Wild kingdom at the Condo

Sometimes it's like wild kingdom outside my living room window where my desk is. Deer, heron, Mallards, rabbits, hawks, fox. I heard a crow making an awful ruckus and stepped outside to the deck to see what was going on. I looked and looked and followed the crow hopping from branch to branch by the creek. Then I saw it. Another animal, brown and black, not a bird was probably 30-40 ft up in a tree. I went back to my desk and grabbed the binoculars. I searched and searched. The crow was quiet. And then I saw it again. The largest raccoon I'd ever seen. In our 22 years here I'd never seen a raccoon, and now one was in a tree. He was probably hoping for an evening snack of a bird egg or two. That big old crow better get back on duty quick.

The deck has shed its winter coat.  Our friend Rod came over today and power washed it, the furniture and the stairs.  It was ghastly hot so he said he'd do the patio (where all the crud fell) another day and move the bush and trim the trees. As he had the chairs flipped over I noticed some of the legs had lost the little plastic disks that keep them from scraping the planks.  I'll have to look for some replacements. This set has held up well--probably got it about 20 years ago.