I'm A Bird Watcher

Have you ever heard of a "thing" called the "Big Year"?

Apparently, amateur birdwatchers venture out into the wilds of the planet in order to see how many different species of our avian friends they can spot in a single calendar year. They are absolutely on the honour system, they spend a shitload of money traversing the globe, and the only thing that they are permitted to shoot is a camera. Sometimes the contest is done within a single geographic area and sometimes the entire world is in play. The current record for a Big Year in North America is 839 species while the world big year record of 6,852 species was set in 2016 by Arjan Dwarshuis of the Netherlands.

The first time I was made aware of the Big Year was in a movie of the same title starring Steve Martin, Jack Black, and Owen Wilson. Frankly, I thought the entire escapade was ridiculous and boring as hell but guess what...

I've become one of those people.

I am officially a bird-watching fanatic. Sign me up for a membership in the Audubon Society. Take me to the wilds of the continents to discover the mating habits of the Great Blue Heron or perhaps the Baltimore Oriole. My fascination is real and deep. Today, I put an app on my phone that will help identify various species by a simple photograph and attended a lecture on the endemic and indigenous fowl of the Galápagos Islands. I am in it up to my armpits.

And nothing helps to stoke a fascination and a burgeoning hobby like an eco-vacation. I find myself looking up into the sky as often as I do onto the ground or into the water. I was truly amazed by the diving and feeding habits of the Galápagos brown pelicans that we saw today at dusk of the beaches at Rabida Island. I loved that the Galápagos flycatcher that landed on The Husband's camera lens this morning on Santiago, was so fearless that he was almost posing for the shot. The flamingos that came to feed in a tidal pool in the red sands of Rabida were so at peace with us idiot tourists that they didn't even seem to mind us photographing their evening meal. The American oystercatcher was almost proud and puffing to show off her two eggs in her nest on the black volcanic rocks of Santiago. And me...I just lapped it all up like a thirsty puppy.

The sea lions (we saw a mom nursing her pup. Bestill my heart.), fur seals, various varieties of crab, and...yes...those weird-assed iguanas and lizards are truly something to see but for me, it was the birds. Sorry, Mom. I know that you have a fascination with the reptiles but I will stick with the marine mammals and the brilliantly feathered.

A few tidbits.

1. We haven't snorkelled yet and that is my doing. The Husband is unable to breathe out of a tube and I simply didn't want to go without him. There will be other opportunities still to come, so stop nagging me, Twin Son's Better Half. 😉

2. We are incredibly impressed with Celebrity and this tour. If anybody wants to ask me questions for a future trip, private message me. My only mistake so far was not bringing water shoes. Those wet landings in bare feet are making for some interesting markings on my soles.

3. My vegetarian food choice has been very much validated and not for the reasons you might think. I am watching the food chain and natural selection happen in real-time while here and I have no illusions about eating meat, but the ecosystem is so very fragile that one alteration to even the smallest of lichen or plankton can have catastrophic consequences on the whole. I feel very strongly that the planet is in crisis and doing my small part to keep it in balance is important. We all have choices to make, and I am certainly not advocating that anyone choose to become vegetarian or vegan, but practicing some conscientious eating is something that we all should strive for.

4. If you aren't following The Husband on either Instagram or Facebook, you are missing out on the best photography on this tour. If you are reading this and don't know him, ask a friend to send you his info. A few of his masterpieces can be seen below.

My Facebook Diet

For the past week, I have been on a Facebook diet. Not a fast nor a total abstention, mind you. A diet.

You see, lately I have noticed a more intensive polluting of my Facebook feed. I have been dismayed by the level of mindless shares, toxic discourse, junk science, and disheartening advertisements that have grown exponentially on the site. I thought that if I could dramatically cut back on my postings and instead become an acute observer of what was developing on my homepage, I might begin to bring Facebook back to a level where I once again feel comfortable in engaging. I really wanted to become a leaner, sleeker, better informed user of the product, so I decided to conduct a little experiment.

For one week I didn't "like" anything on Facebook. Nothing. Nada. Rien. I didn't wish anybody a Happy Birthday with the exception of Younger Son which I managed by way of a photographic post. (If I missed your birthday this week, I apologize and wish you all good health and many many more!) I didn't share a single article, blog post, (mine or anybody else's) newspaper article, and with only one exception last evening, I didn't post a single status update. I did post pictures relating to my latest strange obsession, bird watching, but I limited them to one per day. I did engage in a few short conversations on those particular photos and I did visit the site often in order to observe what was happening on my feed.

Here are a few things that littered said feed this week that I pointedly avoided.

• The Grammys
• Kanye West vs Beck
• Brian Williams
• Jon Stewart
• Measles
• Anti-Vaxers
• Bibi's congressional speech
• Bibi's perhaps cancelling of his congressional speech
• Rob Ford
• John Baird
• Stephen Harper
• Barack Obama
• GMOs, Gluten, Toxins that might be invading my foods, vitamins, makeup, or beverages
• American Sniper
• Stupid or Cute Cat, Dog, or any other animal videos
• Animal rights stories
• Sun News
• 50 Shades of Grey and BDSM (Thank God!)
• The Leafs (Are they still playing?)
• Stories that were clearly anti-Islam, anti-Israel, anti-Jewish, anti-religion, anti-liberal, anti-conservative, anti-democrat, anti-republican or anti-anything.

And that is only a small sampling. There is not a single thing on this list that I feel as though I missed out on, but I did learn a great deal.

Here are a few of my observations after a week of Facebook dieting.

