Cool Bird Sighting of the Week!

I saw this bird sitting on a telephone wire today as I walked over to the fitness center to work out (well, not this actual bird, but one just like it). At first I thought it was some warbler with a ball of red fluff in its beak. Its head is the most brilliant red. It's ridiculously red. The strange bird hopped down from the wire and sat on a stone wall in front of a house. I was able to approach it pretty closely and observe its markings, and then it flew up to a roof, as if it were unsettled.
When I came home I searched through my North American bird book, all the while pretty sure that it was an escaped pet. Finally I found it online: A red-crested cardinal (Paroaria coronata), native to South America and introduced to Hawaii. It's a popular, although somewhat rare, pet bird. I went out again a little while later and looked around for it (with my camera this time) but there was no sign of it. I hope it gets back to where it belongs.
This photo is from a website for the University of Hawai'i campus at Manoa (near Honolulu), where the red-crested cardinal is apparently a common bird on campus.

A Tale of Two Frozen Desserts

I recently made these two different frozen desserts. The one on the right is maple bourbon frozen yogurt; the one on the left is maple ice cream with buttered pecans. Just by looking at the photo, you can tell the one of the left is creamier and more delicious. In fact, it is incredibly good and chock full of pecans (not stingy like some butter pecan ice cream). I made the frozen yogurt to go with the pumpkin pie at Thanksgiving, but although it has a nice tangy flavor with a hint of bourbon, it's too icy. My sister said thoughtfully, licking her spoon after eating her portion, "You could make maple ice cream..." So I did, "for my book group." (Although the idea that I need an excuse to make ice cream with two teenage boys at home is a little ridiculous.) I could have made the frozen yogurt creamier by straining some liquid out of the yogurt, but it would still be just frozen yogurt. The maple ice cream with buttered pecans might be a bit over the top with pumpkin pie; I like it with Anna's Ginger Thins (hey--that would make some adorable little ice cream sandwiches).

The recipe for the maple ice cream, and the buttered pecans, is from David Lebovitz's decadent ice cream book, The Perfect Scoop. I will not reproduce the recipe here because if you are at all tempted to make this and have an ice cream maker you should go out right now and buy the book from your local independent bookstore.

Cool Bird Sighting of the Week!

I know there's no bird in this photo. But there was one, just a second ago! This is the view out my kitchen window at the palm-tree-like thing that has grown up between my house and my neighbor's. Some birds really like to eat the little white berries, including a yellow-rumped warbler (or maybe two). They are really skittish and dart away the moment we appear at the window. There was no way I was going to get a photo, despite standing at the window with my camera focused on their landing spot. Until my arms hurt. So I found another photo of a female, below. Mine has a more vivid yellow patch at the throat, and darker, bluer back and wings, so it's probably a male. I don't think I'm patient enough to be a nature photographer.
This photo is by Will Elder of the National Park Service. There are lots of great photos by park service employees of local wildlife and fauna at the Presidio website.

Okay, She Won!

Rachel finally acknowledges that she did in fact win a seat on the Board of Education. It took a week of the numbers not really moving much for her to decide that she wasn't going to jinx it by saying she won. By today's count, the Dept. of Elections was up to more than 80% of registered voters casting ballots, and she is nearly 4,500 votes ahead of the next candidate. They have fewer than that number left to count, making it mathematically impossible for that person to overtake her. She'll be sworn in the first week in January, and I'll be there.

49,129; 48,130; 49,131...

That's the Department of Elections, counting ballots. Estimates are ranging wildly from 60,000 (Dept. of Elections) to 130,000 (Aaron Peskin in the Chronicle) of how many SF ballots are still to be counted. Here's what it says on the Dept. of Elections website as of today at 1 pm:

Last Updated: 11/5/2008 2:55 PM

Total Registration and Turnout
Registration	477,651
Total Ballots Cast	241,090	50.47 %
Election Day Reporting	191,962
Vote by Mail / Absentee Reporting	49,128

Check out that turn-out number: 50.47%. (This reflects only those ballots that have been counted.) Now go to the elections archive page and see what historic voter turn-out in SF has been: 74.3% in November 2004, the last presidential election. With Obama and Prop. 8 on the ballot, did only 63% of San Franciscans turn out (projected total if there are only 60,000 ballots left to count)? I don't think so. If there are 130,000 left to count, the total turn-out would be 77.6%. Now that sounds more like it.

I think Rachel is right in concluding that the number of outstanding ballots must be much higher than 60,000, because I can't believe that turn-out for this election was less than for the last presidential election. In Noe Valley alone, which usually has the highest voter turnout in the city, they are currently only recording a 56% turnout. And best of all, Rachel feels that these uncounted ballots will tend to go more moderate, which favors her (she is the one who tipped me off to the historical turn-out figures). The Department of Elections is now saying they should know the results by Friday. Stay tuned.

Head Space

It was a relief to get away from the post-election buzz and go take a walk on the Marin Headlands with my friend Jenny.

Tempering my pleasure at Obama's win was the inconclusive results of the Board of Ed race. It's too close to call at this point. Rachel is 898 votes ahead of the fifth place candidate, which puts her on the Board. But there are still 60,000 provisional and absentee ballots to be counted. Most likely they will fall as the already-counted ballots did, and Rachel will remain in 4th place. But we have to wait until all the ballots are counted to be sure. Today they only counted 5,000 more ballots. We may have to wait two more weeks to be sure.

Election Eve

My husband came home from work tonight and asked me if we had any large Rachel Norton for Board of Education signs. I told him yes.
"Good, because the N___ Y___ people are out on the corner with their signs and we can't let them be the only ones out there," he said.
I ran downstairs and told the boys there was a campaign emergency.
My oldest went in the garage and got some leftover posts and started taping our signs to them. My youngest got his sweatshirt on. We left Dad to finish cooking dinner and me and the boys went out to the corner with our signs. We decided we didn't want to be too confrontational so we planted ourselves across the street and started waving our Rachel Norton signs. I waved at the N___ Y___ people, who were joined by a S__ L__ F__ person. We waved our signs at each other.
One lady stopped. "You are all pretty nice to be out here for this....Rachel Norton," she said.
"Well, she's our aunt," said my son.
"So, why should I vote for her?" she asked.
I started to give her my spiel, and she waved her hand.
"If the three of you are out here for her, that's good enough for me!" she told us.
One more vote for Rachel Norton!