everything is different now

izan he 24

[larusichthyaetus]

INTRO

Hi, everyone. I'm Ethan and I'm a trans man from Spain. This blog is a diary of my stay as a volunteer at the RV natural reserve.

I am a traditional and digital artist, though in latest years I only really do digital art. I also study dogs for fun and my dream job is to keep and breed hunting nihonken, specially Shibas, my heart breed. Right now I own two Spanish Water Dogs.

Aside from drawings, dogs and birds I love indie music, the color yellow, video games, dinosaurs, the sea and some other stuff. I collect feathers and I used to do a bit of vulture culture (this is how I started getting interested in birds).

BIRDS

I started formation as a bird ringer in September of 2023 after being interested in it for a small while and getting introduced to birdwatching and ornithology when participating aboard in a long-stay program with the European Solidarity Corps. I was able to join a fairly active ringing station not long after returning home and I have been going ringing almost weekly since then.

In Januray of 2025 I will be moving again as a volunteer for the same ornithology ONG I am a member of now, and I'll stay with them for roughly a year doing work in a natural reserve and participating in several environmental and scientific programs.

I am very excited for this opportunity because my favorite birds are gulls and I don't have much opportunity to work with them in my autonomic community. I hope to re-enter the educational system at some point (since I studied arts back in college) and specialize in gulls through either biology or ecology, and to keep working with these birds overseas if I'm lucky and able to. I love the sea and the ocean and to experience both of these things together beings me immense joy.

BLOG + SPECS + MISC

This blog is intended as a diary and I will try to post a small update each day, along with pictures if possible. I use a NIKON P1000 to take my photos, but I don't consider myself a serious photographer and I don't have much interest in editing or artistic photography. My digital art is made in Clip Studio Paint with a HUION Kanvas Pro 16 Premium.

My icon is my oc Trout, a mongrel based on a Pallas Gull, my favorite gull species.

[fella-lovin-fella]

my whole life has been spent in self preservation. next year is going to be the start of self exploration and self determination

[fella-lovin-fella]

it's this

[larusichthyaetus]

Sat 14th Dec 2024

Acentor Común | Dunnock | Pardal de Bardissa Europeu (Prunella modularis)

Forgot to update yesterday again yayy

Anyway I FINALLY managed to get the organizer to send me the document so I will be sending it back on Monday. Hopefully I get this done and finished this week and I can send my resignation letter by Friday?? I'm so stressed, I don't know how to tell my coworkers about it... I have to try to find some kind of gift for them as well.

I'm finally going ringing tomorrow/today (posting this on sunday already) and while I really want to go I am also not looking forward the fucking -3°C we're gonna get the first hours. REALLY wish we didn't go or left it for a warmer hour when it gets this cold :_)

This bird was ringed a month or so at our station (that's my hand) (I may have ringed it myself) (I do not remember)

[myfairylily]

Towan Beach, Near St Mawes, Cornwall | @Mike Lidgley

[larusichthyaetus]

Thu 12th Dec 2024

Perdiz Roja | Red-legged Partridge | Perdiu Roja (Alectoris rufa)

If you saw me skipping yesterday's blog, no you didn't. I actually completely forgot until about 2 and half in the morning when I was already trying to fall asleep and I couldn't be bothered to grab the phone just to write. Nothing much happened, but I did get a good amount of progress on the gloves, though I spent a horrible amount of time backtracking a stitch and then fixing a layout error... Crosstitching at 1 in the morning is not too good of an idea.

I had a normal-ish day at work for the most part, until at the end we had an incident. I feel really stressed about going back to work, I am seriously so burnt out with it and new things just keep piling up.

If that wasn't enough I wrote to the organizer again because I have nothing official signed yet and I can't do any preparation if I leave. I can't notify my workplace I'm quitting, I can't start the residency registration, I can't look into transportation. I feel super stuck. I asked them if they needed anything from me to finish formalizing the proccess and I just got told we would call tomorrow morning so. Yay 🥲 Not to be a catastrophist but to send me an email calling through the phone is not needed so I'm already expecting bad news. Idk what to do if this doesn't go ahead, I was looking so much forward to this. Maybe it's just that I have to go there later than what I expected but I really wanted to leave asap. I don't know, it's so frustrating!! It feels like at every step I have to overcome 500 difficulties. I wish things could just go well and streamlined for once. Sighs.

I've been thinking abt taking a small escapee somewhen this weekend to go watch gulls because I haven't birded "seriously" in what feels like months now but this weekend is going to be complicated. I (finally) ring this Sunday and I got a butchered T shot today so I don't know how I feel about limping through the mountains. We'll see how I wake up tomorrow.

Picture was taken one of the last times I went to the ringing station. This guy kept walking in front of the car and my station mate and friend told me to get out the camera, but I couldn't get a good photo because I initially tried to take it from inside the car instead of leaning out the window. I felt so silly when I realized... To be fair I had never taken a picture from the car because I don't drive myself and my father doesn't want to come to bird with me, so I have never been in the situation before. Still I felt a bit embarrassed. Apparently everyone who birds does it from the car pretty often.

