ROBINS

A robin laid 4 eggs in a hanging basket on a family porch.  It was close enough to get these remarkable shots over a period of four weeks.  The photos are a little fuzzy because I captured them from the video.

If you don't like the captions, blame me.

Freshly laid.

 Hi, Mom!

Sitting on the eggs, just as any good mother would.

 Here’s the first chick.  I think they are born with their mouths open.

 Here are three of the mouths, er, babies

The early bird gets the worm?

Aha! All four hatched.

And the chorus of this song is, “Feed me first!”

The kids are getting bigger!

...And bigger, until, finally ..

The nest is empty.  “Bye, kids.  Go find your own food.  Love, Mom.”

Humor --

Intuition is that strange instinct that tells a woman she is right, whether she is or not.

 A wise woman puts a grain of sugar into everything she says to a man, and takes a grain of salt with everything he says to her.

Housework is what a woman does that nobody notices unless she hasn’t done it.

COLOR

Humans have the ability to see things in color

 But what if we could only see in black and white?

... or this?

These are much more satisfying

 ...as is this

Funny punny --

If you take a laptop computer for a run you could jog your memory.

He had a photographic memory which was never developed.

Those who get too big for their britches will be exposed in the end.

When she saw her first strands of gray hair, she thought she'd dye.

Acupuncture: a jab well done

THE APPLE OF HIS EYE

Back on June 8, Steve Jobs of Apple Computer made a presentation to the Cupertino City Council for a new office building for that computer company.  And he showed an architect’s rendering of what the building would look like.  Jobs stressed that more trees would be added to the site, and the City Council was most receptive to the idea.

Then Scott Herhold, a columnist for the local San Jose Mercury News, decided to run a contest to pin a nickname on this unusual building.  Herhold had this to say shortly thereafter:

 “When I launched my contest to find a nickname for Apple's new circular building in Cupertino, I wasn't prepared for things to go viral: I got nearly 1,000 emails and calls, with more than 2,000 suggestions from across the world.

The response reinforced my belief that the four-story spaceshiplike building will be an icon (yes, somebody suggested that name, too) in Silicon Valley. The deluge made me laugh and smile and shake my head.”

Scott and his journalist committee winnowed the list down to 6, and then got that down to the final three which has been put to a vote of the Merc readers. 

Here are a few of the entries, though none of these made the final three:

Glass donut        SteveHenge        Apple Saucer       

Appcot            iSite

My personal favorite was Apple Saucer (Apple for the obvious, and Saucer, as in Flying Saucer  -- just look at that rendering!), but it didn’t make it to the final round.

Here are the three top vote getters.  Which would you pick?

Fruit Loop           The Halo            The Core

Of course none of these might stick as people have a tendency to choose their own nicknames for buildings and sites.  We will see.

And you want a joke, too?

KIDS ON ELECTIONS

In January, the president makes his Inaugural Address after he has been sworn at.

Once he is elected, sometimes the president has to work 24 hours a day until he finds out what he is supposed to do.

The nominees are usually called candidates or campaigners although I have heard them called other things.

One of the strictest rules is all dark horses running for president must be people.

Popular votes tell who is the most popular. Electoral votes tell who is the most elected.

Heredity is a bad thing in politics because it gets us kings instead of presidents.

MOTHERHOOD

The tenderness of motherhood --

On the riverbank ...

In Africa ...

In India .....

In the Ocean ...

AND FINALLY... 
SOMEWHERE NEAR WALMART

Health update--

My neck and shoulder are much, much better.  AND Cliff is home!




UNITS OF MEASUREMENTS


365.25 days of drinking low-calorie beer because it's less filling:
1 lite year

1 kilogram of falling figs:
1 Fig Newton

1000 milliliters of wet socks:
1 literhosen

1 millionth of a fish:
1 microfiche

1 trillion pins:
1 terrapin

NOT USUAL

No, not usual at all.  Most unusual, don't you agree?
Comments by Guess Who.

Interesting house pet

Okay, you can have some, too.

Ok, you're on.  No catty remarks, now!

What's wrong with this picture?

I don't have enough banana for ALL you guys!

You're not a tree, but you'll have to do.

Hmmm.  Three cavities.

Hey, get off by dose.  I'mb gonna sneeze!

YOU!  I said get in the car!

Okay, which one of you guys is steering?

KIDS ON ELECTIONS


The president has the power to appoint and disappoint the members of his cabinet.

Much has been said about balancing the budget. It has been found that the budget is more talkable than balanceable.

The campaign is when the candidate tells what he stand for and the election is when the votes tell if they can stand for his being elected.
 
Actually, elections are different from politics. Elections come and go while politics are with us all the time.

The winning candidate is elected and inoculated.

QUITE A WEEK

In brief, it has been a lousy week.  That’s spelled M I S E R A B L E.  For starters, Cliff went to the hospital Sunday  with a splitting headache.  He is still there.  Then I developed pain in my right shoulder/neck/arm that the chiropractor has been working on all week.  He is not done, yet.  I go back again on  Friday, with another appointment scheduled on Monday.  What is interesting about the Friday appointment is that he is not there on Fridays, but he will be this week.  With Cliff in the hospital (and they don’t know when he is getting out) I have to keep struggling to get appropriate transportation. 

Fortunately, I do now have some Home Care Service, but it would be helpful if I knew when Cliff was coming home.  Nikki, the young lady provided by Home Care, is a registered CNA, and quite capable in handling me, including driving me, in my mini van, to and from doctor appointments.  She saw my birds, and now she wants a bird for herself.

Next day:
Just heard from Cliff.  He says he is probably coming home today (Friday).  That solves a lot of problems.

***

This day started interestingly.  I'm sure I've mentioned this before, but my two birds do not get along.  In fact,
although Pepper is about three times the size of Chipper, he does seem to be afraid of Chip.  I don't allow Pepper in Chipper's cage -- it's too small for her, but he will try every now and then.  So this morning when I saw Pep climbing into Chip's cage, I ordered her out.  It was then that I saw the Pink one in Pep's cage, so had to shoo her out.

Pepper then went into her own cage to eat.  A little while later I looked up and there was Chip once again in the wrong cage.  Shoo!  And it happened a third time.  Children!  Children!  Behave!

Humor -

WILD ANIMALS

Nothing domesticated here!

 The arctic wolf has adapted to a severe climate, surviving in sub-zero temperatures and total darkness.

 This polar bear cub and his mother rely on ice for hunting so they can store up fat for the winter.

The Florida panther is one of the endangered mammals on earth.  The only remaining breeding group  of about 100 -160 are found on the southern tip of Florida.

Alaska is where this grizzly bear family and about 30,000 other grizzly bears live.  While grizzlies do eat meat, 85% of their diet is vegetation, nuts, insects, berries and roots.

Bottlenose Dolphins are considered some of the most intelligent mammals, with highly complex systems of communications.

 The term “gray wolf”, you may be surprised to learn, refers to a species; not a color.  In fact, gray wolves can be buff, brown, gray, black or white.

Puffins spend most of their lives at sea, swimming and diving for small fish.  But they can also take flight, and have been clocked at up to 55 mph

Bison (they are not buffalo) are so well insulated against the cold, that snow doesn’t melt on their backs.

Punny Yeah, they turn up every now and then)

The batteries were given out free of charge.

A dentist and a manicurist married. They fought tooth and nail.

With her marriage, she got a new name and a dress.

Did you hear about the fellow whose whole left side was cut off? He's all right now.