The Weekly Smile for the 21st of February #weeklysmile

39 Replies

Hello everyone! I hope you all had a good week and had at least one thing to smile about. I actually had a really good week with multiple things to smile about. For instance, there were quite a few long walks in New Hampshire and Cape Cod that included woods, forests, salt water marshes, beaches, large hills, mountain scenery, quite ponds and equally quiet villages.

But that isn’t my smile ;)

The other day I walked out of my house and around my car. Suddenly something came whizzing by me. I have now seen similar feathered missiles and knew what it was (here is post of the first encounter with one of these, when I didn’t know). So the falcon zipped by my at chest height and little more than arms length away. It then did a high speed landing on the fence on the other side of my driveway, perhaps 30ft/9m away. Cool.

I did a bit of puttering around my car – I had to put air in two tires and I did a few other things. The peregrine falcon half ignored me and half watched me as I did my chores, and I half ignored it and half watched it. At one time it fluffed up, and started preening. I figured it would be there for a while. I turned away for just a moment and it was gone.

Still, it was a cool encounter. I was close enough to see a lot of detail and spent at least 5 minutes with it there.

One bummer is that I didn’t have my camera. Here is a photo of a young falcon I took several years ago. I was actually closer to the falcon I saw a couple of days ago than I was to this one when I took its picture!

That was my smile for this week, seeing a falcon up close and personal.

What made you smile?

(A reminder – There will not be a Smile Recap post next week).

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Come on, I’m sure you smiled at least once last week.  Why don’t you share it?  I hope you can join in!

Here is list of “rules” and guiding ideas.  If you don’t have time to read it right now, just remember that this is an exercise to spread positivity.  Don’t smile about the misfortune of others.  Don’t smile in a way to excludes others.  Make sure a 12 year old can read it.

To join in, write a post to share your smile and then leave a comment on this post with a link to your smile.  Or, if you prefer, do a pingback to this post (pingback = have a link from your post to this one) (Note – pingbacks have been very inconsistent – please leave a comment :) ).   You can post any time until next Sunday evening (to be simple, I will say midnight GMT, which is 7 PM Sunday for me).  Note – I am no longer compiling the Smiles into a Recap post. I’ll try to get the new smile out between 7 and 8:30 Eastern Time.

39 thoughts on “The Weekly Smile for the 21st of February #weeklysmile”

      1. SHL2

        I saw a hawk this morning in the pasture went to get my camera and of course long lens was not on it. By the time I got it all together it was gone. It was stomping something on the ground I was so mad I missed it..

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  5. Diana

    What a great smile post! There is something so special about being so close to birds outside. I thought of you when a red tail hawk landed on a telephone pole along the arena fence yesterday. I tried getting closer so I could take a photo but a bunch of crows were being really loud and rowdy in some trees not too far away and it flew off to investigate them as I watched it land in a tree near the commotio. So fun to watch nature in action!Thank you for the smiles! 😀

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    1. trentpmcd Post author

      It is fun to watch big birds/birds of prey. I very rarely see falcons, so that made it even cooler than usual. Having a big hawk land close is nice, so I’m sorry the crows drove it away.
      Hope you are having a great week!

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  8. workinacresnothours

    I often wonder when we have an encounter like that if they are actually screaming in fright(picture animated eyes & beak) lol. I think it is a sign of a kind soul when wildlife preen close by. How beautiful. Hope the rest of your week continues to be great.

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    1. trentpmcd Post author

      Unfortunately in the photo you might be right – it was a very young falcon and was very afraid of some people flying ultralights above it. It wasn’t making any noise, so not screaming, but it sure was frightened as long as those huge, noisy “birds” were up there.
      This week’s encounter was far less stressful for the bird ;) For m, it was an ultra-cool encounter. Have a wonderful week!

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  12. Emille

    Wow, it looks like you don’t mess with this bird! You did what the locals had advised us you do with animals in the forest in general – you pretns you ignore them, and do not look them right in the eye, but avert your gaze.It works perfectly with deer:):)

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    1. trentpmcd Post author

      Right, wild animals do not appreciate you looking directly at them, which makes photography that much harder! OK, it has been here for a while and doesn’t seem to mind my presence. I will very slowly lift my camera and… oops, it’s gone… When I took the photo of the falcon on this page, not only was I pretty far away (it is big telephoto and heavily cropped), but the poor thing was afraid of a some ultralights, so not paying attention to me at all.

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  13. WildChild47

    Totally cool and awesome – and certainly all the more so because it was, as they say, in your “backyard” – so to speak. And to whiz/zip past so very close? Truly amazing. THAT doesn’t happen too often – but at least neither of you had your feathers ruffled! Definitely worth a HUGE smile – just imagining this and I’M smiling – which is a really big bonus this Monday (pain crunched) morning!
    Hope you have a most tremendously lovely and wonderful week Trent :D

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    1. trentpmcd Post author

      About three or four times I have seen them zipping down the road, pretty low and closer to me and the dogs than I would expect, but I think this time it was so very close because it didn’t see me until I stepped almost into its path! Still, amazing! And that it landed right there, and stayed there, knowing I was around, was even more amazing. Glad it gave you a smile :) have a wonderful week!

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    1. trentpmcd Post author

      The poor baby falcon in the photo was terrified of a few people in ultralights flying above him/her. But at least that gave me a chance to sneak up and get a few good photos before the small aircraft moved on. Seeing these birds up close is always great, and with the one this week flying up to me… even better.

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