Karma's When I Feel Like It Blog

March 28, 2026

My Spring Colors

Filed under: Uncategorized — Karma @ 12:24 pm
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I’ve been a bit of an absentee from the blogs this month. Life has been keeping me busy. It is nearly the end of term 3 at school, generally the most difficult academically, and it is a long stretch between breaks. Massachusetts has their spring break in April, aligning with the Massachusetts holiday, Patriot Day, so that is on the horizon to look forward to.

One of the things that had my attention was shopping for a new car. A new-to-me car, I should say, as I would not purchase brand new. I made the decision that it was time to trade in my 10-year-old Buick Encore with over 103,000 miles on it. I did not want to be faced with an expensive repair on a car whose value would not be worth the cost of the repair, so I traded it in for this:

It is a 2025 Ford Bronco Sport with ruby red metallic paint. It is a little bigger than my Buick, and has all the room I need for transporting my kayak or my bike, or whatever else I may need for whatever adventure I get up to! I’m very happy with my purchase. I think this sporty little car suits me just right.

After I picked up the car last week, my sister and I headed to Cape Cod last weekend to visit our mother. The weather was chilly and windy, but at least the sun was out. I took them on one of my geocaching adventures; one of the nice things about geocaching is that sometimes it takes you somewhere you may never have thought to stop and have a look around. I found two on this trip to the Cape.

This one led us to a little bridge in Dennis, where in nicer weather people like to go crab catching. I was ready to give up after hunting around for a while, but as we were about to walk back to the car, I spotted a familiar sight in this game – a fake rock key holder laying right on the ground blending in with the real rocks.

The second one I set my sights on this day led to a view of an osprey’s nest. Mr. and Mrs. Osprey were not to be seen on this day, but this appeared to be a regularly used nesting site. It was in a guardrail overlooking Swan Pond River, which had a view of a different bird, common eiders:

New bird for my life list on Merlin! The sky and the water reflected deep blues in the sunshine.

Back at home, after reading Mike’s and Barbara’s blog posts this morning, celebrating the arrival of spring in the south, I decided to have a little peek outside my own door to see what might be poking up. Nice to see some fresh green after a winter of white.

I was surprised to see my parsley coming back! I usually have to replant parsley each spring, so after the harsh winter we had around here, I did not think it would over-winter and come back on its own.

I was not surprised to see the chives. They are very reliable year after year. Maybe I’ll see the dill soon too.

And the very first hint of the first blooms in this yard – hyacinths. I just love their sweet scent, and their pretty purples and pinks when they blossom.

Spring warmth has teased a bit here in Massachusetts, but temperatures are still not consistent. A high of only 39 degrees is expected for today. Between the temperature and my busy-ness running around the last few weeks, I don’t think I’ll be exploring any farther afoot today, but I hope you enjoyed a bit of my spring colors.

February 25, 2026

Fort De Soto Park

Filed under: Uncategorized — Karma @ 5:00 am
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One of my favorite days on this trip to Florida was the one we spent at Fort De Soto Park in Tierra Verde. It is a beautiful county park straddled between Tampa Bay and the Gulf of Mexico that is abundant in wildlife, walking trails and beaches full of shells and sand dollars.

This pier was closed at a point for the public to walk on, due to storm damage, but that didn’t stop a crowd of cormorants, and a few terns from gathering.

While walking back on the pier toward the land, I spotted movement of birds at the top of the trees. I got to see and photograph a new-to-me bird, a nanday parakeet.

This next one is a super-tightly cropped shot at 400mm, but I thought the lens did a decent job with it:

The trails in the park are a nice place to walk and get a little exercise while exploring – and exploring got me my first Florida geocache. This was just slightly off the beaten path, but hard to miss once you were in the right spot!

The trails were also loaded with these little guys, fiddler crabs.

The adults of these are only an inch or two in width. I wish I’d thought to put something in the photo for scale. As we were walking we noticed all these small holes with balls of dirt on top, wondering what they were. We found a sign explaining and then it was hard not to see them as they scurried into their holes to hide from our footsteps.

Back out by the water at the park, I discovered and photographed another new-to-me bird, the reddish heron.