It is clear that there are some individuals who are all about sharing other source's content rather than creating their own. When I first started using Facebook, I was excited to have a social conversation with friends and family. I loved the reconnections. I loved the photos and the catching up. Sharing the odd article of interest is certainly part of that conversation, but many people on my feed are sharing 20 or more posts from outside sites or other users a day. A day! That level of sharing is going to dilute anything of value that you may wish to convey, because believe me, I will, and have already begun to ignore you. If you are one of these people who over-share other people's content rather than create your own, you probably have been muted in my feed.

Avoiding the "Like" button, even for a few days, has certainly led to an increase in the diversity of posts I am seeing. I know absolutely nothing about algorithms and the manner in which they function, (that's math, right?) but I do know that being more judicious in my "liking" has cleaned up some of the more distasteful ads on my feed. If I haven't "liked" your posts this week, please know that I probably really did. I will most likely go back to "liking" certain things, but I will be far more attentive as to when I press that insidious little button.

Too many of us are lazy users. If Facebook is to function properly, it requires the collective masses to have a basic working knowledge of how it works. Today, a friend posted that Miep Gies, the lady who helped Anne Frank, had passed away. The problem? She died four years ago. A closer reading of the date of the article would have cleared up the confusion, but this friend didn't take the time. It happens with old photos and statuses as well. Please take care not to "like" a photo that is older than three months. All it takes is one person and the damn thing jumps to the top of everybody's feeds.....AGAIN! Just look at the top left hand corner of the post to discern the date and be careful what you are "liking".

By thinking more carefully about my own postings, I became far more conscious about things and opinions that might have been better left unsaid by many. That was a difficult lesson for an opinionated b**** like me, but it was a very worthwhile one. Look, I am fairly open, honest, and vocal about my preferences and interests. You can read all about them right here in this space. But, I refuse to get drawn into hateful discussions with trolls who clearly revel in their anonymity on social media in order to advance an agenda. If you have expectations that you might possibly be able to bring me around to your position,  I will only engage if the conversations contain meaningful, rational, and polite debate. If you cannot follow these simple rules, you are blocked. Facebook is supposed to be fun. It has become less so.

Facebook is an amazing tool. It affords introverts like me an opportunity to interconnect while maintaining a safe environment in which we feel comfortable. But it has lost it's focus and it is up to us, the individual users to bring it back to a place of usefulness. There is much that I love about the site, but I have learned a small amount of judiciousness goes a long way.

Be wise, be wary, and be careful.

That said....I saw a black swan today. No picture, so no Facebook post, but it was just as exciting.

Routine Is Not An Ugly Word

One of the many things that I had hoped to accomplish following my retirement was to dispense with daily schedules. I really wanted to let my life choices dictate the clock and the calendar, rather than allowing the clock and the calendar to dictate my life choices. I certainly didn't have any grand notions of existing within a "Freedom 55"  commercial at the still very youngish age of 52. Me sail away on a schooner? Yah...not with my motion sickness. Instead, I saw the the future as a giant tabula rasa that could only be limited by personal preferences.

Naïveté is a peculiar circumstance.

While it is true that part of my mind knows that there is nothing stopping me from staying in bed until late morning on occasion to luxuriously read the newspaper, another part screams obscenities at me if I laze around for too long. My reason says "Relax. Take your time.", while my body yells "Enough already you lazy arse. Get your shit together and let's get moving." And so it is that I find myself back into an early morning exercise regime. 

While I am comfortably ensconced in The Southern Home, the majority of that activity consists of a lengthy early morning walk, either around the neighbourhood or down on the beach. After all, we have all been told that sitting is the new smoking, and since I have never so much as taken a puff, I figure that I need to get some real value out of my $99.00 FitBit Flex. 

It's funny. Even though my schedule has become much more fluid and flexible, the world around me, both human and natural, obviously still adhere to theirs. During those walks, I have encountered the same school children waiting for their buses, the same landscapers going about their business, the same locals exercising their dogs, and the same customers at Starbucks purchasing their morning caffeine injections. That's normal and to be expected. What was gloriously unexpected was my encountering of the same wildlife, in the same locations, doing exactly the same things every single morning. There is the squirrel in the park who actually responds to my mother's call and expectantly waits for bits to be dropped. (I won't allow her to give in to her better urges simply because he is a squirrel and I consider his northern cousins to be mortal enemies.) There is the large orange iguana who has taken up residence with his family in the mangrove trees abutting the Intracostal near our home. But I am most totally engaged with these White Ibises who cross my path daily.

As you can see, they are unfazed by human involvement and they are just quietly going about their morning routine, which usually consists of breakfast and crossing the street. Note to self: Resist urge to tell Ibis crossing the street joke.

They are awkward looking creatures who are as ubiquitous down here as sparrows are up north, but there is something about their patterns that has me mesmerized. I see them every single morning on my walk, and then miraculously, every single evening at dusk, an entire flock (I'd like to think it is the same birds) flies in perfect formation low in the sky right in front of my balcony. I could swear that they are dipping their wings in a familiar salute to me as they pass. (I have tried on several occasions to grab a photo or video clip, but they simply move too quickly and I am simply not that great a photographer.) I know it seems crazy, but it feels like my own remarkable interspecies moment. I have actually taken to parking myself on the balcony for an hour or so before dusk waiting for my friends to arrive. It is a magical moment that I now joyfully anticipate.

Yesterday as I watched my new friends perform their evening ritual, it struck me that schedules aren't the evil notions that I had made them out to be. Rather, it is how and what we choose to fill them with that truly matters. So far, mine doesn't suck.