National Bird Day

Porte Musings:

Time to get out and look for a snowy owl. Today is National Bird Day. A day set aside to reduce the pain and suffering of caged birds. Keep your caged birds clean, happy and well fed. When you buy a bird, be prepared to keep it for a lifetime (some live for 100 years).

Today is also National Whipped Cream Day. So indulge a little and add some whipped cream to your coffee or dessert.

On the 12th Day of Christmas (and the last) my true love gave to me:

12 drummers drumming
Eleven pipers piping
Ten lords a-leaping
Nine ladies dancing
Eight maids a-milking
Seven swans a-swimming
Six geese a-laying
Five golden rings (five golden rings)
Four calling birds
Three French hens
Two turtle-doves
And a partridge in a pear tree

The Christmas tree is down and we’re ready for the Epiphany. COVID restrictions began again today for a minimum of 21 days. A Stay-cation credit has been added to our tax exemptions for this year, if you’re rich enough to stay anywhere other than home. 2022 is already looking like a repeat of the last 2 years.

The season of failure
is the best time for sowing
the seeds of success.
~ Paramahansa Yogananda (Indian – Leader / January 5, 1893 – March 7, 1952)

Holidays and Celebrations:

National Bird Day
The Twelfth day of Christmas

Porte Musings:

We are finally at the 12th day of Christmas and the end of the Christmas Season for 2020/21. This is the first time I’ve left my Christmas tree up until the end of Christmas and it will be coming down on the Epiphany (tomorrow). My Ukrainian friends and co-workers waited until January 6th to celebrate Christmas. One of my friends always said it was great because Christmas trees and presents were cheaper. One of the things I miss most about working was the multi-cultural and multi-ethnicity of my co-workers. All of the different ideas that I was exposed to by just going to work and being able to to put a face to the colours and cultures. Especially during lockdown we’re limited to our own little world and ideas.

Thank goodness for the internet and the way it has opened the doors to so many new things. Virtual tours of almost anyplace you would want to go and almost anything you want to learn. Allowing families to see each other and lessening their isolation. But a virtual tour doesn’t compare to the feeling of snow on your face as you toboggan down a hill or the sound of the wind in the Rio Valley tree tops.

The dwarf mallards in today’s picture are a variant that I’ve found only at my local conservation area pond. They are only about 2/3’s the size of the other mallards on the same pond. These females are also brighter and more caramel coloured that the other females. Their heads are also more rounded and compact. Apparently the small sized mallards are referred to as “Call Ducks” a domestic variety that was bred to lure other ducks by hunters.