Not very creatively named, is it?

Pterodactyls, uh, I mean pelicans, were also soaring in the sky, a fairly common sight in Florida.

They really do look like dinosaurs, don’t they?

This great egret seemed to be posing for a portrait:

At the end of Sand Dollar Key, you can look at Fort De Soto passage, a waterway that passes between the park and Shell Key. You can take a ferry ride to Shell Key and collect many beauties or just enjoy quiet nature. This grouping of birds at this tip of the park contains quite a variety of gulls and turns, among them another bird for my life list, a black skimmer.

Walking along this stretch of beach, yet another new-to-me creature appeared, a brittle star:

With a bit of research, I discovered these critters have been on this planet for 480 million years! Talk about dinosaurs!

After this delightful visit, we had a delicious late lunch at Billy’s Stone Crab. I had grouper tacos – the grouper was fresh and perfectly prepared. A fun little side note about this spot, if you remember the John Candy movie from the 80’s, Summer Rental, the scenes in Sculley’s were filmed in this restaurant!

February 24, 2026

The Manatees are In!

Filed under: Uncategorized — Karma @ 6:00 am
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I’ve had a love of manatees since I was a child. I remember learning about them for the first time on a trip to Sea World with my parents. I was fascinated by these gentle giants, and I purchased a manatee stuffed animal to take home.

Fast forward to adulthood, a trip to Florida a few years ago. It was a very warm February vacation week. The water temperatures in Florida were quite warm. Attempts were made to see manatees in places they are reported to congregate in winter. No manatees.

February 2026, water temperatures in the Gulf and Tampa Bay are a bit cooler – 62 degrees reported during my trip. Manatees prefer water temperatures of 68 degrees and head inland to warmer springs and other places. Tampa Electric has a power plant in Apollo Beach that produces warm water in an inlet off Tampa Bay where manatees enjoy the warm, clean water produced by the plant. On this trip to the Manatee Viewing Center, the manatees were in abundance!

There are places in Florida where you can kayak with manatees. I need to plan a trip to one of these spots on my next trip. We wanted to kayak on this trip, but the persistent wind caused us to opt out of trying this year.

February 23, 2026

Touching Down in Sunny Florida

Filed under: Uncategorized — Karma @ 2:13 pm
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As most of the northeastern United States is in the middle of experiencing the Blizzard of 2026, I am home from school on a snow day, and reminiscing about my recent trip to Florida.

On Saturday, February 14, we touched down at Tampa International Airport around noon in sunny skies and the temperature was 77 degrees. Coming from what has been a frigid and snowy winter in New England, it felt like arriving in paradise. After grabbing the rental car, we made our way to the Gulf Coast for our stay in Madeira Beach. Our journey had begun very early that morning – we had to fly to Chicago for our connection – and we were hungry! First stop, Sea Dog Brewing, Treasure Island.

That’s a Sea Dog Blueberry Wheat beer – delicious and refreshing along with my bacon and havarti burger and a view of the intracoastal waterway:

Next was a stop at the local Publix grocery store for some snacks and such, then on to check in at Barefoot Beach Club.

The view from the room was not too shabby!

Gulf Coast sunsets are spectacular, and the first night did not disappoint.

The morning dawned with a more subtle beauty that was meant for a beach walk.

About half a mile to the south is John’s Pass, a busy shopping and restaurant area. From the beach you can see the drawbridge that allows taller boats out of the pass, created by a hurricane back in 1848, into the Gulf of Mexico.

Can you see who is waiting for me at the edge of the water?

My friends have started calling the great blue heron a “Karen’s Heron” since they magically appear in the places where I am most happy!

Like a lot of the country, Florida has also experienced some unusually cold weather (for them anyway) this winter. The wind on this particular day, a bit later in the morning, had become unrelenting. Although the temperature was warm enough (mid-70’s), the wind made it unpleasant for lounging on the beach. We retreated for the soothing water of the hot tub at the hotel instead.

As you can see in this photo I took later that afternoon, the wind was so strong it pretty much flattened the beach!

Clearly other folks had decided too that it was not a good beach day.

