Cooper's Hawk on the wire

Looked out my window today, and saw a young Cooper's Hawk. Must have been all the rain and smells stirred up some interest from this predator.

 

Here are some facts:

(Accipiter Cooperii)
Description: Distinguished from other woodland hawks by a larger head; longer rounded tail and shorter rounded wings. In adults, there is a stronger contrast between back and crown.


Habitat: Prefers mixed woodlands, or streamside groves.
Diet: Preys on songbirds, small mammals, reptiles and amphibians.
Displays: Courtship flight with wings in a deep arc.
Nest: Broad and flat or narrow and deep. Made of sticks and twigs and lined with wood
chips, down, strips of outer bark or green conifer needles.
Eggs: Bluish- white or greenish- white. Usually spotted with brown.
Natural history notes: Uncommon, and may be declining.

Of course, these birds may come and go at will, perched and holding tight until prey is in sight.

And then they are gone....

Glow!

About every 3 years, the Santa Monica beach welcomes art projects set up at night that GLOW.

 The Ferris Wheel also got into the act, it colors from the Mandela created on it's face.

Open from sundown, until 3a- it is a night for reveling in the evening atmospherics.

 

How not to think that this is all pretty priomordial and elemental to our being.

Most enjoyable.

 

AltCar Expo Santa Monica

Granted the newer car technologies - hybrids, electric, natural gas and converted diesel are so much better for the environment, and if all of us were smart, we'd get one!


In rolled about 25 cars - Nissan Leaf,Toyota RAV EV, Mercedes e-cell, Chevy Volt, Toyota Prius Hybrid Synergy Drive, and the very newest, Tesla which were on view and some of them test-driven.

Tesla was only for show....

The Chevy Ecco cars made by GM, were the least expensive (with incentives from the State of California) - with Spark starting at around $18k, but is about as small as they come.

Nissan Leaf are all around....but they require hookups to charge. Again, a small car, but
it has a lot of great features. This is a hugely popular car, especially in Europe.

Leaf EV is driven by a police force in Portugal and they have a range of about 100 mile per charge and can get up to 90 mph.

The most tricked out displayed belonged to Toyota, and the sales team asked me immediately if I wanted to get on video describing my feelings about electric cars for a bottle of water. Not really.

They had cut in half their RAV EV model...which looks a bit weird this way.

Then came the real innovators.....kids from Santa Monica High, calling themselved Team Marina converted a VW Bug into an electric car.

And then explained how they combined the batteries.....exponentially adding to the power of the car.

Here are the details...

And the little engine that could, came from the Peterson Museum - which was a converted Honda Civic, re-created in the 1970's by a group in Los Angeles....It was tiny....but still drove and what a concept that might have been way back then.

Brought to you by Waller from the Peterson Car museum....

Get used to seeing this.....

It's a sign of the times...

Enjoy.

Flatfooting at the Farmer's Market

West coast Appalachian flatfoot teacher and dancer, Rebecca Stout gave a rousing performance at the Santa Monica Farmer's Market this Sunday.  At first the little girls were a tiny bit shy, but
Rebecca's infectious enthusiam got them going.

Oh, what fun....and all with Sausage Grinder - the fabulous country-honky-tonk band - try to catch 'em sometime!


http://www.flatfootandfancyfree.com/

Mornings at 7

It has been much hotter here lately....

and that extra boost of sun, has made us all take notice.

Woke up to see yet another amazing sunrise, and a small bird also taking notice of the day!

A move on

Caught this group heading out....thought it was startlingly beautiful.

And an ode to long summer days!

Forever is finite

Keep the thought in mind that there is no forever.....so, here are some bucket list items!