Creature Comforts

Dear House Lady,
If you're not going to use your bath pillow per manufacturer guidelines, then it's officially a cat bed.
Love, Joey.

Never Perform With Kids Or Animals

I guess this guy didn't get the memo.

Backyard Bird Maternity Ward

    For a couple weeks now, we've had a pair of mourning doves who're sitting on eggs in a nest over the front door. It's a good location. The only person who uses the front door is the Fed Ex guy, and we don't get that many deliveries. It looks like there's just a mama bird in the nest, but we Googled the nesting habits of doves and found out that the incubation duties are shared by the male and female birds. Mama bird sits on the eggs during the day and then Daddy bird takes the night duty. The Internet resource we read said the exchange can happen so fast that it looks like just one bird is sitting on the nest. I will say that whichever one is sitting on the nest when I check on things first thing in the morning has one heck of a dirty look. I'm certain it's the Mama bird. Her look says, "Who you lookin' at, house lady?" Makes me slam the curtain down and feel bad about checking on her and her little family. We think we should have babies in the nest any day now. We're all very excited. 
     Last Friday we discovered a hummingbird nest in the Oleander bush in the backyard. That corner of the yard is quiet and hardly used, but the branch this little hummingbird built her nest on isn't very stable. We've had a lot of strong winds here and when she's in the nest, it's like she's riding a bucking bronco. I don't know how she does it. When we first found the nest on Friday, it was empty. Yesterday, there was one egg. Today, there's two. We had to research hummingbird incubation and found out that building the nest and sitting on the eggs is the female's job -- big daddy doesn't lift a finger. We're trying hard to keep the three indoor cats who live here from figuring out that there home has become a birdie maternity ward -- but we have a feeling they know that something's up.

Your Life May Now Commence

The Power Of Love

Think human mommies invented being worried about their kids? Watch this doe circling dangerously close to the group of humans who are doing something loud and obviously dasterdly to her baby and you'll think again. And as if we needed another reason to think that firefighters are hot. These guys put their tools to good work to rescue a Bambi. Thank you, gentlemen! Now, where do I send the brownies?

I Believe

"I have everything in the world that I need now."

I Was A Suicidal Laura Ingalls Wilder

Let me be clear. I loved the "Little House On The Prairie" book series by Laura Ingalls Wilder. "On the Banks Of Plum Creek" was my very, very favorite. The chapter where Mr. Edwards brings the lost Christmas gifts I can almost recite by heart, but please, I beg you, do not expect me to live in a little mud hut next to a body of water. Yesterday, some nice high school student ran over a transformer on his way to school and cut off the power to the high school and nearby neighborhoods -- that would be us.  SoCal Edison said we wouldn't get the power back until 10:00pm -- which seemed discouraging to say the least. Since the HMA works at home, he couldn't access his work on his home computer. He could go to Starbucks and work like everyone else -- except for one little sticky wicket -- he uses a desktop computer not a lap top. So, over his mild objections about what kind of idiots we would look like --- we loaded his computer into my car and took the whole she-boodle to Starbucks. Customers were curious about what we were doing. I heard some guy say, "Now he means business!" But everyone was friendly and sympathetic. They made room for us and made us feel welcome. The low point was when we had to return home, as twilight was fading, to a cold and ever increasingly dark house. We gathered up our flashlights and candles. (I was seriously worried about how putting three very active cats and a bunch of candles together in a dark house was going to turn out.) We checked on the food in the freezer. (We have hundreds of dollars of Jenny Craig and Weight Watchers ice cream in there, and as God is my witness, I was willing to sacrifice my own diet and eat it all before it went bad. Yes, I AM that cheap.) No matter, once we rounded up the troops, we decided to take ourselves off to our fave restaurant for dinner. We are treated like gods there. They know us by name and didn't seem to mind when we lingered after dinner. And as we drove up the long road back to our house, my eyes searched the shadowy outline for any signs of lights. There were none. It wasn't until we got up next to the house that we saw the lights were on and we were back in business. I've never been so thrilled.

Dear Electricity, I love you. Please don't ever leave me again. I can't live without you.

And don't ask me if I want to go camping. I don't mind sitting around a campfire at night singing "Kumbaya" and roasting S'mores. But when the sun comes up in the morning, I want to be at the Marriott in a white fluffy robe blow-drying my hair. Enuf said.