Love the faces: more barnswallows

            Moments--in Between the  eating --               

They seem sated and look both earnest and ridiculous

Barn swallows -- Notes from the Photographer

Wednesday June 20, 1984 (Blue book page 102)

I put the blind in the barn loft about 10 am & the birds started coming in right away.

What a good idea! There are at least 3 nests. The nest I watched had 5 babes and they were huge. I had more fun watching them than any birds yet. They followed bugs and wasps and flies with their eyes – watched the horses – called their parents – stood on nest edge and whirred their wings.

Two babes fledged – flew to a beam, sat awhile, and then back to the nest.  The parents usually feed fast, on the wing.

The parents occasionally give a special chirp and all babes become statues in whatever position they are in – like the game “statues” except they usually shrink down in size. A fun experience. I was 6 feet 8 inches in the hay loft and used 60 power zoom.

Note from the editor: Barn swallows are beloved by many in blogland. If you want to read more or see more of the pictures see the previous stories -- More barn swallows.

Sharon

What are these called?

There is a group of animals that I do not know how to categorize.  For example, When you search for a picture of a wild animal you expect to see this

or maybe this

But you do not expect to see this

or this

Ok, so the latter group is a problem. We love these guys. They are not pets, they are not domesticated, they are wild but....??  It may seem like a trivial problem really, something that a good librarian, or veterinarian could tidy up and at the very least apply some good nouns and viola' --all is well.  But, alas, google and its friends are photo-blind, seeing only a box, an empty box, or an "object" where there is a picture.   So, to create eyes and windows we use Categories & keywords -- wrapping these gorgeous, silly, educational, friendly and familiar creatures in pictures with words.

Most stock photo agencies, professional photo buyers, and even regular folk agree about how they would categorize most animals.  Right or wrong image websites offer pets, wild animals, and farm (or agriculture) animals. As one creative director said -- there are the ones you shoot, the ones we eat, and the ones we adopt and treat like children." Granted there is a bit of slippage across cultures but by and large given a photo of a cow or an elephant we know how to categorize them.

But then one is left with the opossum, raccoons, the "garden deer", foxes, turtles, squirrels, etc..... We have an extraordinary collection of images showing baby and adult animals that I cannot seem to categorize.  They are "wild" but when placed in that category it is clear that the person searching for wild animals isn't looking for a smiling possum.
If keywords are the way people find pictures and search engines make them available it is important to word-ify these creatures to help them and us.

To solve this problem I started asking people --- image buyers, photographers children, biologists, marketers, and frankly anyone that would bear up to it three different questions.
1. Do you think possums, hedgehogs, squirrels, groundhogs, turkeys, and raccoons are "wild" animals?
2. If you were searching for pictures of "wild animals" and  images of a raccoon came up would you disagree.
2. What would you call this group of animals to differentiate them from cattle, pigs, dogs, elephants, and kittens-- the farm animals, wild animals, and pets or just cute?

Here are the suggestions so far....Yard animals,
.....garden animals.... pests......mid-size animals, wild animals, short-range animals, familiar animals, animals of fields and meadows, storybook animals (?), Wind in the Willows animals, animals that hang around bird feeders,animals that eat from my garden, animals that seem to thrive despite or because of people.  More suggestions, please.

Thanks
Sharon and all from Mother-Daughter Press

Click here to see more "Yard animals"

OW! Kidney stones

 

OUCH!!

Surgery today.   Stone free, now.
Ok...enough already.
It would be better if the stones were diamonds or pearls.
Ordered not to lift more than 10 pounds for at least a week. ...Yippee. Let those boxes alone!  Bring on the bon-bons and People magazine.
Thanks for the well-wishes.

Bent-- Not broken

 
A friend mentioned that he didn't wear t-shirts or buttons anymore
Overt slogans might intrude & close gentle civil inquiry
Under the radar --polite and safe. Safe?

I think that as a crone, with the crown of age
I shall start wearing a few more signs of my ideas
goosing the world & to explore for myself

which ideas fit and match 

Jewelry made of my own pin buttons
One says "imitate water"

 My current favorite you see here
it says ..."Bent"
It caught my eye and tickled me
niggled at me
I made more of them in many colors
yet no one asks 
'what is bent?'

