At the bird feeder and the wisdom of Eight

This is absolutely the best time of year to have a bird feeder.

The goldfinches and house finches are starting to color up. The mourning doves have paired off, if they hadn't been already. The grackles strut around on the ground, puffing up their feathers to show off their virility.

And the starlings -- ah, the starlings. They have no inhibitions. It a starling orgy out there when a flock flies through.


Poor ol' Danny Kaye, though. Every time he attempts to get something to eat, he is chased away by the mockingbird. He finally grabbed a couple of bites today, shielded from his tormentor's view by two dove couples. I can only hope the mockingbird is in it's nest when Danny's mate comes out to eat at night.

I have made up an entire drama in my head about what's going on at the birdfeeder. We'll keep it there lest my sanity come into question*. Again.

*I confessed to Heir 2 the other day that ever since I was a little girl I gave numbers personalities and relationships to each other. While he agreed that One really needed to get over itself, we disagreed about the personality of Eight. He thought Eight was evil, but I assured him that Eight is the wisest number of all. This is probably the point at which I lost him. I think it was when I said, "Eight is the Ben Franklin of all the numbers."