which_chick | (no subject)

I'm sure everyone is very interested in how I'm making out with Ubuntu 8.04 (Hardy Heron). Fine, thanks. It updated seamlessly from Gutsy (I'm running the 64-bit version) and Firefox 3 rocks my world. It has been a long time since I actually fucking *liked* a browser revision. FF3 does not suck. It is actually better than FF2.

Banshee has totally stopped locking up under Hardy, too.

Pony night went well enough. It was apparently time again for a ride on Cole, the big dumb thoroughbred who ignores my leg and leans his massive head/neck on my hands. At least I got him to canter several strides in each direction this time. Still, it was a hell of a lot like work. Anybody who is perhaps confused as to why I have no desire to get myself a 16.2hh pony of the sort I would look "so much better" on? I give you exhibit A: Cole. I don't want to have to use that much leg, ever.

The poppies are still not blooming but their weird pod-buds are straightening up. Barring weather weirdness, I should have blooms here directly. I'm really quite excited about the poppy flowers.

Tomorrow night is the Thurmont auction, so a late night for me. Saturday is currently open, Sunday is the last opera of the year.

I've been sort of slacking on these updates and probably I should try to do a better job. I miss updating when I don't do it.

Also, if you are ever removing a shrubbery and discover, part way through the removal, that you have lopped off the branch that holds a nest containing two baby robins, half-fledged, those baby robins are dead. It doesn't matter that they don't *look* dead yet. They are still dead. They may open their shockingly yellow beaks for the bright splash of color that makes parental robins feed them. They may make small squeaky sounds and shuffle around in the nest, jockeying to be in a better position for the arrival of the parental robin that is never going to come again. No matter how lifelike they appear, they are dead.

It doesn't matter if you feel really bad for them and gently tuck the nest in a nearby bush so that they will live. They aren't going to live. Once you have cut the branch that they were living on, the baby robins are dead. The parental robins will fly back to the bush that isn't there, over and over, for a couple of hours, with bugs in their beaks. They will look sort of confused but since robins are not programmed to go look for their missing baby robins in a relocated nest, they just look at where the nest used-to-be and then leave. The parental robins come back and leave and come back for a while. I guess eventually they give up. Maybe they try having a nest and some baby robins again somewhere else.

I'm really sorry about the baby robins. I didn't see them in time. Fuck.