Personal Fitness Trainer!

I realize have the best personal trainer! If I sit down, even for a minute, there she is at me, shouting at me to get up and be on my feet. If I do sit down, it must be for some serious stuff--no sitting in front of the comp or sitting down with my mobile phone. As long as I'm walking around,or standing, whether inside the house or outside, she lies peacefully in a corner of wherever I am. She's happiest of course, if I'm in the kitchen.
This morning was the funniest. I decided to tidy up a shelf in my wardrobe. I laid the clothes from that shelf on the bed. Then I sat down to fold them into piles. There she was, my personal trainer, barking her head off. When I finally stood up and started folding the clothes standing, she went off to a corner of the bedroom, where the breeze from the overhead fan would be on her and went peacefully to sleep!!!!
So probably in a year or show, I'll be this really fit 60 yr old, almost fit enough to run probably:-)

Early morning.........
Butterscotch body stretches, liquid eyes smile, furry head plops on my lap;---love.
Pale brown ears flapping, cream tail wagging, puppy legs pumping, grinning mouth full of toy, a furry missile swings past---joy :-)

I have an old exercycle, which had been consigned to an outside shed. But recently I decided to pull it out, to make way for something else. So it was just placed in the backyard, till I could think of where to put it.

So now, it sits in a corner of my backyard, a corner where I hope to catch a stray breeze. It is now where I now sit on an evening, cycling desultorily, looking at the trees, looking through the leaves for the stars, inhaling whatever the warm night air brings, sometimes good and sometimes not so good, while my pup, happy to have me outside, lies on a cool bed she's made for herself, in the ground near me.

I enjoy my evening peace and feel virtuous in the bargain!

I exercise outside--late evening, looking up at the stars. I inhale the scent of flowers, over-ripe jackfruit and the fresh scent of a rain washed evening.

Was walking in the front area of our house in the morning with Elsa our lab. The ground was still damp from yesterday's thunderstorm. I had finally got someone to come and take the cut gulmohar tree, but the debris was everywhere. Elsa was rooting around in the debris at one side. As I looked around I noticed, luckily at the side away from the dog, a mongoose crossing. Suddenly it saw me and stopped and then probably got the scent of the dog too. As I watched, she didn't run away immediately, but slowed and looked behind her. I wondered what she was looking at, when I saw this tiny little mongoose pup coming out of the undergrowth. Only after that, did she go into the base of my palms, with her baby. But a little later, I saw her come out and sit up on her haunches, looking almost like a meerkat, like this picture I've linked to and keeping the position for a bit. I promptly called Elsa away and into the house, to leave her in peace.
This is the first time I have seen a mongoose sit up like that and also not just run away immediately on seeing a human. It was a treat.

I cut my gulmohar tree because it had gotten old and besides the constant shedding of the tiny leaves got into the roof tiles, collected water and had damaged the roof more than once. It really was too close to the house. I decided I would remove it and plant a divi-divi instead; leave the base--which I love--and put the divi-divi near it. It was an old tall tree and had very few leaves at the moment--just a few peeping out. I couldn't bear to watch while they cut it though and on Sunday--before they cut the last raised branch, I looked at it standing there forlornly, with it's few leaves--and I cried, almost like for a beloved pet!

Bird calls

Here are two videos. The first one is of the magpie robin's cry alone. I hadn't seen one around for a while. But there he was after the first few summer showers. Wanted to show what the magpie robin's call is, because in the second video, he's having a hard time making himself heard over the racket-tailed drongo's loud and varied warbles.

In the second video, you can also hear the cawing of a crow and unfortunately the sound of a vehicle horn (very common in India alas).