Just a Quick Hello

Hi everyone! This is The Daily Bone and I'm your trusty doggie reporter Chester L. W. Spaniel. 

There's been nothing much going on around here lately. We still don't have any flowers, except for little Miss Lily who came to visit today.

 There were a couple hours of sunshine this afternoon. But that was soon replaced by the usual WNY March cloud cover. Then around 6pm a big wind hit—BLAM!—that sounded like thunder! Leaves and sticks were flying everywhere! Later, when I went out, I was amazed to hear a few spring peepers. All ghostwriter could think about was, oh those poor little naked froggies in the nasty cold wind. They must be freezing!

In other news, I got some recent pictures of my kitty cat cousins and our TDB Florida associate.

Hannibal and Tiberius

 Maddie (aka Medusa aka The Kitten Overlord) 

Miss Charlee in Florida

For the entertainment section today, check out this movie trailer! 

Any movie that features doggies has got to be good!

And that's all for today! 

NEWS FLASH NEWS FLASH NEWS FLASH NEWS FLASH NEWS FLASH

It's getting late now. I was able to get a quick glimpse of the Blue Moon when it appeared through the fleeting clouds. What exactly is a Blue Moon? Check out the link below for a full explanation.

Good night!

earthsky

To my dearest Princess Leah, I'm going to try to give you a call on the moon phone. But the reception might be a little sketchy due to the clouds and wind. Hopefully you have a clear view of the Blue Moon where you are across the Pond. 

And to everyone, please have a Happy Easter!

Icicles and Sournotes

Greetings friends and fans. This is The Daily Bone and I'm your diligent doggie reporter 

Chester L. W. Spaniel standing in the last snowy area in my yard.

It's on the north corner of the yard next to the house and the shed where the sunshine can't reach it long enough to melt it like in the rest of the yard.

Another Friday has arrived and we still have no flowers! But we do have one thing to show you that might be just as nice. 

The snow drift on the roof has been melting. The dripping water made icicles on the yew bushes! 

Amazing!

In the evening we were serenaded by a gaggle of grackles. Oh joy! After announcing their initial arrival way too soon on February 27th, a big snow storm rolled in, crashed their party, and cancelled their grandiose performance. So this is their second debut. You wouldn't believe the racket they made: an inharmonious cacophony of screeching and squawking and bragging!

If that wasn't bad enough, they proceeded to raid the birdie feeder and chased all the little birdies away.  There's a link at the end of this post if you care to read more about these pesky birdies.

Can you see Mr. Seedcruncher CEO of Sparrows Incorporated trying to get a perch on the feeder? I'm sure he's not very happy about this situation either. I agree with him that there's not much worse than a mob of pompous, magniloquent grackles! Of course I went out to chase them away.

At least we got a nice sunset after that clangorous crowd left for the night! 

Just before the sun went down, we heard the Stodgy Robin Society tuning up for their Spring performances. Hopefully they'll sound better than those horrid grackles!

Common_Grackle

I Guess It's Spring Now

Hello loyal readers. This is The Daily Bone and I'm your windblown doggie reporter 

Chester L. W. Spaniel. 

Supposedly yesterday was the first day of Spring. If you take a look around my yard, there is absolutely no sign of it. The ground is frozen solid and covered with snow in parts. This snow has been melted, frozen, melted, and refrozen a number of times. It's hard and crusty, and not nice to walk on. The sky has a thin cover of clouds that make a halo around the sun. Usually when that happens, it means there's a storm coming our way.

And it's very, very windy. Do you see my ears flapping?

We found some little piles of feathers on the ground this morning. Ghostwriter says they're from a mourning dove that was probably caught by a hawk.

Tail feathers.

Wing feathers.

I did some more snooping around and I found a whole pile of birdie feathers right next to the fence!
Wow! There must be enough to cover an entire mourning dove! I bet the hawk sat right here on the fence and ate that birdie for breakfast. Ghostwriter says she's seen a lot of hawks in her travels lately. It's migration time for them. She's spotted lots of vultures too, and thought she heard an owl hooting in the middle of the night after she came home from work late the other day.

Also this morning, there were two ditzy squirrels under the birdie feeder. They ran away before ghostwriter could take a picture. But then they played a silly, inane game that involved chasing each other round and round the trunk of the silver maple tree. Perhaps it's squirrel (gag) mating season.

Ew!

You squirrels keep out of my yard!

