Results tagged "Bird"

Amanda, or Mandy — as I like to call her, and I went to college together.
We went to a women’s college on the Main Line of Philadelphia where we sat on pedestals while hummingbirds bouffanted our hair and talented monkeys ironed our tops… Men were slaves and there was a constant rainbow overhead… And we basked in the never ending sunshine…

When Ry wrote me asking if I’d be interested in guest blogging on For the Birds this week I became totally and completely overzealous and did jumpy claps of excitement. Would I be interested in guest blogging?  Would I?  Would I EVER!  

You see, I am a newbie to all this blogging business.  Before I began my blog in May I used to skulk silently around the interwebs reading other blogs, For the Birds was and is one of my favorites due to Ryan’s ability to tell it like it is and make a seemingly everyday observation interesting, thought provoking, and often hilarious.  I would check in via facebook whenever I saw she had a new post up.  I’d read For the Birds and blogs written by other friends and acquaintances of mine and think to myself, “How do they do it?  How do they find inspiration?  Day after day they come up with something engaging to write about.  I could never do that.  Could I?”.  I still ask myself that question on an almost daily basis.  Does anyone really care what I have to say or am I just shouting my ideas, musings, and thoughts into the echoy cavernous abyss of cyberspace?  For instance how can Ryan make a recap of a Southampton town meeting such a good read?   For me the fact that she had been writing a blog for so many years, and was still managing to keep me, and numerous others,  coming back for more was awe inspiring.  I mean MARTHA reads her blog for crying out loud!  So Ry is sorta my blog hero, she’s kind of a big deal.  So yes, I accepted the invite whole heartedly!

Then  I panicked.  For two reasons, the first being that people actually READ her blog.  My blog is mostly frequented by my Mom and my sisters.  If they don’t comment I harangue and verbally abuse them at family functions.  And I have 5 sisters so that helps hike up my traffic quite a bit.  Sidnote, sister number one, why are you STILL not following me? I am not buying the whole “Your blog won’t let me follow you” bit.  Save it. Just DO IT!  But I digress…Oh, yes, so I was a little unnerved to realize people would actually be reading what I wrote and even more unsettled when I pictured them mumbling to themselves, “Who the hell is this hack and what has she done with Ry?”  And secondly, in the the last week I have hit the proverbial wall.  After 2 mere months of blogging I felt like I had nothing to say.  So I did what anyone would do, I made excuses.  ”I have no time….this week has been insanely busy…I am working non-stop…I’ll get back to it Monday”.  In my defense, my sister was in London on business so I was taking care of my little Terr-bear round the clock.  (Big ups to all the Mothers out there who manage to both parent and blog, I don’t know how you do it).  Add in a freelance wedding makeup gig on Saturday and a birthday party on Sunday and stick a fork in me I was DONE.  As the weekend wore on I started to look towards Monday with apprehension and anxiety.  I HAD to come up with something to write after a weeks silence!  It’s only been two freakin’ months!  Pull it together woman!  Must…find…inspiration.  Write something! Anything!  There were no more excuses, and as Monday loomed closer my angst grew worse.  What will I write?!!  

Then Sunday night I logged onto the computer and there was this little beacon of light, a message from Ry asking me to be a guest bird.  But whatever shall I write I thought?  This week, of all the weeks, when I seem to have lost my mojo, NOW she wants me to guest blog?  So, screw it I thought to myself, I’ll write about the fact that I am freaking out over not having, uhm, anything to actually write about.

Well, will you look at that!  I actually just wrote something. It may not be amazing, but hell at least after six days of nothing I got SOMETHING.  Thanks Ry for the opportunity, for being a pioneer, and for nudging me out of my dry spell.

If you’d like to check out my blog about spending my days with an amazing little man while I figure out what to do with my life please stop by here: http://thebutterflyandthebear.typepad.com

I was at the library the other day multitasking.
Because that’s what libraries are for, right?

Writing recipes, looking for design inspiration while simultaneously reading TITANIC TRUCKS to the boy running through the stacked aisles. I was beginning to think that a vacation might be something to consider when all of the sudden books started screaming and jumping off the shelves — dangerously missing my head… I grabbed Will and dove under the nearest table. The piles of books surrounded us as one manuscript fell open at my knees… it was Poe, “I am above the weakness of seeking to establish a sequence of cause and effect, between the disaster and the atrocity.” It was then that I realized that something needed to be done immediately… Because I have reached the final point, and this is it. I am dangerously approaching the end of my blogging quota.

