Naptus Interruptus

The house was clean, my belly was full of brunch and the feather down duvet was inviting so I laid down to take a nap.

It was an awesome nap. It really was.

And then I was rudely awakened by a particularly shrill version of Greensleeves.

In the groggy haze of my nap brain I became convinced that a Renaissance Fair had established itself on the lawn.

I soon realized it was the local ice cream van taking an excruciatingly long time to negotiate his way out of the cul-de-sac in front of our house.

I suppose there is no greater support of the local meteorologist's claims that we are having a mild winter than the fact that an ice cream vendor was out in full force with his rangley jangley version of the romanesca classic.

I tried to settle back down to my nap but I'll be damned if the ice cream van didn't keep coming back down the street as if he was stuck in a mobius strip.

And so a perfectly good nap was brought to an irritating conclusion.

How things are going

I have gone through a bunch of changes recently, not just growing to the size of a small whale but also switching from a student visa to a work visa and becoming a journalist once again.

I have put the PhD on hold for now and I don't mind at all.

I work for a farming publication where the sheer amount of science involved keeps my mind stimulated and intrigued.

I think if and when I return to academia it will be to do a thesis on social habits of the captive and wild Kea.

Nick, the NPR and I have moved into a larger house with more space for us all.

Nick's mom has come over from the UK to help out with the baby and keep us company.

She arrived last week with her partner Dave.

They had flown 11 hours from London to LA and spent another 12 on a flight to Auckland.

When we met them at the airport in Christchurch they were in relatively good spirits for people who had traveled half the globe and last eaten a 4 a.m. breakfast consisting of a tiny omelette and a glass of wine.

For the next month our house will be home to two Brits, two Americans and one Kiwi.

It's like the United Nations: Varieties of Vanilla.

I think I'll invite my French Canadian colleague over for tea complete the "circle of whiteness."

Anyway, the new house has a lovely conservatory attached off the living room and I thought it would be the perfect place to put a few tropical plants and let Archimedes spread his wings.

I bought a very expensive plant that looks like a shefflera but has a more loosely configured branch system. I was very proud of it and spent quite a few minutes trying to get into just the right spot in the conservatory.

Upon his first release, Archimedes flew around and screeched happily. All the starlings and blackbirds and house sparrows in the area came to check him out.

When the sun went down he returned to his hanging cage and I took him in for the night.

The next day I let him out in the conservatory again while I went off to run errands.

When I returned I noticed that several stems on the expensive shefflera like plant had been completely torn to bits and were hanging limply.

For the first time in the seven months I have had him, I genuinely lost my temper with Archimedes.

This little stunt came a few days after he had chewed through one of the folds holding his "happy hut" in place and caused it to dangle pitifully from his top perch.

I propped it back up on the perch and he has taken to nesting on the top of it. At least, I think that's what he's doing. He may have formed some sort of romantic attachment to it for all I know.

Anyway, I got really miffed when I saw my mangled plant and I chased him around with my gray sweatshirt just to be mean.

Why is it I can go into the Kea enclosure at Willowbank and be perched on to by half a dozen semi-wild parrots but my tiny, hand reared, domesticated parrot still won't let me get in his personal space?

And now I have to deal with his destructive tendencies.

Too much.

Nick isn't a huge fan of Archimedes and says that he is willfully antisocial and would need therapy if he were human.

When I pondered finding a new home for him however, even Nick said I was being a bit hasty.

I meant this to be a positive post about improvements and stuff but then the dad gummed bird got me all worked up.

Anyway, life is mostly good and stuff right now if we just don't dwell on my overpriced, recently denuded houseplant.

Pregnancy: The Final Trimester

So I'm just getting into my eighth month of pregnancy and I'm pretty much over it.

At first I was all like:

But now I'm all like:

The TIME top 100

I just bought the TIME 100 Most Influential People and I cannot for the life of me understand what they were thinking with the cover photo of Beyonce.

Here you have a beautiful, talented Superstar and someone thought it would be a good idea to dress her in Hanes underpants and a sportsbra and then put some cheap shear 80s top over it. And then they rolled up one sleeve and tucked the bottom of one side of the shirt into her granny panties.

You know how sometimes ladies come out of the loo with toilet paper stuck to one of their heels? Yeah. somebody did that to Bey's shirt.

Her face looks bewildered like she's just survived an ordeal and then had a camera stuck in her face.

