Bye Bye Birdy

I came home at 1:30 yesterday to find this little guy in a heap on the patio. Apparently in his exuberance to partake in the regurgitated worm that his folks were serving up, he leaned a little too far over the edge of the domicile and down he went. I got out my step ladder, scooped him up and made my assent to reunite him with his kin. Even on the top rung I was too vertically challenged to replace him. Heavy sigh. I went next door and begged Rob to come and share his tallness for a couple of seconds and help me out. He nestled Birdy back in his home and all was right with the world. I checked him off and on until dark and he was happily munching meals with his three brothers and sisters.

We had wicked storms last night. They called them ‘train storms’ because individual super cells popped up one after another after another after another and they all traveled the same route. One round of horrendous thunder, lightning and funnel clouds would go over. It would clear out a little for about 10 minutes and then the next one would come. Thankfully with all of the rotation in the clouds, there was no serious tornado damage even though there were several touch downs in the area. The real havoc-raiser was the rain. Beaver Dam got 2.5 inches in 22 minutes at one point. I took some pictures or the torrents, but because it was so dark out, it’s hard to see my sidewalk river and the new swimming pool under the trees. It got even more difficult to see when we lost power. I read by flashlight for a while and then went to bed.

At first, Ben did what he always does during a thunderstorms; goes and finds Percy Porkloin and together they snooze it out. Because of the funnel activity though, he was all weirded out and did a lot of pacing and whining. Twice there was such a sudden, drastic, change in air pressure that my ears popped painfully. It must have been ever worse for him. It was a looooonnnnnggg night.

Come daylight we unhunkered and peeked out to find that there was surprisingly little damage overall; standing pools of water and a few limbs down. We were just breathing a sigh of relief when we saw the little birdy back on the patio. He had departed to that big aviary in the sky when the worms are free and the flyin’ is easy. I don’t know whether he broke his neck, drowned, or died of exposure but he was 'legs up'. I preformed a hasty service and burial before Rob woke up and happened by. (He’s even a bigger sap over animals than I am if that can be believed!) I’ve been thinking about Birdy off and on all morning and wondering if I had checked during the night, if I would have seen him earlier and been able to bring him in before he died. Poor little guy. (I take back my earlier statement...I'M the bigger sap.)

Just back from knitting with the girls at The Ear and am going to go watch Haven. Ben will be watching through his eyelids from the other end of the couch. He's making up for last night. Hope you all weathered the storms. Have a great weekend!