November 27 2012 11 pm cst 60 degrees

angry turtle.

 

Make this turtle picture as big as you can and decide if you see what I see on this ugly guy.  In addition to his enormourly long fingernails, is that a huge set of teeth that he is showing me?  Neil says that is his neck and his  mouth is  closed.  You decide.

 

speaking of ugly animals, this muscovy duck looks like he is wearing a Halloween mask, but tht is his unfortunate Phantom of the Opera face.

 

We went to Pendleton Park yesterday afternoon and there was almost no one there except these black blied whistling  ducks

and they flew away the minute we got there

so here is the parking area near the pond.  All handicap parking but Neil won't park there even tho there is not one other soul there except a few runners.

 

 

 

 

He parks here

 

 

 

After telling so much about football in the public schools, I want to give equal time to the valley's charter schools called Idea schools.  They are indepentaly managed public schools sothere is no tution.  The kids apply to go to school there and are chosen by lottery, not by ability.   They ignore phys Ed and Languages,  but they are dedicated  to having every graduate go to college.  Fine idea! 

The average teacher salary is $50,000.

 

You can see a Red Sox fan wherever you go.  Guess that is why they call it a Red Sox Nation.

 

 

 

 

Am having some trouble uploading pictures this week because  I have used up all my free space  so since it is nearly midnight , I guess I will have  to quit here and try to work out the  problems on the next blog.

Tuesday, November 20 2012  3pm cst  78 degrees

                                                                         Great  Kiskadee

This is a common sight...it is the  burning of cane just before harvest.

I wouldn't want to be the person riding in the truck keeping a watch on the fire.

  Burning the field takes care of about 80% of the trash involved in the harvest, including dry leaves, spiders, snakes etc.  Cane can be harvested without burning but it saves a lot on labor.

before burn        after burn

 right away, they begin cutting.  It is done much the same as we cut haylege/corn..... with a truck traveling just beside the cutter and

as soon as one truck is filled, another falls in and the cutter never stops until the field is done.  It really doesn't take very long even in these huge fields.

About a half hour after we saw the burning up close, we were at a quick stop and it kinda looked like it was just barely beginning to snow...black snow,  Just little flake or two here and there, but what was happening was after the very hot fire sent the embers high in the air, the small sooty pieces began falling ...and we were maybe 7 miles from where the fire was.   The clerk at the convenience store said that they don't even take out the garbage when the fields are being burnt because they get soot on their  clothes.

I cannot begin to photograph the number of grackles in the area.  As it comes dusk, they begin to settle on the wires and trees along the well lit streets and  parking lots.  And they are noisy!

And they are not at all skiddish. 

 I got to within two feet of this one before he flew away.

Ever wonder what happened to all those pumpkins after Halloween? 

A quick trip to the Brownsville landfill gave us the answer.  What were we doing at the dump, you may wonder. Well, the Tamaulipas crow, formerly called the Mexican crow can only be seen here at this landfill so we thought we would pick up a lifelister....instead, we picked up a couple of nails in a tire.

Christmas layaway at the pawn shop.  I don't know if that is funny or sad.

I am not going to embarrass myself by telling you what I thought this said when I first looked at it............. didn't catch on to the fact that peanuts was misspelled,...................I thought the ut  was an i

                                                          

November 13,  2012  11 am cst    67 degres F.

Saw these two bulldogs on Padre Island yesterday................ Winston (top) and Fletcher, (bottom).   Their faces just make you smile, don't they?

 

It was a windy day and there were about 8 kite surfers there.

  It looks like it takes a long time to get to get the kite, strings, etc, all lined up on the beach

 

 

 but once that is done, you put on your harness,

 

 

 

 

get someone to hold the kite up to catch the wind,

 

bend down very crefully to get your board,

And wade in.

 

Then hang on for dear life because you will be moving fast.

 

Friday night we went to the last game of the San Benito football season.

  We went early because it was homecoming and we didn't know how  difficult it would be to get in but as it turned out, we were VERY early.

 As we were getting our bearings , these friendly men asked us where we were from , who we were cheering for etc.

  We obviously were not the usual football attendee as we had no purple on, (both teams wore purple...Weslaco-purple and white; San Benito, purple and grey...the greyhounds),we were older than the average homecommig crowd and didn't seem to know what we were doing.

Anyway, turns out that they are coaches for the Weslaco team and teachers at Weslaco High.  Nice guys.  Sorry for the bad picture..I inadvertanly took the auto focus off and was too stupid to notice.

Anyway, they said that San Benito was already out of the running for the playoffs so would we cheer for Westlaco?  Yep. 

