A common theme this week is the color yellow. There are yellow blossoms on trees, cacti and bushes.
My week included enjoying my Bird Buddy. This is a juvenile Cardinal. His coat is getting hints of red. Males are brilliant red while females are brown.
Blooming yuccas at our neighborhood park.
This staghorn cactus is bursting in blooms.
Mourning doves have been dominating my Bird Buddy.A view of yellow blossoms in the neighborhood.
Palos Verde trees are common in our neighborhood. They are in their full glory of yellow blossoms.
I can’t help but remember my daughter who loved the color yellow but called it “lallow” as a toddler.
Our house guests are gone, we have friends visiting from Seattle who arrive today. We swam and walked, I cooked, I was productive in my new space. We made it to breakfast last weekend at our favorite cafe and I had a delicious latte and bagel with lox and cream cheese. It was a good week!
I swam Tuesday and Thursday after not swimming for five or six months. Thursday I almost cancelled because it was a cool windy day and the pool was cold on Tuesday. I told myself that I had enough to do to get ready for guests. But I decided to go. If I was freezing, I could get out. I was thrilled to discover the pool was a perfect 81 degrees (at least perfect to me. That’s too hot for people who swim faster and harder than me.)
Another plus happened Sunday. I took my husband to the coffee shop where I met a longtime friend last week. I wrote about that HERE. Hubby and I went for lattes and breakfast. We never get lattes, that was a one off for us, but so delicious.
They roast their own beans and I bought their House Blend for my pour over set-up the kids got me for my birthday in March. The coffee is smooth and delicious.
Speaking of delicious:
This was my breakfast. It’s called Avocado Smash, and I added an egg. It has lettuce, tomato, goat cheese, capers, pickled onion and a vinaigrette — and avocado of course. YUM!
During the week, we drove to a Mexican restaurant my friend recommended. She’s lived here for 15 years. Her son went to culinary school and was a chef in Palm Springs. I take her recommendations about restaurants to heart. She told me about the Carefree Coffee Roastery, for example. Her Mexican restaurant suggestion was a hit. I wrote about my quest for Mexican food in Arizona last week HERE.
“It’s the closest thing in our area that is like the Original Las Casuelas,” she said referring to one of our staples a few blocks from our old house.
The restaurant she suggested is called Plaza Bonita. I finally found my huevos ranchero fix without having to drive 45 minutes to an hour!
I’m not sure what this is? Cellular tower? On our morning walk we pass several fake saguaros. This one is getting a face lift.
Olive the cat is checking out my new workspace in my official office. I think she likes the view.
Another highlight this week was reading some amazing blog posts that really moved me — especially on The Heart of the Matter. The connections and similarities to my own life and other bloggers was comforting. I’m honored to be in this blogging community.
I loved having Bird Buddy up and running. I was thrilled to get Cardinal photos and videos. Here are two photos I got yesterday. I love this Cardinal’s attitude.
Why does this shot remind me of Kramer from Seinfeld? Do you see it, too?
What are some of the highlights of your week? Have a happy weekend!
After waiting patiently from January until now for a new solar panel for my Bird Buddy AI bird feeder with a camera, I made the executive decision to take it out of storage, charge it up and use it without the solar panel roof.
I emailed the company and they said I should receive it this month. Until then, I’m enjoying Bird Buddy and have to charge the camera every four or five days.
I’ve written about Bird Buddy before. You can read those posts HERE and HERE if you missed them.
My son works for a crowdfunding company that helped raise money and marketed Bird Buddy. I think it was one of their more successful campaigns.
In one of my prior stories I wrote about my trouble setting up Bird Buddy. There was an awkward small space to plug in the charger or solar panel. I found it frustrating and I had to get my husband to help me. However, when I set up my 91-year-old dad’s Bird Buddy, he cleverly showed me you can plug in the camera before you put it inside the feeder! Duh!
This is a House Finch who can eat a lot of sunflower seeds!
Bird Buddy takes “postcards” (these two photos are examples.) There was an update to the software and now there are videos, too. It works with an app on your smartphone, identifies birds, gives details and you can play their songs and calls.
Here’s a video of a House Sparrow and Cardinal competing for the bird feeder:
Bird fight!
What birds do you have in your neck of the woods? Which are your favorites?
I’ll keep this short. We have a planned power outage today for an upgrade to our electrical panel. It’s four to five hours without electricity. Who knows? That’s why I’m powerless today. I’m using my iphone as a hotspot to write this post. I want to conserve my iphone and laptop battery until the power is back on — so I won’t ramble on too much. FYI the upgrade has to do with solar panels.
As far as my Bird Buddy goes, I haven’t been posting any photos lately because a covey of quail jumped on it all at once and the bird feeder flew off the fence into the wash. The solar panel roof hit hard on the ground, popped off and the usb-c connection broke in half.
I contacted Bird Buddy to see if I could get a new cord, but they said I needed to order a new solar panel roof. They sent me a code for a discount, but the solar panel roof isn’t expected to ship until late February or early March. Also, we need to find a better place for the Bird Buddy so it’s stable and can’t be knocked over by wind or greedy feeding birds.
If your power is out, what’s do you miss using the most?
When you don’t have electricity, do you find yourself forgetting the power is out and try to use something like the microwave? I found myself hitting the lights in the dark bathroom.
