Don't Be Afraid of the Dork: Saturday in the Garden

OUTSIDE

It was a week of natural happenings. For weeks now I've been driving around spying on Bald Eagle nests and teaching others how to do so also. I'm all about nest voyeurism. At last weekend's workshop, it was snowing and blustery so the eagles were hunkered down and invisible but just so we didn't get too disappointed, a mink popped up and frolicked around the pool of a creek perhaps 20 meters from where the group was standing.

During the week at the office there was a drama playing out at the bird house between a Bluebird couple and some nefarious House Sparrows. House sparrows aren't really nefarious but they're not native in the U.S., they're much more common than Bluebirds and despite their smaller size they frequently seem to out-compete Bluebirds for scarce nesting cavities. I'm rooting for the Bluebirds.

This morning I took the dogs for a walk at a nearby park and was enjoying some towering pines, admiring lichen-covered sticks and picking up rocks, as one does, when a fox flushed from a wooded ravine we were walking along and scampered away from us. Thankfully the dogs didn't see him/her. Of course I only got pictures of the boring stuff.

There is nothing like Spring for watching the world:).

LIFE

I had a serious case of job burn out this week which prompted me, somewhat guiltily, to take Friday off. Burn out frequently attacks when I am coming down from a super busy period at work to a slightly less busy period. It's obnoxious because I usually am still plenty busy with lots to do, just not with the same level of frenzy as the preceding weeks. It can't be helped though and the only cure is to try and take some little mini-breaks here and there that help to get me motivated again.

How about you? How do you deal with work or school burn out?

In other news, I went out to a local brewery last night and, in addition to some tasty beer, had my first Kombucha. It was super delicious and I may have a new obsession though I'm not sure I buy all the claimed health benefits touted online. Have you ever tried Kombucha (it's fermented, carbonated tea if you're ignorant like I was)? Any commercially available brands you'd recommend particularly?

WATCHING, READING and BLOGGING

Watching

I've been slowly making my way through season 4 of Glee this week. Slowly, because I think it sucks. It is really hard to transition a show that takes place in High School into the after high school years. In fact I can't think of a single show that successfully did it, can you? Even shows I love dearly, like Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Veronica Mars just never worked as well post high school. Season 4 of Glee has other problems as well: the music sucks for the most part, the new crop of Glee kids are seriously the most boring human beings ever, and the adults on the show seem to have lost all color. I continue to watch simply because it is Finn/Cory Monteith's last season. Besides watching the tribute show to him that aired in season 5, I will not be continuing and will just live in a self-imposed bubble where only seasons 1-3 exist. The end.

Reading

Finished Last Week:

Murder on Lenox Hill (Gaslight Mystery #7) by Victoria Thompson: A mystery series focused on a midwife and police officer in turn of the 20th century New York.
Whispers Underground (Peter Grant #3) by Ben Aaronovitch: This British urban fantasy/mystery series has one of the best lead character voices going. I adore Peter Grant.

Currently Reading:

One Magic Square by Lolo Houbein: A gardening book about maximizing food production in a small space. An ARC from Netgalley (though I think it's an older title).
Fire and Hemlock by Diana Wynne Jones: A stand alone novel I ran across at the local used book store knowing nothing about it except that it was by Diana Wynne Jones:0). It is taking its time to get going so I hope it picks up the pace soon, simply because that's what I'm in the mood for now. It has an awesome atmosphere, though, that is really sticking with me.
The Round House by Louise Erdrich: I started this in D.C. on my kindle and it pretty immediately sucked me in despite the brutality of the subject matter (violent rape against a minority).
The Incarnations by Susan Barker: I heard about this book on the All The Books podcast and it sounded really interesting. Follows the lives of two soul-mates through several re-incarnated lives in China.
The Gods of Gotham (Timothy Wilde #1) by Lyndsay Faye: A historic mystery-thriller set in 1800s New York about the start of a police force.
Six-Gun Snow White by Cathrynne M. Valente: A novella re-telling of the Snow White fairy-tale in a U.S. Frontier setting.

Added to the TBR:

This is a list of books that I have added to my Goodreads TBR list this week. It helps to burn the books I want to read a little more firmly into my mind, maybe get them on some other folks TBRs and gives me a chance to recognize a lot of the awesome bloggers that add stuff to my TBR!

Burning Midnight by Will McIntosh: A YA series by brilliant sci-fi author Will McIntosh? Yes Please! The premise sounds really intriguing as well. Picked up from The Book Smugglers.
The Lotus Eaters by Tatjana Soli: I saw this book on Musings of a Bookish Kitty's Top Ten Tuesday list. About a American female combat photographer during the Vietnam War.
Moloka'i by Alan Brennert: Also from Musings of a Bookish Kitty's list! I've always been a little fascinated by Leprosy and especially how it was treated
The Mangle Street Murders (The Gower Street Detective #1) by M.R.C. Kasasian: Brillian irascible detective solving crime in Victorian era London. Sounds familiar but I'm game. I cam across this series while browsing at the library.