Celebrating Spring! Two New Videos

Originally published April 2016

Contemplate This! Spring Into Bloom is a video designed to relieve your stress. It features the beautiful flowers of Central Park, the Cloisters and Riverside Park in Manhattan, and more flowers in Fort Greene Park in Brooklyn and the New York Botanical Garden in the Bronx.

And speaking of the New York Botanical Garden in the Bronx (and we were just speaking of it!), check out An Afternoon in the Gardens, which has flowers (of course), but also lots of birds and chipmunks.

There is now a page dedicated to the New York Botanical Garden, with lots of photos from that magical place.

Little Stick Hawk

Originally published February 29, 2016

This little hawk has been visiting Central Park for at least two weeks. The youngster hangs out around Strawberry Fields and the Bandshell, until chased out of those areas by the Beresford hawks. The hawk got the nickname because one day after getting harassed by blue jays and moving up several branches in a tree, he pulled off a small branch and flew to another tree, where he proceeded to flip it around with his talons, then wave it around in his beak. After several minutes of playing with the branch, he dropped it. You could almost read his mind as he looked down: "I dropped my stick. I dropped my stick. Now what?" His decision: to fly north over Bow Bridge, into the Ramble.

For more photos of Stick, visit the Red-Tailed Hawks page.

This Silly Video shows Stick from Feb. 3 through Feb. 23 as the youngster tries to survive in Central Park despite the blue jays and adult hawks that harass him. You can see how Stick got his name in the video on the Red-Tailed Hawks page.

Three More Sagas Have Been Added to the Archives!

Originally published February 2016

PM's Chronicler has been working hard to make sure that all the PM Sagas —  the exploits of the amazing Purple Monster and her North Pole and Christmas Monsterland crew — are available on this Web Site. I mean, really, that's the ultimate purpose of this site. Everything else is window dressing.

I have just added three early Sagas to the archive:

The Prodigal Elf, The PM Saga, Book VII, in which Clyde Elf, blinded by Hollywood stars, deserts the North Pole to seek fame and glory, only to dredge the depths of debauchery.




 

A Christmas Soap Opera: As the North Pole Spins, The PM Saga, Episode IX, in which a dastardly plot is perpetrated to kill the expectant purple parent-to-be, and we are introduced to the new progeny, Lapis Snowflake and Geranium Amethyst.

The Parable of the Lost Christmas Monsters, The PM Saga, Book X, in which the harried parents search for their wandering offspring, and we hear the legend of "The Doll With the Sad Eyes."