  Also, he's done this dozens of times over the years and I just take out the key and don't say anything.  Obviously, it was a mistake.  In this exchange, the swear words that I will abbreviate were actual words coming from him.  Plus there were lots more peppered in -- you get the idea.

Thomas: Do you know who left the key in the front door?

Me: It must have been me since I was the last one home from running yesterday.  Sorry; it was an oversight.

T: I don't understand why you left the key in the front door?

Me: It was an accident.  I was cold and tired after a long run.  I didn't mean to.

T: Why the F did you leave the key in the door?  Are you trying to get me killed?  How can you be so irresponsible?  (More yelling/complaining/swearing/blaming,etc.)

Finally, I left my breakfast and went into the bathroom until he left.

Later that evening, when he got home, he was congratulating himself on realizing that I was upset because he's trying to be more empathetic.  Of course he wasn't hostile at all; he was just trying to let me know that I'd left the key in the door so that I don't do it again; excuses and more narcissistic excuses.  What a wonderful guy!

Now that the blinders are off, I am realizing more and more what a jerk he is.  People had been telling me for years that he was emotionally and verbally abusive to me (even some comments on the blog -- you guys are perceptive!), but I didn't believe them.  Now I can see the truth and am remember many incidents from the past where he was abusive.  I always made excuses for him -- he was tired from work, sore from his arthritis, he had a bad childhood, etc.

He should be out of the house by the end of the month, and our divorce should be final by the end of May.  I can't wait to be done with him!  I just don't understand why he's being hostile to me.  I was loyal and a great wife -- even he admits that.  He's the one who had an affair (with someone who could be a clone of his mom) and destroyed our marriage.  You'd think he'd be apologetic or at least happy since he's getting what he wants.  Instead, he's ramped up his abuse of me.

After that upsetting exchange, I went to my volunteer position, where I had a great time as I was assigned as a sentry with one of my friends.  We had to make sure that runners went the right way along the course:

It was held at a zoo, so this was our long-range view of the closest enclosure:

Zoomed in: a pacing cheetah.  Probably jealous of everyone running by!  I've done this race before, and the deer/moose get so excited.  They start circling their enclosures and running with the racers.

After our volunteer shift was over, my friend and I went for our run.  I don't even want to think what my mental state would be right now without exercise.

I am doing really well.  I will be doing much better once these things are complete: getting a job, getting an apartment, moving to the new apartment.  And I will be wonderful once these additional things are complete: selling the house, completing the divorce, never seeing Thomas again.

I'm still trying to figure out why I put up with his bad behavior for so long.  I suspect that he has a combination of antisocial personality disorder and narcissistic personality disorder.  I do know that I was frequently embarrassed by his behavior around other people.  Why didn't I do something earlier?  Would I have lived like this forever had he not had an affair?  I thought I was happy (I have a high happiness baseline) but can I be even happier?

My new life is beckoning!  I am changing back to my maiden name, and I've signed up for several races using my real name.  I also called the art museum to see if they could back-date my new individual membership since I was the driving force behind our membership and there are perks the longer you're a member.  I was told no, but that I could just take over the membership, so I did.  That was one little victory for me!  My new art museum membership cards, with my new name, should arrive next week.  I can't wait!

Saturday

I had a great morning!  I met one of my favorite running partners and we had a great chat for 2 hours as we ran.  I have signed up to do a 50 kilometer (31 mile) race in May, so I need to get out and do some longer distances than I have the past few months to train.  I ran 15.1 miles this morning, which put me at 40 miles for the week and allows for an extra beer with dinner tonight :)  I don't even want to contemplate what my mental state would be without running.

I have been trying to avoid Thomas as much as possible.  I stayed in bed until after he left for his run and I left for mine a bit early so I wouldn't be here when he returned.  Unfortunately, there's about a 0.2 mile section where I would be going out and he would be coming home that we could run into each other.  I mean, what are the chances?  100% in this case.  I just waved to him, as I would any other runner.  He has become someone that I used to know.

