Weekly Chat (Non-Osprey), 22 December 2019

Thank you ROSY, FORESTBOAR, OG, ANNETTE, HEATHER, HARELADY, PAT, LINDA. Have I missed anyone? I hope you are all having a great time.

Evening here. OH & I had a lovely quiet lunch (turkey roll & roast veg followed by mini choc cream pie), afternoon snooze, turkey sandwiches for tea. Not too hot indoors (city max 35, here 30). Sadly yet another flare up of Cudlee Creek bushfire. Most country fire service people are volunteers and they gave up their family X-mas to fight the blazes. Other volunteers donating time, goods, toys, meals for firies & victims.

Everyone - Enjoy your day, however you are spending it.

I think all of us in the UK will have a rain - free day, and I am glad to read that AQ will be slightly cooler.

Not too extreme for Diane and Annette, I think.

Glad you enjoyed your quiet lunch, AQ.

We've had a good day, with only a couple of minor hiccups! More about it tomorrow. Off to bed tired and very full, now.

Evening all: Lovely quiet day here. Facetimed the UK family; also the Arizona crowd (daughter was thrilled by grandson's surprise arrival this morning; also Ms. D. who came home early from her Dad's to find her favorite uncle there). They are settling down to eat now (grandson went shopping for Xmas dinner this morning! ahem....) .OH and I sat down to watch the news this evening but they were focusing on 2019 global events linked to global warming and the political state of the world. I don't have to be convinced about the former and have had quite enough of politics, so I ran away. I have part of a tiny apple pie (not baked by me) in the oven that I plan to top off with Haagen Dazs vanillla ice cream and enjoy while I watch "The Favorite," which I got from the library yesterday...

Hope all are well.

Hey, folks. There's an annular "Ring of Fire" solar eclipse in progress. It's not visible in the U.K. or the U.S., but you can watch it online on Slooh HERE. Just thought I'd post in case anyone wants to take a look. 

Annette and anyone interested: California surfers encounter a huge whale passing right beside them. Video from ABC News, a safe source.

Love the whale encounter, Diane. Wow.

Got up late and then soaked in a warm bath, something I don't do often. It's pouring with rain here, and when I went out to replenish the bird feeders, the feeding tray was completely full of water. Put some seeds on the ground, hoping that the rats don't appear, to enjoy them.

We usually go for a bracing walk to get rid of the cobwebs today, but its not fit to go out. I shall stay in and do some online sale shopping, and rest: I've got a strange throat and don't feel 100% anyway: hope I'm not sickening for anything.

Hope All are enjoying their holidays and doing what they enjoy best.

Things are crazy here - just had to get youngest son in law to put up another table as our numbers have increased a little. So now we have a top table going across the - well - top. Like a T shape. We have done it before. I've been shooshed away as all I do is tell everyone what to do (aka making helpful suggestions!), hence my appearance on here.

I hope that you aren't coming down with anything nasty, LINDY x

I wonder if anyone can help with a rather strange query. Yesterday I was driving along the A303 across Salisbury Plain when I hit a bird. Sadly, not an unusual occurrence, so I thought very little of it. I hadn't seen the bird, but heard the noise. My destination was around 30 miles away. When I arrived someone said, 'There's a bird on the front of your car'. The bird was alive but shocked. We managed to extract it from the grille of my car, minus quite a few feathers, and put it on the grass. An hour or so later it was nowhere to be seen. Description: Size of a small pheasant, feathers pale buff with brown tips, whiteish face with bright red wattles. I have tried to identify it online, without success. Can anyone help? I was amazed it managed to survive for that distance/length of time - a nice steady 70mph on the A303 and then twisty, turny country roads for the final ten miles. Isn't nature wonderful?

Quiet Boxing Day catching up with all sorts of 'paperwork' - not being at home means I can do these things without interruption! And it's been pouring with rain all day, unlike yesterday which was beautiful all day, with clear blue skies. More like Easter than Christmas. Hope everyone has recovered from the (possible!) over-indulgence of yesterday and are now gearing up for New Year's Eve!

Morning all:

Diane: I saw that video on our local TV!.  During our whale count season we've have seen the same thing many times:  Surfers sitting waiting for a wave and completely oblivious to a huge whale coming up behind or under them unless it rises to the surface and blows close by as happened in the video.  :-)  I watched part of the eclipse online for a bit last night but when I came back the sun had disappeared.

Lindybird:  Ditto Heather's remarks  - don't get sick!  And if so can't think of a better cure than online shopping (not that I do that much of it).  :-)

We had a very strong storm go through last night - they actually issued tornado warnings but all was well. Besides, they were California-style tornadoes, small and likely capable of taking out a fence, but nothing like the killer tornadoes that Diane and bjane have to cope with.  Still, very windy during the storm and my solar Dolly the Sheep garden thingy got tossed around.  I'd already put rocks in the pots of our two largest plumeria plants and they stayed upright....   Sunny today and as far as the U.S. is concerned, Christmas is done and it's on to the next commercial opportunity.  :-)

Take care all.