Our friend above was right in front of the dog kennel when I let the dogs out this morning. Both dogs sniffed the little lizard like crazy, but always stayed a few inches away. The animal must have some sort of smell that tells the dogs to better keep some distance. Anybody know what we’re looking at?
Literally! I counted six bird nests just at the front entrance and the back patio. Looks like every safe spot is occupied. Here’s the one from the front entrance. Right next to the door we have some metal sun-like sculpture hanging on the wall. The birds built a nest at the top of it and actually moved some of the metal “rays” out of place to make room for the nest.
This is the second batch of bird-babies in this particular nest for this year. I count two pairs of eyes and one single eye on the right hand side. Looks like they are getting ready to leave the nest soon.
One of my schoolmates, Juergen Schenk, sent me a CD with some 70 photos from my 20-year highschool reunion, which I could not attend because of a severe (World Cup related) shortage of short-term plane tickets to Germany. I posted them on the site and also created top-level page (look for it in the “Around here” section on the right hand site). Here’s the link: Abitur 1986 - 20-jaehriges Jahrgangs-Treffen.
Now if I only could remember all the names of the people I see in the photos …
Over at – madeyouthink – there’s a gallery of 236 photos of dog poopie with Bush flags in them. They’ve been pooping (eh) up all over the US and Europe. Guess one could call them art in a strange kind of way …
One of our neighbours here in Los Caminitos owns HeliNM. He flies for movie studios, checks out pipelines, brings half-naked models to remote locations and does some sightseeing tours as well. When I was over at their house for a recent beergarden-opening, I asked whether it would be possible to charter the helicopter and take Pia on a ride.
That’s what we did today. We left at 10:00am this morning and the three of us (including Manfred the pilot) did a roundtrip around Santa Fe for about 20 minutes. We opted to keep it short to make sure that Pia does not have a bad time.
The photo above shows her just a few seconds before we actually lifted off from Santa Fe Municipal Airport. And below you see her right when the engines were started - big eyes, lots of noise.
It was really, really nice to see things from the air. We went towards Cochiti, parts of Bandelier, White Rock Canyon (which is only accessible by canoe or helicopter), turned just before Los Alamos (a no-fly zone with surface-to-air missle protection) and then back to Santa Fe.
Pia was not afraid at all and enjoyed the whole ride. About 5 mins into the flight she decided to hop on my lap instead of staying in her seat - she did that only to get closer to the window and see more stuff.
Thanks Manfred! Gonna recommend this experience to anybody who lives or visits here.
I think I made a mistake. Weeks ago I told Pia that she can plant new bushes by putting the berries with their seeds from the bush on the patio into the soil. After returning from the pool this morning she spent almost 30 minutes outside with this task. She carefully selects 1-3 berries, finds a nice open spot on the ground, digs a little hole and puts the berries in there. She’s so concentrated that it almost seems as if her life was dependent on this procedure. Very cute to watch.
All the way through the living room the setting sun hit the wine glass on the table in the kitchen and casted a shadow against the wall. Our walls are dark and earthy with small sparkling particles (micah) and some straw pieces in the plaster. I liked it.
I just put Pia to bed. It’s unusual that she goes to sleep before 8pm, but I guess the fact that she’s allowed to sleep in daddy’s bed made it easier. Just before I left her she turns to me and whispers a little “I love you!”. It sounded very sincere, from the heart, not like something that husbands and wives add to the end of a phone conversation. Sigh. Tears in my eyes. Now I know again why people refer to their kids as their most precious possessions …
Santa Fe New Mexican: Rigged and Ready. [sarcasm]Santa Fe’s Police SWAT team just got a new toy, as the New Mexican reports under the link at the beginning of this post. A $250,000 toy. You see, Santa Fe has really turned into a crime-ridden city over the last few years: hostage situations happen almost daily; there’s not a week where we don’t have terrorists in town trying to blow up the Palace of the Governors; the SWAT team is in action 24/7. It’s terrible! I would also suggest the Department of Tourism sends out a warning notice to all travel agencies around the world, that it is not safe to visit Santa Fe any more. Too bad, it used to be such a nice and quiet city. [/sarcasm]
This was an interesting lesson. This Google video talks about a number of situations where you can have an encounter with the police. Know your rights and watch the scenarios the ACLU provided.
PS: For whatever reason I don’t seem to be able to embed the video on this page ….
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