Late Day EXCITEMENT!!

 There was a big 3 on my clock this morning.  There are lots of OKAY numbers, and 3 is not one of them.  I can tell you that a train comes by every morning at 3:30 am.   EVERY   SINGLE   MORNING.  If I keep going to bed earlier and earlier, I'll end up being a night owl, something I have NEVER ascribed to.

That makes it pretty easy to capture the morning sunrise since it doesn't come up until almost six.  It starts out looking like this.

Ever so slowly, the sky begins to change.  Wouldn't it be nice if it would just drop a ton of rain and cool the place off?

But NO .... instead we are regaled with beautiful clouds and colors.  It wasn't a spectacular morning sunrise, but ANY sunrise is better than none.  It means I lived to fight another day.

Judith was right about the Rufous hummingbirds.  I happened to see one on my wildlife page yesterday, which talked a little about them.  Mean little buggers.  Maybe it's because they are the smallest.  They fight like a banshee for their sugar territory.  That's one at the very bottom.  This feeder that I put out at 7:00 in the morning, was empty by 6:00 at night.

It was a pretty blah day.  Another quilt bites the dust.  Almost anyway ... for now I have to cut and sew the binding on. 

Christmas happened about 3:00 in the afternoon.  Finding parts for a sprinkler valve from a company that is out of business has been difficult at best.  Apparently someone is making new valves now, with many of the same parts and pieces.  These are new caps and seals for the backflow system, hopefully to stop the little bit of leakage that continues.  Bob and I are still having "valve" conversations, but at least it's working.

And more sewing.  My fingers are a little stiff and sore this morning.  Yes there is a way to machine stitch these on, but I prefer the look of hand sewn.  With the machine, you are sewing blind on the back, and it never comes out straight and even.  That's probably just me.

At long last, it's time for bed.  I'm yawning in my soup and so tired I missed the bull riding at the last rodeo.  We can't have THAT!!  So instead, let's get revved up and be awake for the next two hours!!!

As I set my house alarm every night, I look out the window to be sure the rat-deterring lights are on.  I saw something on my walkway.  IT CAN'T BE!!  NO WAY!!  Is that a snake????  I looked not twice, but THREE times.  Why in the world would a snake be laying right out in the light?  We just had a nice little five minute downpour ... if he was in a hole, maybe it got flooded?  Or maybe he was just born??????

He's a baby for sure, barely ten inches long.  Of course you know me ... doesn't matter if they are ten inches or 30 inches ... a snake is a SNAKE!!  As I'm contemplating this, he doesn't move, even when I got closer for a picture and he's resting his head on a rock.  That's weird!!  That pretty much tells me he's just been born.

The eyes and the tail tell the story.  If they have slits for eyes, it's venomous and of course if they have rattles ... but babies haven't shed their skin yet ... so no rattles.

But they DO have the telltale black and white section with a tiny nub, as shown in this picture from the Arizona Poison Control Center.  By the way, babies are born in July and August.  Appropriate, yes?  Just my luck.

And so ... I apologize to all the wildlife enthusiasts out there, but Rainbow Bridge.  I just can't take a chance of him crawling under my gate into the back yard where Mr. Cooper hangs out.  Of course he's never out there without me being 3 feet away, but I can't roll the dice.  I don't really want to get bit either.

Hey ... let's try to get some sleep now, yeah???  Well obviously, that would be a big NO.  I spent the next hour with my thoughts looking something crazy like this sky.  You just never know what you're going to find in the desert ... right outside your back door ... on your stepping stones!!!

It's still pitch black outside, so I'll wait awhile before I head on down for the game camera.  No use taking a chance of running into another baby.  They have 8-15 at a time, so you know what THAT means!!!  Oh yeah ... there are probably seven more slithering around outside my house somewhere!!!