i like stonechats (aka, cartaxo comum). they prefer to perch on top of things, making them super easy to spot and photograph. plus, their colors are quite striking (at least the males), so they easily stand out from other birds. they’re so common here.
the females are a little bit less showy, more muted in their colors, but still easy enough to spot, high on a fence or stick.
we rarely noticed them before we started birdwatching, but once you start looking (really looking), they’re everywhere!
“When I am feeling dreary, annoyed and generally unimpressed by life, I imagine what it would be like to come back to this world for just a day after having been dead. I imagine how sentimental I would feel about the very things I once found stupid, hateful or mundane. Oh, there’s a light switch! I haven’t seen a light switch in so long! I didn’t realize how much I missed light switches! Oh! Oh! And look – the stairs up to our front porch are still completely cracked! Hello cracks! Let me get a good look at you. And there’s my neitghbor, standing there, fantastically alive, just the same, still punctuating her sentences with you know what I’m saying? Why did that bother me? It’s so… endearing.”
― Amy Krouse Rosenthal, Encyclopedia of an Ordinary Life
stumbled on this quote the other day, and found the thought really moving. another book to add to the book pile!
– phase 1 of the garden transformation is afoot: the garden has been sprayed with weed killers to rid it of the stubborn clover and grass. i’m not too keen on herbicide… but after 7 years of trying to unsuccessfully tame the weeds, i give up. it is what it is. next week we should order the little stones and the anti-grass cloth that goes underneath them. i’ve started planting the succulent patch on a reserved corner of the garden, but my dodgy back makes it slow going.
– the air fryer is still going strong! this week, besides roasting veggies for side dishes, we also did some zaatar chicken wings and also some creamy garlic chicken which were quite nice. i’m enjoying exploring it!
– started to knit a sweater for my future baby nephew! maybe knitting sweaters for small creatures will be more successful than knitting sweaters for grown-ups, which so far has proved beyond my patience and ability. i’m using these instructions, which seem simple enough.
– we started the process of hiring someone to help me with support at postcrossing. it’ll take time to interview, choose and onboard the new person, but at last i’ll get some help and (hopefully) stop being so overwhelmed by work all the time. it’s a start!
– i finished book #2 of the neapolitan novels, which invited a trip to the library to get some new books! i got book #3 of the series, then browsed the shelves for a long time and stumbled on a couple of books by portuguese authors (who, coincidentally, were themselves a couple). i love the library!
– we played the game with friends, and it was surprisingly challenging, despite the relatively simple mechanics.
january saw a lot of potatoes, a lot of cozying up at home, the lunar new year, and air fryer’s debut!
– my hair is mostly white around the temples these days, so i paint it now and then (usually when there’s some event coming up) and let it run wild the rest of the year. we had a big meeting on the weekend, so earlier in the week, i painted it — this time, pure black. the color looks a little radioactive in its blackness but it gives me some wednesday addams vibes, and i like it! now, if only the hair paint would stop running into every pillowcase and towel, that would be just perfect.
– book #5 of the year was part 2 of joe sacco’s palestine series. still as gut-punching as the previous one, though the stories are so short and disconnected that sometimes you feel like you’re just getting disjointed glimpses, and not really the big picture. i guess reading a more broad book on the topic would help.
– we had a quote for transforming the space around our house into a minimalistic zen garden (aka, covering the floor with little stones), and we’ll probably go ahead with it soon. it’ll be nice to have a clean space that isn’t overgrown with clover and stubborn grass, and the succulents will migrate to a smaller patch in the front of the house. i look forward to the end result.
– it’s tree-planting season and so, off we went to marinha grande to re-forest a bit more of the huge pine forest that burned there in 2017. the weather was perfect, and it felt wonderful to be out there with friends, chatting the whole time and getting those tiny maritime pines planted. the ground there is mostly sand, which makes for really easy digging!
– we spent a couple of days up there with our local friends, before driving back south on sunday. they took us to explore s. pedro de moel, and we ended up having lunch at alcobaça, where the food (and especially the conventual sweets) are to die for.
– the month of letters is on! i started out strong, but failed to write in the days we were up north… no matter — i will try to do better the rest of the month, now that we’re back home and our calendars are free until the end of february.
– less than 50 days to taiwan! :D