feather flexing

McBeth.

While having my morning coffee and cigarette outside on the front step this morning I heard the chuttered squalling and feather ruffling of a baby bird waiting impatiently to be fed.

To my great surprise it was not a tiny sparrow being fed by the sparrow parent, but rather, a -- starling? Hmm, no it doesn't look at all like a starling but I'm honestly not sure just yet what kind of bird the mammoth-looking baby is (in comparison to the wee sparrow). It was a giganto baby, that's what it was. The rare Giganto bird, ahhhhyessss.

They stayed just long enough for me to grab the AA batteries that had been recharging overnight and get the camera set up for a couple of shots.

(If you can I.D. the baby let me know and I'll add it in here.)

Birds will flex adoptive muscles to care for another's young... who knew?!

a spade and a hoe

McBeth.

I accidentally picked a weed yesterday.

Or maybe my mind knows when I myself need a good weeding and it just sends me out to find one outstandingly tall misdirected and unwelcome plant ready for the picking.

When I weed, all else in inconsequential. I couldn't give a flying fig whose car is coming up the street or whose has just left; I don't hear the sirens and ambulances; the highway noise floats far far away. The background chatter volume is reduced by three clicks in my head. My fingers become outrageously sensitive, feeling for the best direction of tug to pull the entire plant, full roots and all, from the earth.


Again, today, both the internal and external weather look to be perfect for a long quiet uprooting time.

Two year old Charlie is becoming his own man, with definite preferences of habit and style that may well stay with him the rest of his life. Or the toothbrush passion may go away in another year. That's one of the thrills of childhood: so much can go any of a thousand different ways depending on another thousand variety of factors. My sister has learned that his shrill baby-pterodactyl shriek means "While I'm grateful for your offer of assistance, Mother, I'd really prefer to handle this task myself". Same with the military-style index finger wag into her face, accompanied with a sharp "NO MOMMA!". The rough translation is 'lay off, lady or I'll stick this finger up your nostril until it reaches your brain stem'.

One of Charlie's current fascinations is shoes. He loves shoes. If it was legal for a toddler to marry, and then for a toddler to marry an inanimate object, and then for a toddler to marry an inanimate object in the state of Iowa - he'd marry a shoe. Then he'd probably move to Utah where he'd marry multiple shoes and live happily ever after with hundreds of them. Charlie puts shoes onto his small wide feet hundreds of times each day. Daddy's shoes, Mommy's shoes, Charlie's shoes. The shoes down by the garage entrance, the shoes in Mommy and Daddy's closet; any shoe anywhere.

During this past weekend visit we were treated to a Charlie shoe fashion show in which he click-clacked out from Mommy and Daddys' room wearing (first) two black slip-on high-heel sandals belonging to my sister. After a traipse through the kitchen (and c'mon, the kitchen floor is OBVIOUSLY the best place for a shoe fashion show, what with the big tile floor. Carpeted bedroom floors simply won't produce that satisfying *clomp clip clomp* the same way a solid linoleum or wood or tile floor will). After he watched his feet parade through the living area in Momma's black heels he disappeared momentarily, returning shortly after wearing one strappy white dressy high heeled sandal on his left foot. For the number of times I calculated whose shoes were on his feet, I have to surmise that Mommy apparently wears the shoes with the best clackety-clack value. Or maybe it's the open-toed style he prefers because he can see what's going on down there at foot-level.

My sister happened upon these slippers at the Dollar Store recently and figured that they might fit the bill for the combination of Charlie's "I DO MYSELF!" and his shoe passion. Oh, and his aminal adoration. And his growing language capabilities. For a buck, that's quite a deal.

Beeeee. Suessssss.

That's what these are. Charlie's Beeee.Suessssss. And near as I can tell, this is how they work: Slip on. Slip off. Slip on. Watch your toes wiggle in there under the wings. Slip off. Check your toes to see if they have wings attached to them. Slip on. Run through the kitchen to the window to see how fast the Beeee.Suesssss. will carry you. Slip off. Line up a few trucks on the floor. Line up some trucks against your Beeee.Suessssss. Slip on. Move your feet away from the military straight line of trucks to evaluate the situation. Sit down on Aunt Beppie's lap for a picture of your Beeeee.Suesssss. Rinse. Repeat.

sleeping theo

McBeth.

Child rearing myth #1: Labor ends when the baby is born.
--Unknown