I've got a few new friends

[Oxankle]

I've been running back and forth, here and yonder, trying to find a place to fish, looking at the scenery and get myself oriented.

Once a day I go downtown to the city park and feed the ducks on the little pond they call a lake--they even have a "Lakeshore Drive".

Now when the ducks here me "quack" they come flying down the pond to meet me. I scatter about five pounds of corn and they pick it up about as fast as I can scatter. Must be close to a hundred of them--Mallards, pekins, teal, Campbells and all sorts of piebald and dun crosses.

I also set out a bird feeder outside the window next to my reading chair. Took them a while, but the birdies have found it.

Before long the ducks will be on the bank waiting for me.

[newfieannie]

best thing I did this past year was set up the bird feeder in front of my living room window. I go out every morning and fill the feeder. I swear if I'm a bit late with it they call me. I know they kick up an awful racket until I go out. ~Georgia

[handymama]

Not exactly wild birds, but my chickens would come up on the porch and peck the door til I came out with food if I was late. It was funny.

[Shrek]

The old lady across the road from me hates my bird feeder.

She bought a $40 fancy wood one that she hangs from one of the lower branches of a tree by her kitchen window.

I cut a hole in the side of a 3 liter soda bottle large enough to scoop a liter of seed into and then use the bottle top end to pour a few lines of seed on the front walk for the larger birds and then put a liter of seed in the old plastic feeder by the porch for the smaller birds.

While me and the dogs are watching 40 to 50 birds feed as the sun rises and I read the morning paper and drink a cup of coffee from the front sun porch with my mr heater at my feet on cold mornings, she stands behind her screen door staring at us as five to 10 birds feed at her feeder but she is missing them because her feeder is on the north side of her house and her front door is on the west.

[Oxankle]

LOL, Shrek:
Birdies leave an awful mess under the feeder. I hope your front walk gets rained on often.

Go over there real early some morning and pour grain on the old lady's sidewalk. Then look out your window as she comes to stare.

[light rain]

If I go out to get wood or do some chore outside occasionally a chickadee will perch on a nearby branch and raise Cain. I look over at the bird feeders and shore enough, they are empty. Once they came to the kitchen window to complain...

[RedEarth]

My chickens love to check out the newest additions to my compost pile. Last summer a family of quail moved into the area, and after a while, the quail would sometimes cautiously be on one side, with the chickens on the other. I liked watching their shy semi-interactions.

Oh- it was also really sweet to find a couple baby quail stumbling through the yard and garden. So tiny they could hardly get through the grass!

[cindilu]

Ox, I am so glad to hear that you are making new friends and have something to look forward to every day. Change is hard and esp when you have been at the same place for so long. You leave a part of your heart with moving. So glad you are finding new things to be thankful for and look forward to. Now we just need a picture of said ducks.

[Oxankle]

Well, Heck!! Had this written and it went away.
Not lacking for things to do, Cindy; duck pictures will be forthcoming.

Yesterday we went to buy a Subaru Forester, had the deal made but told the twit we wanted to think it over at lunch. Came back and some $$%#$^$ was signing the papers on it with another salesman. Will probably go to Springfield after one now.

Later went to a graveyard to look up Isaac Reed. Friend bought a safe at an estate sale in OK city, found a deed to a cemetery plot bought in 1922. I found it for him in Prairie Grove, Ark.

Seems that Ike, knowing he was dying, bought the 8-space plot in 1922 and died as planned. Wife, Dora, lived on until 1949, a daughter married well and she and her kin used up four more plots. I asked Ike if he had any plans for next Oct 31. He said Nothing at all!, so I told him we were having a party that evening and he and Dora would be welcome. Told them to bring the daughter and her kin if they wanted. He never did tell me how his deed got to Ok City.

[Oxankle]

Here they are; they won't stay on the bank without feed, and I can't put out enough feed to keep them on the bank while I get out the camera!!! They are like ants at a picnic!