I’ve been busy reviewing and editing my photos today. I haven’t decided how many Florida posts there will be just yet. The wind did continue for the week, but luckily it wasn’t quite as strong as this day. I’ll end this post here, so as not to overwhelm with too many of the photos I am excited about sharing. My 100-400mm f8 lens performed nicely for me in the bright sunshine, so I’ll definitely have more to share this week.

January 27, 2026

Still Home…Just a little update

Filed under: Uncategorized — Karma @ 9:24 am
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This is the view out my front door this morning. School was canceled again today. They originally called for a 2 hour delay this morning, then called back and changed it to a cancellation. I’m assuming it is because side roads are still messy and difficult. I wouldn’t know, I haven’t been off Main Street in Monson since Friday. You can see the snowbanks created by the plow in our parking area. Normally I wouldn’t include the dumpster in a photo, however, it gives you the scale for the size of the snowbanks. I’d say we ended up with somewhere in the ballpark of 16 new inches from this storm. It is supposed to be “unseasonably cold” according to the weather peeps this week, so the snow will be hanging around, and they are saying there is potential for another significant storm to roll in this coming weekend. **Sigh**

The power and the internet stayed on all weekend and yesterday too, so that is something to be grateful for. I was able to cook, and watch TV, and stay warm, although my heat definitely struggled to keep up with the cold outside. I’m not looking forward to my next natural gas bill.

There is one bright spot that made me smile this past weekend. I got an email from the resort where I’ll be staying on my vacation next month with the heading: “20 Days till Beach Time!” That came on Sunday, so 18 days left!

January 25, 2026

Lazy Days

Filed under: Uncategorized — Karma @ 9:53 am
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It is Sunday morning as I’m typing this post. We are awaiting a major snowstorm to hit this afternoon into tomorrow morning. The sky is a heavy gray, and the air is cold (6 degrees Fahrenheit as I write) and dry. The forecast for western Massachusetts is 12-20 inches of snow by the time it is all said and done tomorrow evening. Many schools have already canceled for tomorrow – not mine, but I’m assuming that will happen. My superintendent has a tendency to wait until the last moment to call it off. As I’ve said many times, I’m not a big fan of winter, however there is something kind of relaxing about hunkering down for a big storm, as long as the power stays on. That’s far from guaranteed. It feels like permission to be lazy. I went to the grocery store after work on Friday, with about a gazillion other people, and bought ingredients for easy to make meals, and snacks. Then yesterday I made another quick trip to the little store in the center of town and picked up some fresh yeast because I decided to bake bread.

It isn’t very pretty, but it tastes good. I used the Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day recipe because it is a simple recipe. Simple is what my lazy day was calling for. I also made a favorite soup recipe in my Instant Pot – chicken tortilla soup – another extremely simple but tasty recipe.

I binge-watched an entire Netflix limited series yesterday too, His & Hers. It was a good thriller with twists and turns that keep you guessing, and has a totally surprising ending. If you are staying home today and enjoy that style of tv show, give it a try and let me know what you think of it.

On my couch, wrapped in fleece and blankets and sipping coffee this morning, I’m waiting to see what this day will bring. I’ve downloaded an extra book to my Kindle ahead of finishing the current one I’m reading, just in case the power goes out. I figure if it does go out, at least I can read. I found a Kindle sale on The Housemaid – a book that has a lot of buzz around it right now due to being recently made into a movie. I prefer to read the book before I see a movie – I like to make my own version of it in my mind before I see Hollywood’s version. The book I’m currently reading, The Last Thing He Told Me, I just learned has a sequel that was published a couple weeks ago – might have to grab that too! – and it is a series on Apple TV. Hmm, might have to subscribe for a little while after I finish reading. Are you reading anything interesting right now?

My mind is also drifting to a warmer place in my future. I’m heading back to Florida for my February break this year. I’m hoping to be doing something like this three weeks from now, enjoying a cold beverage on a warm beach. Probably not beer since it is around 9:30 in the morning while I’m typing, but I wouldn’t be opposed to a mimosa or Bloody Mary. Interesting side note about the beer in my hand: that is the same brewery that originated in Maine, that I’ve visited a couple times. They have a brew pub on Treasure Island in Florida where I bought the koozie and the beer.

