A Lesson in Persistence and Perseverance

There are probably many lessons to be learned from wildlife, but one that comes to mind is of persistence and perseverance by a pair of Osprey that chose to nest on my street. Located a couple of blocks East of our home is a pond of sorts with a stand of dead pine trees. I began observing (generally on my way to work) the busy work of nest building in preparation of their expected young. Based on photo dates, this process began in April and all-in-all it seemed to be a fairly speedy process and they were soon finished with the nest. Not long thereafter, we had some very windy weather and the following day on my way to work, I saw that the tree top had snapped and the nest had fallen. On a nearby tree sat one of the Osprey and I could only imagine the dismay, frustration and maybe even sadness it felt. I wondered if there had been any eggs laid yet and felt sure if the birds were to try again, they would hopefully move to an entirely different location. However, much to my surprise I soon witnessed new construction on a nearby tree. I felt a sense of happiness, but at the same time, wondered if they were making a big mistake. All of the trees in the pond were dead and they could very likely lose their nest to wind again, especially since we were moving into the hurricane season. Pretty soon, the new nest was complete and they begin the business of settling in and tending to their eggs. Eventually, the eggs hatched and we would later learn there were 3 chicks. Because the nest was so high up, you really couldn’t see into the nest to see the eggs or the chicks. I only learned there were 3 chicks because once again, the nest was blown down by high winds on June 27. That evening, the entire island lost power due to the downing of two power poles in the bay caused by a waterspout. It was heart wrenching to once again see the parent birds perched on nearby trees and again I could only imagine what they were thinking and feeling. Over the course of several days a group of folks from the Apalachicola National Estuarine Research Reserve, the National Audubon Society and some locals, banded together to retrieve the nest and chicks and build a platform for the nest.  The remnants of the nest were placed on the platform and two of the chicks were returned to the nest.  One of the chicks was injured and is being nursed back to health rather than being returned to the nest.  It was reported that in no time the parents came back to the nest and are happily still rearing their young. I am now able to see the chicks because they are getting up in size and are hanging out on the edge of the nest. Soon they will be learning to fly on their own and hopefully, the nest will last to welcome a new family next year.

Beginning of 2nd Nest.  The Original Was to the Right of This One.

A Start

One Standing Guard and One Going in Search of More Building Material

Deja Vu?



Let's Not Sing that Rock-A-Bye Baby In the Treetop Song Anymore.

 

I Sure Hope Our Wind Coverage Was Paid Up!



Finished Again

Man Made "Tree"

A Little Weird Kids, But I Think We Will Like It.

 

There Sure Are A Lot Of People Stopping By To See Us Lately.

  

And Over There Kids Is Where Your First and Second Homes Were.



Let Me Tell You The Story of Our Efforts to Get you Here Little Chicks.......

At Ease

If I Hold My Coffee Cup With Two Hands

If I hold my coffee cup with two hands, will it piss somebody off? Yes, it most certainly will and there are many other things in life that just really seem to get under the skin. It may be the sound of someone slurping their coffee, snapping their chewing gum, tapping their foot, drumming their fingers on a table, clicking a ball point pen, smacking when they eat, sucking air through their teeth, or making that slapping sound with their flip flops as they walk. And snoring – how about snoring? That drives me bonkers and I know others who say they can sleep right through it! What is up with that? I could go on and on. Why is it that insignificant things such as these go un-noticed by some yet drive others to the brink? The flip-flop thing really drives me insane, but back to the two-handed, coffee cup holding thing. I do this quite often and I don’t do it to give off any vibe or impression to say “Hey, look at me, I am all cool drinking this special brew coffee imported straight from Columbia from my rich uncle’s farm and it’s so strong I have to hold on to it with both hands”. I do it sometimes because the warmth feels good to my arthritic hands and other times it feels good when it’s cold. Other times, the cup is just really big and heavy and it takes two hands to comfortably hold onto it. I also have problems with certain people. There is this news guy that I simply cannot stand to look at or listen to. I mute the TV and/or change channels to avoid seeing or hearing him. He irks me to no end and I have no idea why. He may be one of the nicest, most intelligent people on the planet - who knows? Apparently there are many who like him because he’s still got the job – right?


