Author: Steve

Sparrows kind of all look alike.  There are a whole bunch of different species though.  They’re all about the same size.  They’re all little brown birds.  Most of the ones we see in cities look like this.  House Sparrows.

 Male and female.  Note the clear breast of each and the dark face of the male.

They’re often in flocks.

And here is something a little different visiting our feeder.  A lincoln’s sparrow.

A finely streaked breast.  A cresty head when he’s in that kind of mood.  And a buffy jawline.

He’ll come to a feeder around other birds, but otherwise more solitary than house sparrows.

I haven’t sent out any bird pictures lately, so here is a female northern cardinal at our feeder.

We’re not feeding much right now because there are so many red-winged blackbirds they overwhelm our yard any time we put food out.  I think in a few days or weeks, the blackbirds will move on, and we can feed the regulars again.

Looking forward to the hummingbird migration in April.

When we lived in the rig, it was our house.  Then we bought a house in the Valley and the bus became our great indulgence, a second home, a way to wander in great comfort.

The big motorhome is not that expensive to travel in; it’s comparable to airfare, hotels, and rental cars.  It’s getting old enough now that upkeep is a problem though.  It’s costing too much to keep it on the road.  So, after all these years, it’s time for a change.  We’re not going to get rid of the bus, just travel less in it on the premise that if we use it less, it should cost less to maintain.

We’ll try the fly/hotel/rental car visits with the kids this year and see how that works out.

The first Formula One race of the season is next Sunday in Bahrain!  Practice on Friday, qualifying on Saturday, and race day Sunday.  Almost all the F1 races are on the other side of the planet, so they go on our DVR in the middle of the night, and they’re there when we wake up the next morning.  A far cry from the old days when we had to set the alarm before dawn for “Breakfast at Wimbledon”.  Meanwhile, we’re binging all the episodes of Race to Survive on Netflix to get us there.

The races do come our way later in the year.  Two races in the U.S. this time.  A new track around the Hard Rock Stadium in Miami in May, and The Circuit of the Americas in Austin in October before they go to Mexico then Brazil.  The Austin track has some nice terrain built into it.  The track in Miami will be as flat as the rest of South Florida.

I enjoy the outdoors. I feel in touch with the forests and fields; the rhythm of the days and seasons. Noon is when the sun is directly overhead, not when it is overhead somewhere else, a thousand miles to the east!