Beautiful day for porch pondering. The weather temperature is just perfect. Vivid blue sky has a few wispy clouds. The birds are flitting and finding perches on the feeders. The porch lizards and Penelope are taking their morning sunbaths. A small flock of common blackbirds, also called Eurasian blackbirds, lit on the ground under one of the feeders. This is their first visit to my yard buffet. Counted eight males and two females. The males are so pretty in the sun. Their jet black feathers have an iridescent blue-green sheen when the sunlight hits them just right. They have a yellow ring around their eyes and orange-yellow bills. The females are beautiful, too, with their light brown feathers. They have light streaks and dots on their bellies. They didn’t stay very long but I enjoyed watching them strut around. They had a little head bobbing going on, too.

The doves and cardinals are beginning to tolerate each other on the ground. I love to watch the antics of the doves. They seem to have the hardest time flying and perching on the power lines. They rock back and forth when they light on the lines. Had a humming bird visitor today, too.

One of my friends told me her yard cat killed the mother bird from a nest close to their porch. Her husband told her the father bird usually takes over the feeding and he’s right. Baby birds eat up to 720 bugs a day so I bet that daddy learned real quick to appreciate his partner’s help in feeding the babies. I’m pretty well versed on adult birds but I did a little research on baby birds and learned a few things. Nestlings are featherless baby birds with pink skin. Fledglings have their feathers and hop around. The fledglings are pushed out of the next by their parents trying to teach them to fly. Some of the fledglings grow up after everyone has migrated and rely on their instincts to migrate alone. Don’t think it would be fun the migrate alone.

Had a long enjoyable phone conversation with my oldest son this afternoon. He and his wife and another couple enjoyed a trip to California recently. He sent me photos of their hour’s ride in a hot air balloon. The photos were beautiful but made me sweat just to look at how high they were. If that had been me a long-billed curlew would have flown along and pierced the balloon. I did I a lot of tricks on skates and bikes and stilts but hot air balloons and roller coasters make me break a sweat. I don’t have a brave bone in my body for them.

Someone mentioned today in the comments that getting old is not for sissies. That’s right, but I’m loving these retirement years with their easy unscheduled days. Billie Burke said, “Age is something that doesn’t matter unless you are a cheese.” Love that! But dealing with losing muscle strength and flexibility and endurance is not fun. Knee and back pain is the worse. I sit on the floor and play dollhouse with my granddaughter and struggle to get up. It ain’t pretty watching me get up. But I’ll sit on the floor and struggle happily to get up for as long as she wants me to play with her. And the loss of dexterity in trying to open bottles and pull tabs off milk and coffee creamer. Even tin cans with pull tops out do me. And the one I suffer from the most is looking for a lost cell phone while I’m talking on it or looking for my glasses when they are on my face. Good thing is, the average age in the United States for entering Shady Oaks is 81 years old. So I’m good for another 14 years!

“Getting old is like climbing a mountain, you get a little out of breath but the view is beautiful.” — Ingrid Bergman