My doodles have cycles: a week or two of realism, a couple weeks of abstract line art, a period of typography, etc. Lately, I’ve been doing bird sketches from memory in the margins. I’m not sure if it’s because I still have birds in the brain from Arizona (probably), if I just have birds in my head right now (definitely) or if I am just enjoying doing some realistic drawings of something that I have a fairly decent picture of in my mind’s eye. Regardless, it’s been fun to try to draw a reasonable likeness of some birds from memory in my notebook. Some samples are below. I just wish I had a better scanner for them (the details didn’t come out very well).

For our fourth day, we decided to reverse our previous days’ path, except we still wanted to start the morning at the South Fork. We had heard that many people were hearing the Elegant Trogon* right near the bridge, so we started there. Initially, things were a little slow as the sun was just starting to peek into the canyon, but they quickly picked up as all of the birds started to wake up, producing a magical post-dawn chorus. Numerous Empidonax flycatchers were joined by warblers and orioles in song, while other, quieter birds like the Painted Redstart and several hummingbirds flew about in frantic activity. Vireos and a few warblers (including a few Townsend’s and Wilson’s) were flitting about in the tall sycamores by the creek, while Acorn Woodpeckers competed with Canyon Wrens for top song of the morning. Soon, it was almost impossible to keep up with all of the movement and chittering on the trees.

But all of that became moot when the ‘injured dog’ call of a male Elegant Trogon came from the forest a short distance away from us. I quickly started tracking the call, triangulating to narrow the search. I tried to walk quietly, but with the drought, the density of dried leaves made it very tough. I walked in the creek bed where I could until I had to head back into the brush to find this target bird.

Another birder had offered what turned out to be a valuable piece of information the day before: that the trogon would be closer than the call made it seem – a fact I proved as I was looking about 50′ up a cliff slope, only to find the male bird perched about 15′ in front of me.

I was captivated by the beauty of this bird. I made sure I got some nice looks before I tried to get any pictures, which I knew would be tough with the low light, even with the D300. [aside: I was finally getting a chance to really get out and shoot with the new camera; up until this point I'd only had a couple short opportunities. This trip really gave me a chance to put it through its chops. More on that someday...] It called while I was standing there, and while I got a few ISO1000 shots, I mostly just watched, happy as a kid over a new toy. I tried to call for Shari, but to no avail.

Eventually, another call came from a short distance away, obviously from a female, and the male took off to go find his mate. I followed (I’d love to claim discreetly, but it was hard in those leaves), seeing him again perched in a nearby tree. A few more shots and enraptured observation later, the female called again and he flew to her only about 20′ away from me – and I got a chance to see them mate! Right after that, the male flew off, and I tried to get a few shots of the female, but she wasn’t as obliging.

I was uber-excited, but didn’t want to rub it in Shari’s face since she had started to follow the call but had stopped early on. It ended up not really mattering because only a few minutes later a second Trogon (or the same one, on a repeat performance) called from what sounded like it was right above us. This time the sound was accurate, as he was perched about 50′ up the hill from us.

Shari got to see him quickly before he flew, but to our fortune he flew to a tree only a few feet from the road, giving us great looks if not necessarily great photo ops (although she got this sweet shot – better than I was able to do).

Eventually, the trogon flew off in search of trogonette (trogonella?) love, and we went back to the bridge. The birds were still out in force, with warblers, orioles, hummers and flycatchers galore. I saw my first Plumbeous Vireo, as well as numerous other vireos and Empidonax flycatchers, feeding on the bugs congregated in the trees surrounding the creek. And Shari found the nest of a pair of Painted Redstarts in the bank, where she waited for that one great shot of it entering or leaving the neat (it didn’t oblige).

On to Paradise

We decided to make a trek up the road to visit the very small town of Paradise and the George Walker House located there.  The drive was pretty rough – unmaintained roads, lots of dust and some precarious turns, but at the same time it was beautiful, surrounded by red wind-eroded rocks, scrub bush and cacti.  Every so often we would come to a wash, and although they were all dry, the evidence of water was very apparent as the amount of green in those areas increased exponentially.

