Alone for a few hours

I am alone for a few hours today as everyone is either in school or at work.  I'm just taking it easy and catching up on my email and things like that.

I went with Sandy yesterday to the Commissary at West Point.  It is a beautiful drive and I've always loved looking over the hills and imagining it years ago.   Sandy usually only shops there about every two or three months, so she really stocks up.  Graduation was last weekend, and a lot of the parents were still around the post.

This morning I walked a little over a mile on Mike's treadmill, and hope to do the same every morning.  I'm sure my legs are going to hurt by this evening.  Don't they say "No pain, no gain"?

Rhododendrons are blooming in profusion in this area and flowering in all the yards around, except Sandy & Mike's.  I think because their back yard is where the deer have always come down the hill and out into the neighborhood, and this is the first house they get to so they start eating in this yard.  I remember in past years seeing so many deer from morning to evening, but not on recent trips.  I really do  miss them.

When I arrived there was a bird nest (a robin, I think) on the front porch railing, with three baby birds.  I never saw them that they didn't have their mouths wide open and waiting for Mom to fly back with food for them.  Yesterday we noticed that two were gone from the nest, and the third looked big enough to be ready to leave.  I was hoping to catch sight of their flying lessons, but you can wait around for hours for something to happen, and it's all over with now.  When Mike was a very young baby I spent at least a week holding him while looking out the bedroom window, and witnessed the always-hungry  babies  until Mom took them out on our front lawn to teach them to fly.  I really hoped to see that with these birds, but I missed it.  I love all the sights and events in nature that I see here, but miss at home in California.  I'm sure the same happens there but just not in my space.

That's about all from here for the time being.  I'll be back again soon. 

A Few Hours Later: 
Regarding my post yesterday when I tried to explain the origins of Fishkill:  I'm reading a book in the Images of America series, East Fishkill, which has this explanation:

"Fishkill is a translation of the Dutch word Vis-kil, or "fish creek".  So Governor Fish had nothing to do with it, but I was correct about the creek.