Circus Tent Hat

 

Today I worked on campus, and at lunch I walked with Seabird. I'm thinking of making a collection of people's reactions to my plaid tam:

Tiffy: You sure are getting your Irish on!

Three people on campus: I really like your hat! It's so stylish!

Hardingfelde: That hat is so 70's!

And my new favorite:

Seabird: That hat looks like a circus tent!

She's not wrong, and now I can't unsee it. Here's the photo that made me fall in love with it, which I stole from the seller's site:

Cue circus music. Ah well, maybe I'm a dork, but 50% of the comments indicate that I'm a stylish dork. And now it's a protest hat, with the little red hat pin on it. Of course, I already have a protest hat, and my neighbor said she might be able to get me a full-sized red tasseled hat. Someday I will blog about something other than my hat, but right now I'm kind of obsessed with it.

Meanwhile, Travalon took some photos off our dock and at Cherokee Marsh today. First, some hooded mergansers.

Some ring-necked ducks.

Two female mergansers among the Canada geese. 

And now... swans.

This photo just killed me.

Check it out! A two-headed swan! (Just kidding, of course.)

Some male common mergansers.

And back to swans.

I was planning to go home and relax tonight, but then there was a Union meeting at 6:00, so I was going to go home, get into play clothes, and log in from home. Then another email came saying oops, it was at 5:30, so I sighed and stayed on campus. I got to the meeting place not long before 5:30, but the Leprechaun had not started the meeting yet, so the organizer (who was supposed to be in person but had to go home for some reason) sent a new link, so when we few in-person attendees finally logged into the Zoom meeting, there was nobody else there. The Leprechaun had forgotten his phone, so the other person had to notify him about this. We finally got it together, and the organizer had promised the meeting wouldn't last more than an hour, but it was dragging on, so at 6:30 I took my leave. If I didn't catch the shuttle back to my car, the next one was half an hour later. So now I am exhausted. I'll try to get to bed on time tonight, for once.

Famous Hat

Random Early Music Encounter

 

While there isn't too much to say about today (I worked from home and went to Adoration), something interesting did happen to me. At our morning break Travalon and I went out on the dock and he took photos, and he took more when we went out at lunchtime. These are mostly ring-necked ducks.

I left him on the dock, taking photos, and set off on a vigorous walk around the neighborhood. Suddenly a car pulled over, and the youngish guy driving asked if I went to the Lutheran Cathedral of the Midwest. I was puzzled because I did sing there years ago, as my regular readers know, but this guy looked too young to have known me back then. He asked if I went to the early music concerts there, and I realized he is the baritone who always sings there, one of the directors of the whole thing, so we chatted awhile. I had only ever seen him all dressed up in a suit, so I hadn't immediately recognized him in a baseball cap and hoodie. He asked my name and recognized me as one of their donors. (Probably not the biggest one.) He asked if I would be at Bach Around the Clock, and I said my band has a gig out of town that day, but I'd try to catch their group, who are performing last - I should be back in town by then. As all the musicians I know do, he has a side hustle, and it's delivering food. Apparently there is a regular in our neighborhood so he has seen me walking around before, and I said, "Probably with a different hat every time," and he said, "You have to be fashionable." 

I do love my new hat. I just kept looking over at it during Adoration, sitting on the pew next to me. I love my argyle beret, but that's a thing that anyone can order online so there are many in the world. My plaid tam is one of a kind, hand-knitted by someone who knows how long ago. It doesn't have any tags inside of it. If the St. Andrews Society has another ceilidh, or I ever take up golf, it's the perfect hat for that.

Famous Hat

Apologies to Noelle My Car

 

Today Travalon went back to Cherokee Marsh and took more photos of the common mergansers and the tundra swans and the flicker.

I think this puffy little bird is a chickadee.

Judging by some of his other photos, which weren't clear enough to post, he also saw red-headed ducks, canvasbacks, scaups, goldeneyes, and ring-necked ducks. I have posted his photos of all these types of ducks on this blog previously, or you can just google them if you wonder what they look like.

Meanwhile, I worked on campus, and in my building not one, not two, but three people said they liked my new plaid tam, two of our grad students and someone I didn't know in the elevator. One guy said it was very stylish. When I walked with Hardingfele at lunch, she said it is very 70's, but I think it's an older style than that. She wants us to play for some singalong at her department, on a Tuesday when I'm not usually on campus. I have to think about this one. Maybe I'll take the afternoon off and drive in - she said she could get me a parking pass. I asked if we had music, and she said no, but everything's in G, so she's right in that I don't need music for that. She wants me to play the mandolin, and she and her coworker will play violin, and a woman we don't know will play the guitar.