By the way, the teachers... history on the left, English on the right, said that they have a period in each school day for football.  Sort of like a phys Ed class, I guess....if a student doesn't want to play football, they can do some other sport, but part of the teams practice is during the school day.

So we sat on the Westlaco side , right on the 50 yard line but down pretty low.

  

  About a gazillion cheerleaders directly in front of us were very distracting, tho.

 

Distracting for me by shaking those pommy things and making pyramids etc,. but to Neil because he kept saying he thought this particular cheerleader was the second pretiest girl he has seen...Mary Jo being the first.

I have mentioned before that it is a surprisingly sophisticated  stadium.  Here is the scoreboard complete with video and instant replay.

I don't know who was in the bleachers because it looks like most of the school was involved in the evening in one way or another.  Just check out the musical equipment that moved onto the field with the band

then there were these flaggy people and the marching people

I don't know who these people were but I think they just formed a line for the players to run onto the field through.

Then there was the Navy ROTC who held the flag for the Natioal Anthem.

Finally and seemingly endlessly, the introduction of the homecoming candidates..dozens of them. Of interest to me was this partiular thing they do here and I am not sure I have this right but the young  man who helps you find your seat explained to me  like this:

See the young lady on the far right with flowers on the top of her outfit? 

And all those streamers. I guess it is some sort of thing that well wishers send to the candidate to show their support.

 

Finally,..... the game.

Unfortunately, Weslaco played badly and lost the game and the opportunity to go to the playoffs.

It was a long and tiring evening and I am once again glad I am not young and have to do this often.

Next week,  Neil and I  play competition shuffleboard.  Just my style sport. 

What kind of person wears high heels to the beach?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

November 6, 2012 , 4 pm cst     temp.81 degrees f.

Last year we didn't get around to going to the turtle rescue center until well into the winter and then it was too cold and the  pools for the turtles were covered.  We went earlier this year. 

This is Gerry, a male  green sea turtle who spent a lot of time looking at us look at him ...he was waiting for us to feed him some lettuce but there wasn't any available at the time.    How much lettuce does it take to feed a 200 pound turtle, I wonder.  In the sea, he eats mostly sea grass.

 Gerry is a permanent resident of the center and is used in some of their education lectures.  In this capacity, he has met some famous people including  Johnny Carson and David Letterman    

This is the Kemps Ridley turtle, the only one native to our area.  His name is Hang 10 and he is a permanent resident .  He was rescued  when he was young and he will stay here because he has genetic  deficiencies.  Don't know what the deficiencies are but I  think it involves the mouth.  Kemps Ridleys are the smaller sea turtles.

The sex of turtles is determined by the temperature in their nest.  Below 85 degrees= males. Above 85...well, you get the idea.

Turtles only lay eggs every other year and they usually lay hundreds at a time.  There is no menopause for the female turtle..she will lay eggs all her life, but like the director says, once she lays them she is finished with them so .....no hassle raising the kiddies.

This is the director of the center, Jeff George.

Here is something I didn't know: Leatherback turtles eat mostly jellyfish and if you look at this picture, you can see how plastic bags are a danger to them.

Here is a wall of pictures of turtles saved.

Tomorrow, Nov 7th, they are releasing three more rehabilitated turtles.  The public is invited to  go and it only costs $10 each to be on the boat when they go out to do this.

We talked about going but I think I would have a lot of trouble being on a boat.  There really isn't much to see either, so we decided......... .no.

This just doesn't seem like the right wording.  It looks like these dedicated turtle rescue people are riding the highways looking for stranded turtles...perhaps at a bus stop or at a local bar asking for a ride to the nearest seashore.

This is a photo at the rescue center of a hatching.  Because predators get most of the turtle before they can get to the water, volunteers protect the new hatch until they get to the water.  

One in one thousand turtles will make it to adulthood.

We tried to guess who the owner of this car might be.  A felon? A lawyer?  A hard nosed judge?

.We stopped in at Cameron County Park on the way home and the owner of this bait shack asked Neil to stand beside this man while he took a picture.   The young man was supposed to working  and owner of the shop took the picture to show his daughter who is engaged to the young man.  Don't know why he wanted Neil in the picture

Finally on the way home, we stopped at what I thought was the Birding Center to go to the bathroom.  I took the picture because I have never seen a public bathroom so clean and attractive.  Turns out I wasn't at the birding center but at the Convention center and there were a lot of well dressed business people with laptops and briefcases there.
Oh, well, when you gotta go, you gotta go.

Here is another one of those billboards that irk me.  I don't know who sponsors them but it looks like they are aimed at increasing road rage.