N is for Nature (and Newsworthy)

Last night's local news coverage gave the scantiest of passing nod to some of yesterday's best events.

First, the local university engineering department won the regional concrete canoe contest. (Sorry, no pics. I was there but my camera wasn't.) Now it is on to the nationals in alabama for them.


Second was the painting of the N by local students looking for an expression of their creativity. Having missed that event, I planned to at least hike up there this morning to capture photographic evidence. Didn't even get close...because...I got distracted by

A BABY OWL NEST

Just goes to show that not all babies are cute. This little guy doesn't even take much after

the parents who were hovering nearby.

They must be very ashamed of that ugly baby with his

scary looking, beady eyes.

More from the Kid's Hike

I'm pretty sure it is too early for rattlesnakes, but was still really hoping Jack wouldn't get into one. Even though he has had his rattlesnake bite vaccine, it still could harm him. But, he proved himself a fine companion once again, staying right with us and never once going off the trail. Here he is being good with a 4 yr old we met while out. He didn't even try to go for the kid's cookie. (Just sniffed and licked it a little-same as the little kid did.)

The two kids at the front and right side of this photo were with me. The rest we met at the top. Note the snack my Su-Bin (5 yr old with hat in hand) is holding. One of the grandmom's was passing out snacks to her kids and while my back was turned he hopped in her line and snagged one-even though we had our own. He's cute, but a handful.

It was very bright up there, so, when I took this picture of the downtown area I didn't even notice the N on the hill.

That is the same N previously featured in this blog.

Spring Break

The kids have been duly taken on their promised hike. I had in mind this easy trail for them, but, nothing doing!
They wanted to go across the street and climb up Rattlesnake "Mountain".

I had been up there before and knew it was do-able for the kiddies. It overlooks the airport (and many other places). Mr. Sunny and I have been there at dusk and enjoyed watching planes coming in for a landing. It seems they are right over your head so that you should almost be careful tossing rocks for fear of hitting one. We were there at the wrong time of day for landings this time, but, here is one taking off.

But, that is not why Daniel is holding a rock in this photo. He carried one up in the hopes of finding a rattlesnake to gently encourage away from the path by the softest little bop on the head.

We did not see a rattle-snake, or an anaconda ,or a bald eagle, or anything on the list of wild-life they were hoping to spot. The trip was not a total loss. They did enjoy a very brief sighting of the world's fastest lizard (Who wouldn't run?) with some other spring-breakers we met at the top.

The last vestiges of winter?

Don't know.
Hope so.

Hard to tell though.

As was opined recently by a good blogger,

"I love northern Nevada…but springtime here can be a killer*. She teases you with 70F one day and then drops the daytime temps to 46F the next."

(* I use a different word to describe 'lady' Spring around here.)

Not EVERY cloud has the silver lining

but, I barely took notice last week when this happened (yes, those are snowflakes falling down), because

A) I had to work that day anyway, so, it wasn't messing up my plans or anything.

B) These things happen in Spring. You have to take it in stride. It doesn't last too very long.

C) It made for a pretty good time taking puddle pictures the very next day

on which I happened to be off

and it was SUNNY.