Life Events and a One Footed Duck

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There isn't much going on here.  The two footed Snowbirds are pretty much gone.  I do not bemoan this fact.  We can now walk right into restaurants, not worry about cars in the right hand lane turning left in front of us and best of all, have great inventory once again at TJ Maxx and Home Goods and the outlet mall parking lot is free of chartered busses with northern plates.  And yes, of course I realize that a  lot of the economy here where I live depends on all of this.  This is my favorite time of the year, those precious weeks where the pool temperature, thanks to solar roof panels, hovers between 85 and 87 degrees, the sun shines, gentle breezes blow and the humidity is nonexistant.  My hair is not frizzy and fluffy.  Below, my annual homage to the now departed Snowbirds.

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Speaking of Snowbirds in venacular other than metaphorical...

We have been adopted by two wild ducks.  We always have ducks that arrive to spend the winter on our little lake.  Last year, in the Fall, we had what appeared to be a male and female pair.  Soon there were six adorable, fuzzy ducklings.  I loved watching them daily.  In the Spring the ducklings were gone.  During the Summer,  I'd catch an occasional glimpse of  two big ducks gliding along the water .  I'm not sure about the babies, if they got big enough to fly north last  Summer or if they were eaten or even if the two who now own us are two babies left behind.   The two ducks are almost always together, one a male (I looked them up, he has blue triangles on his wings and is larger.), the other a female.  The ducks began waddling up to the bird feeders.  One day maybe in mid-March, poof, just like that the zillion Finches and two pair of Cardinals we fed daily flew off and disapperared, abandoning both me and the feeders. The ducks began eating tthe spilled seed.  I noticed the larger duck had a funny waddle/walk.  I then noticed he is missing one foot., probably a gator or snapping turtle bite.  We have some huge turtles.  Maybe even one of those adorable but decidedly vicious otters.. 

So then I became a duck worrier.  I began trying to teach the dogs not to bark at them.  Believe me, it's a really steep learning curve.  I used the same method I used to keep the dogs out of the living room.  For that, I taped a small flag leftover from their shock collar training for the invisible fence to a can of Bush's Baked Beans.  I placed the can at the entryway to the living room and lined up the dogs with collars on and demanded their attention.  Then I'd jump over the can or walk past it into the living room and and start yelling and jumping like I'd been shocked "Ohhhhhhhhhhhh Noooooooooo Owwwwwwww Owwwwwwww Bad Juuuuuuu Juuuuuuuuu!!!!" and the poor dogs would back up all the way into the kitchen scared to death I'd explode or something.   John used to get so mad at me and say I was crazy.  But hey, it worked.  So now as soon as the ducks start to waddle up the bank and one of the four legged creatures starts a soft woof, I start dancing a bit and threatening "bad ju ju, bad ju ju" and the dogs pretty much shut up.  The ducks don't seem afraid of my bad ju ju chant at all.  Then again, they aren't wearing shock collars.  I may not be Caesar Milan, but I try.

Last week , we bought ten pounds of cracked corn at the feed store for the ducks.  We scatter it beneath the bird feeders.  They feed early morning and again around 5PM.  The first night the cracked corn was out was one of my insomnia nights.  About 2AM the motion detector lights (to keep away the piggles) went on and there was a huge fat beady red eyed oppossum under the feeders just munching away.  I'll try to gett his photo next time.

That's my life...