I am going to have a used book sale on June 3rd in my town of (deleted), IL. All the money will go to the Fire Dept to purchase trauma teddies. Trauma teddies are stuffed animals given to kids that are in need of comfort after a traumatic event. It came to my attention that they are out of them because my 2 year old son has needed to go by ambulance to the hospital twice since Feb 14th and they didn’t have any. I belong to a volunteer organization, called the Jaycees and I know this book sale will be well attended in our community. I just really need books to sell.
If you have any books to donate, maybe they can be shipped to me? Or maybe you and Fred have readers in Illinois that would donate?
If anyone, anywhere, wants to send book to Illinois to donate them for a very good cause, email me, and I’ll pass your email on to Janet. Thank you!!!
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Saturday evening, after we’d had a scrumptious dinner of catfish, sliced tomatoes and corn, Fred went upstairs to take his usual nightly bath, and I sat down on the couch in an attempt to catch up on the last few remaining episodes of Oprah and Dr. Phil I’d DVR’d. The blinds on the windows (and door) on the back of the house were all open, and so when Mister Boogers went across the back yard in a low run, he caught my eye. He did that stop-and-start run that cats on the stalk like to do, and then he ran under the shed.
I’d just had enough time to wonder what he could have seen under the shed, when he came running out from under the shed, something small in his mouth.
“Shit!” I yelled, and flew up off the couch, running in the direction of the cat door. If I could block the cat door fast enough he wouldn’t be able to bring whatever it was inside the house. I wasn’t fast enough, though, and he came through the cat door, ran through the computer room, and headed upstairs. I followed him as fast as I could, yelling the entire way.
He went into the master bedroom and I followed him, shutting the door behind me so that he – and whatever was in his mouth – couldn’t escape. Mister Boogers ran under the bed, and I yelled for Fred to come help me. I got on my hands and knees by the bed and yelled at Mister Boogers to drop whatever he had, and he responded by running out from under the bed. Then he jumped up on the bed, and dropped what was in his mouth.
A chickadee. Not only a chickadee, but a BABY chickadee, and it was dead. Fred picked it up and held it while I went and got some paper towels to wrap it in. I made some sad sounds, gave Mister Boogers a dirty look, and brought the bird downstairs to put it in the big trashcan outside the garage.
I sat back down on the couch and began watching Dr. Phil, and less than two minutes later, my attention was caught by something outside. A couple of adult chickadees were squawking in a pissed-off manner, and looked like they were dive-bombing something. I stood up and looked, and Tommy was running across the yard, something in his mouth.
I ran out the back door, yelling the entire way for Tommy to “Drop it! Drop it, Tommy! DROP IT!” He ignored me, and kept running for the cat door, and I swerved to cut him off so he couldn’t get to it. He swerved away from me and after some chasing (and much yelling), I caught him. I picked him up and shook him, yelling for him to drop it. He did, and I saw for sure that it was another baby chickadee, but at least this one was alive.
In my hands, Tommy squirmed, and he’s turning into a portly little fucker, and I had no choice but to drop him. He might be portly, but he’s a quick motherfucker, and he immediately had that baby chickadee in his jaws again. I picked him up and yelled at him some more, and after he dropped the chickadee, I went across the back yard to the cat door, shoved him through it, and pulled the bottom part of the window down so that none of the cats could get outside.
The baby chickadee was just sitting in the middle of the lawn, not moving much, so I walked over to it to see if it was okay. It let me get about a foot away, and then it took off flying. It was able to fly almost to the other side of the yard, but it couldn’t get any height in its flying – it stayed about 6 inches above the ground – and I thought that if I could put it in the platform bird feeder, it might be able to get some air under its wings and do some real flying. So I chased it for a few minutes, before it gave up and ended up hopping onto my foot. I picked it up and carried it over to the bird feeder, but it refused to leave my hand. I could feel its little heart just pounding, and I spoke soothingly to it, and after a few minutes it calmed down.
The entire time, the two chickadees flitted around the yard, bitching at me, by the way. I could see every cat in the house milling around in the dining room, trying to get out through the cat door. And Tommy sat in the window, giving me a dirty look ’cause I had taken his toy away.
I ended up sitting on the patio, the bird in my hand. It let me pet him, and it actually even fell asleep for a few moments. Finally, Fred came downstairs from his bath, and I told him to go get my camera, because OF COURSE I needed pictures.
After the pictures had been taken, Fred took the bird and put it down in the middle of the yard. The two adult chickadees flew back and forth, and we watched them, then decided to go back inside so that the adults could do whatever they needed to do to help the baby. An hour or so later, we looked outside and didn’t see the baby anywhere, but one of the adults kept flying over to the bird feeders, grabbing up some seed, and flying up into the tree. Hopefully either the baby figured out how his wings worked, or the adults were able to get the baby back up into the nest.
The really funny thing is that I
just told my brother on Friday that we’d only had one bird in the house so far this year.
Apparently the cats were listening, and took that as a challenge.
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Yesterday was kind of crappy out – it was overcast and kind of cool – but neither Fred nor I wanted to be stuck in the house all day, so he decided he was going to go fishing, and asked if I wanted to go watch. I decided I would, and brought a book with me, because fishing isn’t something I’m interested in doing myself, but I was willing to go and keep him company.
We ended up going out to
Madison County Lake, where we spent a couple of hours, and Fred only caught a single bream – which he let go, because apparently one bream isn’t enough to make a meal.
A shot across the lake.
These ducks were laying here sleeping until I got too close with the camera.
And then they decided to move on.
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Did anyone else see the episode of Oprah with Dr. Mehmet Oz, where he said “Do you know where I put my nuts?!”, all excitedly, and the audience tittered like it was full of 12 year-old boys?
Cracked me up.
(The answer: he keeps his nuts in the refrigerator so that the oil in them doesn’t go rancid. Also, you’re supposed to eat raw nuts, not roasted nuts, because if you cook them, the oil in them breaks down, and they’re not as good for you.)
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“Hey, let’s eat lots of grass, then go inside and barf it up in several strategic locations through the house!”
“Good plan!”
“How YOU doin’?”
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