We stopped at the nearly-famous Paradise Cemetery to see if we could get lucky and see some Montezuma Quail, but we found little more than a western phoebe and another unidentified flycatcher.  I got a few pictures of the historic gravesites, but then we moved on the George Walker House and Paradise itself.  The House is a B&B that caters to birders, and we were welcomed by the owner to come see her feeders.  Unfortunately, we didn’t see the Juniper Titmice or quail, but we still had a good time.

Lunch Time

After a little while longer here, we decided to take an early lunch, after getting gas in Rodeo (which cost us $2.95/gallon vs $1.75 in Tucson). We went back to the Portal Lodge, where were both had another good meal while were recharged. Then it was off to look for the Yellow-throated Warbler which head been hanging around the town. We didn’t have any luck with it but did get to see several other cool birds in the area of the dry creek: Black Phoebe*, Vermilion Flycatcher* and what would turn out to be my first Phainopepla* (although I couldn’t ID it at the time). There were a host of other birds as well, most taking advantage of the limited pools of water to bathe and drink.

From there we ventured back to the Ranch, where we took it easy. I decided to walk around the property to see what was hanging around. For the most part, it was pretty quiet: a few warblers (mostly Wilson’s), a couple of Curve-billed Thrashers, some cardinals and an oriole or two calling from the trees. And despite my efforts of walking around in the scrub, very few lizards and NO rattlesnakes! [aside: in the 8+ days we spent in the desert of Arizona, I NEVER saw one rattlesnake. How is that possible when you are looking for them?] The one cool thing I did see was a white-lined sphinx moth. Similar to the hummingbird moths we have at home, this one was colored in an orange and pink blend, with heavy white lines across the thorax and abdomen. I never got a picture, but the ID would be provided by another photog when we saw them again at Madera Kubo.

Elf Quest

After making dinner and relaxing for a bit, we got ready to head back to Portal to see one of my target birds: the tiny Elf Owl*. Only 5″ tall, this is the smallest owl in the world, the size of a very thick sparrow (although they still only weigh about 1 – 1.5 ounces). The previous night we were told that the owls (a nesting pair) were like clockwork with their appearances: quarter-to-seven every night, hanging around for 2 or 3 minutes and then flying off. So, we made our plans and set up shop in front of what we thought was the hole. Luckily, someone came by and let us know that it was actually in a different hole, otherwise we would have missed it. As it was, we barely got to see the owl when it did arrive – which wasn’t until about 7:30 in the moment just before dark. The owl had been coming near the hole for about 30 minutes – I could see the barest outlines of a face in the hole through binoculars, but photos were useless even on 6400ISO. Finally, it started creeping out closer to the edge – I got a decent 3-second look and was about to hand the binoculars to Shari when it bolted! Our moment to see one of my target birds and it was over before I had realized it had really begun!

But it wasn’t a total wash. We watched as a great horned owl went flying by in the distance about 20 minutes earlier, and a couple of researchers helped us spot a Whiskered Screech Owl* and (briefly) the Elf Owl as it landed in a tree almost next to the screech owl. But it seemed to panic after only a second or two, so we doused the light and decided to call it a night. The only thing that stood between us and a shower after a long day turned out to be two rather large bulls standing in the yard next to the parking lot where our car was. Arizona seems to have more of a free range attitude for cattle, and this pair seemed to think they had the right of way. Considering their size, we decided to agree and went the long way around.

All in all, not a bad night, considering – three owls and a long-eared bat to boot, but not nearly what I was hoping for. But, considering I got the trogon, everything else was gravy.

Sighting List

Birds

Trip Stats (Species/New): Day: 56 / 11 | Trip: 91 / 53

Still, I’m playing better overall, although it seems like I am only getting one at bat per game, regardless of how long I’m in. Wednesday, I went in for the last 4 innings of the 7-inning game … except it got called after 5 innings, right as I was coming up for my second at-bat. Oh well. But I’m getting the ball out of the infield this year, so that’s nice – last year I would pound the ball in batting practice, and then shank it when it mattered. I was a one-bagger through and through. This year, I’ve got a couple of doubles already and even two of my outs have been sacrifice flies.

