I had to open the umbrella again this morning... Clear skys, bright sunshine, slightly foggy air made it unbearably, glaringly brite. Opening the umbrella I woke a anole that had taken refuge inside the closed fabric... he is still roaming the fabric looking for breakfast. The morning an hour after…
There was no sunrise this morning. A cool blustery darkness greeted my appearance on the back porch. It was so dark for so long I had trouble sipping from my insulated travel mug. I couldn't see the hole in the top... black on black in an unaccustomed blackness. And to…
Walking out before "first light" in the morning, the sliver of a moon hangs like a stylized bowl just a bit above the horizon. Once the sky lightens enough to photograph though, that bare sliver fades into the background. By the time the shot above was taken, three separate flights…
A school day, laundry day, early voting day... I'll be busy today. Since it is a school day, I'm on the back porch before the eastern horizon began to color. It's cool, but it's not that cool... so the ceiling fans are on chilling my hair still damp from my…
Fog. The weather prognosticators say it's a dense fog. Out here on the back porch it's as dense as I've seen this fall... but not really all that dense. Just another fall sunrise of cool portents. The dense air is helping the traffic sounds travel from the bypass with a…
Ahhhhhh, sleeping in on a Saturday. Yesterday's windy, rainy weather has moved on to the northeast. Delta has churned her/his way onshore and into the interior were it's still spinning and looking very much like a Hurricane on land. According to the prognoticaters, this coolish morning will have to last…
Another blustery near miss morning. Hurricane Delta is about 180 miles south-southeast of Galveston. This morning's winds are blowing almost east to west at the moment. A few weeks ago the morning temperature would have made me smile, but after a couple of weeks of fall-like temperatures I'm just not…
I slept a bit late this morning since my daughter is home to start her kids off with school. Stepping out on the porch I was greeted with overcast skies. Looking at the radar I can see these are the outer bands of Hurricane Delta starting to move into our…
Fall Morning Redux The whistling ducks flying over each morning keep growing in number... even as they loose all coherence as a flight. Flying over this morning I was reminded of watching a mob move through an environment. I was unable to really gauge there number, but at a guess,…
Another fall morning on the back porch that luckily actually feels like fall. Whispy clouds hide in the first light color. The sunrise should make them pop. The stars are fading rapidly in the lightening bowl of the sky. Birds are singing. Crows are cawing. The whistling ducks flew over…
In order to enjoy this beautiful fall morning on the back porch I had to break out the big umbrella. The stand has managed to get itself broken, but that's ok, it works great laid over on it's side... The morning flight of whistling ducks keeps getting larger. It appeared…
Saturday morning... an hour and a half of extra sleep... a cool fall morning. Quiet, the only sounds are traffic roar from the bypass... louder on this side of the house. Well... karma seems to have caught up with our president***. His politicalization of masks and social distancing seems to…
7:35 am Full Moon Setting 7:36 am Sun Under Horizon Walking out to last night's full moon settling towards the western horizon as the sun rises to the east... nice. This is what the sunrise schedule is for this morning as we slide into fall. 6:00am Start of astronomical twilight…
It looks like another cool, cloudless morning. The eastern glow has gone from pink to yellowish. The most prominent sound is of tires on concrete coming from the bypass. Though, the mockingbird is doing it's best to try and outdo the traffic. A flight of great egrets flew over just…
6:45 am The first real autumn morning. No ceiling fans required. The prognosticators promised a low in the 50's and they were blessed in their foretelling. The flock of whistling ducks grows larger by the day as it circles my house as the sky brightens. This morning it's the cardinals…
It's a warm and muggy pre-cold front start to the day. The first front is around Waco heading our way. There are enough clouds out over Galveston Bay to make the sunrise interesting even if a temperature of 77 degrees doesn't make it very comfortable. There's an owl softly calling…
The sun rose over an hour ago. It's warmer and there's enough humidity to fog my glasses just a bit as I walked out. I had to increase the speed of the ceiling fans back to full power. The hummingbirds are fighting as usual. A daddy longlegs scurries across the…
I'm on the front porch this morning. Another below seventy degree morning. The crows are congregating, not quite a murder yet, but gathering... playing at follow the leader. Big black velvety birds with a big, area filling call. I slept thru sunrise. My favorite weekend activity in these pandemic times.…
It really feels of fall this morning. Sixty-six wonderful degrees. What I am assuming is a clear sky... if there are clouds they aren't evident yet. A color on the eastern horizon even before first light. Birds singing, crows announcing themselves on their morning rounds. Theirs a low hazy ground…
Sunrise facing southeast. The temperature outside this morning is delightful. A couple of degrees below that magical 70 degrees Fahrenheit on the thermometer. And after days and days of winds from Beta, it's still this morning. The outsized remnants of Beta have moved into Alabama and Tennessee. Once the storm…
According to the almanac it's first light right now... but Tropical Storm Beta is putting a lie to that. The only light in the sky is the reflection of civilization on the underside of the cloud cover. It's loud out, the blustery, gusty winds are making the leaves sing. Shadows…
It's a cool, breezy morning. Our first fall-like morning of the late, almost over summer season. But, don't worry, the heat and humidity will be back... we're not done with summer here on the Texas gulf coast. As a matter of fact, as you can see from the radar image…
The silence thirty minutes before sunrise is deafening. The overcast sky just barely lighter than the shadowy blackness of the trees. Though there is enough of a glow to the sky to make the ground visible. The Houston/Galveston eathglow effect. The first bird calls. Then another. A breeze stirs the…
Yesterday's sequence of photos inspired me to do it again once I saw the morning sky... First Light - Dawn The first shot was at Dawn... first light in the sky. The noun dawn refers to the first light of day, or the first time period, like the dawn of…
It's not cool, but it's not that warm either. Pairs of crows keep flying over heading south... raising a ruckus as only crows can. The day gradually lightening as the sun approaches the horizon. The hummingbirds chatter at each other as they bully their way to dominance at the feeder...…
It's a strange morning, no color in the east... what color there is is in the west as the sun rises. In the east it's bands of clouds flowing across the sky from north to south... filling in as the minutes tick by. While around the porch the hummingbird battles…
The sun is well up. Birds are singing. The hummingbird wars continue. The coolness of yesterday morning is fading into memory like a barely remembered dream. The promised rains keep teasing us on an almost daily basis. Thunder, lightning, a bit better breeze... and then 5 minutes of lite rain…
I love weekends. Before covid, I slept in most days... even through the summer I didn't have to get up early. Now that school has started, and virtual school does keep a school schedule, I'm up before the sun five days a week. So... I love weekends... again. I doubt…
There's a difference in the feel of the air this morning. For one thing it's cooler. For another, the clouds are drifting south instead of the more normal northerly direction. I don't know that the front ever made it this far before falling apart. But it really got close. But,…
Once again we are being promised a fifty percent chance of rain. The prognosticators are also foretelling of highs next week in the upper eighties... of course, that foretelling comes with a good chance of rain all week. Oh well, if I can have cooler weather, I'll take a little…
