The words Queen Bee conjure in my brain a single-minded bee, buzzing around more sedate bees, going here and there, owning the hive. That’s me. I buzz around endlessly, exploring, hiking, camping, paddling, bird-watching. The hive that I own is the mosaic of ecosystems called North America. The honey I seek is simply knowing, seeing,…
Home from trip. Laundry in washer. Phone calls. Appointments. Routines. Cords. Cords? Straightening out and plugging cords back into their assigned outlets has taken days. This task now surpasses even sorting and washing the travel laundry as I dig into my shoulder bag and pull out the tangled mass of cords that keep my electronics humming.…
I learned something new while coming home from California. As I approached the security line at the airport, a man asked to see my boarding pass, as usual. He told me that I was a TSA-Pre and pointed me to a short line on the far left. I did not have to take off shoes…
On my last day in California we went to the Yolo Bypass Bird Sanctuary. Hit the jackpot! I saw 7 new birds for my life list and a number of others. The photos are not great that I took, but I included some of the clearest ones below. Short-eared owl Northern Harrier Black Phoebe White-Faced…
Yesterday we drove up to Lincoln, CA (Sierra Foothills) to see another friend. We drove through the Sacramento River Delta and saw large numbers of ducks, hawks, gulls, herons, and egrets. I have not gotten any bird photos yet, but here are some shots of our friend Adele’s place out in the country. Today we…
I am so excited to be in California. This morning we had to make a decision about what to do first. The choices were: attend a seminar on Argentinian Ants at UC Davis Entomology Department, sit around all morning drinking coffee while Dixie’s two Bernese Mountain dogs (huge) drool all over me, or go out…
The variables lined up for a winter camping adventure: sunny 40 degree days, nights around freezing, and low wind speeds. The winds while driving were actually much higher than expected–35 mph gusts on I-25. However, I did not know that when we took off, so I learned what those wind speeds are like when pulling…