Steve and Judy's Travels!

    It’s slow going, adding to the life-list, only birding occasionally.  Meanwhile, our friend Jon continues his birding compulsion, a Texas year-list.  We’re at 491 on our life-list, trying to get to 500.  Jon is at 338 on his year-list on his way to….   Said goodbye to Chris and the kids tonight.  They’re off at the crack of dawn tomorrow for the airport.  The visiting, boogie boarding, birding, and turtle feeding is done.   It was crowded at jetty beach.    

  Prairie Warbler    

  We picked up Niece Christie and Tony, Kyle, and Cameron at the airport.  They flew in from Seattle to visit us (and the beach) for a few days.    

  I’ll do anything for attention.  The leg continues to heal, but yesterday both my forearms broke out in tiny itchy bumps (blisters), and my face hurts.  We went back to the leg mechanic for a follow-up this morning.  He let me discontinue the antibiotic, at least for a few days, and gave us some hydrocortisone cream to see if that would ease the issue.  I suspect the problem might be a combination of antibiotic and sun exposure.  I’ll try to avoid both for a few days.   Meanwhile, we continue to change the packing and dressing on the leg as prescribed.  The ripping continues.  Twice a day, every day, Mistress Judy approaches to administer the pain.  I don’t want anyone to worry about me, though.  I embrace the pain.  I’ve learned to love it.  Now I crave it.    

  It was soo hot, we had to close the windows and turn on the air conditioning.  Cold front roaring through tonight.  Back down into the seventies tomorrow.  Meanwhile, all the highways in Denver were closed by the blizzard yesterday.   We had a pack of dowitchers feeding along the end of the pond this morning, then a spoonbill flew over, then a kingfisher, then a merlin.  We decided to make a day list for Gulf Waters; what we could see from inside our park, including the end of the boardwalk.  A pied billed grebe showed up.  A pair of mottled ducks.  Piping plover.  Dunlin.  Laughing gulls circled, calling.  Forster’s tern circled, then crashed into the pond in front of us, after minnows.  26 birds in all.   A half hour at Paradise Pond tonight yielded couch’s kingbird, scissortail flycatcher, orange crowned, yellow rumped, and nashville warblers, northern parula, and yellow throated warbler (our first there of the season).