Visualize this to be like filling a water balloon to capacity or eating copious amounts of McDonald’s like this guy did a few years ago… only to result in weight gain, heart disease, ulcers and bad skin…. because what did he think was going to happen? I wonder if he wishes that he could go back and undo — kind of like going back and picking through – deleting the bad blog posts while copying and saving the good ones for republishing possibilities… revitalizing the QUOTA. But oh the HUMANITY.

I started For the Birds on August 22, 2008. It was a slow start… and, although I never intended for this blog to turn into what it is now… it has been a journey like no other… similar to swimming across the Atlantic or leaving the space shuttle mid-universe to test out that gravity theory… floating aimlessly into DEEP SPACE. And if you know what this blog is about, then you’re a hair-slight more genius than I, because I lost track a LOOOONG time ago. But I am missing the point.

What I am trying to inch out there is that I am now starting the tedious task of going back, judging myself and then deciding who gets to stay and who gets to go hang out at the pearly gates of archival heaven. But what do you think? If you are here, reading this right now — If you wouldn’t mind turning time off for a few minutes and letting me know if there are any posts that must stay live… Because beyond self-inflicted torture, I am my own souvenir. And I’m sure that isn’t the first time I’ve said that.   

I can take a smack down better than most, but when LZ aka My Messy Paradise and Eric Striffler aka http://www.striffler.com & http://www.striffler.com/weddings.html, both answered HAWAII within the same 1/2 hour, I was floored.  LZ answered via comments and Eric via Facebook – I’ve tried to decipher which answered first but all I can get is within that same 1/2 hour… so CONGRATULATIONS TO BOTH. Interviews will proceed sometime in the next 2 weeks. Okay okay… so perhaps this was a little obvious, but wasn’t it fun too?

Soooo… Now what? I was hoping that this contest would last longer than 1 hour into publishing time. smart-asses, so here’s another Guessing Game for the long weekend.

WHERE IS THIS?

What STATE, in the great U S of A was this picture taken?

1. Guesstimate the closest STATE this picture was taken in.
2. Guess as many times as you would like.
3. The first person to answer correctly will be interviewed for an upcoming For The Birds “Bird Watcher Profile” post. Read the most recently published, it was a blast!
4. Then I will promote the hell out of your story for a week.
5. All about you. 
6. I am no joke about promotion. 
7. Game ends November 29, 2009 – the closest guesstimate location wins… exact preferred.
8. If you won the last guessing game here at For the Birds (LZ & Eric), you can play but you can’t win– you can suggest the right answers (if you can’t control yourself).
9. If you were with me when this was taken, you can’t play–I promise to be more original next time.

Bogus Original Post:

Can you find me?

1. Find me in this picture.
2. Name the city that I am in.
3. Guesstimate the closest year this picture was taken.
4. Guess as many times as you would like.
5. If you answer correctly, I will interview you for an upcoming For The Birds “Bird Watcher Profile” post.
6. Then I will promote the hell out of your story for a week.
7. All about you. 
8. I am no joke about promotion. 
9. Game ends with the right answers.
10. If you were with me when this photo was taken, you can’t play.
11. Mom, Dad… You can’t play either.

Photography by Photog Melanie Zobian

Meanwhile, I’m guesting over at Guest Bird Robin’s blog.. I like her, she’s spunky.

We are taking a few days off… getting out of town… fleeing the Hamptons… be prepared to rock out next week with For the Birds first Guest Bird. Hmmm will he/she be a Rooster.. Chicken… Ferruginous Duck… Slaty Egret… Peacock… Black-faced Spoonbill… ?

PS. If you would like to be a Bird, please let me know.

Is it just me, or have we hit the dog days of summer? It’s suddenly hot — after being wet and unseasonably cool for months and now it’s August? What? And when did July happen? I’m in denial–hot sweaty dehydrated denial.

In other news… 299 tropical bird skins have apparently up and flown away from London’s Natural History Museum… Now – I’m always one for a good art heist (as Scotland Yard beats down my door), but bird carcasses? Really? Apparently that’s what they are — just dead bird bodies with feathers–no eyes or internal stuff…. You can read about it here: http://www.timesonline.co.uk. Can you imagine how this happened? In our world of secured insanity… Someone went into the bird carcass area of the ornithological
collection in Tring, Hertfordshire — picked up 299 dead birds… some more than 3 feet long– and then simply carried them out? There was no gun chase, no bomb scare.. no getaway car… very hush hush and low key…very unbirdlike. Those that cherish these feathers are of course torn to bits over the loss… a catastrophe for the science of bird studies and future generations… Truly a mystery that needs to be solved immediately and authorities are on it… searching high and low, questioning collectors, fashion designers and fly fishing extremists…. but have they considered…