[larusichthyaetus]

Tue 10th Dec 2024

Aguilucho Lagunero Occidental | Western Marsh Harrier | Arpella Comuna (Circus aeruginosus)

Not much to say today, kind of a lazy, tiring day. I have 8 days of work left and I really cannot wait to be done with it and tell my boss I'm quitting. I got the Christmas gift from the company already and it was... alright, as in it's really good but barely anything from it is useful to me and I really wish they would have just upped my Christmas bonus instead. Same as last year, mainly. I hope the voluntary organizer gets back to me this week so I can sign the papers soon, otherwise I'll message him again Thursday or Friday.

Did not do much aside from work because I have been sleeping really bad this past week, but I did accompany my mother to the vet to have my childhood dog checked out for a little lump on his armpit. We're getting results in a week but the vet said it looks like it's just a fatty cyst so I'm hopeful it's nothing worrying. He also got meds for his back pain because he's an old man.

No progress on the gloves, hopefully tomorrow. I should buy new, better ones anyway because I got these in a hurry once and they're fingerless, so not really useful for keeping the cold out, though they work in a pinch. I'm going to try to fox my sleep schedule so I have energy to work on stuff through the day.

The photograph today was taken a month or so ago close to my working place. There is a big river and some open fields really close to it so if I have time I take a walk and birdwatching before work. Raptors are not super common but I have seen this juvenile Marsh Harrier a few times. Fooled me once thinking it was a Spanish Eagle, but alas.

[larusichthyaetus]

Mon 9th Dec 2024

Cistícola Buitrón | Zitting Cisticola | Trist (Cisticola juncidis)

I haven't contacted the volunteers' organizer yet, but I did write to my union to ask about the proccess of notifying my employer about my leave, and now that I know when and how I have to do things I feel a lot more relieved about things. Legal matters stress me a lot and I can't wait to get this matter over with.

I have to make a list of clothes I need to buy and bring. Most of my wardrobe is +7 years old, and it wouldn't be an issue if it wasn't because the quality of the fabrics is not the best, so I should invest into newer and better clothing. Yesterday my mother sewed back my favorite pair of running shoes, though. I'm not letting those die, they're too comfortable, even if they're falling apart. I should bring my sewing stuff in case I need to do emergency repairs.

After I got home from work today I watched the movie Perfect Days and I enjoyed it a lot. The OST reminded me I hadn't listened to a few of these old songs in a while so I've been playing them on repeat while working on fixing up my gloves. I have some work to do still, but it's nice to get some progress after not touching them for so long.

Picture today is also an old one from this summer, I think the laat days of July or first of August. I took it at the sea town we spend the summer vacations at. I adore the place and I'm rather sad I will probably not be able to go this year, but it's true I am going to have a "private" beach 5 mins away from my room for almost a whole year, so that should compensate a bit. I will miss the Atlantic though, the Mediterranean is not the same.

[larusichthyaetus]

Sun 8th Dec 2024

Cernícalo vulgar | Xoriguer comú | Eurasian Kestrel (Falco tinnunculus)

I have been speaking with the voluntary program's organizer for some weeks now and I'm almost about to finish formalizing the proccess, just need to sign the final paper. I was hoping to have it done by thursday last week but it ended up not happening and I've spent the whole weekend feeling stuck about this. Hopefully tomorrow I get the papers so I can sign them and contact my job about my leave.

First entry to the blog! Because my introduction is in the pinned, I won't go over everything again, but hi, I'm Izan (or Ethan, however I wrote it there. They're pronounced the same way by the way), and I'm soon going to move away to do voluntary work for SEO/BIRDLIFE and continue my formation as a bird ringer. I made this blog because it's my second time living alone and I would like to make the experience more smoothly than the first time, I thought keeping some sort of diary would help me with it.

I've done a bit of preparation today, even though I still have time to do it. Mostly noting down stuff I should buy or have ready. The house I'm staying is inside a natural reserve and I won't be able to go to the shop down the corner, with it being 20km away and all that, so the more stuff I prepare in case I can't find it easily afterwards the better.

It is getting really cold these days in Spain and they say in the news it's about to get colder, so I will probably try to finish cross-stitching my gloves tomorrow. I started sewing a pattern on them really long ago and I just left it unfinished...

Speaking of news, I barely watch the TV at home and then I feel really uninformed, so I will try to get the habit of staying up to date, either watching the news or listening to the radio or something similar. It's not something I've ever been particularly interested into but I really don't like how increasingly isolated from the rest of the world it makes me feel. Another weirdly specific adulting thing to add to the news, I suppose.

I will try to pre-organize the trio this week, and then it'll be the count down to leaving. I hope I will have all documentation signed before next week so I can look into transportation and tickets without having to pay much. The NGO will pay my transportation but I don't want it to be excessively expensive just in case. It's going to be a horribly long month I feel.

The picture is not from today, by the way, but from a past ringing morning. I haven't had time/energy/drive to go and birdwatch or just take a walk lately because of work, but I want to get my shit together and get as many species as I can here before I leave the community. Or at least not spend so much time inside, though temperatures aren't going to help much now.

37 days left until RV.