Author: Steve

We got to sleep to the sound of rain on the roof. We got to wake up to the
sound of birds outside our window. The neighbor on the starboard side has
bird feeders. They’ve been there for quite a while; the neighbors and the
feeders. This time, we put the binocs next to the bed the night before, so
when the birds went off in the morning we could just lift up and look at
them. Tons of birds. Mixed in with all the other birds, we saw another
unusual one. Acutally, two unusual ones. We saw the Bendire’s thrasher
again. They’re shy and secretive compared to the curve-billed thrasher, and
the Abert’s Towhee. We’ve only seen him once before. And more of my
favorite: the little chuckling clucking gamble’s quail scratching about on
the ground. I don’t get tired of listening to them nurdling. Another day in the rain. We decided it would be a good day to drive, so we
could be stopped somewhere when the sun comes back out. We drove east
underneath the weather. It didn’t change all day. If you drive from east
to west, you drive through the systems moving west to east. The weather
changes every day. You drive west to east, and the weather doesn’t change.
We’re still in Arizona, south and east from where we were. South on
Interstate 17 through Phoenix, then east on Interstate 10 through Casa
Grande, Tucson, Benson, and stopped for the night in Willcox. Stopped for
the night in Willcox? Limped into Willcox. We picked up fuel in Casa
Grande. A lot of fuel. Seventy gallons from a truck stop. It wasn’t long
before the sputtering started. But we didn’t know it was fuel. We just
knew it was sputtering. We pull over and shut it off. We wait. We start again. It’s better.
Seventy miles an hour. Then it starts slowing down. It’s losing power.
Then it starts sputtering. It goes slower. I put the flashers on. It
starts blowing black smoke. I pull over and wait. It gets better….. Judy called ahead to a Freightliner mechanic in Willcox. He has helped ten
RVrs in the last two weeks. They all tanked up at the same truck stop.
Rubble in the tank. Now it’s in our tank. Our fuel filter is blocked. He
needs to change it. We need to burn up the rest of this fuel and get some
good stuff. Guess stuff happens. Life on the road. Judy is awesome. Two weeks ago, she was in surgery. One week ago she could
barely move. Today. She is still sore and gets tired easily, but she can
get up and down by herself, climb and descend the motorhome stairs without
assistance, and even reach above her head to get stuff out of cabinets.
Yesterday, we shared a laugh. A really big laugh. It takes a lot of
abdominal muscles to laugh. We’ve snickered a little. We’ve started to
laugh, then groaned instead. But last night, we shared a guffaw. It hurt a
little, but it had to happen.

Work occupies my thoughts and my time. Revise and update the Colorado
mailing list. Done. Complete the New Mexico mailing list in preparation
for my approval to practice there. Done. Revise the flyer for the December
mailing. Done. Make a few more changes to the web site. Do the annual
reviews. Finalize the 2004 projections so I can do the 2005 projections. A
staffing change in Denver. Take some on-line CPE… I’m not done yet. Did I mention the website lately? It’s still in process; a good one
probably always is; but we’re getting a lot of information there. Check it
out: http://www.taylorandcompany.net/ <http://www.taylorandcompany.net/>. My daily run has degenerated to a walk. A sharp pain under my right kneecap
won’t let me run downhill at all. If I run until it hurts, then try to
walk, it still hurts. If I just do an exercise walk, it doesn’t hurt much.
After all the running and racquetball, though, it’s hard to consider walking
exercise. But if I don’t consider walking exercise, that means I’m not
exercising any more. I have no choice but to change the rules and declare
victory. Walking is exercise. Maybe if I’m nice to my knee for a while, it
will get better by itself. Last trip I mentioned that I was reading a book called “The Big Year”. It’s
about listing how many birds you can see in North America in one calendar
year. It’s a 2004 book about the 1998 big year. The story is now complete,
and I’m happy to report that the 1998 big year destroyed the old record of
721 with an astonishing total of 745 birds. In 1953 the record was 572. In
1955 it was 598. 1971 626. 1973 669. 1979 699. 1983 711. And 1987 721.
You have to see all the regular North American birds, then you have to have
a particularly bad weather year that blows in accidentals from Siberia and
pushes South American birds up across the border. 1998. A particularly bad
weather year. 721. A record that will never be broken……

A photo from the Shockley side of the family: John Jacobs, Judy’s nephew,
being interviewed by journalists in Fallujah.

Moved a little. Different place. Still north of Phoenix. New River
Arizona. More of the same…. Only different. Still in the desert. Warm weather. Cooler weather. Sunshine. Clouds. Even more birds here. More of the same: little doves, big doves, quail,
house finches, hummingbirds, cardinals, cactus wrens, curve billed
thrashers, ravens, white crowned sparrows. And different birds too.
Verdin. We’ve only seen it once before. It is a little desert bird. Tiny
like a hummingbird, but it is not a hummingbird. We saw it on a hummingbird
feeder here though. Lesser goldfinches. Black throated sparrows. We’ve
only seen them once before too, but here they are all over. Gila
woodpeckers. A ladder back woodpecker. And a new one on the life list.
Bendire’s thrasher. Like the curve bill, but shorter and less curved. And
the eye is more yellow. 332 on the life list. A coyote symphony. A flashing crashing desert thunderstorm in the predawn
darkness. Pounding rain. Hail. After, a hundred birds feeding on the ground and suddenly there are none. A
dark silhouette drifts by overhead. Gradually, the birds return. A walk through the desert brush. Saguaro, cholla, prickly pear, ocotillo,
palo verde, and creosote. The quail chuckle their little alarm call and
scurry across the trail to safety. The ones on the left side of the trail
go right. The ones on the right go left. Light rain. Heavy rain. Light rain again. Bronco’s Football. Go Broncos! Seven and three.

The desert garden in the dry wash.