Now I just have to get my first home run…

My year started off with seeing a real rarity in our area – a green-tailed towhee. Only the eighth record in the state, I was lucky enough to have it right down the road from me.

A few weeks later, Shari and I went to Barnegat to see what we could see. While we didn’t see anything new there, we were lucky enough to visit the nearby docks to see both eared and horned grebes. While we’ve seen them before, I’d never had a chance to photograph them.

a few weeks ago, I finally made the trip up to N. Jersey to see one of those birds I’ve wanted to see for a long time: a snowy owl. Unfortunately, I didn’t get a hoped look at it, because it decided to hide behind a set of pipes a distance away. As a bonus, however, I got to also see my first rough-legged hawk, which flew in over the same site with a number of northern harriers (including at least one gray ghost). So, while my sighting of a snowy owl was led than dramatic, the day was okay despite the cold.

My latest trip was bank to Barnegat, again with Sylvia, to see if I could see the red-necked grebe or the Atlantic puffin that had been seen there. We didn’t see either of them, but we still had a great time seeing other common residents of Barnegat: common and red throated loons, brant, and the beautiful Harlequin ducks. I have to say that although the numbers if birds were down on this frigid day, the photo opps were still pretty good. And while the shorebird numbers were minuscule, among the other highlights were my FOS snow bunting and horned lark.

But on my way home, I got an email that there were some white-winged crossbills being seen just down the street from my house – if I could only get there in time to catch these finicky birds before they disappeared.

I was lucky – they were there, and in large numbers: 15 – 18 birds of both sexes feeding in a stand of pines. Unfortunately, the birds were way up in the trees, hiding in the shadowy edges of the pines where pictures were tough to come by. So I did something that I’ve been doing more and more of: I just watched and enjoyed. Birding through the eye of a camera lens has its advantages, but sometimes you lose something when you are focused on “getting the shot”. So I have been spending more time with the binoculars and just watching the habits and behaviors of the birds, including those in my own backyard. Granted, I probably won’t see many new birds in my own back yard, but there its something magical about just watching the little bit of the wild we manage to stay with our feeders. It’s something both Shari and I have loved in the past but didn’t have much time to enjoy least year. Hopefully this year we’ll have more time to enjoy ‘our birds’ from our porch.

And look forward to our trip to Arizona in a couple of months, of course.

On the plus side, at least everyone is in the same office now – no 20-minute walks between the offices for meetings.  It’s new and clean and we are going to have the ability to ‘customize’ it a bit once things settle down.  But I’m still not sure about the accomodations.  I liked my old desk because it was big and open, and I had a direct line to my boss when I had a question.  The new desk is smaller and a bit more cramped than I was used to.  But the big problem is that the ‘tubercules’ we sit in now are really isolated from each other.

The rest of the office has a more open style that allows everyone to see each other – although the low walls also means that it gets kind of noisy around there.

There are some things that need to be finalized in the place – I want to see more thorough recycling, and root beer in the soda machine would be nice.  But in the meantime, here are a couple more shots of the place.

That said, I’m hoping that I’m coming down the home stretch for a bit. I’ve launched one of my two side projects (and finished most of what I need to do on the other one – or at least I hope I have…). We’ve launched 3 major projects recently (see below), as well as a number of smaller updates. And we’ve kicked off a double-handful of new work with ridiculously aggressive timelines that it seems like we’ve actgually managed to meet (or have at least done so for my part of it).

Recent Projects

PulmicortRespules.com :: the new brand website which we tore apart and put together to increase its usability and user-appeal. It was especially fun because we were able to do 3 rounds of user studies to nail down what people really wanted.
AKC Pro :: A new tool for physicians to send their patients information about pediatric asthma and Pulmicort.
FacingBipolar.com :: An unbranded website dealing with bipolar disorder/bipolar depression.

