Cape May 2010 Post #2: A Jeff sandwich on Flock bread. With a Liz pickle (and a hell of a lot of name-dropping)

Let's go back to Thursday.  I had gotten into town late (12 hours in the car and punchy as hell).  Delia and I were in our jammies when a text came from Jeff asking if we were staying up late.  We were invited to Mark Garland's house where Jeff, Liz, Bill and a few others were happily imbibing some Scotch.

There were introductions all around...I don't remember a few of them, but one stuck in my head.  But not until later when Delia started hollering about it.  The one that had us cussing and squealing was Richard Crossley.  Yeah ,the Richard Crossley who writes field guides.  Well, we geeked out totally and for the rest of the weekend, we called him "Richard Freakin' Crossley!".

I didn't really want to drink, having come off a twelve hour drive, but as the Scotch was poured and re-poured, I thought I might like to try it.  I didn't like it.  So I sipped a little more.

It was so, so, so very cool to be sitting in a living room with all of these massively talented birders and authors. (Delia told me later that I looked like a kid at Christmas, sitting on the floor just smiling at everyone.)

A call came in.  The words "massive flight" were used.  Everyone got up.

Into the cars and down to the boardwalk on Beach Ave.  We looked up, and there were hundreds of birds overhead.  Now, remember...this is 11 o'clock at night.  The birds were lit up from underneath by the street lights and they resembled fireflies...blowing leaves....embers from a camp fire.  Hundreds and hundreds of them.  Some were falling into the street, exhausted.  I got my lifer Savannah's Sparrow right there on Beach Ave.  In the dark.
Robins.  Chipping sparrows.  Yellow-rumped warblers.  Woodcocks.  And many others that were not identified. The biggest bird spectacle I have ever seen.


I have never birded at night, unless there were owls involved.  This was something completely different.

Wow.  I don't know who has the better legs, Jeff or Delia.



We were right outside Morrow's Nut House. Seemed fitting.

The lights were getting in the way...


We moved behind the convention center to get out of the light.

There in the dark, it was much easier to see the birds.  They were lit up but the lights were no longer in our line of sight.
My neck was getting sore, so I had the brilliant idea to lay down on the boardwalk to enjoy the birds in comfort.  And everyone else eventually joined me.

Somehow Delia and I were lucky enough to snuggle up to Jeff for warmth, and Liz completed the dish.
A Jeff Gordon sandwich on Flock bread.  With a Liz pickle on top.

Hail to the Chief!!

When Jeff Gordon asked me recently, "What do you know about the ABA?", I didn't know what to say.  I knew what the letters stood for, and....umm....that's about it.  I couldn't tell you who was leading the organization, what they did or how they did it.  My opinion of the organization was vague, to say the least.  I proved a point for him, with my ignorance.

Over the past month or so, I have done some reading up on the ABA and have a clearer picture of what it's all about.  And up until about a week and a half ago, things were not looking good.  I kept reading phrases like "financial crater" and "poor leadership" and "Who cares about the ABA anyway?".

As it turns out, all birders should care about the ABA.  It is the only organization of its kind in North America, and it is FOR birders and BY birders.  They have a comprehensive Code of Ethics that as birders we all need to adhere to.  They contribute to bird and bird habitat conservation.  They offer conferences and workshops.  It's an organization for US.
This is the place where we all need to be.

About a week and a half ago, the news came ripping through the intertubes through email, texting, but most of all, Facebook.  Jeff Gordon had been selected as the new President of the ABA.  I'm pretty sure Facebook broke that day.

We will be learning more as the weeks and months go on, but for now, I am unbelievably proud of Jeff, honored to be his friend, and ready to help in any way he needs.  He has a HUGE job ahead of him.
Be sure to stop here, at his blog and the new ABA blog for updates.

Here's a link to a video Jeff has posted on the ABA blog:
Hello from the New President and Greetings from Providence

I was telling my mother about Jeff's good news, and I mentioned that I wanted to join the ABA for the first time.  Mom decided that a membership would make a good early Christmas gift for me.  Thanks, Mom!

I leave you with my favorite photo of Jeff (because I took it, and because it captures just what makes Jeff so darn lovable)...
Chilling on the Farmhouse porch one evening during the 2010 New River Birding and Nature Festival.
(And Jeff is on the front page of their web site too!)

Zip it....zip it good!

Even while having the time of your life at the New River Birding and Nature Festival, it can happen. Bird-Burn-Out (or BBO).

Bird songs, birdjams, (Hi, Jay!) bird photos, birds birds birds. There is a point that I think many people reach at this festival, where they just have sensory overload and can't handle any more birds.

The promoters realize this, and one of the ways they have chosen to deal with BBO is to offer some unconventional trips that aren't really about the birds, like Birding by Boat, a gentle float trip down the New River (that's for another post).

Another way, and frankly a zippy way, to deal with it is the Canopy Tour, aka "the Zipline".
This was offered on two different days of the festival at two separate companies.
(Ours was Ace Adventure Resort)


I was digging the idea of flying through the trees yelling like a kamikaze, so I signed up.
Nina also signed up, but was on another trip. Here's our adorable Nina, getting suited up and ready to zip:


(Photo by Geoff Heeter)

I was pleasantly surprised that only four women, including me, had signed up for this day of zipping. I was the youngest of the four...that rocks.
We did some low-impact birding before suiting up.
Jeff Gordon acted like a very sexy female turkey and called in not only a male turkey, but a red-shouldered hawk:




Yes. That's JEFF making that sexy turkey noise.




Devo makes a comeback.
(Photo by Geoff Heeter)



Why we look like we don't want to touch each other, I don't know.
I'm usually all over Jeff like a bad suit.
(Photo by Geoff Heeter)



The very competent young woman who was our leader made me feel quite safe.
And she reminded the men, as they geared up in their harnesses, "Make sure all of the furniture is in the same room."
Ahem~


"Jeff and Geoff, is all of your furniture in the same room?"


I am usually happy to not be a man, but this day, I was especially thankful.
Even without "furniture", that harness really should have bought me dinner first.

My bra did end up around my neck.


It was so fun, zipping from platform to platform, and platform up to tree, across ravines...
Since this was a free-style zip, your momentum usually makes you spin around a few times.


Here's a quick video of one of my zips, when I don't quite take off hard enough to reach the platform, necessitating pulling myself hand over hand on the safety line, hence the silly cackling at the end of the video.

(This video achieved by turning the camera on right before I zip,
and balancing said camera on my right boob):


The women were great...and the one that I will remember for the rest of my life was Dot.
Dot is a 70-something grandmother who, as she did the last and most terrifying zip (where instead of running off a platform, you scooted off on your rear end and basically did a free fall) went flying through the air yelling "Whoop! WHOOP! WHOOP!".

She had a plan for the photos that were taking of her zips.
"I'm giving them to my grandbabies, so when their friends show off pictures of their grandmas in a rocking chair on the porch, my grandbabies can show a picture of their grandma ziplining."
That's just awesome.


Here's Dot, on her Blackberry, no less:






And in conclusion, Jeff Gordon: KAMAKAZE: