As I start to write this at a little after 1:30, it has been snowing steadily most of the morning. It was snowing when we got up. Big, soft, fluffy flakes. It looks quite pretty.
Earlier this morning I went out in it just to get some fresh air and stretch my legs. I walked in a big loop around downtown, ending at the central library where I was picking up books for Karen. It was lovely - no wind and it didn't feel very cold, although Environment Canada says it's only -6C now, with a wind chill of -10C.
The only snag was the footing on the sidewalks. In lots of places, business owners have failed to clear any snow, so you're walking in a trench made by other pedestrians. And everywhere I went, whether there'd been any attempt to clear the path or not, it was slippery underfoot. The treads on my winter boots aren't very deep, but I don't think that was the issue. It's just what you get when you have fresh wet snow on packed snow underneath. Every step, you slip back a bit.
I think I'm in for the day now.
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Every picture tells a story Another low-light photograph - with a story.
When we were staying in Lisbon in the winter of 2016, one of the things I wanted to be sure to do was take in some live fado music. Fado is the often melancholy-sounding folk music of Portugal, still very popular today. Shelley Boyes had come to visit, and it turned out fado was on her to-do list as well. There are many, many bars with live fado, all in the same Alfama district, which was about 20 or 25 minutes by foot down the hill from the flat where we were living.
The advice from travel experts was to go late and look for a place with no service charge that didn't insist you buy an expensive and - according to most reports - usually mediocre meal. So that's what we did, setting out after our usual bed time. It didn't take us long to find this place. It was a real down-home bar where local amateurs often came to belt out a few numbers. We're not sure whether this woman was a professional or an amateur, but she was good.
We were amused by the antics of a middle-aged Dutch couple there. The woman had apparently downed two bottles of wine on her own, and was drunkenly irate because she thought she and her husband had been billed a cover charge - it was only €3 - after the maitresse 'd had assured them there was none. It was a bread charge, not a charge for the music, but she wasn't having it. At one point she came and sat at the table behind ours and loudly voiced her discontent. Finally, her husband came back into the restaurant, told her, 'Stop!', paid the bill, and they left. Cringe worthy.
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Music recommendation: Murmúrios by Cristina Branco. It's modern-day fado by a wildly popular (in Portugal) artist, not quite the down-and-dirty version we heard in that Lisbon bar, but not that far removed. She has a fabulous voice and great accompanists. Sample track available with free Spotify account here - or, I'm sure, at any of the streaming services if you have a premium account.
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Sorry, no amusing bird fact today, although I am still reading and enjoying Jennifer Ackerman's The Bird Way.
The last chapter I was reading about bird vocalizations and mimicry reminded me of a bird Karen and I heard in Tucson the winter we stayed there in 2013. It would sit in a tree or on the peak of the roof next door and sing its heart out, especially in the morning. I had never heard a bird with such a varied and melodious song. When we got back home to Canada, I tried to figure out which species it was, but I was never entirely satisfied with my identification. Today, however, I found it for sure.
The little fellow we heard was the northern mockingbird. He appears in a list I found on the Web of backyard birds specifically in Tucson and area. And when I found a recording of his song, I was in no doubt. This is our guy, and it's a beautiful song. Here's what he looks like in full spate:
And here is what he sounds like. As I suspected after reading Ackerman and remembering the song, the mockingbird is a great mimic, often parroting the sounds of other birds - and animals, including frogs. That's part of the reason his song sounded different every time.
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