Sunday, August 24, 2008

Our Neighbour


This is our resident barred owl.  Not terribly concerned about humans apparently. She can be seen afternoons and evenings in the spring and summer perched near one of the ponds waiting for salamanders to surface.  Sometimes you can hear her young fuzzy ones hissing hungily, deeper in the woods.  The behbehs are harder to spot and very difficult to photograph.  There are usually two behbehs waiting for their poor overworked mom to feed them.  Often the mother is set upon by chipping birds who dive at her on her perch, sometimes literally colliding with her in a vain attempt to scare her away. Squawking crows then often join in on the harassment. If she swoops down and catches something, the crows will chase her and try to steal her prey. The crows and chipping birds often alert us of the owl's presence.

One evening I heard an awful desperate squawking which abruptly ended after a few seconds. It was disturbing because I was not able to identify what creature was making the sounds. On Katie's walk that evening we discovered the grizzly explanation. Exactly centred between the two large hollow cedar stumps that straddle the driveway, near the bridge, we came across a freshly severed crow's head. Well, the beak and half the head, still wet with scarlet blood droplets.
I guess she had had enough.  We have not heard the crows squawking after her since.

Creeeepy.

Monday, August 11, 2008

The Roadrunner

My honey on a practice run with me following (and filming) on my bike.

Friday, August 8, 2008

What the largest automobile manufacturer in the world can't do on the ground...





What's this? No suit, No tie? No multi billion dollar Corporation?
And no flight suit either.

Thursday, August 7, 2008

Q: How Many Dolts Does It Take To Screw Up A Volt ?

A: General Motors

The General Motors guide to making an electric car that won't sell.

1: Make it UGLY
2: Make people wait way too long so they get bored of it.
3: Make videos of it driving 2mph in a cul-de-sac and call that promotion.
4: Sell the battery technology that got the EV1-genII a range of 150 miles. Then claim that there is no battery available to use in the Volt.
5: Use negative suggestion in your advertising "Don't forget to recharge the car" 
6: Don't sell it, lease it.
7: Wait for gas prices to drop, then don't make it some more.

Wednesday, August 6, 2008

Too Much Fun

Riding a lot this summer now that Arturo has the right gearing.  I now have an 8 tooth front sprocket and a 60 tooth rear. The new Scott 2 hp motor runs at a higher rpm now that it's got 24v coursing through it's copper veins. That tiny sprocket sure is noisy though.  It's super torquey and accelerates like mad.  I get stopped at least once every trip by people fascinated by it.  

My honey has been taking Stella to work regularly and loving it. She found it a little terrifying at first but was determined to ride.  Now she's hooked.  When we go out together we turn more heads than a Ferrari on fire.  It takes some getting used to. Being the focus of a car full of screaming, pointing kids is not something I had ever imagined.