Speaking of playing, this evening I brought the violin to the Moldy Jam jam. I left home earlier than usual but had to park far away, and I got to the music club in time but they had already started to play. My A string is starting to unravel, but it is a gut string I've had on there since I did early music, and that was ages ago. It may be time to put new, steel strings on the violin. Heaven knows the mandolin has needed new strings for ages; Travalon bought a set for me some time ago, and now I can't find them, and Hardingfele always mocks me for it. She changes her strings every year - is that really necessary? The string didn't break during the jam session, but I didn't know the first few songs and wondered why I had even come. Then people started to call out tunes I did know, so it was more fun, and the ones I didn't know seemed easier to pick up. I called out two tunes I've known since childhood, "Rakes of Mallow" and "Blackberry Blossom," and they were happy because those are tunes they know but don't do all the time. (I was trying to do old timey tunes instead of Irish ones, since I always do Irish ones, but "Rakes of Mallow" is Irish - oops!) People were really friendly to me tonight, so I was kind of late leaving the club, and then I had the long walk to the car, plus it kept sounding like a train was coming but it never came on the track alongside the street where I parked. On the drive home I hit a median really hard (no idea why), and the plastic wheel well came off of the front driver's side wheel, so I had to stop and pick it up. I apologized to Noelle my car, but she drove fine without it. She is fifteen years old now, so we have to think how much we really want to spend on repairs for her. If she drives fine without this part, and you can't really tell there's a problem by looking at her, does it really matter? Maybe it was the full moon that caused all this weirdness tonight - it was so beautiful, with a rainbow around it, but they say it makes people crazy. There's supposed to be a lunar eclipse early this morning, around five, but I don't plan to be up to see that.

Famous Hat

First Good Birdwatching Day of 2026

 

Today I had a lot of free time after Mass and recycling the plastic, since Brazilian drumming practice won't resume for a while. Travalon and I set off to go birdwatching, and I moved the Red Tasseled Hat pin to the side of my plaid tam so the tassel wouldn't hang right in front of my eyes.

We started in Cherokee Marsh, where we saw swans among the Canada geese, and when we stopped the car, we saw a pileated woodpecker. I didn't expect that in a residential area! It was right above our car and posing perfectly, with its bright red crest (just like Woody Woodpecker's) flared out, but when I pointed it out to Travalon, it flew away before he could get a photo. 

These are actually photos that Travalon took on Friday, when we went out on the dock, and I didn't have time to post them. I'll get to today's photos soon. First, some buffleheads.

This common merganser is doing a mating dance, stretching his neck up high.

Not sure what's going on here...? I can't tell what kind of duck this is that is just sticking its neck out of the water, but I'm guessing a male common merganser like the one behind it.

More common mergansers.

The male and the female.

And a hooded merganser with a Canada goose.

Here are photos from today, at Cherokee Marsh. First, common mergansers.

We saw two bald eagles in the tallest tree on the little island.

More common mergansers.

I thought I saw the pileated woodpecker again, and Travalon got a good photo, but you can clearly see that it's a flicker, which is also a large woodpecker.

Here are some photos of the swans.

This swan family seems to be following a pintail duck.

There were other types of ducks in Travalon's photos too, at least one canvasback and several goldeneyes, but those photos aren't in focus enough to post. Just saying it was quite a bird party!

After that we went to Tenney Park, and this hawk was right above us.

We just saw geese there, so we went to Picnic Point and saw this goldeneye among the Canada geese.

We didn't really see much at Mendota County Park or Governor Nelson State Park. Then we headed home and rested for a bit before I headed to the Slow Irish Session. Today a bassoonist joined us, and I love how this session welcomes all instruments, not just those that are traditional at an Irish session. The leaders told us to listen to each other and try to hear the harp, but I listened for the bassoon. The leaders said we did a great job staying together and not playing too loudly when we listened like that. Meanwhile, Travalon went to fight Bald Bull at the video arcade as he does while I'm at these sessions, but today he did not prevail against him. He said he played Asteroids too and didn't do that well, but he was in the Top Ten because so few people play it. Hmm... maybe I should play it and get into the Top Ten myself, if it's that easy. I have never been to this arcade myself, but someday I'll check it out.

The cranes always come back on the First of March around here, and sure enough, we heard them today, and then when I took a rosary walk before the Irish session, I saw one. Do they have calendars? How do they know? I also saw three swans fly overhead, but I have no idea where they were going. Not to Cherokee Marsh - they were flying west, not north. Maybe going to Picnic Point.

Famous Hat