We are both enjoying our remaining weeks in the high mountains and preparing for travels after our departure.  We have let some of you know our plans directly.  Others may be interested in an outline of our travels below.

Friday after lunch at Ft. Wilderness Campground.  I (Chuck) laundered and paid bills this morning.  I have other chores and work on my Florida tree identification program for this afternoon.  The forecast is for showers over the weekend, but we will still attempt a walk tomorrow morning in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, and we may on Sunday go paddling on the Tuckaseegee River.  Anne will be off work on Wednesday, but we have made no plans for that day yet.  We would like to make a long day-hike, but we will watch for a break in the showery weather.

The subject of Unitarianism has been making the rounds as plans are made for this summer’s events.  As a Unitarian, I view this with some humor and also concern.  I don’t mind if people consider Unitarians weird, but I do mind if people misunderstand what Unitarians are.  To prevent this, I seek to discuss the views of the faith and of this person.

The temperature is 46 degrees F. and it is raining lightly.  Not the same as south Florida.  Still, spring is coming, and the birds and vegetation reflect it.  A pair of fox sparrows appeared in our back yard yesterday.  I spotted one on my way to the compost barrel, and tried to dismiss it as a song sparrow.  Looking more closely I thought the size and profile suggested fox sparrow.  I set down the bucket, retreated to the house, and soon stepped onto the porch with my binoculars.  The bird was not to be seen. 

Pursue this essay for the sake of curiosity.  I write it in part because I am in south Florida, and in part because of the resources now available on the World Wide Web.  Mostly I write it to express wonder about the creation.  Nature really is an antidote to boredom, but only if one chooses to look a bit more closely and always questions the conventional wisdom.  Of this world we know but a little, and much of what we know is wrong.  Still, it is all there in front of us.  We may not have the genius of Darwin, but we can still have insights into the mechanics

I am pleased to provide this update from the Woods Clan Southern outpost in southwest Florida.  Today Anne and Chuck are at the Davidson Condo with Mom and Dad Woods.  Three Woods brothers, Rob, Mark, and Joe are at the Estero Island Beach Club time-share.  Of course it is never that simple.  At this moment Dad is at the beach with Mark while Rob and Joe are off to a “spring training” Red Socks game.  Mom went with Anne to a small recorder gig.  I (Chuck) am at the condo to do some chores in peace.

It is a fine afternoon here in southwest Florida.  Anne is out playing recorder with other players she found in the neighborhood.  Mom and Dad are napping.  Outside are brilliant sunshine and a strong wind.  The temperature is 60 degrees F.  A “reinforcing” front passed through this morning as Anne and I traipsed about Sanibel Island.  At dawn the sky was clear though a shimmer of orange played out around the rising sun.  At eight a.m.

After one finds some six hundred kinds of birds in the continental United States and Canada, seeing another usually entails some kind of adventure.  On the morning of January 1, 2009, Anne and Chuck found a barnacle goose on the millpond on the south branch of the Raritan River in Califon, New Jersey.  In recent decades one or more birds of this species, probably from Greenland, have appeared somewhere in eastern North America during the late fall of the year.  Barnacle geese typically migrate east and south across the British Isles to reach wintering grounds in southern Europe and north

The holiday season has ended and we will be off to Florida tomorrow if the possible ice storm leaves us alone.  We have returned from Princeton where we celebrated the holiday with Mom & Dad and Laurie Strehl.  We arrived New Year's Eve after dropping our children off at the Princeton Junction train station.  They preferred to spend the evening with friends in the Big Apple.  We had enjoyed their company from Christmas Eve.  Chuck and Elley built a new base for her snake cage and all enjoyed a wintery South Mountain.  

We have not posted for some time, what being “at home” and all since mid-October.  Still we have not been idle, and now planning a departure by the beginning of next month, I felt it was time to provide an update to our friends and family who review this site from time to time.