Then, I met my mom for lunch and some shopping.  We had a great afternoon!  I had a phone interview for a job yesterday (my current job ends on March 31) and found out that they want me to come in for an in-person interview next week, so I had to get a new suit, which my mom bought for me.  The last time I wore a suit was in 2003 and I'd already donated my old suits, thinking I'd never have to wear one again.  (You know...I put Thomas through medical school and then he allows me to follow my dream of going back to school or working or starting my own nonprofit.  I held up my end of the bargain...)  I also bought another pair of pants since I only had one pair that fit me, having lost weight due to the stress of my impending divorce.

I came home and spent some time boxing things up and getting ready to move more things to my parents' house.  I want to get down to just the essentials here in case Thomas gets violent and I have to quickly leave the house.  That's part of the reason I'm trying to get the animals placed as soon as possible, with smaller, temporary cages at my parents' house if Max and Calypso have to stay there until I get an apartment.

Almost real-time blogging; these pictures were taken about 30 minutes ago.  Thomas is currently out on a date with his married mistress; the parrots and I are enjoying an evening at home.  We hope he stays out until they go to bed and I go upstairs to my room.

Calypso, who does not realize his dreams are about to come true and he will soon be rid of Thomas forever:

Max, who knows something is up and has been extra loving to me in an attempt to reassure herself everything will be OK:

Basil, who returns to his home a week from today.  He loves his owners, so will be very happy to see them again.  The plan is for him still to be willed to me at some point.  I can't keep him now because he's too loud for an apartment, but by the time he needs to be rehomed, hopefully I will be in a house and he can come back to me:

Beeps, who is reacting to the stress in the house by being increasingly aggressive, but just to Thomas (and when he sees the camera, as usual):

I've gotten daily updates and pictures on Stella.  She is doing remarkably well in her new home.  She always seemed to want to befriend Max, but Max was not interested.  In her new home, Stella's grey companion, Ellie, appears to want to be friends, so we're hopeful things will go well.  Additionally, she lives with a severe macaw who loves greys.  When he was at the rescue where I volunteer, I'd take him around with me to greet the parrots.  He'd ignore everyone except the greys.  When we'd stop by a grey's cage, he'd blush a bit and say "hi!  hello!" and flirt a bit.  He's enjoying his little grey harem (from afar -- they don't physically interact, he just talks to them.)

Rocky is doing really well at the rescue.  I visited him on Thursday but forgot to take pictures.  He's housed next to a female severe macaw, and the two of them go to the bottom of their respective cages and interact.  I took him out and he seemed rather happy to see me.  He was talking, singing, and dancing.  He's extremely resilient and will be OK.  He's enjoying the activity of the rescue and I will be involved in finding him a great home.

Thomas has not asked about Rocky or Stella at all and has basically ignored the parrots we still have at home. It's so strange how someone can change so much, or possibly that they were able to hide for so long and then reveal their true self.  He fooled me for years, but now that I look back on things, they weren't as great as I thought they were.  I am doing some writing exercises to understand our relationship and heal.  One was to come up with 5 nice things he'd done for me over the course of our relationship and then 5 upsetting things.  I could only come up with about 3 nice things and stopped at about 32 upsetting things before I realized I was supposed to stop at 5!

I just rationalized and made excuses for a lot of his behavior.  I'm pretty sure he has a combination of narcissistic personality disorder and antisocial personality disorder, so I'm pretty lucky to be able to get out and start anew.  It's just too bad that the parrots are affected by his behavior.

My friends, both online and in real life, have been amazing.  Even my massage therapist has been calling to make sure I'm OK and gave me his cell phone number in case I ever need to chat.  My mom and I have made tentative plans to go to Europe once the divorce is final (possibly with my dad and sister), and my favorite running partner is going to hook me up with one of her friends who loves to go birding and would like a companion.  2012 is going to be a fantastic year!

