Sometimes
the days are just packed. I think that's a Calvin and
Hobbes quote. Today must be the kind of day they
meant.
First, snow removal vehicles of all
types and sizes from tiny little Bobcat things to front
end loaders and plows blocked the road out of my condo. I
sat there in the car waiting for them to move something,
anything, so I could get by. One of the men standing by
the garage noticed they were causing a traffic jam and
started toward the front end loader but he went flying on
a patch of ice and landed in the street on his ass. Other
guys rushed to his aid. The vehicles didn't move. There
is supposed to be another way out but since the snow (not
this week's snow - the first snow) that's been pretty
much blocked with parked cars and giant frozen snow
banks. However, as these guys weren't moving any time
soon, I tried the other exit and managed to squeeze
between a pickup truck and the snow bank. It helps that
the side of the car that I scraped against the snow bank
is the one that's already dented. The trim strip is now
about to fall off, but for now it's still there. Boy am I
glad that I failed to keep my New Year's Resolution to
get the dent fixed.
By this time, I knew I was going to
be late getting to the cat shelter and I figured stopping
at a Dunkies drive-thru for coffee wouldn't appreciably
slow me down. Wrong. Cars were lined up practically onto
Rt. 110 waiting for coffee. I got the coffee and rolled
in to the cat shelter parking lot at what must have been
close to 10:00 AM. I'd meant to be there at 9:15. Grrr.
There is no place to park. None. I finally pull my car up
as close as possible to the wild animal rehab cage
(remember where all those raccoons used to be?) and
blocked in two SUVs that I presumed belonged to people
who work at the vet's. As I'm doing this, a woman in a
BMW pulls in and blocks the parking lot entrance. She
gets out of the car with a little white dog under each
arm and walks around front to the vet's office.
Inside, I discover no volunteers
and only Barb on staff. Barb is all scratched up on one
arm having just broken up a fight between Reebok and
Beethoven. A news crew from channel
7 is in the main room
waiting for the arrival of someone from NEAVS
and Mass. Animal Samaritans with the cat who had been set
on fire in Lawrence. They needed a place to do the photo
shoot for a story about Phoenix (the cat's new name) for
the evening news. Barb cleans cages and I wash dishes.
More staff arrives. The channel 7 people stand there
waiting. Every once in awhile the camera man asks a
question about cats. I end up explaining to him about how
cats' eyes have more rods and fewer cones than ours so
they can see better in the dark.
The Mass. Animal Samaritans guy
arrives with the cat. She doesn't look as bad as I feared
considering how badly she was abused. The tip of her ear
is badly burned, her whiskers are burned off on one side
or look melted, and she's got a burned patch on her
belly. The vet from NEAVS says she will lose that part of
the ear, her whiskers will grow back, and the burned
patch will heal. She's remarkably friendly and
cooperative with all the handling. She's a nice
cat.
It's impossible for me to wash the
dishes and litter boxes quietly and unobtrusively while
the news people film so I retreat to the office with
Eddy, the orange tabby who needs constant human attention
or else he will meow plaintively. His adopters are
supposed to come pick him up today but meanwhile he seems
to want to be all over me all the time. Barb and I take
turns cuddling Eddy who seems to prefer me for some
reason. He tries to stick his head in my mouth. He
settles in on my shoulder to look out the window. I may
never get the dishes done.
The news crew is shooting a couple
more scenes when I start back in on the dishes. Reebok is
acting weird (weirder than usual as my niece would put it
about me) growling at something invisible and swatting at
thin air. Dawna checks him out and finds a cut from his
fight with Beethoven, but nothing serious.
Once the news crew finishes up, I
get into a rhythm with the dishes and litter boxes and
manage got get back on track. I'm still working when
11:00 comes around and the shelter is open to the public.
A troupe of acrobats arrives. They all look alike with
long curly hair. They seem to know Dawna. They ask a lot
of questions about the cats but don't seem interested in
adopting anyone. I think there are five of them. They
seem to take over the whole place. They're quite taken
with Eddy and demand to know how anyone could have
abandoned him. Why does anyone abandon any cat? The
acrobats hang around asking questions for what seems like
ages.
Tired and hungry and insufficiently
caffeinated despite my small coffee from Dunkies, I
decide to get lunch at Middle Street Foods. Of course
downtown Newburyport, like just about every place else,
is full of snow and short of empty parking spaces. I
drive around and around and finally find a spot that only
requires me to climb two five foot snow banks and cross a
puddle the size of Lake Superior. Well, OK, the size of
Liberty Street... The wait is long to place my order.
Every table is full. When I finally order my lunch "for
here", Karl looks puzzled. I say "I'll stand".
