Urgent owlet update...and other stuff

Photo credit: Sister in law Unit.

A while back I posted a picture of a baby great horned owl that was born on our hill. I'm pleased to say that he survived and has now taken to venturing forth. This isn't quite the same as fledging, according to the Spousal Unit. Apparently that is like moving out. Instead, the little critter is branching, which entails a return to the nest. You can see both in the picture above, with the nest in the upper left and the owlet in the lower right.

YOU REALLY CAN'T. I've often mentioned here my campaign to update state motto of West Virginia from "Mountaineers Are Always Free" to "You Can't Make This **** Up." This column by statehouse reporter Phil Kabler has a priceless example in it.

COAL-LAPSE. There's been a lot of coverage about the decline of coal. This AP article suggests it's happening faster than anticipated. Note that the article attributes most of this to market conditions rather than a certain Muslim socialist of questionable American birth.

SPEAKING OF SUBSTANCE ABUSE. I knew things were bad, but I didn't know things had gone this far.

A spring arrival

Photo credit: Sister in Law Unit.

Spring is here and one unexpected sign of it is a baby great horned owlet that was recently born on our hill. He (or she) is pretty cute.

Speaking of spring, here's a great quote about it by George Orwell. I posted this on Facebook a while back. Sorry for the duplication but something this good deserves to be read more than once.

“ I think that by retaining one’s childhood love of such things as trees, fishes, butterflies and—to return to my first instance—toads, one makes a peaceful and decent future a little more probable…

At any rate, spring is here...and they can't stop you enjoying it. This is a satisfying reflection. How many a time have I stood watching the toads mating, or a pair of hares having a boxing match in the young corn, and thought of all the important persons who would stop me enjoying this if they could. But luckily they can't. So long as you are not actually ill, hungry, frightened or immured in a prison or a holiday camp, spring is still spring. The atom bombs are piling up in the factories, the police are prowling through the cities, the lies are streaming from the loudspeakers, but the earth is still going round the sun, and neither the dictators nor the bureaucrats, deeply as they disapprove of the process, are able to prevent it." George Orwell, Some Thoughts on the Common Toad

 Orwell didn't explicitly mention owls, but I think he'd be down with them.

Words and birds

"Auspicious" is a great word that shows up now and then on solemn occasions, but the etymology is kind of interesting. It is related to the word auspice, Latin auspicium, meaning someone who looks at birds.

Lots of peoples historically and probably now as well look to signs from the flight of birds for omens. The Romans were particularly bonkers about it. We got the word auspicious from those times when the signs from the birds were favorable.

I kind of wish the Spousal Unit and I had an auspicium with us on a hike we took this weekend. It happened really fast--too fast to take a picture. We saw in broad daylight an owl fly by with a young rabbit in its claws.

It's still unclear how auspicious it was. We thought it was cool, but the rabbit probably had his own take on the situation.

DOS AND DON'TS. Here's economist Jared Bernstein on how to handle a fragile economic recovery.

SLAVERY IN THE MODERN WORLD is alive and well.

THE STATE OF THE OCEANS: not good.

WHY DIDN'T WE JUST KEEP HUNTING AND GATHERING? Archaeological evidence suggests that the rise of agriculture was a downer for those involved. After spending several hours pulling weeds this weekend, I can see why.

GOAT ROPE ADVISORY LEVEL: ELEVATED