Halloween morning
Oct. 31st, 2003 02:31 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
senoritafishI'm sitting at Point Fermin, looking out at whitecaps in the Catalina Channel. There was rain on my windshield on my way to the docks yesterday - "No, don't rain here! Go east!" I urged the clouds. Only spatters of it though. Although the weather has gotten cooler and moister, the winds where the fires are still high. Today, there is supposed to be a storm blowing in this evening, which I hope will help even more. It's certainly windy out at sea; it doesn't look like any of the boats went out last night.
I still have a cold. I lost my voice and either my tonsils or my Eustachian tubes must be inflamed because it hurts on either side of my throat when I swallow or cough, and of course the nose, but I'm the most mobile adult in my family. My father has bronchitis and is coughing all night long - I told him to go to the doctor so it doesn't turn into pneumonia. John tells me his sinuses feel like they're going to explode out of his face and he reinjured his back as well. We were supposed to go to the pumpkin patch last night for Gareth's birthday, but we're all too sick, and John's mom thought it would be too ashy anyway. I feel bad about this; we've been going every year since the night before he was born.
Yesterday, while I was sampling one of boats, a woman getting off the boat started gesturing at me with some paper towels. When I went over, she handed them to me. "What the heck," I was thinking, and when I started to open them, I saw dark gray feathers!
"You have to take him," she told me, "If I let him go here, he'll get eaten." It was true enough; where the boat was unloading was nearly shoulder-to-shoulder with Western gulls waiting for squid to be dropped, who would be quite happy to prey on a small bird. Uncovering the little bird's head revealed he was a storm petrel (looking very much like the second picture on this page), little sea birds usually found a long distance from land. Consulting my bird book later, I figured he was either he was either an ashy storm petrel or a least storm petrel. I had nothing to put him in and I needed to finish collecting my sample, so I took him down to end of the wharf where there was a much fewer number of gulls, and uncovered him. He hopped awkwardly on my hand a couple of times, then fluttered down to water, took a drink, then took off oceanward. My heart sank when, unfortunately, a lone gull noticed and arrowed after him like a hawk. But the petrel ducked in and out under the oil docks south of the markets and the gull appeared to give up, so I hope he made it back out to sea. When I got back to the boat I was sampling, I found gulls had eaten my squid sample so I had to start over.
I was planning to look for some boys clothes that match those worn by Ed, Edd & Eddy, because Angus and Gareth had wanted to be the latter two for Halloween, but last night John’s mom brought over two fireman coats with matching hats. They were quite delighted with them, and Angus decided, "I’ll be Eddy next year." A little disappointing, because I was kind of looking forward to put something together for them, but it saves me a lot of time. I was drawing a blank trying to figure out how I was going to make those three hairs Eddy has on Angus's head. Edd (Double D) would have been easy because he wears a hat. Avalon is going to be a squid. I hope it doesn’t start raining until after I can take them trick or treating (if I’m up to it No, it’s too fun to miss).
Aha! Here comes Sea Queen around the Point. My sitting here waiting has not been in vain. Time to head over to Terminal Island. Off I go...
I still have a cold. I lost my voice and either my tonsils or my Eustachian tubes must be inflamed because it hurts on either side of my throat when I swallow or cough, and of course the nose, but I'm the most mobile adult in my family. My father has bronchitis and is coughing all night long - I told him to go to the doctor so it doesn't turn into pneumonia. John tells me his sinuses feel like they're going to explode out of his face and he reinjured his back as well. We were supposed to go to the pumpkin patch last night for Gareth's birthday, but we're all too sick, and John's mom thought it would be too ashy anyway. I feel bad about this; we've been going every year since the night before he was born.
Yesterday, while I was sampling one of boats, a woman getting off the boat started gesturing at me with some paper towels. When I went over, she handed them to me. "What the heck," I was thinking, and when I started to open them, I saw dark gray feathers!
"You have to take him," she told me, "If I let him go here, he'll get eaten." It was true enough; where the boat was unloading was nearly shoulder-to-shoulder with Western gulls waiting for squid to be dropped, who would be quite happy to prey on a small bird. Uncovering the little bird's head revealed he was a storm petrel (looking very much like the second picture on this page), little sea birds usually found a long distance from land. Consulting my bird book later, I figured he was either he was either an ashy storm petrel or a least storm petrel. I had nothing to put him in and I needed to finish collecting my sample, so I took him down to end of the wharf where there was a much fewer number of gulls, and uncovered him. He hopped awkwardly on my hand a couple of times, then fluttered down to water, took a drink, then took off oceanward. My heart sank when, unfortunately, a lone gull noticed and arrowed after him like a hawk. But the petrel ducked in and out under the oil docks south of the markets and the gull appeared to give up, so I hope he made it back out to sea. When I got back to the boat I was sampling, I found gulls had eaten my squid sample so I had to start over.
I was planning to look for some boys clothes that match those worn by Ed, Edd & Eddy, because Angus and Gareth had wanted to be the latter two for Halloween, but last night John’s mom brought over two fireman coats with matching hats. They were quite delighted with them, and Angus decided, "I’ll be Eddy next year." A little disappointing, because I was kind of looking forward to put something together for them, but it saves me a lot of time. I was drawing a blank trying to figure out how I was going to make those three hairs Eddy has on Angus's head. Edd (Double D) would have been easy because he wears a hat. Avalon is going to be a squid. I hope it doesn’t start raining until after I can take them trick or treating (
Aha! Here comes Sea Queen around the Point. My sitting here waiting has not been in vain. Time to head over to Terminal Island. Off I go...