This was the view of my backyard on Monday, after last weekend’s snow. By tomorrow at this time I expect to see much more snow out there. In the time since I began this meandering post, the snow has started falling and I got the phone call about there being no school tomorrow.

I’ll wrap this post up for now, while I cross my fingers that my power stays on. If you are with me in the path of this storm, stay safe and warm.

January 19, 2026

Winter Walking

Filed under: Uncategorized — Karma @ 3:22 pm
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If you’ve read this blog for a while, or even just last week, you may know I’m not a big fan of winter. I will, however, give winter its due when it presents some beauty. We had a snowfall filled weekend this past weekend in Massachusetts, and in most of the northeast. I’d say we ended up with about 5 inches total after it was all said and done. There is no school today in honor of Dr. Martin Luther King, so I took the opportunity as the sun peeked out today to get a little winter wonderland exercise and photography trek at Conant Brook Dam. Come along with me.

The entrance to the path I follow had only been walked by a few at the time I arrived. Cross-country skiers made a bit of an indent in the snow, so I followed along in their tracks.

I’ve shown you this pond several times in this blog, but each season, each visit, reveals another nuance, and a touch of tranquility.

The quality of light and the presence of clouds changed as I continued my journey to the top of the dam, made a bit more arduous by the presence of deeper snow underfoot.

When I reached the top, I paused to take a shot of another view I’ve featured many times, but this time with sticky snow clinging to all of the branches below.

At this point in my walk, a somewhat decent cell signal returns, so I took a moment to send a selfie to some friends, and to show them that I actually remembered to bring the Canon with me on this walk.

(The New England Patriots are back! AFC Championships next weekend – go Pats!)

This is the snowy view across the top of the dam. I walked all the way across, and sometimes I travel the diagonal path down the dam that you can see in this photo I took from the bottom:

I considered it, and I had my trekking poles with me, but I thought better of it since it was kind of slippery out today. Over where you can see the railings above the spillway, the route back to the path can be a little tricky to navigate without snow covered rocks, so I erred on the side of caution and just turned around and went back across the top of the dam.

On my walk back down toward the pond, sunlight was playing on the water, but I had trouble trying to capture it through the branches in my view. By the time I got back into a clearer area, the water sparkles had passed, but I did manage to get a nice reflection of the sun on the water.

While I was taking this photo, subtle movement out of the corner of my eye caught my attention. A single Canada goose was quietly paddling, poking in the water looking for food.

Normally, I wouldn’t have given this bird a moment’s notice. There are so many of them around here we think of them as nuisances. They have a tendency to be quite aggressive when there are babies, and in certain places you have to be careful not to step in their poop! But this time, the moment felt different. It was alone, as I was, just going about its business, as I was, with a light spray of snow blowing across its face, as it was across mine. It seemed peaceful, as I was. It continued on its journey, as did I.

January 11, 2026

Sunday Stroll

Filed under: Uncategorized — Karma @ 3:59 pm
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Motivating myself to go outside in the winter is no easy task. I’m not a fan of the cold, and if it is windy out, just forget about it. However, I’ve got two things that may help me get out there more. First, Jane and I have challenged each other to increase our total step counts this year. Last year, according to data recorded by my Apple Watch, I totaled 986 miles. I’m thinking if I include all the days I forgot to wear my watch, it was probably pretty darn close to 1000 miles. **side note: if you’ve read this blog for a while, you may remember my brain constantly connects to lyrics, so right now I have I’m Gonna Be by the Proclaimers and 1000 Miles by Vanessa Carlton duking it out for dominance in my head.

During my winter break from school, my little group of friends and I got out for a hike in Wilbraham, right after snow had fallen the previous night. We built up some heat, so by the time we reached this vista for a picture we were unzipping or taking our coats off.

A second reason to get out has been presented to us by our friend Mike over at MLCreations. Today he published some inspiration for theme days for photography. Go over to Mike’s place and read his post and get some inspiration yourself. He invites us to participate as we wish. The sun was out today, and it was about 40 degrees out, so I took myself out just for a little neighborhood walk. Monson became a town in 1775 and there are still quite a few historic buildings around, including the original library, built in 1882. I often walk by it on my neighborhood walks, and today, with Mike’s ideas in mind, I stopped and took a picture of this door:

I thought it was a unique looking structure. You can’t go into the library through this door anymore, but the original granite library is connected to the more modern looking addition to the library that was built in 1990. This is my contribution to Mike’s theme, Door Sunday.

