Tuesday, September 06, 2005

Vuja De (George Carlin) - the feeling that I haven't seen this before

I just spent an hour next door at my brother's house (I haven't visited him in almost a year) watching Hummingbirds at feeders outside his living room windows. The birds were amazing is probably why I stayed so long, but I got back to my house in time to watch the sunset and play with Kilo for a while. The whole evening I have noticed that something is different and when the mosquitoes attacked I realized what. All of the other birds are gone. We rarely have mosquitoes because there are usually many hundreds of birds in all of the trees and using the water. They were here this morning, and here when I came in from work, but I've looked everywhere and they aren't here now. There was a Robin and a Plover using the sprinkler in my front yard when I went to my brother's house. I noticed because the Robin was shaking itself, showing more red than usual and it evoked an image of what I used to think Robins looked like (it wasn't even close to reality). Those are history. There are usually 10 pairs of Eurasian Doves in the back yard. Gone. Every evening, the air above the pond and adjacent yards is filled with hovering, mosquito eating Barn Swallows. None. And those hundreds of Sparrows, Mockingbirds, Wrens, Robins, etc., - disappeared. I just went outside and checked again. Still nothing. That's all kinds of interesting.