I've just spent the last 15 minutes searching bird guides on-line and on paper to try to figure out what is nesting in the grape arbor. It looks like a nuthatch or wren that has dressed to go to work for UPS. It's incredibly tiny and quite cute but clearly not one to be pushed around. When I first saw it at the beginning of summer it was trying to take over a bird house I had created out of an old boot. Some chickadees had moved in and I was thrilled to see the house used. The chickadees had dutifully carried a boots worth of material from the yard to their nest. At a moment when both the male and female were out collecting material my little UPS bird 'discovered' the boot. He sat at the hole pulling material out. Clearly their tastes in furnishings were different you could almost see him (her?) shaking his head "this straw with those drapes - come on!". The chickadees returned and a battle royal ensued with it ending with two chickadees (which are bigger) holding little UPS down on the ground. Pinned, cage match over! It was then that I knew the housing market in Denver was tight.
By the way I'm listening to Rubber Soul it's a find from the Friends sale. It was a copy from the Library's own collection usually these are in very rough shape having had lots of rough use. This one was pristine. Or at least that's what I thought. The first song Drive my car (Baby you can drive my car) was first loud than soft. But I could care less as long as Norwegian Wood is fine.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7-aKdwSuBn4
I didn't think anything more about who or what was living in my boot till this morning. I came in the back gate with the dogs and saw little UPS driving off a squirrel from his nest, the boot. I'm not sure when the lease changed hands and what was involved but it was clearly his.
I started down this whole what kind of bird is that road (and by the way there is a clear need for a stupid-user friendly bird ID app!) simply to prove my bona fides as a bird lover. I'm happy to share a boot with a bird or see a robin grabbing a worm from the garden. Heck, I can even accept that the robins taught our dog Cooper to eat our raspberries (I swear!). There is a line tho'! I woke this morning to a flock of grackles in the onions. Wanking bleeping grackles!
I'll offer what I think is the best YouTube video ever to explain that term. Warning the language is well - the point I guess. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q2nA2szz8dY
My frustration with grackles is they come in a swarm and thrash and peck the leaves and bulbs of the onions. What's left looks like it's been hit by a weed wacker. They don't seem to really eat more than a peck but it's a thousand pecks. I once thought they were maybe going after bugs but that doesn't seem to be the case. Perhaps the smell and juice is what entices them. They always seem to show up just as the onions are getting close to time to pull. Thus you are left with pull 'em early and slightly battered or lose 'em entirely.
I know I'm not the only gardener who has uncivil thoughts. Just this week one of my fellow gardeners at the Mennonite garden lamented that he had not gotten one single strawberry due to a rabbit. Actually, on the walk this morning I saw four rabbits poised across the street from a neighbors garden. The neighbor had netted and fenced his beds after losing all spring long to these cute little bunnies. I swear the four I saw were planning something - almost rang his doorbell to warn him.
Deb is just back from working on the tile floor for the cabin's bathroom with her step-son. It was a physically and emotionally exhausting few days. Deb is a trooper. The topper came last night when her step-son had gone off for a drive and a bear visited. The bear never came in the cabin fortunately but didn't seem to be willing to get lost either. Tired, alone and in the dark (except a flashlight) Deb tried to scare him away by banging and turning on a battery operated vacuum and made plans to hide under the bed if he got in. As a husband it's hard to hear. Between bears, rabbits and wanking bleeping grackles it's a tough dangerous world out there. And perhaps that is the thread I'd like to pull.
I mentioned a few blogs back that among the items that I don't think I'm hearing the straight truth on is North Korea. As no one challenged my assertion "Hey what are you nuts Doug?!" I feel I have to expand upon the thought to explain. If only to reassure myself.
North Korea's government is to my standards horrible in about every aspect. I don't claim any special knowledge about the country or the government. The little I've heard about huge slave labor camps to assassinations of relatives to ICBMs and nukes I believe. I don't know why North Koreans don't revolt. Perhaps three generations of dictators have boiled the frog slowly enough that starvation and brutality are just, well -Tuesday. I've heard that studies have shown that it is the loss of, not the actual standard of living that cause revolutions. That could make sense - I guess, tho' I doubt they have an immigration problem.
