Daily Roundup

I still often feel at a loss about what to write about in my blog. Tonight I'll write about some of the odds and ends of the day. At my 8 am water exercise class, I met a woman, Monica, who turned out to be from Chile. We found out that we had many things in common, and had a great chat in the hot tub after our workout. I learned from her, among other things, that Whidbey Island is at a latitude in the Northern Hemisphere that corresponds to some parts of Chile in the Southern Hemisphere. This area is very similar in landscape and climate to where she and her husband grew up - who knew?? So they are very comfortable here.

Next I took Zuma to the beach for a romp. It was low tide, and the beach was wide and wet and briny. Some children there wondered why Zuma was afraid of them. A little boy, about 3 years old, said "maybe she thinks I'm a giant!" and his face lit up with a joyous grin at the notion that he might be a giant to someone. Adorable!

From there, I drove around to various places to look at houses for sale. A friend's mother wants to move here, and I've got a notion of what she wants. It's a great excuse to go house shopping, a favorite activity up here! I saw a few losers, a few odd but promising possibilities, and a couple of absolutely stunning places with views to make you never want to leave your front porch again (see photo above for an example).

Then Zuma and I went to a second beach for another run-around before coming home for lunch. This afternoon I worked on a painting I'm making, and that was all about being lost for several hours in the process, and all of a sudden it's 5:30 and the dog is giving me that look like "hey, I'm hungry, I'm bored, are you ever going to come back to this planet?"

Tonight a charming quail couple sat on top of the fence in the back yard, between us and the horse enclosure, looking like they were surveying our back yard for snacks. Later, when I walked Zuma down our street, a pair of crows was kicking up a major ruckus. When I walked down closer to the lake, I could see that a large bald eagle was sitting on the tip-top of a big tree, and the crows were dive-bombing it relentlessly, coming within inches of its head. The eagle was clearly annoyed (did those crows have a nest nearby that they were defending?), and frequently stretched his neck up and snapped at the crows as they whizzed by him. Don't ever think we lack for drama and excitement up here on our little island! It's a happening place, believe me!(photo by Ballard Blog)(of course I forgot my camera!)