Since I can rationalize why I do what I do, I wonder if those who slurp, snap, smack and flap can do the same? Maybe if they could offer me an explanation that makes sense to me, maybe, just maybe, I could get to the point where it won’t drive me nuts. On second thought, I doubt an explanation would help at all because I sincerely feel there is simply no good reason whatsoever to make that noise with your flip flops, your chewing gum, your ink pen, etc., etc. If my holding a coffee cup with two hands gets on someone’s nerves, that will never change either even though I have given many plausible reasons for doing so. The fact is, there are things in life that are just meant to be annoying - like mosquitoes. There is no good reason they should be here other than to annoy us, yet here they are and they are here to stay.

Just Chill'n With Sy Guy



This past weekend Sy came to visit for two nights.  We didn't really do much other than hang around the house and ride on the golf cart.  We did venture over the Apalach Saturday to do a little shopping and had lunch at Burger King.  After we ate, Sy wanted to play in the inside playground there, so he did for a little while.  He didn't want to leave though and I thought for a minute I might have to go in after him, but he finally came out peacefully but making it very evident that he did not wish to leave.  After that we went to Ace and then to the Family Dollar Store.  Of course, he picked out a toy or two and we proceeded to go pay.  While in the line, he spotted the gum ball/junk machines near the door and wanted one, so we got Grandpa to give him $.50 and he got one of those plastic ball shaped containers with a rubber bracelet in it.  That wasn't enough though, he wanted to get another one.  He was not very receptive to the answer "no", and pitched a fit, so I decided to take him outside until Grandpa came out.  After putting him in his car seat with him still fussing, we drove on to CVS.  Gary asked if we wanted to come in and I answered him with my brow furrowed saying "I don't think so".  Sy eventually settled down and was fine the rest of the way home and thereafter.  I think part of the fit once we got in the car was because he thought we left the motorcycle he purchased at the store because he kept saying we had to go to the dollar store and get his motorcycle. 

Aside from this episode, he was for the most part a perfect little boy angel.  And, he has got to be of the most polite 3 year olds I have ever seen.  He is always saying "Can I please have so and so", or "Can you please give me such and such" and if you burp and don't say "excuse me", he will say it for you, or let you know you should have said it.  I have to say I think  he gets that from his Mommy.  (Sorry Ryan).

There were a few things that he blamed on Thomas and Gracie and bless their hearts, they weren't even here.  He noticed some scratches on the floor and I asked who he thought did that and he said Thomas.  Later I was mopping and commented that there were a lot of milks spots on the floor and asked who might have done that.  I forget if it was Thomas and Gracie, or just Gracie that time.  It kills me how much like his Daddy he is.  He lays on the floor with his hot wheels just like Ryan did and he says "laster day" or "laster night" just like he did.  He's not big on TV though and I guess that's okay with me.  That's another similarity he has with his Daddy (when he was little that is).  In addition to his cars and trucks, he loves to sing and read.  Mommy gets credit for this too I think.  Ryan couldn't sit still long enough for us to read to him.

Sy slept with Gary both nights and I slept in the spare room.  Gary said the first morning he could "feel" eyes staring at him and looked up to see Sy with his chin in his hands and his elbows resting on his pillow staring him in the face telling him in a whisper to get up.  On the side of the bed, Daisy had her head on the edge of the bed as if prompting him to get up too.  I heard Sy run out of the bedroom saying to come get me up too, but Grandpa told him not to wake me up.  I got up anyway though. 

Saturday night, we went down to the beach around sunset and let him run around a bit and that's about it for the weekend activities.

Riding on the John Deer Sporting His Pop Top Bling Grandma Made

His GQ Look

Love Those Lashes

He Loves to Help Water Plants



Nobody Rains on My Parade!