Going Forward

So, another week or so of some intense work and then I hope to take some of the time I’ve accrued and saved up for a couple of extra days off. Shari’s going to be busy with a bunch of photography stuff for much of the week, but maybe I’ll get a chance to steal away to Forsythe NWR to see some waterfowl. AND I’m hoping to have some time to catch up on this blog, read the long-neglected blogs of others, catch up on some ia/ux-related articles and blogs, do some photography and basically relax.

And who knows, maybe start planning for a trip to the Orange Bowl in January?

Less than Normal

• The Hypocrisy of the World Wildlife Fund’s Eco Tour (Wired.com)
• I Hate Nature
• Urban Golf (video) – this looks like fun.
• Star Wars Comes to Business – Real-Life Holograms – more impressive was CNN’s election night version. Amazing stuff.
• Earth From Above – looks like an amazing exhibit.

It started with a MUCH-needed morning of sleeping in. Two of the previous 3 nights I had been up until 4:30a.m. and up by 7. So, I slept to a ridiculously late 11:00 in the morning, with my wife keeping the animals occupied and (mostly) out of the bedroom (a feat considering we have no bedroom door right now because we’re rebuilding the door frame). Once I got my lazy butt up, we decided to do something we rarely do anymore – go to the mall and just walk around.

The mall is a pretty big mess right now as they are remodeling about 80% of the place all at the same time (which seems odd if you ask me). We were hoping to hit the remodeled food court for some sushi at Yanagi Too but alas, the mall has only 2 restaurants set up in the new food court – while having the old food court completely under construction. Since Saladworks and DQ/Orange Julius weren’t really what we were looking for, we decided to go hit the only remaining choice – The Bistro – at the other end of the mall. Yes, you read that right – a big mall with only 3 restaurants in the whole place.

But the food was worth it. An open air restaurant with seating around a central ‘kitchen’ in the middle of the mall walkway, the place actually has pretty good food. I got the pepper-crusted tuna ceasar salad, while Shari got Seafood Penne with Vodka Sauce, which was delicious (and probably better than my meal).

After eating, we did that rare thing: shopping. She and I are both relatively anti-shopping, particularly at the mall. As we walked past the stores where we would NEVER go (is the 80′s fashion scheme really coming back?), we had to laugh at how many stores we didn’t even recognize or that had changed since the last time we were there (before Xmas last year). But it was still fun to do a little window shopping and even pick up some new clothes (although she didn’t get any shoes, like she wanted. I’ll never understand the desire for lots of new shoes).

When we were done at the mall proper, we went over to the Container Store and Crate & Barrel. It’s funny, but the stores have been there for over a year, and we always joke about going in (I’m a sucker for cool gadgets and new ideas for how to put up things on my bulletin board) – but we had never made it in. Okay, so we’re strange when it comes to our quests for places to visit. We don’t get out much.

Sunday was spent doing things around the house – and I actually enjoyed doing them. I know that I’ve been so busy and stressed that doing chores has been just that, but this was nice because I did stuff that made the house and yard look better and I had a decent time doing it (sure, I’d rather have been birding, but I could always say that…). It’s nice to be productive AND happy.

In game 1, I had a decent game – 2 for 3 with a double and knocking in one of our 2 runs. In the fields, I made some nice plays although I did miss a grounded that ended up costing 2 runs (although, in retrospect, they were inconsequential since we never even beat their 1st-inning run total). Hopefully we’ll end up stunning the top seed today, but if not we’ll at least have some beer to drown the sorrows.

You can’t make this stuff up

• How to be understood at ComicCon – funny, but I’m a little disturbed that there is both a Klingon Language Institute and an Elvish Linguistic Fellowship
• The Process – What if there were no such thing as a stop sign, and a major corporation had to make one?

This shot just makes me smile – and I needed it after a long day.

I had to go down to Wilmington for some software training today – a prototyping software called iRise that looks pretty cool. Complicated but cool. And of course, after spending today and tomorrow learning it, I have to have a site prototype done in the next 10 days using it. Learning curve = logarithmic.

