Shadee’s Blog

The other day I was in the back yard with my camera and this little brown bird flew up really close and just sat still posing perfectly for a shot. So I pointed my camera at it, made sure I was steady and focused. But of course the stupid bird decided to turn, flap it’s wings and look like a complete retard THE SECOND I HIT THE DAMN BUTTON! And then it took off.

When I downloaded the image from the cam and looked at it I had mixed emotions. I was pissed off that the damn thing moved at the wrong moment as they usually do, but I was also pretty amused at how retarded the little thing had made itself look. And then I remembered some really horrid shots of a hummingbird I took during the summer too. So I dug those up and I decided to post them for my and your amusement. So here ya have it. A gallery of retarded looking birds and also one of a hummingbird’s butt.

Enjoy

-Dee

… that I won’t get my face chewed off next time I reach into our tomato plant to collect tomatoes.

Last night I let the dog out in the back yard for a quick last pee when I spotted a very large hairy spider on the side of the house. Then another one a bit lower. I was pretty impressed by their size. They weren’t like tarantulas or anything but definitely a bit bigger and creepier than your average house spider.

Then when my eyes wandered from the one back up to the other I saw something else on the drain pipe and my immediate reaction was: “OMFG GET MY CAMERA!!”. So Mord did.

There was this HUGE praying mantis sitting there. I don’t think I’ve ever seen one that big before. And I certainly wasn’t expecting to come across one that size anywhere outside the freaking Jungle lol. So I attempted to take some pics of it in the dark. I used the long range lens even though that’s probably not the best choice for taking close ups of insects in the dark lol, but I so wasn’t going to use my normal lens and stick my face anywhere close to that XD As a kid I used to play with little praying mantids in Italy, carefully reaching out and holding a little stick in front of them and the results even with the tiny ones were scary enough to not want to mess with them with your bare hands. So I can only imagine what kind of hurt this one would be able to inflict lol. Taking the pics was pretty creepy too, every time I’d try a different angle it’s head would turn towards me. It didn’t stop staring at me the entire time. Here’s a version re-sized to fit the blog.

I went outside with a ruler a few minutes ago to measure how tall each of the white siding pieces of our house are since that seems to be about how long the Mantis was, which turns out to be 4 inches (which is 10.2 cm). I also found out that it’s still sitting there lol. If It’s still around when the sun is up I’ll try to take some more pics.

-Dee.

[EDIT]
I just took a great shot from the other side, you can see a lot more in it. I re-sized it to 50% but it’s still pretty huge. Here it is.
[/EDIT]

[EDIT2]
I took some more pics in daylight. It’s still sitting right there
A lot braver this time, using the short lens and leaning in to get a good shot.
Here’s one also re-sized to 50% Intentionally left huge so you can see it’s features.
Weird how the eyes are a lot lighter now. They were really dark before. Must be something similar to when our pupils dilate
[EDIT2]

As some of you already know, our cat tends to have certain bouts of insanity where she becomes this absolutely insufferable whiny meowing monster. Sometimes it lasts a few days, sometimes a week, we kinda wrote it off as it probably just being her “monthly thing” but I’m starting to think she’s either going a bit senile from time to time or that she’s doing it just to piss me off.

When it happens it’s usually her meowing this loud annoying meow over and over and over. Sometimes during the day, but mainly during the night because she makes sure to get a good amount of sleep in during the day so she can keep me up at night. But apart from that behavior she’s perfectly fine. She eats, drinks, plays, runs around like mad chasing toys, it’s just that she has this strange urge to serenade us with this horrid constant meowing sometimes. And it’s pretty random when it starts, sometimes it’s because we leave, sometimes it’s to announce that she just took a crap or that she ate something, sometimes it’s just completely random. And when it happens she just gets this blank stare on her face and just goes to town. And when you look at her angrily when she’s doing it she stops for a sec, and just glares at you as if she knows you don’t approve and she’s trying to kill you with her laser beam eyes. Then later when she snaps out of it for a while she’s the sweetest most affectionate kitty in the world and comes up to you for cuddles as if none of it ever happened.

And I could handle it if it weren’t for her being at her worst during the night…
Mord sleeps like a log and doesn’t wake up at all but I’m a really light sleeper so whenever she starts, I’m awake. And whenever she stops for a few seconds, instead of trying to go back to sleep I just know she’s gonna start again so I’m just lying there waiting for it and feeling the anger rise lol. And of course I’m always right and when she does start again and doesn’t stop I get up, open the bedroom door and go “CAT! STFU!!” And then she does stop for a little while. But in the mornings I usually wake up still tired or not having had any sleep at all.

So today I made it my mission to make sure the little turd didn’t get any sleep at all today in the hope that it’ll tire her out enough for her to actually sleep when we do tonight. It’s been a struggle though. I keep having to tip her out of her little kitty bed or a bean bag chair she tends to sleep in every 20 mins or so. And man has she been giving me nasty looks whenever I wake her up. Needless to say it’s been very satisfying

After a while I got tired of it too though, and I had to go upstairs to do some ironing, so I figured I’d lean both her bed and the beanbag against the wall vertically so she couldn’t get into them at all. But when I came downstairs I found this:

I should’ve known… she hasn’t been in the dog bed for a long time but it’s not the first time it’s happened. So meh, she found a way to outsmart me for a few minutes. Or so she thought anyway. My response to that was to go: “Sophie! Are you a good girl? Yes you are aren’t you? Awww yeah you’re such a good puppy! :D” Which resulted in the cat getting smacked in the face with a big ol’ wagging tail and had her bolting out of there immediately just like I wanted

So tonight we’ll see whether I got the last laugh or if she’s going to give me the worst sleepless night ever…

-Dee.