Wednesday, December 8, 2010

The Painted Bunting has returned to the feeder. Sherry called me into the studio at 10AM this morning. There on the feeder sat a male Painted Bunting. In 09' they showed up on the 27th of December. This is the earliest sighting since I began keeping track in 05.

Sun and clouds mixed today. We will have a High of 63F. We hit our Low last night of 28F. Tonight the Low will go only to 39F which is manageable. The Relative Humidity is 93% and our dew point is 30F. The Barometer continues to be steady at 30.14. The chance of rain is 0%, and our winds will be out of the North/Northwest at 5 to 10mph. The sunrise cam this morning at 6:58AM and will set this evening at 5:28PM.

Here is a 'Dragon Fruit". This exotic fruit is in the cactus family, and is very good to eat. We found this on a property near the Prevatts. We will go over tomorrow, and harvest it. I am really interested to see how it taste. I will also get some of the cuttings of the cactus, and start my own. I do not know how old they must be before they produce fruit, but we are going to try.
Here is a nice big Barred Owl that has been living in the Hammock behind the house. I hear him all of the time.
He is very large, and very tame. He was easily approached, and photographed. I am a little leery of seeing Owls. There is a notion that a visitation by an owl portends the death of a family member. An owl was sitting in the Pecan tree in front of the house in Abell on October 30th, 2010. That was the day my boy died. I noted the Owl in my posting that morning. It was not until two days later that I found out Blaine had died that morning, sometime very close to the time the Owl was sitting in the Pecan Tree, looking at me. I doubt I shall ever see an Owl again, that I don't think about that Owl, on that morning at the end of October 2010.




There is a thick frost on the plant covers this morning. I checked on the Papaya and Banana covers this morning and the heater had kicked off last night. I suppose it was pulling too many amps, which caused it to trip the breaker. We put a tremendous amount of effort into saving them, putting up the tent frame, wrapping the frame with plastic, covering the plants inside the tent, and installing heaters. All for naught. The next time this happens (next week) I am going to put the generator inside the enclosure. It will run on a tank of gas all night with no load. The exhaust is sufficient to keep the enclosure warm. It may not be necessary now, I will have to see when things warm up out there.

I got approval on the glass selection for the Bohannan project last night. I will jump on that this morning. The plant is to get that done before we head north, in order to get the money we need to travel. My poor wife is living like a refugee again. This business is feast or famine. There is no equilibrium. No matter what happens, I must continue working or we starve. There is no "Family" leave when you are self-employed.

Well, here we go. It is time to get started. I will write one or two 'Thank You' letters this morning, and then get outside, and get to work. First I must get the heaters out of the banana trees, and try to warm up the studio for Sherry.

We had a fairly productive day. We did glass. I set up the tent over my outside work area, as they are calling for rain tomorrow night. I am deep into my latest commission. I will try and finish at least one of the three panels over the next two days.


2 comments:

  1. Hello Uncle Steve may be this owl was sent from the Lord telling you that Blaine is looking out to you. He knows how much you love your birds and seeing new ones, you are on 200 something so could this owl be the newest one? Look at the good and know that Blaine loved you.

    To day is your one year of haveing a blog? Happy anniversary on your blog. May your day warm up and you have a wonderful day/ week.
    Love Sara

    ReplyDelete
  2. I agree, the owl is Blaine's spirit. On the one year anniversary of my sister's death a ring necked dove showed up to visit me. It is the only time I have ever seen one.
    ((hugs)) your friends hold you in prayer.
    maggieb!

    ReplyDelete