I’ve got 8506 steps today as of my typing of this post. So thanks to Jane and Mike for helping me get moving!

January 1, 2026

Unexpected Favorites of 2025

Filed under: Uncategorized — Karma @ 4:54 pm
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I’ve been trying to write this post for several days, waiting for inspiration as I browsed my photo library. Usually when I’m thinking of a blog post, it starts with a photo, and the words start swirling together in my mind. Occasionally a theme emerges, sometimes not. As I began adding photos to this post, the theme for my favorites of the year has become apparent: unexpected. I realized that every photo I am featuring here was not planned; they just happened.

In March, my friend and I took a late winter/early spring walk at one of my regular haunts, Conant Brook Dam, and he claimed I was so desperate to see some wildlife that I was trying to manifest it, hence the name of that post Manifesting Wildlife. He said I was just seeing a stick, but it in fact turned out to be, in my words at the moment, a “big ass turtle.” This photo isn’t anything technically spectacular, but it brought me joy.

On our trip to Tennessee in April, I had a moment of awe as a bald eagle soared right in front of me. I was unprepared for the moment and the shot I got is far from technically good, but it brings back that good memory.

My vacation in Maine this year had its ups and downs. The downs would definitely be my visit to the ER and my big screw up on ISO for my attempted Milky Way photography. But, unexpectedly, I learned that my iPhone does a pretty nice job of night photography if you hold very still, and I got this photo:

July brought a morning of contentment that I spent biking, then walking at Quabbin Reservoir. My favorite picture of that day was this one, with a hummingbird that appeared at the last second:

If you’ve been reading this blog for a while, you know I have a special love of hummingbirds – so much so that I have one tattooed above my hip.

A camping trip in August allowed me to photograph a “bucket list bird”, one that I have wanted to see in person. I had the lucky experience of a common loon swimming not too far from my kayak:

In late summer, Jane, Nicole and I took a couple of dinner picnic hikes, an idea that I hope we will do some more of in 2026. At the summit of Mt. Holyoke, we were met with the unexpected view of a hot air balloon drifting along the Connecticut River:

Labor Day weekend was another camping trip, that was unfortunately disrupted by some very inconsiderate camping neighbors. We made the best of our time in Vermont however. A picture I took kind of “offhand” just looking out at the night sky and trying to tune out the rudeness of people, turned out to be one of my favorites from that trip:

Some of the best experiences turn out to be the unplanned ones. I spent a lot of time at the beach this summer, but one of the best days was a very unexpected one in October. Very out of character for New England, it was forecast to be 80 degrees and my companion and I headed to York Beach in Maine. I took lots of pictures this day and it became my contribution to Walktober, hosted this year by Dawn at Change is Hard. After a wonderful day, we decided not to drive home and stayed in a beachfront hotel for the night. The following morning I enjoyed a gorgeous beach sunrise and another walk. This photo, after the sunrise colors had begun to fade but the sun still creating some beautiful light, was my favorite from the bunch:

In an attempt to capture some foliage before it fell from the trees, I returned to Goat Rock in Hampden. But it wasn’t the view from the peak that produced my favorite shot, it was one from the hike up where I was taken aback by beautiful red and pink trees and bushes:

On an evening that I had no idea was the night before the full moon, beautiful light glimpsed from my bedroom window drew me outside, which led to me being able to get this shot of November’s Beaver Moon:

A very happy new year to you. I hope that you will find unexpected joys and beauty in 2026.

December 25, 2025

Merry Christmas

Filed under: Uncategorized — Karma @ 8:41 am
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After a busy day baking and prepping food and bagging Christmas gifts, this was my Christmas Eve: popcorn, wine, a Christmas movie on Netflix and my feet up! Ahhhhhh….

Merry Christmas to all who celebrate. Looking forward to seeing you around the blogosphere in the New Year.

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