This 4th of July, I decided we should use the pontoon boat for our parade float instead of the whaler or golf cart.   It has much more room and more decorating possibilities.  We just got a new trailer for it and even though it's not water ready yet, it will work just fine for a parade float.  The golf cart would have worked well, but it has an exhaust leak and would have knocked whoever was behind us out with all of the fumes! I bought a bunch of stuff to throw to the crowd and it was going to be great!  Well as it got closer to the actual day of the parade, turns out there was no one to ride on the float other than me.  I thought seriously for a while about just scrapping the whole plan, but the more I thought about it, I decided "NO!"  I spent all that money on stuff to throw out and all that time decorating it and I am going to ride in the float even if I am in it all by myself and so it was.  It was a short parade route this year and that was a good thing, and all-in-all, I had a good time.  I got doused with lots of water, some of it was even ice water, but it felt good since it was so hot.  Gary, in the meantime, was riding in truck with the AC on and he remained as dry as a bone.  He got his payback later than afternoon though when he took the golf cart to the store to get cigs.  Seems there was a guy who didn't get his fill of the water activities of the parade and he proceeded to bomb him with a water balloon and then he dumped a five gallon bucket of water on him!  I thought it was a lot more funny that he did.  Tee hee, heee..............

We were home alone that night and instead of watching the fireworks, we shampooed the carpet.  Do we know how to celebrate or what?!

Flag And Flip Flops

Me Sopping Wet Handing Out Flags (Photo by Kara Landiss)

Dry Gary & Wet Teresa

Ha Ha Ha Wet Gary



Waterspout Troubles



On June 27, we were under the house having just finished dinner and were minding our own business when all of a sudden it began to get very windy and started to rain.  Shortly thereafter, the power went off.  We later learned that a waterspout had taken out two poles in the bay AGAIN!  This was the third time this has happened and we were not looking forward to the coming days.  It meant waiting for huge generators to arrive to power the island while the poles were being replaced.  It also meant a big ole pain in the behind at my work because since it was the middle of the peak summer season, most of the rental homes were booked and people were going to be very upset (and with good reason).  The last time it happened I believe it was in January, and it wasn't hot and there weren't as many tourists here.  Most of the locals have generators so we were set as far as enough power to keep the refrigerators and freezers going as well as fans and that sort of thing.  However, our generator (and most folks') is not powerful enough to run the AC.  The first night was not that bad because the house retained most of the cool air from the day, but the second night is was almost 90 degrees in the house so that was very uncomfortable.  To make matters worse, we were not able to keep the windows open because of the rain, so there wasn't even a breeze to cool ya off.  Gary wanted to run the generator overnight, but I didn't want to listen to the noise and was also afraid someone might steal it, so we didn't run it.  We only had two nights running on our personal generator and on the third night we didn't get on the big generators until around 10:30 p.m.  We were about the last section of the island to get on the big generators. We ran off them for another few days.

Our Trusty 6250 Watt Generator

Proof That We Were Hot

Lanterns and  Candles Light The Way

More Candles for Outside



Thank Goodness For Solar Lights Too!

One Of the Big Generators

Big Generators Just Outside the Plantation

Another Angle of Generators Outside Plantation

Blurry Photo Of Pole Repair on July 2



Sy is Three

My how time flies! Our first-born grandchild turned 3 years old on June 26! We love him so much and enjoy every minute we have with him. It just melts our hearts when he runs into our arms each time we see him and says “Hey Grandma”, “Hey Grandpa”. He talks like a grown-up, is completely potty trained and is smart as a whip! Ryan and Ashley are doing a wonderful job shaping him into the little man he is and will become. We are so proud of them all.

On June 25 we celebrated Sy’s birthday with a pool party at Grannie Trish’s house. He got lots of neat gifts including several RC vehicles, clothes, magna doodle, racetrack, money, DVD player, dog tag necklace, goldfish crackers, cream sodas, etc. We all enjoyed yummy hamburgers, hotdogs, chips, dips, mac and cheese and of course – cake and ice cream! Those who got in the pool had fun doing that and those of us who didn’t enjoyed watching them!