WELCOME JAGGER

Nicole and Rob welcomed Jagger James into the world on August 13th (almost 5 weeks early) and he was finally able to go home yesterday. He's doing great and I'm so happy that he is home with his mommy and daddy! In honor of his homecoming, I thought I'd post a couple of the photos Nicole has sent me (hopefully she won't mind!) He is such a handsome baby (and his parents are looking good - and blissful - too!)

THE GREENING OF ARIZONA

This is the 8th wettest monsoon in recorded Arizona history, and it's showing on the hillsides. Everything is green and there are more flowers in bloom than I've seen on any other trip (most of them are small and low to the ground, under the grass, but they're there). Even with all the rain we got on our July sampling trip, it's like night and day from then and now. There is so much green it's shocking!

The hummingbirds are out in force in our sample plots. Anywhere there is an agave blooming, there are at least 2 hummingbirds fighting over the nectar. I can't tell the species from my photo, but here is a female hummingbird pollinating a Palmer's agave. The only bad thing about all the new growth we're seeing is the pollen, and the resulting allergic reactions we're all having. I'm not allergic to ANYTHING, or so I thought... apparently, I am highly allergic to the invasive Lehmann lovegrass (from Africa). As we wade through our plots that have a high density of the lovegrass, we just watch as the pollen blows up into our faces (the many many many grasshoppers that are out now are not helping, every time they jump they knock more pollen into the air). Claritin seems to be helping a little. Our helpers from NAU have taken to wearing face masks to try and block some of the pollen...

KITTY CRUNCH

The kittens were eating solid food this morning...

Our little babies all grows up!

GOODBYE ALIEN IMPLANT

Friday was quite an exciting day for the Lindsays... well, for Jay at least. He was scheduled for surgery to remove the ganglion cyst that had been developing in his wrist for the past 3 months. We showed up at the hospital as requested at 5:45am. Three and a half hours later, he finally got in for surgery! Here he is passing the time:

The before picture, complete with a "remove cyst from this hand" happy face:

It took the anesthesiologist 20 minutes to administer the block (Jay's choice over general anesthesia) and then it took the doctor another 20 minutes to remove the cyst. They called me as soon as it was over to let me know everything went OK and that they would keep him in the recovery room for 20 mintues before bringing him back to his hospital room. They ended up keeping him for 45 minutes because they couldn't find his chart... that was exciting! After he finally got back to the room, they administered some pain meds, then kept him for another 30 minutes for observation before they let us go home. Here he is at home recovering, tired from the long day (we didn't get home until noon) and pain meds:
On Sunday, Jay reached the 48 hour post-surgery mark and we were able to remove the bandages. His poor hand was getting swollen from them being so tight: And for anyone who likes gross pictures, here is the final shot for this blog, of the stiches, still smiling away:

OUT OF THE BOX

The kittens are out of their box! We awoke this morning to find them roaming around the sunroom with Maxine. They had both been working very hard last night to pull themselves up and maintain balance in order to propel themselves up and out, so we weren't really that surprised. Before we left for work, Jay cut the box so that they can now get in and out easily, and we tried to "kitten-proof" the room. We'll see how things are going when we get home today...

CUTE KITTENS

Potential adopters have requested better close-ups of our resident kittens, and who are we to disappoint? The babies are getting cuter by the day. They are moving a lot more now, although still very clumsily. They've started "jumping" around the box (seems more like they accidentally propel themselves forward faster than they intend to), wrestling with eachother, and standing on their hind legs with their front paws clasping the top of the box... and they're definitely getting more curious. They've started following our fingers with their eyes and they sometimes reach out and try to "catch" us. Of course, they're still wobbling and tipping over a lot, especially if they shake their heads even a little bit! By the way, they both have very blue eyes, like their mama. And they're starting to get their canines in. And just look how much their ears have grown! They look like real cats now! Anyway, on with the photos: