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December 4, 1999 |
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Today's Bird Sightings:
Today's Reading: The Golden Compass by Philip Pullman, Autumn from the Journals of Henry David Thoreau edited by H.G.O. Blake, Faith in a Seed by Henry David Thoreau, The Castle of Indolence by Thomas M. Disch
Copyright © 1999, Janet I. Egan |
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I'm happy to see it there. I kind of wish I'd been able to get off my lazy butt and propose it to RIDEM myself. Now maybe I can get motivated to get the city of East Providence to put up signs at the sewage pumping station specifically for waterfowl identification. It would be so cool if more people got to know and appreciate what a wonderful place the cove is. Our walk on the bike path was fairly short because it was
getting dark and also because we wanted to see the 4:00 PM
show of Princess Mononoke at the Cable Car. We tried
to compress a whole weekend of Providence area activities
into one day so I could go to a family gathering at Donald
& Michael's house tomorrow. We squeezed in the
walk/birding, the movie, and dinner at Pakarang with enough
time left over for me to I loved Princess Mononoke. It was like spending 133 minutes inside a painting. A very lively painting. The animation is visually stunning. It's full of the characteristics I love in Miyazaki: the play of light through the leaves and the attention to tiny details like a kingfisher taking off from a rock or a flock of red-crowned cranes flying by in the background. The first Miyazaki movie I ever saw was Laputa, in Japanese with English subtitles. I remember feeling like I'd fallen inside a video game - constant action pinging all around me. The movie that really hooked me on Miyazaki though was Tonari no Totoro. I watched it with friends who were studying Japanese. It had no subtitles. I recognized about 3 words. But I loved it! In fact as soon as we finished watching it we rounded up another friend and watched it again. As soon as it came out on video in the US (as My Neighbor Totoro) I bought it for the kids. Andrea watched it repeatedly (though, I have to say not as often as The Swan Princess, but that's another story) and could tell me every detail about Mei. Princess Mononoke didn't have quite the same effect on me - I will probably see it again but I didn't feel the urge to repeat it immediately (too violent). It resonated deeply with my budding eco-terrorist soul though. I've been dreaming of wild boars a lot lately. I wonder if I can get some giant wolves and angry wild boars to help me defend the cove against the Corps... |
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For
years now I've wanted to put up signs at Watchemoket Cove to
identify the birds. Suddenly today there's a sign at the
northern end of the cove, referred to by Nancy as "the place
where we always see the great blue heron". The great blue
heron was there as usual and being way more active darting
at things with that huge beak and running along the edge of
the water. In fact I was so focused on watching the heron
that I didn't actually notice the sign until I handed the
binoculars to Nancy so she could watch him. Hey look,
signage!
The
choice of birds described is interesting. The only ducks are
American black duck and hooded merganser. I guess they could
only have one diver and one dabbler. Neither the black ducks
nor the hoodies are as common as say American wigeons or
buffleheads, but they are certainly ducks that the vast
majority of East Bay Bike Path users wouldn't recognize. The
great blue is there of course, along with great egret,
belted kingfisher, greater yellowlegs, double-crested
cormorant and some tree birds I wouldn't have picked as the
most common - but then again I suppose they don't want to
document starlings and house sparrows.
be driving back north at a reasonable hour.