The weather man said it was spring. The school teachers smile because its almost summer. But it snowed last week. I didn't know what to believe, until I saw a splash of white floating gracefully on Carp Lake yesterday, marking the return of the birds of summer. Today, by mid afternoon there were over 35 American White Pelicans on the pond. This is the last pit stop before they make nest on Big Johnson Reservoir just a few miles away. Today they rested, fished and washed down their dusty feathers.
A couple of Canada geese took exception to the overnight invasion and paddled over to reclaim the pond but the much larger pelicans barely paid them any notice. After a few indignant honks, the geese flew away. They will return when the flock of pelicans leave for their final destination in a day or two.
A male peacock basks in the early afternoon sun at the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo in Colorado Springs. Although not native to the area, the exotic birds have adapted to the climate and roam the mountain zoo grounds year round.
Its hard not to be mesmerized by the rich iridescent colors of the male peacock's plumage.
I was able to talk my husband into letting me borrow the camera for the day so I went to Memorial Park. I went in hopes of getting a few shots of the Military memorials but was distracted by a large hawk who landed in a near by tree to pluck a pigeon. Once he got used to my presence and the persistent clicking of the camera, the hawk continued his meal. While he showed agitation at the approach of other visitors, he seemed to have accepted me and allowed me to get right up under him. In this picture he watches as I pulled a branch out of the way for a better shot. In fact he seemed so comfortable in my presence that I almost expected him to share his meal by tossing me a pidgeon wing.
For those of you who were wondering, I composed my video slide show using the Windows Photo Story 3 which came preloaded on my computer. The program allows you to control the motion and transition of individual pictures as well as adding music. Once I got the slide show finished I uploaded it to my Youtube account. When I made my entry I clicked the little movie camera icon in the [Add Entry] toolbar, cut and pasted the embed link from my video's Youtube entry, saved my post and presto-whamo! A video slide show on my journal.
There are many other programs that are compatible with AOL journals. Different programs offer different features so you may want to check out a few to see if they offer what you need. I like the simplicity of Photo Story 3, and I already have a Youtube account so I just stick with them, but some of the other programs can compose your entire slide show right online... pretty cool!
To find a list of supported web sites, click here: Blogs Whitelist - AOL People Connection, or click on the [allowed list of selected Web sites] link in the [Add Entry] page.
I'm already looking forward to seeing a bunch of slide shows in your journals now.