On the way home, I decided to pop in and see my grandfather at his shop. When I got there, however, I found out that he was in the hospital – they had taken him there a couple of hours before. So, I rushed over to the ER to find out how he was. Luckily, it seems to be mostly dehydration and weakness from not eating for the last couple of days. He sounded very weak and tired when I got there, but a couple of hours of saline and a ham-and-cheese sandwich later, he seemed to have some of his vigor back.

So, back to the emu – and the fact that I makes me laugh. It’s from my trip to see my nephew in April, and I just had to get a shot of this guy trying to stare me down. He won, by the way – I wasn’t going to mess with someone who was looking at me like that.

« See Who are YOU calling UGLY? on Flickr »

“Well, I have good news and great news. Good news – here’s your bonus…” and he slides over a piece of paper to me. I did pretty well, getting some performance bonuses on top of my standard number, which means a little more money (that will be paying off bills, sadly). It’s a nice chunk of change to get, and I’m happy to hear about the ‘performance modifier’, since ir reflects on the work that I did. Granted, I’m not one of the highest-paid CEOs in the area, but it was still nice.

Then comes the bigger news – I got promoted. I’m not a brand-spankin’ new User Experience Lead (UX Lead), meaning that I will have control over throngs of IA minions and their daily pursuits of interactive happiness. Or I would, if we had more people. As it is, there are no minions, so my power is mostly figurative. Or would be, if that was really what I’m going to be doing. In reality, I’ll be managing a book of business and allocating work to different IAs under me … when there are any. As it is now, I’ll be mostly saying, “I like that one and this one, don’t like that one – who can I beg to take this project?”. But later, then my ability to lord over others will commence… bwah ha ha ha!! (« evil laugh).

Actually, I knew that this was coming because I helped develop the position, a new one here at my company. Previously, we had “IAs” but that title was only part of what we do. Our jobs have been hybrids of IA, User Experience, Interaction Design and User Research – making my title something like those casting people in movies: Marty DeAngelo – IA/UX/IX/URx/MOUSE/Jedi Master. This is our attempt to bring all of those disciplines into a single job title, and the new responsibilities are great because they give me more ‘say so’ among the company, the one thing that was a little lacking around here. We’re regarded as the experts, but our influence was a little lower than we would like – this will be a step in correcting that. Better yet, it came with a nice step up in salary, which is always a nice perk.

In Other News

We also had a fairly good weekend, too. Shari went out and got some beautiful shots of my cousin Erin and her fiance, Chas. They are getting married in June and she wanted to do an engagement shoot for their announcement stuff and to study their skin tones. The shot I have up at the top is my favorite of the bunch. The weather conditions were tough, but she did a great job. I worked on ZeroPercentCards.com stuff for Van for a few hours, struggling through a couple hours of ‘Doh!’ moments because I missed an obvious coding error that was throwing everything off. I also worked on our taxes some more – with Shari’s new business, it’s making things more interesting, of course.

We also watched a few more movies. I started Apocalypto when I was sick last week, but haven’t finished because I thought she might want to watch it too. So, instead, we watched our first Netflix movies: “3:10 to Yuma” and “In the Valley of Elah“. The former was really good – Christian Bale is always reliable, and I thought Russell Crowe did a good job, too. I’m not a huge western movie fan, but I liked this one. “Elah” was a great movie – very intense material, but the cast was great and the story was stark, sad and riveting. Despite it having a fairly slow pace, it really did a great job at showing off the effects that modern warfare have not only on the solders but the people around them, too. Tommy Lee Jones and Charlize Theron were brilliant – I haven’t seen all of the Oscar nominees, but I think her performance beat Tilda Swinton from “Michael Clayton” hands down.

Link Compensation

• Journalist becomes the story at Mark Zuckerberg SXSWi keynote – CNET
• Star Wars Link of the Day: If Saul Bass did “Star Wars” – cool new intro concept.
• Pro Golfer Tripp Isenhour should be strung up
• Worst Shots Ever Created: Campus Squeeze
• PicLens