Precarious

Earlier this year, Thomas and I competed in a race in which age group awards were hand-made and hand-painted mugs.  To our surprise, both of us won a mug!  This has also created much laughter in our house, as my mug was larger (I was in the top 3 overall females and he was in top 3 for males in his age group), so he'll joke about just being a little thirsty or needing a tiny drink of water.  It's all in good fun, as this is definitely the nicest prize either of us has won in a race.

He keeps his mug out on the counter so he remembers to drink from it daily.  Thus far, it's pretty much been ignored by the parrots.  Except one time, when Thomas left it close to the edge and Stella threw it to the ground in a fit -- luckily no damage occurred!  Since then, he's remembered to push it far back from the edge.

Over the weekend, I saw Max trying to perch on it.  I warned her she was too heavy and she'd tip over, but she succeeded, even resting on one foot!

I'm still surprised it could support her weight.

Recovering Rocky

Thomas and I are in training for another marathon, which meant a 20 mile training run on Saturday.  When we returned, the parrots were happy to relax with us.  Rocky had been sipping some recovery drink, but took to threatening me when I tried to take a picture:

Finally, he acquiesced.  Mostly, he drinks water, but he does get a few sips of recovery drink from time to time:

Then, Thomas was peeling a banana.  He'd planned to share bits with the parrots, but Rocky wasn't taking chances, as he ran up to the counter to make sure he would be included:

Since it was so hot and humid over the weekend, the shower we had after our 20 mile was the most satisfying one we'd had in a while.  This may be unpopular, but I can't wait for fall and the cooler weather to follow.

Weekend birding

We got out birding a bit on Sunday.  Saturday, we spent nearly 7 hours running 36 miles on the trails -- our last long run before our race in a few weeks.  Needless to say, after that we tried to convince ourselves to do a little birding Saturday evening, but were too tired to leave the house!

Sunday meant shorter runs, and time to bird.  We went to a place near our house where we've seen a Great-horned Owl daily on our early-morning running route.  Thomas seems to have a sixth sense to see him, and it didn't fail us yesterday.  He spotted the owl from this distance:

He then used our scope to locate him so we could get a good view.  So gorgeous!  We spent quite a long time watching him.  He'd nap a little bit, preen himself, look around.  Unfortunately, we don't have a great birding camera yet, so these pictures are only OK:

We then headed to a local woods near a lake.  We saw tons of waterbirds including Horned Grebes, many kinds of ducks, and American Avocets!  These last are very rare in our area -- in fact, our birding books do not show that they are in our range at all.  The park ranger mentioned to us they were there, otherwise we probably would have not figured out what they were.  Unfortunately, none of the pictures turned out, which has stoked Thomas's longing to get a better camera.  Walking in the woods, we got a great view of a Barred Owl.  All in all, it was a great day, and we returned home to spend the evening with the parrots.

Weekend of running and birding

Thomas and I took yesterday off as we needed to get another long run in.  I am very much looking forward to this race being done so we can go back to normal amounts of running.  Yesterday we left the house before 7 am and got home after 2 pm.  Five and a half hours of running as well as driving out to the trail.  Why are we doing this again?

In happier news, our first year Northern Flicker of the year arrived.  He spent a long time foraging for ants in our backyard:

Yesterday, we also saw our first of the year yard White-breasted Nuthatch and Yellow-bellied Sapsucker -- at the same time!  As we were trying to look at them, Max kept flying to our heads and tapping on our binoculars with her beak.  Typical.

Speaking of Max, here's another dirty beak picture:

While out birding on Sunday, as we were leaving, we noticed a turkey staring at her reflection in the glass of the nature center building.  Evidence suggests she does this regularly.  We told her to go and find a real turkey to befriend, but I don't think she understands English.


Back at home, Stella was standing on her perch, staring out the window.  Interesting parallel with the turkey.

