Tennessee, day 3

Classroom Humor

Doc explains and explains and explains...

...until Glenn flashes his gold Rolex at us.

Why is this man smiling?

Ignore the fact that I am holding my M-4 improperly. I did that on purpose for this picture.

Because that's damn funny!

After class, I walked down Prater Road, and crossed over the border into Lakeview, Chickamauga County, Georgia.


Georgia.

The Peach State.

Where Leland B. Haraszthy M.D. was born.

Who?

Leland and I went to SOTE together in the 1980s, back when the Communists were still in power in Hungary.  Leland's dad was both a medical doctor and a Baptist minister.  Needless to say, Leland has all kinds of hangups about women, booze, and tobacco.  He is a very unhappy man.
Leland stopped talking to me 10 years ago after he wrote an email that was really bad.  He's really into astronomy, so he wrote me an email about how Mars is at its closest that it's been in the 6,000 year history of Earth.  I fired back an indignant reply that if he's a medical doctor who is licensed to treat human beings, I can't believe that he's so ignorant of basic science that he believes all of that fundamentalist baloney where they think that Genesis is a factual history of the world i.e. the world was created in 6 days.
Leland hasn't spoken to me, since.
I'm sorry that I lost him as a friend, but if you can't tell a friend that you disagree with their belief system, then there's a problem.

Tennessee day 2

Notice the writing in the Cherokee language.

This cemetery is in a town called Brainerd that got gobbled up by the expansion of Chattanooga.  Now the cemetery is surrounded by asphalt.  It is in the middle of a gigantic parking lot for the shopping center and office complex.

Yellow-bellied Sapsucker

They are annoyingly uncooperative.  This is as close as I could get.  I chased her in circles around the cemetery.

Gravestone of Chief John Ross' grandmother.

This is what the Brainerd Cemetery looks like from all sides.

Tuesday afternoon

Chester Frost State Park

Marty Paige picked me up after class, and took me to Chester Frost State Park, where I got 2 new life birds: Red-headed Woodpecker, and Eastern Towhee.  Other birds seen here:

Great Blue Herons

Cooper's Hawk

Pied-billed Grebes

Buffleheads

Mallards

Ring-necked Ducks

Canada Geese

Ring-billed Gulls

Belted Kingfisher

Red-bellied Woodpeckers

Downy Woodpecker

Tufted Titmouses

Northern Mockingbirds

Northern Cardinals

Eastern Bluebirds

Cedar Waxwings

PineWarbler

Common Grackles

Blue Jays

American Crows

Red-winged Blackbirds

White-throated Sparrows

White-breasted Nuthatch

Carolina Chickadees

Carolina Wrens

House Finches

Chattanooga, Tennessee: day 1

So far, Tennessee has been disappointing: I have yet to see anyone in overalls, or hear banjo music.

Hm...I'm not the first Omega fan in Chattanooga!

Well, that landing in Chicago was interesting.  Now I know whay they call it The Windy City.  I didn't know that the Boeing 757 was designed to land sideways.

"We're safe.  I've locked the trunk. Tom can't get out!"

I was supposed to get up early, today, and bird the back streets behind the hotel before we went to class, but my alarm clock never went off, and my boss woke me up at 07:30 (!). During our lunch break I found two life birds in the parking lot behind Popeye's Fried Chicken: a Carolina Wren (they seem larger, and longer-billed than our Bewick's Wrens) and Carolina Chickadee (beautiful colors).

Carolina Chickadee, Poecile carolinensis

A very nice lady named Carol Fegarido picked me up, and took me to her backyard feeders,

where I photographed House Finches, Chipping Sparrows, Cardinals, more Carolina Chickadees,

Northern Cardinal, Cardinalis cardinalis 

White-breasted Nuthatches, Slate-colored i.e. Dark-eyed Juncos (our common Junco in California is the Oregon Junco), Downy Woodpeckers, and another lifebird: Brown-headed Nuthatch.

Seen, but not photographed were Red-bellied Woodpeckers and lots of Robins.

Pine Warbler

We then went to Standifer Gap Marsh, where I heard--but did not see--Eastern Meadowlarks. They don't sound like the Eastern Meadowlarks in Arizona (the lillianae that may or may not eventually get slpit off into a separate species one day). There were Brown-headed Cowbirds, Red-winged Blackbirds, and a couple of Canada Geese, but no Rusty Blackbirds or Common Grackles.

Then at dusk her friend Susan drove us to Camp Jordan where they saw an American Woodcock while I was staring in the wrong direction.

It was darker than this when the Woodcock flew over the field, and landed in the forest.

That area is around 1 mile on foot from my hotel, so I plan on walking over there, tomorrow afternoon, unless it is raining. I am going to use your info to look for Eastern Towhees, tomorrow, before the rain arrives (the TV weatherman says maybe light rain around 7:00 p.m.)

American Red Squirrel, Tamiasciurus hudsonicus

These guys are native to the eastern U.S.  They have a relative in the Mountain West called the Douglas Squirrel

Tanagers in Gonzales Park, Compton

Hi there! 

 I'm a Summer Tanager spending the winter in L.A.!

No pictures, please!  I am but a humble Hepatic Tanager.



By April, I'll be a pretty boy!