Gee, I wish those hawks would catch some of those screwy squirrels for a change instead of our nice mourning doves! 

Ahem, where was I?

Oh, here's the science geek part of my report today. Vernal equinox means that the Earth is at a certain spot in it's orbit around the sun, so that the days and nights are of equal length. There's a link at the end of this report where you can get a more detailed explanation.

Spring is usually thought of as the time when flowers bloom and the summer birds arrive from their winter vacations and start singing in the budding trees and bunnies hop around happily and everyone is singing with joy.



In Western NY Spring usually means "Still Winter." (Ghostwriter always laughs at the store ads that show skimpy Easter dresses for sale. Hahaha! You'd have to wear a winter parka over one of those!)

Actually, here is a pretty accurate depiction of the so-called Spring time around here:



Yup! I think I'll keep my nice, warm, furry coat on for at least another six weeks. Please inform my groomer, Miss Jacquie to schedule my Spring buzz cut sometime in May.

everything-you-need-to-know-vernal-or-spring-equinox

Snow Again! (And Still No Flowers)

Hello everyone. This is The Daily Bone and I'm your chilly doggie reporter Chester L. W. Spaniel.

On February 27, I wrote about the return of the summer birds, namely those noisy screeching grackles. Since then, we've had a few big snow storms and several snow squalls. Hahahaha! The entire Great Grackle Flying PTA (Poop Tossers Association) is probably huddled in a bush somewhere, shivering their shiny tail feathers off!

 But that's March in Western New York!

The weatherman says this cold weather isn't going anywhere fast. So we still have no flowers! But check out this picture my Uncle John in Tonawanda took:

You might think these are pretty white flowers. But they're not. This is hoarfrost that formed on the tips of the grass that are sticking out of the water in this little pond. Amazing!

Well, I'm not complaining about the wintry weather.

The King of Spain

Hello my loyal readers and serfs! (Or is that smurfs?) Anyway, this is The Daily Bone and I'm your aristocratic doggie reporter Chester L. W. Spaniel.

Dad has been really interested in researching his ancestry for quite a while. He can track his relatives back hundreds of years, and spends lots of time squinting at fuzzy old documents from churches and towns in places like Finland and Cornwall, searching for more connections. I'll bet in a couple years, he'll be tracking his forefathers back to the Cave Man Days! Hooray!

So I did a little research about myself. Do you know what I found out? Spaniel means someone from Spain! Yes, spaniels of all types originally came from Spain. There is even a possibility that cocker spaniels sailed on the Mayflower with the pilgrims! 

However, I seem to have lost that awesome Spanish accent. Now I'm just a regular pup, and not pretentious at all! Well, unless it comes to squeaky toys. Whenever one of my humans comes home from work or shopping or whatever, I find my favorite squeaky toy or tennis ball and prance around with it to show them that I am the proud owner of said squeaky toy, and you can't have it! Nope, nope, nope. The tennis ball is always MINE! 

Hey Dad, hurry up with that pizza! 

No Flowers Outside Today

Hello. This is The Daily Bone and I'm your savvy doggie reporter Chester L. W. Spaniel. 

Today it was snowing on and off all day. It came down in big, fat flakes. But the wind blew it all sideways so it didn't amount to much.

But there's been plenty of birdie drama! Check out this guy! He was hanging around all day eating suet and seeds at the window box birdie feeder. 

Hi.

I decided to interview him. He said his name is Ziggy Stardust and he's a starling. 

And I'm a star!

Really? What are you starring in? 

I am the star of this box!

Then he jumped into the window box feeder and took a nap. I hope he doesn't think the birdie feeder box is his private domain. 

Well, Debbie Dove came along and kicked him right out of there!

Wake up dummy! This feeder is for all of us!

That was a short career!

Ghostwriter said that starling didn't look anything like David Bowie anyway. (Whoever that is!) Then she said, if you know who that is then you're as old as she is! 

Huh?

Yes, it was a very weird day too!

In other news, the Stodgy Robin Society has reverted to combat mode. There was about a dozen of them hanging around the hawthorn tree all day, sizing each other up and chasing each other around. Ghostwriter said they're all the male robins competing for territory. So I went over to see if I could settle their dispute. They all flew away. And then it started snowing again. 

Harumph!

Meanwhile, at my kitty cat cousins' house: 

Egads brother! It's a stinkbug of doom!

Oh, I almost forgot. It's Flower Friday. I looked everywhere but I couldn't find any flowers! 

Except this one:

Lily.