Wildlife

I must apologize for lax blogging and commenting.  It seems like I always have an excuse.  Right now, it's that Thomas and I are training for a 50 mile race next month.  We will run 25 miles, turn around, and run back.  I'm not quite sure what is wrong with us; my only consolation is that many of my friends do much more.  In order to train for this, we are doing massive amounts of running, especially on weekends.  This leaves us tired, so I have been sleeping more than usual and, when I am home, frequently too lazy to grab a camera and take pictures of the parrots.

Since it's spring, despite being exhausted, we're trying to get out and enjoy nature.  A few months ago, I introduced you to our tailless squirrel.  He's decided to make our yard part of his territory!  I know this is confusing, and that there are thousands of names we could have chosen, but we've named him Rocky.  (We did try calling him Blake for a few days but it didn't stick -- he just looks like a Rocky!)  This leads to some hilarity and confusion between Rocky the squirrel and Rocky the macaw.

 

 We saw this sparrow while out birding.  He was quite camouflaged!

You can't see me, right?

Walking a bit further down, we saw this bluebird couple.  He's taking a rest now, tired after searching for food

and then bringing it to his lady love in the tree:

 There should be much more birding to come in the upcoming weeks.  Unless we're napping.

Gulf coast recap

We just returned from a week-long trip to the gulf coast. The main purpose of the trip was to run a marathon in our 50 state quest, though we got a fair amount of birding in! The only parrot part of our trip was seeing quakers fly over us.

As for the marathon part, Thomas and I both set PRs! Mine was a 10 minute PR (to a sub-3:30 race!), and his was over 30 minutes! We have several marathons and at least one ultra-marathon (50 miler) planned for later this spring.

I think this is one of the best pictures I have ever taken -- a pelican, roseate spoonbill, and ibis all taking off at the same time. The only thing that would have made this better is if you could have seen the spoonbill's head, but her coloring is so distinctive, I love this picture anyway. This was taken from the car. (The day before the marathon -- didn't want to be on our feet much!)That same day, we came across a dolphin. At first, we thought she was dying, as she was thrashing around in the shallow part of the coast, but we think she was just scaring up some food. We watched her for quite some time; she was quite agile. Every other time we've seen dolphins, they've been in a group, so hopefully this solitary one was OK.
We mostly birded and hiked post-marathon. It was so fun to see armadillos!
And this raccoon was one of the cutest things I've ever seen. He kept going up to the plants to see what might be hidden there.
Alligator!
Quintessential gulf cost picture. If I lived there, I'm not sure I'd ever get to work -- I'd just go birding all of the time.
We would have walked right past this nesting great-horned owl; luckily a volunteer at the national forest had us follow her and let us use her spotting scope:
In the botanical gardens, we were able to see this Buff-bellied Hummingbird. We'd spoken to one of the naturalists earlier who told us to look at the cherry blossoms to find him. We'd just about given up and were going to leave the garden when he appeared. What a treat!
This is a picture of one of our most exciting moments. We were driving along the highway when we had a feeling to get out and look. We had to traverse some pretty heavy brush, but it was worth it to see a flock of Black-crowned Night-Herons. During the day!
I love rails -- partly because they are so elusive and difficult to see. During our trip, we saw two Black Rails (different days), a Virginia Rail, and a King Rail. The king is the only one we were close enough to get some good pictures of:Isn't she gorgeous? We watched her for probably 5-10 minutes until she slunk off. She didn't seem to mind our presence and we tried to be as unobtrusive as possible.

We had such a fantastic trip and are hoping to take a mostly-birding trip at least once a year. It was wonderful to spend a week outdoors, in nature.

As for our parrots, they survived our absence just fine. I haven't spoken to our birdsitter yet; I just got her written message. All of the birds behaved for her, with the exception of Max. I just don't get it. Max is our best-behaved bird when it comes to parrot-human relationships. But she does not get along with our birdsitter (who is an amazing person and wonderful with birds in general -- she's the main volunteer at the rescue.)

She left me a cryptic note -- "Max is neither winning friends nor influencing people." I will find out tomorrow what that means. This is just mind-boggling to me and I have to think of ways that she can win Max's affection before our next trip!