Adopt these cats at Merrimack
River Feline Rescue Society
Today's Bird Sightings:
Plum Island:
eastern kingbird (1)
semipalmated sandpiper(17)
northern mockingbird (2)
herring gull (103)
great egret (20)
snowy egret (36)
tree swallow (30)
double crested cormorant (27)
great blue heron (1)
Canada goose (28)
great black backed gull (8)
purple finch (1)
American black duck (7)
greater yellowlegs (1)
lesser yellowlegs (1)
blue-winged teal (5)
Today's Reading: The Outermost
House by Henry Beston
Today's Starting Pitcher: Jeff
Fassero
2000
Book List
Plum
Island Bird List
![](http://world.std.com/~jegan/sig.JPG)
Copyright © 2000, Janet I.
Egan
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Bob
claims Sandy was waiting for me at the door until just
moments before I arrived. I don't believe him. He was
probably waiting for donuts. No donuts today. Roy gave him a
piece of cracker but Sandy disdained it totally. He stared
at it like "what the heck is this? where's my glazed donut?"
and refused to touch it.
He still likes Roy though. As Roy was standing next to
the big yellow bucket talking to Bob, Sandy started rubbing
against his hip and looked like he was going to burrow into
his pocket any minute. Hmm, does Roy have glazed donuts in
his pocket? Nope. Sandy's just being cute.
When
did we become the Merrimack River Towel Rescue
Society? We really have to establish a second shelter just
for the towels. The closet is stuffed to overflowing. The
shelf along the outside wall looks like it's about to have a
towel slide any minute. The floor cages are piled high with
towels. The cat gym is covered with clean dry towels waiting
to be folded. Damp ones are hanging from Miss Newburyport's
cage (she's in the laundry room not noticing). Every surface
that can hold towels holds towels. Roy goes to get a towel
to dry the dishes, looks around, and asks "Do you think we
have a clean, dry towel anywhere?" I laugh so hard that
Kendra comes in out of the other room to find out what's so
funny. We plot ways of turning the towels into wash cloths,
shop rags, anything.
We
need a new Chloe-numbering scheme. Come to think of it we
probably need a Buddy-numbering scheme too, although only
the longhaired big black lump of a Buddy is still in
residence. So now we have Chloe II. The Roman numeral II
distinguishes her from recent residents Chloe and Chloe-2.
She's kind of shy but very nice. Y'know, we never have
duplicates on names like Kuchina or Newburyport or all those
Norse gods the Mullinses were always naming their foster
kittens after. Just a thought. I guess the world can never
have enough Chloes or enough Buddies.
A duck now lives in the cage where the baby raccoons
were. It shows no interest in posing for pictures. It hides
behind its green plastic swimming pool. Never a dull moment
in the wildlife cage behind the parking lot.
Again
I'm starving by 11:30 despite having breakfast at 8:30. A
veggie sub at Angelina's fixes that, and I get to watch the
long range weather forecast on CNN. I know I'm in
Massachusetts because as soon as the weather comes on the
restaurant chatter quiets down and all eyes turn toward the
TV. Not that any interesting weather heads this way yet.
I down a bottle of water and buy another one for the road
before the ritual Wednesday bird search. I note that it's
high tide, which is not favorable for finding shorebirds,
but figure I'm not really serious about this today
anyway.
A few young blue-winged teals paddle around at the salt
pannes. Ominous numbers of starlings crisscross the road in
dense clouds. A flock of peeps lands smack in the middle of
the road. They start foraging among the gravel. Most of them
look like semipalmated sandpipers to me. In the distance, a
whole mess of snowy egrets hang out together staging for
migration I guess.
At
Hellcat I suddenly decide I am really really tired and
besides that I'm hot. A woman coming out of the outhouse
remarks on how hot it is, so it's not just me. The breeze
has died down and mosquitoes begin to swarm around me. How
do they find me? There aren't even that many mosquitoes here
and they're all drawn to me. I forgo the dike and the Bill
Forward Pool and the marsh trail for today.
A
nap revives me a little, at least enough to buy groceries
and later to make supper. Wilbur insists on sitting on my
left shoulder at all times. It is very hard to eat, read, or
type with a large orange cat on one's shoulder. Can't tell
if he's jealous of Sandy or miffed that I didn't take him to
the refuge to eat peeps. :-) (I would never do that, of
course. I don't even let him out - for his own safety and
the safety of all avian life forms.) I close my eyes and see
tiny shorebirds pecking in dust and gravel with herring
gulls soaring overhead. Time for the ball game.
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