Random thoughts...

My beautiful Sisters in Christ!

We all have times in our lives where time seems to be creeping at a snail's pace, the sky is grey, the routine is blah....what do you do when that happens?

There are times where life is not bad at all, it is just very....plain. Which is DEFINITELY good in many ways! But sometimes we just get that feeling like after we have taken a nap too late in the afternoon--kinda groggy.

I must admit, I am having one of those days :-). The week has been a rather stressful in some ways, but has been a blessing in others. TWS has been working dreadful hours, but I am grateful that he is working! Our fuel oil and gas are unutterably expensive, but our legislature just passed an emergency fuel bill that will give each person who is eligible for the PFD a check for $1200!!! What a mercy from God!

It is just sort of a slow day, and I feel a bit like I am waiting for a bus after traveling for many days--kinda weary, kinda restless. :-)

I have been following the Russia/Georgia mess online. I am amazed, and sorrowed, that the affair of a political person takes precedence over a potentially explosive situation. I wonder what our society is THINKING. On foxnews.com, their top story is a group of peafowl (peacocks) that are bugging an affluent Florida neighborhood. I just must wonder why this is such a big news topic as opposed to the conflict that might spill over into something bigger.

Ah, let's think of something else for a bit! I made homemade pasta today. I used flour, powdered eggs, salt, and water. I have a pasta rolling machine, but to be honest I have never really been able to make that work. The other day, however, I found a simple little pasta cutter with about 6 cutting blades set close together. I just roll out the dough and then roll that cutter through it. I READ that some Italian mothers placed a clean sheet on the bedspread and spread the pasta on there to dry.....I just used a wire rack. I am not sure how I would explain raw pasta on the bed.


I have been training the cat....this one

He is such a goof ball. He likes to be on his back more than any cat I have ever seen!!! He will go to sleep if you cradle him like a baby! And he gets grouchy if you try to actually click the mouse instead of petting him to sleep with BOTH hands...what a maroon! :-)

This is Little Man holding the cat...he likes to be held on his back and then SSTTTTRREEEETT CCHHHH. I cannot imagine how good that must feel! He does this almost every time we pick him up.

Anyway, this cat has one REALLY bad habit (well besides his ambush attacks on bare ankles, and his occasion "Kitty from above!" jump to tag your shoulder)...he likes to bolt outside of the door. He is an indoor kitty--it is really too cold here for him to be an outdoor kitty, plus I like having an indoor cat. He is getting bolder in his runs out the door--he used to stop right on the porch, but now he is tearing around under the deck. (though last time he escaped, it was during the recent rain. He is not fond of water, and ran right into a puddle that was up to his ankles! He just stood there immoble, probably thinking "Oh NO! What do I do now, everything is WET!". lol)

He is VERY hard to catch when he does that, so I knew it was time to train him like I trained the other cats we have had. I would give them wet cat food when I say "Heeeerrreee kittykittykittykitTEE". They learned to come IMMEDIATELY when called, which has saved us from many a lost cat, and has made it so I do not have to try to fish them out from behind some piece of furniture. Last night I started his training and he picked up QUICK! So now maybe he will not run off if he gets out. I HIGHLY recommend this to anyone who has a cat or a dog--a special call that they think means the very best of treats. (frankly *I* would come running if someone waved a donut and called "HEEEERRREE SparrowsparrowsparrOOOH!!")

Anyway, back to our original thoughts...what do you do when you are having a grey day? Nothing is wrong, blessings are abounding, but you just feel a bit restless and unmotivated at the same time? :-)

Kitty Interlude...

Waking the Gator

Ok true story....

When I was about 11 or 12, I think, our family was traveling and stopped at a reptile park. We decided to stay and watch the alligator show. There was a big fenced in ring with a shallow "pond" at one end and several alligators in it. The seats were ringside.

Ok, for one trick, the wrangler got a gator and flipped him over on his back to put him to sleep. Then he asked for a volunteer. My hand SHOT up in the air then I looked around and realized "No one else is volunteering....hmmm" and jerked my hand down. Too late. He saw me and called me in. At this point I realized that my exuberance just dun wrote a check my body did not really want to cash.

So I walk into the big pen with a lot of gators lounging by some water and not to terribly far from where I was and nothing between me and them. He said "We are going to wake this gator up. See that gate you just came in? that is where we are going to go OUT. FAST.".

Uh huh.....ummmm....oookkkkk .... I think at that point I wondered if he was going to take point or bring up the rear...I mean surely it would be bad form to let the little cross-eyed tourist take the hit, right?? RIGHT??

Now at this point he taught me a VERY cool thing...if you ever feel the need to wake an alligator that you just flipped over, you run your knuckles from his throat to his belly button. Y'know...just FYI....

So on the count of three, with my one good eye racing between the sleeping gator at my feet and the fully conscious gators not 20 feet from me ("How fast can they run again, Mr. Gator Man?"), I ran my trembling fingers down the underside of the gator and started to take off......and was stopped by the Gator Man.

Dagnabit, I did not press hard enough and the gator is still stacking zzz's. The man told me to try again, and at this point I have to think "Y'know, he looks pretty comfy and *I* certainly could use a nap...let's just let sleeping gators lie.". But no dice and I tried again.

DAGNABIT AGAIN! It's a swing and a miss! Again with the sleeping gator, again with me trying to run away, and again with Mr. Gator Man catching me before I escape.

xsighx

Because at this point I was putting the other gators (and the crowd) asleep from boredom, he said that we would do it together Ready?....1...2...3! Gave a tummy noogie to the gator, BOLTED out the gate and learned a VERY important lesson: Never volunteer without knowing what you are volunteering for first, and NEVER, I repeat, NEVER volunteer to a man standing in a ring full of gators....



