To interrupt my regularly scheduled blog...

I'm in the process of combining my two public blogs. My concept for Kt's Nature ID companion didn't pan out. While I like sharing some personal information, I'm uneasy about sharing too much for internet consumption. Do you know what I mean? Now I'm going to relegate my companion blog for testing and playing around with blogger and coding features. Plus, I'm finding it's too time consuming to keep up with multiple blogs, Twitter, and flickr. Until I get organized, here's a little tidbit to show a new label, shout out to awesome blogs and sites:

I had the opportunity to watch Karate Kid recently since the mid-80's. Ah, I miss the simpler times and seemingly innocent life experiences. Thanks to the power of the internet, I found this on YouTube: Funny or Die's Wax On, F*ck Off with Ralph Macchio.

LMAO! This is my generation in a nutshell. Again, what was I saying about too much information? Seems every celebrity in the news these days has behaved in some heinous fashion, and why it makes "news" is beyond me. All I can do is shake my head and appreciate those who use their fame for good, like Angelina Jolie's work with UNHCR. I still remember when her tattoos and marriage blood vials with Billy Bob shocked the public.

"Haha. You're so sweet, baby. Why don't you come back when you turn 18, okay?"

So, I've been deliberating over actually mentioning the following nature bloggers. They like curse words, but in some ways it helps me laugh and not take things too seriously:

Fuck You, Penguin
Bourbon, Bastards and Birds
The Drunkbirder... Birding From The Hip Flask.
The Drinking Bird (Nate doesn't regularly curse, but his blog name fits the theme)

And, one last shout out to an ol' friend Friday Jones who inked parts of Angelina.

fiery skipper ~ 09/11/10 ~ Monterey

female fiery skipper on lantana
Hylephila phyleus on Lantana sp.
Verbenaceae

Finally, there's some color to my blog! We had so many days of drippy, wet fog here for more than a month that my mood has been in the damper, as evidenced by my infrequent and grumpy posts as of late. There are several activities going about town this weekend. After our respective morning runs and power walks, we pumped up the air in our bicycle tires and tootled around to check out the Triathlon at Lover's Point, Cherry's Jubilee in Cannery Row, and the Festa Italia in Monterey's Custom House Plaza. Sigh, it was a good day.

I guess I should comment about the skipper and flower. I'm 90% sure of the lepidopteran ID. Like crescent butterflies there is much variation within skipper species, not to mention sexual dimorphism. As for the lantana, while we have a couple native species according to Calflora, this one was in a container and so it goes under my * garden flowers label. It's apparently a very popular garden plant to attract butterflies and the like.

Hope you're having a good weekend, too.

about festivals and traditions

Festa Italia bocce tournament

Custom House Plaza, Monterey, CA

In the past many weeks, we attended the Turkish Arts & Culture Festival (Jul 31 - Aug 1), Congregation Beth Israel's Jewish Food Festival (Aug 29), Monterey County Fair (Sept 1-6), Monterey Bay Greek Festival (Sept 4-6), and Festa Italia (Sept 10-12)... and not to mention a family reunion in Fresno, CA.

Apologies, checking links and will finish writing later. To be continued...

ps 09/14/10 - I had thoughts to write about why I love cultural festivals and to relegate stories of my first generation grandparents (Norwegian, German, Armenian, French), while I hail from Korea. Am I in the proverbial melting pot or a chopped salad? Writing about this felt like it was becoming a dissertation, so I'll leave well enough alone.

habitat ~ 09/02/10 ~ Harkins Slough

Harkins Slough

September 2, 2010

Unless I suddenly decide I don't mind hauling around cumbersome equipment (heavy cameras, big phallic lenses, tripods, etc...), I doubt I'll ever get a decent picture of the American white pelican (Pelecanus erythrorhyncho). Yep, those white blobs in the first two pics are white pelicans mixed in with a bevy of gulls. My friend I was visiting had a massive scope, which I declined since I wasn't sure where or how we were getting around the farm during my visit.

Oh, the organic farm sits right alongside Harkins Slough, hence this habitat location label. It looks like the slough area has changed since the main road (as evidenced by the submerged power poles) is now covered and many shrubs have died from the flood of water. Apparently the birds like it.

As a side note and in line with my other comments about seasonal birds in the area, I'm a little curious why a couple reputable online bird sites (Cornell and WhatBird.com) and the ever present Wikipedia state white pelicans only overwinter along coastal CA. Considering the last time I saw white pelicans was in May and my friend says she's seen them around the farm all summer, this seems to be a glaring trivial error. Stan Tekiela's Birds of California seems to get it right in saying white pelicans are a non-migrator in most of CA and includes the only correct map of seasonal presence I've found. This, my blog readers, is the reason why I'm so persnickety about backdating all my post to the dates of my photos and why I try to keep my blog posts writing to what I experienced first-hand, versus paraphrasing and promulgating potentially incorrect information.