A Hummingbird Misogi

Every have one of those to-dos that stares you in the face and it just hangs around and around and around? In my latest situation it was an item on my read list. It has been there since 2019, finally got it as gift this last Christmas and then dragged it on two long trips out west and managed to get through maybe 2 chapters at best. Got back, put it on my nightstand, said goodnight to it every night and promised to turn the pages ….the next night. Even more embarrassing it was about building good habits and breaking bad one. The book – Atomic Habits by James Clear (link here). In my defense, I was keeping up on his thought provoking emails in the midst of this (think he stopped sending those or I got dropped somehow through 2025). My summary, probably would have been more useful while I was still in the grind as my “habits” have shifted a bit and maybe honing them isn’t as critical. I do like the core principles, Make it Obvious, Make it Attractive, Make it Easy and Make it Satisfying, however, my big takeaway was his take on boredom . “Anyone can work hard when they feel motivated. It’s the ability to keep going when work isn’t exciting that makes the difference. Professionals stick to the schedule; amateurs let life get in the way“. That rang absolutely true with me as I always tell people my superpower is the ability to grind in work (formerly) and sport (ultras). Overall, not a bad read, although, I would recommend first consuming my favorite book – Comfort Crisis by Michael Easter (link here) or Do Hard Things by Steve Magness (link here). Those two offerings pretty much summarize my long held outlook on life.

Steve focuses on developing mental toughness and Michael challenges you to participate in activities you have a 50% chance of absolute failure even with focused training (misogi)…and now you know why I do the things I do ha. Why bring all this up..well, because I am about to do something in this post that is hard, which I should make more of a habit of and yes, there is high probability of failure. Today we are taking on the female Hummingbirds!

Violet-Crowned Hummingbird  captured March 2025 at Paton Center for Hummingbirds

Before digging into this, I found myself quoting Theron from 300: “This will not be over quickly, you will not enjoy this, you suck at female Hummers“…or something like that. Hit the jump to see the fruits of my misery ha.

Continue reading A Hummingbird Misogi

That is One Good Looking Broad

Greetings once again from the road. By the time you read this we should be out of California and somewhere in Arizona. Picked up a number of birds during our first “official” trip to the state lighting up the 6th new state this trip on my eBird profile. Have to admit, Linda’s bribe of birding opportunities for agreeing to go out to Washington for the CPE Agility Nationals has materialized far better than ever imagined. I am getting a bit homesick now and looking forward to getting back…but not until we hit a few more of my favorite birding spots in Arizona. Fingers crossed the heat doesn’t chase the birds away.

This month is coming to a close and surprisingly it was spent entirely on the road. Big thanks to Brad for keeping the post quota pressure from adding additional stress to the trip. For this 6th and final post of the month, I am going to feature a member of a bird family that doesn’t get a lot of attention on this site. This has absolutely nothing to do with our fondness for this group of birds – we love them actually – but it comes with a great deal of work both during the encounter, inevitable work in the digital darkroom and then depending on a number of conditions (gender/lighting/breeding/etc), the potentially painful ID process.

Broad-Billed Hummingbird found at Patagonia, AZ in March 2025

To get the ball rolling, this post is going to focus on a Hummingbird that is pretty easy to identify if you can find the male. Hit the jump to learn more about this distinctive speedster.

Continue reading That is One Good Looking Broad