The Cardinal: Slow

Well, the cardinal finally found the mirrors hanging in the tree. Maybe he really is a “slow” bird. He’d been standing next to them for weeks, but he didn’t see them until today. He saw his reflection, and he slammed his beak into the mirror, sending it twirling. He got a cocky confident look on his face like he’d just defeated a giant, but that look quickly faded as soon as the mirror spun back around. As soon as his reflection came back, he reared up and slammed into again…as if to say, “Didn’t have enough, eh?! You want some more of this?!” Over and over, he attacked the mirror until he was satisfied that the bird in the mirror was red from his wounds sustained and not his feathers anymore. And then he flew off, probably to the pub to exaggerate his latest accomplishments.

Dishwasher Art

Doing the dishes for me is like an art form. Maybe it’s my OCD, but I take great pride in loading the dishwasher in a way that not only utilizes the space but groups items by their function. I try to leave adequate gaps between each one to allow the water and soap to cover every surface to ensure optimal cleaning. I even spread the silverware out across all of the slots, so spoons and forks don’t stick together. It actually makes unloading it easier too, because each section goes to the same place in the kitchen.

My wife on the other hand has a completely different philosophy when it comes to dishes. Her philosophy is more of “shove that crap in there.” She loads it as she goes, so things are randomly placed in whatever hole she sees first. This includes stacking things on top of things and possibly stacking things on top of those. She believes in using vertical space as well as horizontal space. So, if the rack slides back in, then it’s okay! I know it’s not wrong, per se, it’s just different. But it still feels like a chaotic mess to me. Almost like a tornado went through the dishwasher.

The Cardinal: Mate

I was premature on the cardinal situation. The stupid bird came back today and once again slammed into the window. He then proceeded to sit on the window sill and bang his head repeatedly into the glass. When I approached the window, he flew out to the fence, and that’s when I saw the female cardinal sitting on the bird feeder.

So, the reason I hadn’t seen the stupid bird for a while was that he had somehow managed to find a girl. Based on what I know of the male, either he was the last available option or the other choices seemed less desirable…which is somehow hard to imagine. Maybe she likes males who brain themselves senseless, because then she can take advantage of them to get what she wants. Either way, he was back and fighting his imaginary enemy to impress her. I can’t imagine she’d be too impressed by this display of stupidity. Perhaps, she was already starting to regret her choices. I mean, are you sure THESE are the genes you want to be passing on to your offspring?! When you realize that cardinals mate for life, it makes it even more perplexing.

The mirrors in the tree obviously are having zero effect on this stupid bird. When I brought this up to my son, he said that it’s because they are spinning…which is probably true. At one point, I saw the cardinal sitting on the ground, watching the lights dance around him. He seemed less scared of them and more just intrigued. I’m so glad I could give him another reason to enjoy coming to my yard…sarcasm implied.

Dead Air

There was a commercial on the radio this morning that said, “Have you ever thought, ‘I could do your job’? Well, prove it! Every Thursday, you get to influence the playlist.” I thought to myself, “I could probably be a DJ. Now, would I want to do that? No. But I probably could.”

As I pondered this question, I realized that I have the gift of gab. For all of my claims and even penchant for introversion, I am still able to talk with the best of them. And I’m really good at filling the silence. I don’t have to have something specific to talk about, but I can usually come up with something to say if nobody else is speaking. I have lots of great stories, and I have a wickedly strange view of things around me. I mean I will often call my mom on my 40-minute drive to my son’s daycare, and I’ll probably talk for 35 minutes of the drive. I’d like to think that my mom is enjoying the conversation and being wildly entertained, but maybe she just puts the phone down and walks away!

Really my biggest issue with public speaking is standing up in front of people and seeing their reactions or getting their feedback. But that’s not a problem with radio, because you’re just talking to “dead air.” You’re sending your words off into the ether without any clue who is listening or if they’re listening. You’re talking to fill the silence.

And then it hit me. Being a DJ is a lot like talking to my mom on the phone. Your audience is unusually quiet, so you just have to fill the dead air on your own. In fact, you’re not even sure if they’re still tuned in. But you speak with the hope that they’re enjoying your words and being wildly entertained.

Homeless Cell Phone

Near the university where my son has his daycare, there is a constant presence of homeless people begging on the corners. There is one man that I see quite often, shuffling slowly along the side of the highway feeder road, a drugged out blankness on his face, adorned in grungy clothes, and smoking a cigarette. Today, when he turned around to shuffle back to his corner, I noticed a large black cell phone in his back pocket. I could tell it was one of the newer model iPhones, and so many questions popped into my head.

If you have no money, how can you afford to buy a phone that costs several hundred dollars? How is it that you have a newer model than I have? How do you pay the monthly bill? And if you’re homeless, where do they even send the monthly bill? If you have no power, how do you charge it? And maybe the most important question is…who are you calling?!

Bum Bubbles

I poured my milk this morning and there were two large bubbles floating next to each other. They were the exact same size, and it looked like two cheeks in a bum. So, I started today being mooned by my milk. Happy Valentine’s Day to me!

The Cardinal: Kamikaze

It’s been a few days now, and there has been no sign of the cardinal. I’m not sure if he has been attacking the mirrors, and I just haven’t seen it. Or if the twirling lights actually scared him away. Either way, I’m hoping this finally resolved the issue.

UPDATE: My spousal unit informed me that the cardinal did attack the window this afternoon. Apparently, he flew into it at full speed and knocked himself unconscious. He laid on the ground for several minutes before getting up and flying away. Maybe this was his last-ditch, Kamikaze flight before he acceded defeat.

The Cardinal: Mirrors

I did it. I hung up mirrors in the tree outside to entice the stupid cardinal to take out his misplaced aggression on them instead of the window. I’m not sure if it’ll work, but if nothing else, we have a beautiful light show now when the sun reflects off the twirling mirrors.