Hi Pam and anyone else interested, After my last posting, we had a very high wind come up for about an hour. It blew some branches and clumps of leaves down all around our area, but no rain. It also blew down a large piece of wood that may have frightened the baby, but for whatever reason, the little bird went back under the fence to outside of our yard, and the parents seemed to keep him there this time. In fact, he quite moved on from being squenched up next to the fence, and I could not see him any more with a quick check, but I did hear him answering his mother, and the parents kept coming back and were in different trees to watch after him. They were actually in the trees they perched in to watch their original bluebird home, about 10 feet closer to the front of the house than they had been through this ordeal in our fenced back yard. This morning when I got up, the bluebird parents were not there nor was he. The parents did come back a couple of times when I was outside and did not seem distressed. They did not seem to be calling to him at all. I didn't hear them sing or call any at all. The trees they were sitting in as I mentioned before were closer to the front of my yard and I cannot see the birds from my back deck with binoculars like I could when they were looking after him in the shed. I didn't want to stay too close to see and frighten him into running again, so I missed seeing if they were going down and feeding him, if they had encouraged him to fly and if he did, or anything at all. All I know is that by about 10:00 a.m. when I went around to sit on my little concrete bench which is about 15 feet from the bluebird house, the mom and dad sat in the tree there where they always looked after their home like they were communing with me. Lol. I did hear what I know was some kind of baby bird high in the trees in my neighbor's yard right next to this area. Since I have not heard a baby bird calling from that area throughout this weekend, I'm just going to believe that it was him and that he was able to fly and get up there with his parents calling him at some time that I didn't see. He could almost fly the day before, so I'm hoping that they get him moved down the block to the little field where they moved and where his siblings are. I hope they bring all their babies back to see me some day the way another bluebird family did a couple of years ago. I'll try to let you know if I see all 5 of the babies some time, but there are lots of bluebirds around here, so it may be hard to tell. Last week, there was a whole family of about 7 bluebirds on my roof for about 30 minutes. Karen

I'm so sorry for your loss. As a father of three, I would know of nothing that would be worse than losing a child. On a related topic, I write for some local web blogs and a while back and I ran into a band named Cloud Cult, out of Minneapolis, MN. I was so enticed by their sound and music, I decided to write about them. I mentiuon it here only because I know many folks who have gone through the gut wrenching loss of a child could relate to this writer. Below is some of my review: The group is lead by Craig Minowa, and was more or less of a garage band that played the local Minneapolis scene. Apparently Minowa held a variety of jobs including environmental activist, organic farmer, etc. He and his wife had a two year old son who passed away from unexplained circumstances. The death of the child apparently was devastating to Minowa. In time, he drifted apart from his wife and everyone in his life, became a hermit on his small MN farm, spent close to two years doing nothing but writing songs; songs that explored life, death, and general human mortality. The end result of this writing endevor produced three albums in the following years, They Live on the Sun," Aurora Borialis," Advice from the Happy Hippopotamus," and a soon to be released CD, available on their Website, "The Meaning of 8." Their music is simply brilliant. The physical body flesh is a recurring theme in Minowa's music. Does man's spirit persist after its shell breaks down? "I want to start fresh, I bought a new shirt, got new socks but my skin is still me, with memories," Minowa sings on "Start New", but "Living on the Outside of Your Skin" he attempts to break those bonds with a toy piano and a growling guitar solo. "What Comes at the End" ponders reunion, reincarnation and "fall[ing] in love in our new skin." The elaborately off-the-cuff "You Got Your Bones to Make a Beat" celebrates existence and gives hope for the future.... I know this probably isn't the place for me to be leaving music reviews, but your post reminded me of this band, and I know I find a sense of hope and optimism when I listen and perhaps you may as well. You can hear tracks from this group at their website, below Here is a link that might be useful: Cloud Cult

