Brenda im so sorry you cant see it ,it is so funny. I will explain it a little bit. It is the music to Funky Town its a fast beat and it is a feeder camera catching chickadees and tufted titmouse at the feeder eating. But they put it to the music and speed it up and it looks like the birds are dancing and getting jiggy with it. The titmouse is the main character and the chickadee dances along and drums with his beak. Its really cute. And it is real pictures i think they put to video ,its not computer make believe. Its the titmouse being dominant over the feeder and the chickadee looking for danger and cracking seeds but it looks like they are dancing and drumming, very funny, I wish you could see it.-------bonnie

My God Joe, how sad, how dolorous, what a lament. Another one from Mary Oliver: Isn't it plain the sheets of moss, except that they have no tongues, could lecture all day if they wanted about spiritual patience? Isn't it clear the black oaks along the path are searching as though they were the most fragile of flowers? Every morniing I walk like this around the pond, thinking: if the doors of my heart ever close, I am as good as dead. Every morning so far, I'm alive. And now the crows break off from the rest of the darkness and burst up into the sky--as though all night they had thought of what they would like their lives to be, and imagined their strong, thick wings. ****** One or Two Things I Don't bother me. I've just been born. 2 the butterfly's loping flight carries it through the country of the leaves delicately and well enough to get it where it wants to go, whereever that is stopping here and there to fuzzle the damp throats of flowers and the black, mud: up and down it swiings, frenzied and aimless, and sometimes for long delicious moments it is perfectly lazy , riding motionless in the breeze on the soft stalk of some ordinary flower. 3 The god of dirt came up to me many times and said so masny wise and delectable things, I lay on the grass listening to his dog voice, crow voice, frog voice,now, he said and now, and never once mentioned forever, 4 which has nevertheless always been, like a sharp iron hhood, in the center of my mind. 5 One or two things are all you need to travel oveer the blue pond, over the deep roughage of the trees and through the stiff flowers of lightening--some deep memory of pleasure, some cutting knowledge of pain. 6 But to lift the hoof! For that you need an idea. 7 For years and years I sturggled just to love my life. And then the butterfly rose, weightless, in the wind, "Don't love your life too much," it said. and vanished into the world. ****** And there are so many more from a book inscribed to a woman with love, respect and admiration...from some guy who thought she was walking the spiritual journey beside him. Perhaps she was, and wearied of his slow pace, or she needed the money she could get from selling this slim volume or the poems rankled or...but it is mine now and I'm glad of it. I most regret the loss of friends I shared poetry with. la

I'm beginnin' to think I'm gettin' too old and worn out to keep waitin' for nice girls... Like Pink Floyd in "The Wall," I think "I need a dirty woman!" But if most of that dirt's under her fingernails from gardening while listening to NPR, I'll be right happy, too! :) Oh, as for bluegrass, Dianne, LOVE instrumental bluegrass... not particularly fond of MOST vocal music in most any genre, with a few exceptions, such as Enya, Pink Floyd, Yes, early Kansas and some of Mellencamp's stuff... Aerosmith... quite a few, when you break it down, BUT not nearly so much as most folks, who seem to think a song ain't a song without a singer... and I don't wanna start a war here, but I didn't think so in the 60s and 70s, and I STILL don't think Fogerty could carry a tune in a bucket. He sounds like an out-of-tune SOMETHING being played by someone in GREAT pain to me... besides, he never lived anywhere CLOSE to a bayou... Want bayou songs, listen to Jerry Reed :) I want a good-quality DVD of the Francis Ford Coppolla/Philip Glass collaboration, "Koyaanisqatsi," which is like a 90-minute minimalist classical music/hopi Indian music video, very slow moving and rythmic at times, followed by some fast-paced movements and.... well, you'd just have to see it... Takes patience to watch it if you don't like this sort of thing. I rented it on videotape way back when it was new, in the mid-80s, but the sound and picture quality weren't up to the standards I'm pretty sure I'd see on a DVD... Some of it is breathtakingly scary, such as the one tranquil beach setting that suddenly turns to something altogether different. Of course I could listen to the Philip Glass soundtrack most any time... Have yet to hear the Glass I don't like and I consider him the most important "modern" classical composer of the second half of the 20th century -- at least that I've heard... He still does interviews and such on NPR sometimes, too... and seems like just a regular guy... still teaches, composes and conducts. There's so much out there so many people don't even know if they like or not, because they never get exposure to it... Hope some of y'all will click on the link to Philip Glass' website. Musically yours, Jeff Here is a link that might be useful: Philip Glass

Hi Suzanne. I am in Southern NH and had 3 bluebird nestings this year from the same parents - 11 babies total. Please don't feel too bad about your babies. Its ok to be sad for a while, but don't blame yourself. Hopefully the mom and dad will be back next spring to make more! I keep my boxes up because I have a lot of woodpeckers that roost in the boxes at night; also I had 7 blues winter here (in Bedford) last season and I wouldn't be surprised if they used a box to roost, too! I was new to all this last year and I know so much more from this site and the sialis.org site. I have 3 babies about to fledge in less than a week and you are right, the rains have been awful. I have saved a couple of the previous nests just in case this one gets wet (or gets too many blowflies)... I have read here you can do a nest change and this will help the babies survive. There is so much to learn; stick around. Even when you think you did all you can do to make things safe, you can still have things go wrong. I had a bad thing happen last week. My papa blue got caught up in blueberry netting and didn't make it. I cried almost all last week about it, it was devastating for me to think that mom lost her mate and now has 3 babies to raise by herself, and how could I be using that net... I tearfully buried him in one of my gardens in blueberry fabric and a box... it was so sad. I learned that this awful plastic net is a killer and I am buying tobacco net for next year. I am hoping mom finds a new mate, now, and that my yard will be safer than ever so there can be more blues born. I am also careful not to use pesticides on my lawn and all organic everything... I read here that is bad for all birds... not to mention groundwater. Birds are mostly instinctual and probably don't dwell on bad stuff that happens to them, like we humans do. I thought I was doing all the right things Nabs box, baffle, 50' away from trees, feeding mealworms but not too many so they get lazy, feeding suet, no pesticides on lawn, feeding waxworms occasionally, providing vitamin supplements, birdbath, etc. Sometimes crap happens and we learn from it and improve their conditions because of it. You are doing more to help the blues and learn about their needs, than most people, so that, you can be proud of. Jenn