Social in a Good Way in Everyday Ramblings

We are not going to have any trouble building up our snow pack this year. It has been raining cats, dogs, and tigers and bears out there. We have some minor flooding now, and lots and lots of trees down and intermittent power outages.

So far so good in terms of sustained power both for my cat sitter and yours truly. She stopped by on her way to work. I’d just arrived home from a birdy morning out on Sauvie Island, the largest island along the Columbia River.

I have been telling myself for years that I needed to find some bird outings I could do locally and on my own and in the newsletter from the bird supply store in my old neighborhood where I go to buy my seed and millet that came last week there was a note about this outing. Carpooling at the store.

I called. They laughed. Apparently these trips fill up months in advance. They are free. You go with an expert birder with a nice spotting scope or two. You all meet up and then disperse in fewer cars and go to the site. The fellow at the store asked if maybe I wanted to be on the wait list in case there was a cancellation.

Yes please.

And yesterday at 8am they called to say that because of the weather they were having plenty of cancelations. Happy woman here. It’s not too cold; it is just very very wet.

I am very proud of myself. I got up absurdly early and caught a bus across town and spent four hours with people I have never met before out on the island. We saw an amazing amount of birds even though the Sandhill Cranes are mostly gone, and the Snow Geese and most of the waterfowl aren’t in yet.

From the viewing platform where I took this picture we saw 18 different kinds of birds.

Our driver was a retired postal customer service person from our main branch. She is an extrovert extraordinaire and was a fabulous driver. She was convinced a Cooper’s hawk that was hanging around her backyard was a Peregrine Falcon but her good spirits and wonderful small talk were fun. (We did get a nice long view of a Peregrine over one of the fields, first one I have seen out there.)

It was a balm after my horrid work situation where the majority of individuals I am housed with still do not speak to me. Shudder. And where I am held to a completely different standard then Pacifica.

Sammy is really grumpy. For the first time in a very long time I got up at 3:30am and put him out into the front room (where his heated cat bed is) because he kept waking me up every few hours. We are going to the vet on Thursday to get some handle of his meds and how frequently to give him fluids. He was nippy when we gave him fluids today.

I had a lovely day yesterday. Met a poetry church friend for lunch (I’ll call her Mrs. Hemingway) and then we went to Powell’s to buy some children’s books for her overnight babysitting gig with her grandkids. We bought a wonderful book about a cat and buttons and she wanted some buttons to share with them so (poor us) we had to go to The Button Emporium. It was great fun.

We went to Nordstrom’s because I love their house brand athletic socks and bought a pair of footless tights size S-M-A-L-L. Wow. Small! Me. Wow.

Then we found the modern equivalent of the tearoom. This pastry pie shop that sells homemade ice cream, pies and… mixed drinks. Mostly with gin in them. :)

I had a little power sweet, and sparkling water and Mrs. Hemingway had a lovely blueberry tart. Mr. Hemingway is on a road trip visiting the other kids while the Mrs. stays home and works for their health insurance. He’s retired. They are wonderful folks.

Next weekend I get to go to Salem and hang out with Jack and Leo. The kittens are a year old. Amazing.

And the weekend after that…four blissful days at the beach.