I brought the Bird Buddy AI feeder inside until after Christmas. I found it on the ground one morning after our GIla Woodpeckers were hanging on it upside down and got it to slide with their weight. It’s strapped on the fence with a velcro strap that came with it, but it’s not secure — obviously!
We decided to cement a pole into the ground and do away with the velcro sliding strap. That was the project for last weekend, but I got sick. I think we’ll wait until after Christmas when we return home after spending a few days with family.
In the meantime, I bought some “critter crunch” bird seed and tossed a scoop on the ground. The quail went nuts!
I didn’t get any birds in the yard except for quail!
You can visit my Instagram @e.a.wickham to view quail dancing to Brenda Lee’s “Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree.” I didn’t know how to add music to the video on WordPress or I would have.
I’m not decorating for Christmas this year, so I’m looking to wildlife to make it festive!
Does anyone know how to add music to photos or videos on WordPress? If so, can you share?
If you have an Instagram account, would you share it in the comments so I can follow you?
A Gilded Flicker who visited my Bird Buddy feeder.
I received a notification to update my Bird Buddy AI feeder. That’s when the trouble began. The update stopped halfway through the process. I read the instructions on the app. It said to press the on button until you got a flashing green light. I pressed and got a red flashing light.
Then the app said my bird feeder was offline. I spent the better part of a day fiddling with it. In order to do the update, the helpful notes said to fully charge the camera unit.
I brought the Bird Buddy inside, unscrewed the camera and plugged it in for hours.
I won’t go through all the things I tried repeatedly. But I finally decided I should do a factory reset. I was quite upset, because the Bird Buddy has given me lots of joy the past few weeks. I’d be frustrated to have it break already.
I wrote about Bird Buddy HERE and posted bird photos on Thanksgiving.
The Bird Buddy has to pair with Bluetooth on your phone. It also has to be connected to WiFI. I couldn’t get either to work. It worked until I tried the update.
Fortunately, the app has a troubleshooting tab and I went through the steps. It turns out I had inadvertently done a factory reset by pressing the button too long — getting the red flashing light.
I had to unpair the Bird Buddy from my Bluetooth and remove my feeder from the App. Then I started over as if it was a new feeder and Voila! It works again.
I bought a Bird Buddy for my soon to be 91-year-old dad. I will set it up for him and hopefully he won’t have issues with updates!
With electronic devices, are you handy at figuring them out or do you let someone else in your family fix issues? What frustrates you about electronics?
We saw this styrofoam on our walk. This is on the other side of the road from where we cleaned up last week.
As I wrote last week, we decided to have a quiet weekend without cooking, cleaning and entertaining.
It was lovely. We’ve been entertaining and going out with friends more than introvert me prefers. I don’t know why our neighborhood is so darn social. Maybe it’s the years of being shut down. The newcomers — like us — who moved during the pandemic were looking to end isolation and make new friends.
Anyhow, a weekend alone was much needed and appreciated.
Some of the highlights were our morning and afternoon walks. We decided to double up on walking and although my feet and knees hurt, I think it may be good for me?
Last week, we noticed trash on the side of the road and sidewalk. We picked up several bags and felt good about our good deed. I wrote about that HERE. After this weekend, we are up to eight bags of trash. The side of the road we started on looks wonderful. But then one day we ventured to the other side of the road — and it’s a mess!
As we were headed back to our garbage cans at our house with our stuffed bags and my husband holding random pieces of styrofoam too big for the bags, we ran into neighbors. They said they thought about doing the same thing. The wife asked her husband to take a photo of us holding our trash! She said, “You can put it in the newsletter and maybe it will encourage others to do the same.”
“That’s a great idea,” the husband said snapping our picture. “We’ll put you guys in the newsletter.”
I laughed along with the wife. He obviously didn’t know that I’m the one who writes and lays out the newsletter.
After they left my husband said, “Over my dead body.”
He explained that he likes to pick up trash because it makes the desert cleaner and it gives him a sense of satisfaction. He doesn’t want any recognition or attaboys for it. Thankfully, he doesn’t read my blog!
Another highlight of our afternoon walks, besides listening to the birds, who I can now identify by their calls and songs — thanks to Bird Buddy — was when a neighbor drove up the road and unrolled her window.
“Down across the street is a big bobcat,” she said.
We thanked her and I wanted to turn around. My husband pushed on. “They are afraid of us,” he said.
We walked to the end of the block and a few feet from us was a bobcat — who is much stockier and filled out than the skinny one we see in our yard. He walked nonchalantly across the road. He was in no rush and didn’t give us a glance. My husband tried to snap his picture — for the newsletter of course — but he quickly disappeared in the brush on the other side of the road.
This is our skinny bobcat on our patio. She passes through for a bird snack from time to time.
Saturday night we watched football. But in two different rooms. I’m a big Utah Utes fan. My husband is rooting for USC and both games were on Saturday night.
USC is already headed to the PAC 12 champs, regardless of what happened Saturday.
Utah had a few hurdles:
They had to beat CO — done 63-21
Oregon State had to beat Oregon — done 38-34
UCLA had to beat CAL — done 35 – 28
Washington had to beat Washington State — done 51 – 33
All the dominoes fell into place. Can you believe it? Our next game is Utah vs. USC for the conference title. I have a feeling we’ll be watching in separate rooms again.
What are some of the simple pleasures you enjoyed this past weekend?