Her hair looks limp and the ends look split. Remember when she got her hair stuck in a fan and she was such a professional that she kept singing? That was awesome but it looks like they took this picture right after she was freed.

Did the person who took this picture have jealousy issues? We may never know.

And then on page 24 we find an ode to the Brothers Koch penned by Karl Rove. If you've ever wondered what written fellatio looks like, check it out.

I haven't finished reading the issue yet but so far it looks like the people at TIME went to take the pulse of the world and put their finger in the wrong place.

Anyway, I thought I would branch out from talking about birds for a bit.

That's enough of that I reckon.

New Zealand is an Awesome Place

I have recently started a part-time job as a journalist for a rural publication and today I was sent to cover the ground breaking ceremony for a major irrigation project in my area.

There were delicious hot mince pies and I got to interview the Prime Minister, John Key. 

Of all the political and public figures I have ever interviewed, he was by far the most genuinely friendly and delightful to talk to. He makes funny asides and looks like he honestly enjoys working for his country. 

I'm a fan.

The bar has been set high for all future stories that I cover. 

I now realize that any assignments not including hot mince pies and at least three heads of state will probably lead to immediate disenchantment.

Oh well.

A squinty American journalist chats with the Prime Minister.

My Agaporins Brings All The Birds To The Yard

My pet love bird Archimedes is what's known as an Agapornis roseicollis. His color pattern is a mutation known as "Dutch Blue."

This is what the internet taught me recently. 

For a moment I am going to mention the unfortunate combination of two very dignified words "Agape," (Greek for "love") and "Ornis," (Greek for "bird.") 

On their own they are both lovely. Together they form a name with the word "porn" in it. 

Sigh.

Anyhoo, Archimedes is an active little soul and has recently extended his flying zone to include our living room.

His favorite pastime is to sit on the windowsill and call out the wild birds that fly through the neighborhood.

He has become quite the spectacle among the European Starlings, Blackbirds, Fantails and Silvereyes.

But perhaps no other species is quite as in awe of him as the common House Sparrow or Passer domesticus. 

Their minds seem to be blown that this bright little bird is even more domesticus than they are as he is actually in the house.

They come in small groups of threes and fours and perch on the bushes and roof just outside the windows to gaze at him.

One actually flew up to the window to get a closer view:

Look you guys, he's actually in there!

For his part, Archimedes seems to love the attention and will even call to these birds from inside his cage as soon as he hears them in the mornings. 

I'm glad they keep him occupied but it also makes me think that he may be in need of a companion who he can interact with on his side of the glass.

Sadly, it appears I am not to ever be this companion. I am accepted as the "bringer of food" but seem to be no closer to getting him to perch on me.

However, he does like it when I pull up You Tube videos of love birds singing and this is about as close as we get to each other.

Archimedes Has His Say

I have noticed that whenever I'm having a conversation with someone at home or on Skype, Archimedes will always pipe up to put in his 10 cents worth.

I guess in Love Bird society he who squawks the loudest has the last say.

Nick, the NPR and I often watch a little television in the evenings and eat our dinner in the living room. Archimedes will start one of his loud speeches (usually during some important news report or bit of dialogue) before hopping onto his feed dish and nibbling meekly on his seeds. I guess it's his way of "having dinner with the family."

Not all his communications are loud though, I recently added a small basket tipped on its side to his cage and he converted it into a nest almost immediately.

First he sidled up to it and made a few pics at with his beak-all the while chirping happily to himself- then he moved in and made some internal modifications.

He's very house proud.

If you call his name he will stick his head out of his nest and give you a searching look. He also perches on what I suppose one could call his "front stoop" and takes little parrot naps.

I still haven't convinced him to perch on my finger but he will let me get close to him without flying away or scolding me.

Sometimes when I am typing on my laptop he will perch on it and pick at the rubber bits that protects the top half from the bottom when its closed.

He likes it when I play Youtube videos of other Love Birds singing and he loves to fly around in my room.

I have discovered that he likes lavender. When I put it in a vase in my room he will land on the vase and set about ripping the flowers and stems into small pieces.

It's kind of like having your own potpourri maker as there's a distinctive whiff of lavender when he goes swooping past me.

He seems to be adjusting well to life with us strange, peach giants.

Archimedes contemplates the song of a fellow Love Bird on Youtube.