Migratory Things

There was a lot of excitement around here today.

First, I caught the big jumping spider that's been hanging about in the casita! When I came out of the shower this afternoon, she was sitting on the window near the door. I immediately assumed that she was looking for a way out. (Do spiders understand glass?) I got Dave's spider catching box and she jumped into it and I carried her outside and put her in the plants on the patio. She was big for a jumping spider, maybe half an inch long, and she was black with a dusky gray abdomen. I'm sure I've said before that jumping spiders are my favorite kind of spiders, so I'm always happy to see one.

Then earlier this evening, as we were coming home from a giant fizzy drink outing, Dave looked up in the sky above the driveway and said, "Is that a bat? Yes, that's a bat." And sure enough, there was a bat and its five compadritas in sky above us, swooping around catching insects in the twilight. I love bats. I've always loved bats. One of my favorite books when I was a tiny little child was about bats. I was enamored with these amazing creatures from the first time I ever heard about them. I thought they were magical, with their powers of flight and echolocation. Those were the real super powers to me, better even than Wonder Woman's invisible airplane on TV.

We called Kelly and Kevin to come out and look at the bats with us and as we stood there in the driveway, one of our neighbors whom we've never met, rode up on his bicycle and asked us what we were doing. He introduced himself and chatted for a bit and by the time he rode away, it was fully dark and the bats had moved on.

Everything's preparing to migrate into and out of our lives. The hummingbirds are loading up for their trek down to Central America. The bats will soon follow. The cranes will be coming back for the winter, as will the Canada geese. It's that time again.

I want to do a little cleaning and rearranging in the casita to get ready for winter. I also want to pick up some warmer bedding, maybe some flannel sheets. And I want to rotate out some of my crafting supplies so that I can start doing some new things. I want to start keeping an art journal, for example, just to practice some new techniques.

Anyway, that's it for tonight. I'm making this short and sweet because it's 10:00 and I have to be up early to make it to my 7:30 A&P lecture. Yawn!