That’s just good advice.

A Chickadeeee Emergenceeee

Hello Beautiful Sisters!

Yesterday we had a chickadee emergency!

Little man heard a commotion in the woodstove, and we found a black capped chickadee!

Chickadees are one of my favorite birds. They hang out with us all winter, are not that scared of humans (especially if there is food around), and are generally to adorable for words....

Unless they are covered with ashes and soot and I have to try to wrangle them out of the house. Then they are less cute :).

We have had at least three birds in our house since we have been here. Last time I tried to fish a chickadee out of the woodstove, it escaped into my house. Picture two kids and one mom trying to guide a frantic featherduster through either of two doors. You ever try to herd a bird? They are a lot less cooperative than herding, say, two year olds or cats or something....

So my goal was to try to get the bird out of the woodstove in some sort of container.

I needed a net, but I did not have one handy, except for the one we use for the fishtank. I figure odds of me actually getting the bird in a net that size without it escaping into the house was like.....nil.

So I figured that I would try to get a big black trash bag and open the door to the woodstove VVEERRYY carefully and see if I could get it in the bag, close it tight, and get it to the front door without it escaping.

Though my wrist is the skinniest part of me, it is still bigger than the bird. So if I try to sneak my hand in, there are plenty of holes for that little bugger to fly out of and they are ALL face level--my face. Plus, because I would be essentially pinning my own arm in a giant cast iron box, I would be helpless (and probably would squish my arm trying to slam the door back). I could just picture myself hollering and flailing while the kids scream and the bird panics. That image was SO rich in my imagination that I spent many minutes yesterday afternoon in "paralysis by analysis"--unable to actually do what needed to be done.

Now, let me say this. I am not afraid of birds at all. Not in the least. But you know what it is like when a tiny little flying thing comes RIGHT at your face....you are GOING to holler and swat. And then try to chase the thing all through the house. So I was REALLY trying to avoid that.

OH Did I mention the CAT? Yes, my "no-peripheral-vision, falls-off-the-couch-when-he-stretches, runs-into-walls-because-he-looks-backwards-when-he-runs, situationally-unaware" cat caught the tiniest bit of movement in the smoked glass (I bet the bird was a lot more thankful to be IN the woodstove at that moment!). The cat saw the bird in the glass, then walked BEHIND the woodstove to see if he could outflank the bugger before we shoved him in the bedroom and shut the door.

Ok, so plan "A" was to get the black trashbag around enough of the woodstove door so that the bird could not escape, and then wait for him to say "Oh, big black noisy hole that seems to be collapsing.....maybe that is my way out" and duck in the bag. (you know, it seemed a lot more reasonable at the time). Precious' job was to hold the top right corner of the bag against the stove AND to record the event on her camera, Little Man's job was to hold the bottom right of the bag against the stove AND shine the light in the woodstove, and my job was to press the bag against the left side of the stove, open the door, and try to look like I knew what I was doing.

Problem: bag was WAY too small for the opening, the children are positively BRILLIANT, but not terribly coordinated, and the bird is not stupid. No, the bird did not escape (through any of the holes that we left gaping around the edge of the bag), but he also did not cooperate. Time to shut the door and regroup.

Regrouping involved a terribly ridiculous idea of me just reaching in there and grabbing him while Little Man directed my actions (he was the only one with a flashlight, and I could not see in because of the way I had to sit to get into the door). Yeah, yeah...I know. However, this idea DID afford me the opportunity to look positively heroic in Precious' eyes. She kept saying "WOW mom, you are so brave!". (Quandry: do I confess that I have my own personal Alfred Hitchcock moment lodged firmly in my brain, which is why I have not actually TRIED to grab the bird? Or do I just nod with a serene, humble-yet-wisdom-of-the-ages smile?)

While regrouping, we discovered that the bird would fly part way up the flue. I figured that if we could be REALLY quick, we could put the bag UNDER the flue when he did that so he would fall into the bag. We called this "Plan B" and were quite proud of ourselves of coming up with TWO (wholly useless) plans.

Wonder Sweetie called when my right arm was deep in the bowels of the woodstove. After I extricated myself, he mentioned that he has BIGGER black bags (drum liners) in the garage. EXCELLENT. As I walk in with my newly acquired SUPER big black bag, I hear Precious hollering from downstairs at the top of her lungs "PLAN B! PLAN B!". I raced downstairs, but was too late to implement Plan B--the chickadee had come back out of the flue.

Anyway, Wonder Sweetie saved the day...again. The drum liner actually fit over the WHOLE hole. Little Man and I managed to hold the edge of the bag around the outside of the hole. Then we waited. I tried to make the bag look more open by stretching it out, and Little Man kept peeking in with his flashlight to see where the bird was. Eventually we were rewarded with the sound of bird feet on plastic. The bird got dumb enough to explore the liner, and Little Man and I got the bag closed without much of a problem.

We let the bird go, then let the cat go. He went right down to the woodstove and actually put a paw on the handle trying to open it! (He has figured out that handles and doorknobs are the key to happiness. I thank the Lord that He did not give cats opposable thumbs!).

It's a good thing those little birds are cute! We might have had chickadee soup for supper!

The stove......

The captive...










Still captive....







Yeah, Plan B is NOT going to work....








Wonder Sweetie saves the day!