Fortunately, I don't have to try eating lasagna while
standing for too long. Someone gives up a table and
leaves behind a Boston Globe. There's a special
section on people who have given up the 24/7 work
lifestyle for a slower pace. Alas, their solutions seem
to mostly involve either becoming stay at home Moms or
moving to Martha's Vineyard.
I figure I'll just go pick up the
newsletter at the printer and spend the afternoon
stuffing envelopes. But it wouldn't hurt to take just a
short birding trip to the refuge. The trip is
short because the road is still closed from Hellcat south
and there are hardly any birds around. Not even tree
sparrows.
Do I go straight to the printer?
Nope. A quick stop at the Chain Bridge to look for eagles
shouldn't take long. They've been putting on quite a show
there for the past few days as it's the only spot with
open water on the Merrimack. Birders reported seeing 11
of them at once! I'll just make a quick stop. Yeah,
right.
I
spot an immature bald eagle right away. As I'm following
it toward the pine trees on Deer Island where it's about
to land, a Cooper's hawk flies by right in front of me. I
start following the Cooper's and miss where the bald
eagle landed. I'm trying to re-find it in the trees when
another birder who has just arrived asks if I've had any
bald eagles yet. I point toward the trees and explain
that an immature just landed. He then asks if I saw the
"Coop", which flew right over his head as he got out of
the car. Yup. The Cooper's is the reason I lost track of
the eagle. It takes a long time to find the branch where
the eagle landed but once I know it's there, it's obvious
to the naked eye. The other birder spots two more eagles
that I miss, then it quiets down.
There's lots of open water and the
ice is breaking up and flowing down river all around us.
"I guess we missed the bald eagle show" says one birder.
"Now it's the great cormorant show" says I. Indeed there
are great cormorants all over the place and they are
putting on a show. A young great cormorant gets a huge
fish. Another one takes it away. The first one grabs it
back. Another one takes it away. About 6 great cormorants
chase the one with the fish, splashing furiously and
swatting at the fish-possessor with beaks and wings. The
melee goes on until one great cormorant, in possession of
the fish, finds a spot close to the bridge to work on
swallowing the thing. By this time it's half of a big
fish, with entrails hanging out, but the cormorant still
has trouble swallowing it. Even the half fish is way too
big. He does get it down eventually,
remarkably.
Great cormorants are diving all
around. There's close to 50 of them but they're so active
I can't really count. They pop up among a flock of common
mergansers and a pair of common goldeneyes. Some of them
roost on an ice floe and spread their wings to dry. A
huge chunk of ice breaks off and flows rapidly away down
river with a sleeping female common merganser on board. A
flock of male common mergansers emerges from under the
bridge swimming in a straight line, like they're in a
parade. They are making noise and splashing and generally
showing of. All this takes place right in front of a
great blue heron standing on that ship-like thing that
sticks out from under the bridge. An otter swims toward
the bridge, never quite surfacing. The heron never moves.
Another birder who's been there all afternoon says the
heron hasn't moved a muscle for three hours. Just then it
moves its head, takes a step closer to the edge, and
freezes again.
That December issue of Birder's
World I was reading yesterday also has an article
about wintering great blue herons. Apparently if they
can't find open water to fish in some of their wintering
areas they will move further south, but a lot of times
they end up not getting enough to eat, losing fat and
muscle, and becoming easy prey for bald eagles. The heron
I'm watching doesn't seem to be fishing, nor does it seem
to be worried about predation from the two bald eagles
here. There's plenty of open water here, more emerging
every minute. I never thought of ice-out as such as
sudden and dramatic process. There are clearly also loads
of fish, judging by the great cormorant show. So the
heron probably isn't in danger of starvation. Another
great blue heron lands on the shore among a flock of
mallards and Canada geese. Unlike its stationary
counterpart, it's moving around actively looking for
fish. I doubt it will become eagle food either.
Before I know it, it's 4:00 PM and
the printer closes at 5:00. So much for a quick stop. I
do manage to pick up the newsletter, get some supper, and
head to Central Square for my Thursday meeting. I somehow
end up browsing in Rodney's and finding yet another New
Bedford whaling memoir - with Rhode Island connections -
that must join my collection.
On the way home, I'm driving
through Somerville when a car pops out in front of me
from behind a huge snow bank. I swerve to miss it and tap
the brake. I skid on a patch of black ice. Fortunately, I
don't hit anything and regain control of the car. Heading
north on I-93 the traffic is stopped at Stoneham. The
black ice starts there apparently. I get off at Montvale
Ave and take the back roads home, constantly on the
lookout for black ice. It's a long slow trip.
So many adventures in just one day.
It's good to curl up with my own cat and
books.
