Where have you been Mrs. Proud?

This question has been asked of me many times as of late. The truth is that I have been busy. Not busy with my children, well, at least not more so than usual. Not busy with my house...I will still try and visit with you on my non-existent veranda should you pop by unannounced. I've been busy with my birds.

It started pretty innocently, a single parakeet for my son's birthday. Then, in the blink of an eye my husband and I had a whole flock. In truth, I knew that what we had been wanting was a medium sized parrot. Instead, I tried to go the 'easy' route. Smaller birds are less of a commitment, right? That one little parakeet turned into a flock of six in the blink of an eye. Then we added a pair of canaries, and a cockatiel. Still, something wasn't right. So, we brought home a Nanday Conure. (There is a whole blog post on loving and losing a bird here for another day.) "Ahh," I'm surprised you couldn't hear our contented sighs from where you are Internet.

And then, we did something silly. We checked Craigslist one more time for the heck of it. A Sun Conure was listed. So, my husband said, "offer her 25% of the list price." So, we did. AND...she accepted our offer. So, we brought Herbie home to join our flock too. My husband keeps asking him, "Damn you, why do you have to be such a cute looking bird?"

I'm exhausted people. It is a contented exhaustion, but, bringing home these babies has been much like bringing home twins I should think. They wake me up every couple of hours all through the night. They cry constantly if I am attending the other. They both seem to be bonding to me. It looked like our Nanday was going to be a man's bird. Then my husband tried to get him to step up off of me, and got torn a new one. Nan seems to be mine now. Herbie won't step up for anyone. He does shriek until I open his cage so that he can chew holes in my shirts, preen my feathers, and give me kisses. He is very sweet until he sees hands, then he tries to amputate fingers with his beak.

There are all sots of other things going on too. My husband has been home this week. He is sick, and he is also sick and tired. He is about to lose his job. We knew that he had been 'working' on borrowed time. He also knows that he needs to stick with it until he finds another job, or until they dismiss him. If he gets emotional enough to quit, we would lose the unemployment option should we God forbid need it. It is stressful.

I ran my son to school yesterday morning. The truck was out of gas, and our local filling station has but four pumps. There was a pick-up with a trailer blocking the entrance to one pump, and closing access off to two more. I will admit to being grumpy, and pre-caffeinated judgement led me to jump out of my truck and yell, "You're busting my balls for two frigging gas cans? You've gotta be kidding!" So, if you are the dude I yelled at yesterday...I realize that I was not in my best form, and anatomically incorrect to boot. You're still a douche bag though Bud, 'kay?

I'll post some pictures of my new babies later. Thanks for all the emails and stuff asking if we were okay, you guys are great, really great!