What I don't get is South Korea just elected a President who campaigned on negotiating with the North. There is a strong element within the South that sees re-unification as both a goal and possible. The so called 'Sunshine' policy is looked upon as doable. I doubt every single South Korean sees this as the correct approach but enough to elect a President do. What do people who know the situation much more intimately than I ever will see, that I don't? What cultural aspects allows them to just say " Oh that's just Crazy Uncle Kim, don't worry"? Is it simple fear of the huge death toll should war come? If you were South Korean would you want any part of what is North Korea to become part of your life only maybe softer?
The US entered the Korean war after the invasion of the South. We came to protect them and at least partially to stop a domino from falling to communism. We have generals telling Congress that the North can now reach Alaska and Hawaii with missiles. We seem to be amp-ping up to a war that will almost immediately have a death toll in the millions. That is before you start doing the math on alliances and animosities in the region. Perhaps it is because I grew up during the Vietnam War (thankfully to young to fight) that I distrust dominoes. More to the locus of my distrust too many Journalists seem to see war as part of a career path. What am I not hearing in all this that obviously many South Koreans do hear? It is a tough and dangerous world out there. Doug A.
Oh and apropos nothing, how does an exceptionally fast ship, a cruiser, designed to see every thing short of a cloaked Klingon Warbird not see a container ship before a collision?
By the way I'm listening to Rubber Soul it's a find from the Friends sale. It was a copy from the Library's own collection usually these are in very rough shape having had lots of rough use. This one was pristine. Or at least that's what I thought. The first song Drive my car (Baby you can drive my car) was first loud than soft. But I could care less as long as Norwegian Wood is fine.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7-aKdwSuBn4
I didn't think anything more about who or what was living in my boot till this morning. I came in the back gate with the dogs and saw little UPS driving off a squirrel from his nest, the boot. I'm not sure when the lease changed hands and what was involved but it was clearly his.
I started down this whole what kind of bird is that road (and by the way there is a clear need for a stupid-user friendly bird ID app!) simply to prove my bona fides as a bird lover. I'm happy to share a boot with a bird or see a robin grabbing a worm from the garden. Heck, I can even accept that the robins taught our dog Cooper to eat our raspberries (I swear!). There is a line tho'! I woke this morning to a flock of grackles in the onions. Wanking bleeping grackles!
I'll offer what I think is the best YouTube video ever to explain that term. Warning the language is well - the point I guess. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q2nA2szz8dY
My frustration with grackles is they come in a swarm and thrash and peck the leaves and bulbs of the onions. What's left looks like it's been hit by a weed wacker. They don't seem to really eat more than a peck but it's a thousand pecks. I once thought they were maybe going after bugs but that doesn't seem to be the case. Perhaps the smell and juice is what entices them. They always seem to show up just as the onions are getting close to time to pull. Thus you are left with pull 'em early and slightly battered or lose 'em entirely.
I know I'm not the only gardener who has uncivil thoughts. Just this week one of my fellow gardeners at the Mennonite garden lamented that he had not gotten one single strawberry due to a rabbit. Actually, on the walk this morning I saw four rabbits poised across the street from a neighbors garden. The neighbor had netted and fenced his beds after losing all spring long to these cute little bunnies. I swear the four I saw were planning something - almost rang his doorbell to warn him.
Deb is just back from working on the tile floor for the cabin's bathroom with her step-son. It was a physically and emotionally exhausting few days. Deb is a trooper. The topper came last night when her step-son had gone off for a drive and a bear visited. The bear never came in the cabin fortunately but didn't seem to be willing to get lost either. Tired, alone and in the dark (except a flashlight) Deb tried to scare him away by banging and turning on a battery operated vacuum and made plans to hide under the bed if he got in. As a husband it's hard to hear. Between bears, rabbits and wanking bleeping grackles it's a tough dangerous world out there. And perhaps that is the thread I'd like to pull.
I mentioned a few blogs back that among the items that I don't think I'm hearing the straight truth on is North Korea. As no one challenged my assertion "Hey what are you nuts Doug?!" I feel I have to expand upon the thought to explain. If only to reassure myself.
North Korea's government is to my standards horrible in about every aspect. I don't claim any special knowledge about the country or the government. The little I've heard about huge slave labor camps to assassinations of relatives to ICBMs and nukes I believe. I don't know why North Koreans don't revolt. Perhaps three generations of dictators have boiled the frog slowly enough that starvation and brutality are just, well -Tuesday. I've heard that studies have shown that it is the loss of, not the actual standard of living that cause revolutions. That could make sense - I guess, tho' I doubt they have an immigration problem.