It seems that some of us are retired but many are not quite there yet. A couple of tips from my own experience: - DO a budget. Even if you're terrible at that kind of thing (I am and we are). You need a good idea of what your real outgo is and what you are spending month to month on your personal 'splurges', which we all have. Accept that housing is an expense you will always have, whether you rent or own a home. Property taxes go up, water heaters go out, roofs leak, cars die of old age. Always assume you're going to live long enough to encounter major expenses of some sort. - ALLOW for inflation. Never mind the CPI, you know how prices increase and new taxes are passed that hit your pocketbook even if they never get included in the official statistics. - PRACTICE living on your retirement income. Don't assume your expenses will go down in retirement. That isn't automatic. Our expenses went up drastically in the first year, when we traveled extensively around the West. There were new casual clothes and shoes to buy, travel accessories we hadn't needed before, and a lot of very happy poor people got our expensive work clothes from free donations. We didn't even get a write-off: the standard deduction was bigger than our charitable totals. - ANALYZE the biggest risks to you NOT achieving your retirement goals. Is your health impaired? Does your family medical history send up red flag warnings? Have you budgeted for long term care costs? Is your home suitable for universal access, or would a broken leg make it impossible for you to manage by yourself for three months? Do you have sufficient retirement savings? Pensions or annuities? Social Security and Medicare eligibility assured? Did you work for any company long enough to be fully vested - because if you did, they should have sent you a letter at age 50 telling you how much you'll receive in a monthly annuity they purchased on your behalf, for which you are eligible at age 65....but they have to be able to FIND you to send you the letter. - MAKE new friends. Boomers are really the first generation to have defined themselves by their work, and to have made most of their friends in the workplace, not from community or church affiliations. It has been shown the happiest elderly are the ones who not only retain good social ties, but who develop new ones to replace old friends that move away or die. - IMAGINE worst-case scenarios. The Boomers I know who retired (or meant to) and got into financial troubles, didn't stress-test their assumptions. Playing ostrich with your retirement planning almost guarantees life will slap you in the face with a wake-up call at some point! Everyone has risks in their daily lives. It's your retirement, and therefore your responsibility, to figure out how to mitigate some of those risks. You can't eliminate all risk, but you CAN, and should, research how to lessen the bigger risks. For example, our biggest risk was the death/disability of a spouse. Being in our late 50's at retirement meant a sizable financial hit if one of us died or was disabled by serious illness/injury. Therefore, we mitigated that risk as best we could, in several different ways. Anticipating things going wrong means you will feel better prepared and more able to cope, if something does go wrong. Like being aware of the "Exit" signs in a theatre or on a plane, having a mental plan is very reassuring.

Since everyone was so helpful, I wanted to pop back and share the final plan! Things have become even more hectic than I spoke of before.. so took a deep breath and decided to order almost everything from a local coffeehouse/bakehouse. I had planned to make muffins but I just don't have the time to do it. I trust this place and while it isn't cheap, it's very low stress. The team nixed yogurt -- we did talk about a sweet Pongal but opted to nix that also. Someone else is handling decorations and was *very* excited to get blue Gatorade. Not my choice but I have decided I am too much of a control freak and I can roll with it :) BTW my suggestion for drink was iced butterfly pea flower tea -- a beautiful indigo blue with no artificial colors! I'll save it for the 4th of July! Here's the menu.. Asparagus Leek Quiche Mini Croissants with apricot nut chicken salad Mini savory bagels shipped in from NYC + butter/cream cheese Scones - two flavors: blueberry lemon ginger and apricot almond with a citrus glaze raspberry coconut thumbprints (a team favorite-- and they really are amazing!) fruit platter - I will do this piece but will keep it super easy and casual .. like this The team requested cake instead of cupcakes. I intend to order a cake similar to this and add a "welcome baby boy" cake topper thingy: Thanks again for all your help-- I am sighing with relief now. My food order is complete and the gifts have arrived. All I need to do is order the cake!