...And I'll still look like this.  Oh, bother.

Salton Sea February 19th, 2012

Wister Unit 8:00 a.m.

Much to his disappointment, Balázs didn't see any rattlesnakes.

BIRDS SEEN:

==========

Abert's Towhee

Black-tailed Gnatcatcher

Ladder-backed Woodpecker

Gambel's Quail

Red-wingedBlackbird

House Finch

Audubon's Warblers

one Myrtle Warbler

Inca Doves

Eurasian Collared Doves

Red Hill Marina 11:00 a.m.

American Herring Gull?  Okay, but we need a Yellow-footed Gull!

No Yellow-footed Gull, huh?  Too bad.

Dude, where's my Salton Sea?

The Salton Dea is drying up.  Its water source is being diverted to water golf courses in San Diego.  They are trying to save it.

John Thomlinson, Ph.D.

Biology Professor at California State University,        Dominguez Hills

Who do I run into, when I go to a party at Cathy Jacobs' house? John Thomlinson!

Who do I run into, when I chase a Scissor-tailed Flycatcher in San Pedro? John Thomlinson!

Who do I run into, when I go to a party at Cathy Jacobs' house? John Thomlinson!
 
Who do I run into, when I chase a Gyrfalcon in Riverside? John Thomlinson!




I can't get away from the guy!

Laughing Gull at the end of Lack Road 5:30 p.m.

István kept pronouncing "Laughing Gull" as "Lo-fing Gull".  Lo fing is Hungarian for "horse fart".

Common Redpoll in San Diego County (of all places)

Zsezse San Diego Megyeben 

 At 11:55 a.m. today, I was baking chicken for my kids while doing the dishes.  Little did I suspect that 3 hours later I would be in Julian, a quaint tourist trap in the mountains of rural San Diego County, staring at a Common Redpoll.

Ez igen!

     Then the phone rang.  After my friend told me about the Redpoll being found at the parking lot bird feeders of a bird feeder store in downtown Julian I yelled at my kids, "ROAD TRIP!!!"

Ennye, ennye, Zsezse.  Neked a Hortobágyon kellene lenned!

      The usual crowd of birders were standing the The Birdwatcher's parking lot when we pulled to a stop, and parked.

     After admiring the bird for an hour, I went inside their shop, and bought some gifts for a couple of friends who are birders.  My way of expressing my appreciation.Wow, I didn't expect to get a life bird this weekend.  Certainly not a Redpoll this far south.

    

Losing Dad

    When I was working in the Radiation Safety Office at USC, I walked over to help a marine biologist, with the improbable name of Jeb Fuhrman, who couldn't get the campus-wide computer network to update his inventory of radioactive chemicals.
     I said, "Hey, I'm going to stand here, right behind you, and watch.  You have the font set too small on your computer."
     He peered up at me through glasses that looked like a matching pair of magnifying lenses, and groused, "How old are you?"
     "Forty.  Why?"
     He swiveled away from me and said, "Yeah, that's when it happens."


     A couple of weeks later I was the proud owner of a set of prescription reading glasses.


     My father died when I was 22 months old.  I don't remember him.  I have a few things of his: his East German 35 mm film camera, a brass button from his Hungarian army uniform, his wedding ring from when he was married to my mom (it is now my wedding ring for being married to my wife), his cuff links, and his glasses.  Lately, through a miracle of heredity, I have been able to wear his glasses. 


     Wow, I'm wearing Dad's glasses.  And they work perfectly for my eyes. Interesting, how we like to wear somebody else's stuff: a kid wears his dad's coat, a wife wears her husband's shirt.  It really does make you feel closer to that other person.


     So, of course, this week I put the glasses on, and the frame broke.  It exploded.  It flew apart with a dry crunch that only 50 year old plastic can give.



    My first instinct was to keep them, anyway.  Logic prevailed, and after I snapped a picture, I threw them out.  What you don't see in this photo are the multiple small shards of plastic from when the frame exploded.  Still, the act of tossing my father's glasses into the kitchen trash can was painful.

     The same thing happens to Oskar Schell in "Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close".  The movie trailers and newspaper advertisements make it clear that this movie is about a kid who lost his father--played by Tom Hanks--on 9/11.  Despite knowing this, and knowing that the movie is about how young Oskar sets out on his journey to heal his soul by connecting with others who knew his father, I wanted to see what happens.  I wanted to see how the story unfolds.  I'm glad I went to see this movie. 

     I remember where I was when 9/11 happened.  I was married to my first wife, and it was two months since my mom had died.  I was getting ready to go to work, making coffee in the kitchen, while listening to the local NPR station, KPCC, which used to broadcast from the campus of Pasadena City Collge (hence the name KPCC).  They announced that a large plane had crashed into the World Trade Center.  Well, that was weird.  I went into the living room, turned on the TV, and saw the second plane crash into the second tower.

     I could kiss the screenwriter, Eric Roth.  I hope they give him an Oscar for best adapted screenplay.  He didn't make the movie unbearably saccharine e.g. a post-9/11 version of "Terms of Endearment".  The lady in the row behind me said to her husband, "This was intense."  Good description.  I'd like to know what all of the room-temperature IQ film critics out there were smoking when they wrote their scathing reviews of tis movie.  They're idiots.