What I don't get is South Korea just elected a President who campaigned on negotiating with the North. There is a strong element within the South that sees re-unification as both a goal and possible. The so called 'Sunshine' policy is looked upon as doable. I doubt every single South Korean sees this as the correct approach but enough to elect a President do. What do people who know the situation much more intimately than I ever will see, that I don't? What cultural aspects allows them to just say " Oh that's just Crazy Uncle Kim, don't worry"? Is it simple fear of the huge death toll should war come? If you were South Korean would you want any part of what is North Korea to become part of your life only maybe softer?
The US entered the Korean war after the invasion of the South. We came to protect them and at least partially to stop a domino from falling to communism. We have generals telling Congress that the North can now reach Alaska and Hawaii with missiles. We seem to be amp-ping up to a war that will almost immediately have a death toll in the millions. That is before you start doing the math on alliances and animosities in the region. Perhaps it is because I grew up during the Vietnam War (thankfully to young to fight) that I distrust dominoes. More to the locus of my distrust too many Journalists seem to see war as part of a career path. What am I not hearing in all this that obviously many South Koreans do hear? It is a tough and dangerous world out there. Doug A.
Oh and apropos nothing, how does an exceptionally fast ship, a cruiser, designed to see every thing short of a cloaked Klingon Warbird not see a container ship before a collision?
Happened upon an interesting article in Atlantic mag.
ReplyDeletehttps://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2017/07/the-worst-problem-on-earth/528717/
As to the Denver housing market for birds, I can attest to the shortage. A real estate battle broke out this spring in the mud sparrow nest that has adorned my front porch for the past five years. Every spring (and fall) a new female moves into the nest and raises a family (usually 4-5) babies, and due to it's proximity to the front door, and the difficulty of climbing the post to get to the ledge, predators have largely left it alone, and the chicks usually mature and fly off. This spring however, a dispute over the lease broke out and either a wren or a regular sparrow decided that it wanted to move in to the nest. Mud not being it's 'thing', it built a straw nest atop the mud nest, moved in and laid her eggs. A week or two later however, a apparent representative of the HOA, and a contestant to the lease came by, kicked the eggs to the ground and dismantled the straw nest, and proceeded to lay her own eggs into the mud nest. Not to be one to let bygones be bygones, the aforementioned flouter of building codes came back to avenge her unborn children and flung the eggs of the new mother to the ground. The fight was ON! The next day, apparently one got the better of the other, and there were a pile of feathers on the ground beneath the nest, and I have not seen either bird since.
ReplyDeleteAs to the trouble with bunnies in the strawberry patch, I can relate as we have not had a single strawberry in three years from our patch. The only answer my friend is: Hasenpfeffer
Chick fight!
ReplyDeleteI'd always heard the word Hasenpfeffer thanks for getting me to look it up.
Doug, I apparently missed this post of yours from last summer until just today. But you shared your thoughts on North Korea - and we are still talking about North Korea even today in May of 2018. It is still relevant. I have to ask myself if any of your thoughts have changed since you wrote this some 10 months ago. We have since had the Winter Olympics and we have seen monumental change in attitudes among Koreans of late. I happen to be of the mindset that if the two countries could unite, not only would both Koreas benefit, but the world would benefit also. It seems that the only country that would NOT benefit from a reunification would the US of A, because of the diminishing importance and relevance of the US$ as the world's reserve currency. Oh, and the Military/Industrial Complex don't want the reunification, either, because the MIC makes mega-bucks of profit from having a conflict to profit from. I say "Let's have a Peace Dividend." I think war is stupid and evil. And I also believe much (if not all) of the "news" we hear in our media about North Korea is propaganda. (Or as the Bible describes it "Rumors of Wars.")
ReplyDeleteMy two cents.
Hey Kelly, sadly I agree with your thoughts on the Military/Industrial complex not simply regarding Korea but for so much of our foreign policy. While I was never a fan of our President upon his election I had hopes this might be one area he might actually 'drain the swamp'. I still have some hope that might happen but it is minimal.
DeleteI do think No Korea would benefit greatly from some form of reunification. I have a hard time seeing benefits beyond security (not a small matter) for the South but I really don't think my opinion as a non Korean should matter. It does appear So.Koreans can see something that looks appealing to them and that should be enough.
I would only offer that negotiations while better than the alternatives are unlikely to be quick or decisive. Both chief negotiators seem to be of a type that nothing is ever a final fact.
I did notice my little 'UPS' birds returned to the boot nest this year so some things endure. Doug A.