I wonder if I'll run out of money before I run out of time

Click the pics before they all fly away.

Sunset on the Rio Grande.

Not much him going on today; I spent most of it walking around taking pictures of birds since that seems to be the main reason most people come here...That and walking the river trails. So I think I'll stay for one more night and then mosey back to Elephant Butte and find a different boondocking spot.

When I got back from Walmart yesterday and checked out my fuel and grocery receipts, I was shocked, shocked, I tell you! It cost $65 to put half a tank of diesel fuel in the truck, and even though I rarely spend anywhere near $100 for groceries at Walmart, yesterday I spent almost $150...That, to me, is shocking. And what that did to me was made me reconsider the sanity of paying $10 a night to boondock here on the Rio Grande instead of boondocking at Elephant Butte for free.

I talked to an old guy at Elephant Butte the other day, and I figured he was a little younger than me, which would be less than 75. But it turned out he was 80; I couldn't believe it. But the point is he was living full-time in his fifth wheel, with his dog, pulling a little trailer behind the fifth wheel with a generator and some other stuff piled in it and seemed to be doing just fine. He didn't walk like he was 80, he didn't talk like he was 80, he appeared to be in at least as good a shape as me, maybe better.

I had always figured that 80 would probably be as long as I would be able to boondock, but talking to him made me think perhaps I could hang in there beyond 80. But you never know, genes and luck seem to have more to do with it than anything else, but ... I have always been pretty lucky.

Theboondork

I noticed a Buzzard flying around me when I got to my new boondocking spot, but I didn't think nothing of it, I figured I just smelled like I was dead, and it has been a while since I had a real shower.

But then a second Buzzard showed up and started watching me. I'm not sure what that means. It could mean I'm too much for one buzzard to eat. Or it could mean I've attracted a whole herd of buzzards. Or maybe they know something I don't. Either way I told the Buzzards about the 80-year-old guy at Elephant Butte.... I made up the part about him looking a little wobbly.

This rare Big Headed Blue Bellied New Mexico Waterpecker is very similar to your average Woodpecker except instead of pecking holes in trees the Waterpecker eats trees. If no trees can be found Waterpeckers will make do by eating bushes.... Little known fact... Pres. George Bush was horrified of Waterpeckers.

You can always tell there's a Waterpecker around when the trees next to the water look like this.

This is a Blue Bellied Amazonian Teenybopper, these birds have never been spotted in New Mexico before... Except by me of course. So how do these birds, that are known to be very weak flyers, get from the Amazon to here? No one knows for sure including experts such as myself, but I have reason to believe they come here on UPS trucks which bring them right to your front door.

An incredibly rare, and extremely dangerous bird is this Australian Zebra Legged Grunt. Right off the bat, even if you're not a renowned ornithologist like moi, you should be able to recognize the thick powerful beak, vicious claws, and beady eyes, and realize this is a meat eater... In Australia this bird kills more people every year him him than there are in the entire country.

And you can tell from the blood-soaked feathers this bird has been feeding recently, probably on a photographer, since anyone holding a camera is their preferred food.