Perhaps what captivated me was a
line of word play; a loose chain of associations

I mean this
I am not straight
or narrow
I am weathered still flexible
I have a vein of dark humor and some twisted ideas

I am bent
Not broken
holding some measure of the worlds weight
I will bend to it
Be bent with it

Say this..."I am not in a hurry"

"It's ok. I am not in a hurry."

Say this to people & time slows down, 

You can hear it.. feel it...there are a few extra beats

&

a bit more air

 Plus

It surprises everyone. 

Try it.

Where are the frogs going now?

Frogs and Toads - Images by Mother-Daughter Press

Our first cold snap is coming here in Maine.
Maybe all the ticks will die. Oh yippee! Stay tuned to our tick experiment going on in the jar. Yes, with photos -- we just had to .... ugh.
But, each autumn there is a flurry of online inquiry about the "cold blooded" animals and how they will fare.  Each species does it a little differently and the  details are very interesting.
The specialists say this about it all

"leave them alone. They will find their way, you do not need to herd them off or take them in".

Smart little beasts that they are they will dig down snuggling in the mud and leaves in a pool or river and "chill out". They need some oxygen and Bullfrogs will stay near the top of the mud. Meanwhile frogs on land stay  within the leaf cover.  In contrast, Toads can dig down under the surface. It is all a type of hibernation. And if you want to see it for yourself you should check out this video - with Robert Krulwich and real frozen frogs and miracles.

This video and a nice explanation of the frogs fate can be found at a website called "frogsaregreen.com: See you later frogs.

Women for Peace- Everyone uluate

Nobel Peace Prize winners

Leymah Gbowee, Ellen Johnson Sirleaf,  Tawakul Karman

Today is be a good day for ululation

A sound from ancient Greece and Egypt that continues to now

the sound of women celebrating 

feeling strongly

in India, throughout Africa and the Middle East
It is onomatopoeia known by many names
in many tongues

my favorite is Ulu-uli

Ulu-uli...yes....

a long, wavering, high-pitched sound accompanied by

moving the tongue, rapidly, from left to right

repetitively

A cry of praise in honor and today in celebration
Three women share the peace prize

It is a foreign sound to many of us in the west
but it is familiar to this years winners.
  

So, maybe we can practice it for them.

Join in with a woman at the 2010 ululating competition
in Nagaland a state in far nothern India

Each of these women is worth knowing better. In my research, starting in earnest today, I offer these words from Leymah Gbowee from an interview that is worth hearing with Michel Martin on NPR's program "Tell me more"

"MARTIN: Finally, do you have any wisdom to share? Perhaps to a younger you
who is just starting this sort of path of awakening that you've been on. 
Ms. GBOWEE: Well, one of the things that I always say is never despise a
humble beginning. That's my word of wisdom. No matter how small, if you have
a conviction that this is something that is going to change your community,
if you have a conviction that this is something that is going to change your
family, if you have a conviction that this is something that is going to do
some good, step out and do it. That's one.
                  
The second word of wisdom that I would like to leave with the American
people, in the face of evil, in the face of depravation, in the face of a
lot of horrible things when you turn on your radio, people sometimes lose
hope, that evil is winning. But I just want you to know that from a tiny
part of West Africa, a group of women there taught me to know that in this
life, good always overcome evil. Thank you."

Ulu-uli..Ulu-uli..Ulu-uli..Ulu-uli..Ulu-uli..Ulu-uli..Ulu-uli...Ulu-uli
Ulu-uli..Ulu-uli..Ulu-uli..Ulu-uli..Ulu-uli
Rises up from the Ministry of Crones and gorgeous women everywhere

Ulu-uli..Ulu-uli..Ulu-uli..Ulu-uli..Ulu-uli..Ulu-uli..Ulu-uli...Ulu-uli
Ulu-uli..Ulu-uli..Ulu-uli..Ulu-uli..Ulu-uli