Double Post Friday

It looks like I have a lot of writing to do today.

I have something very important I need to say, but I am feeling pressured to supplement Auburn Pisces' account of her brother's funeral, which we attended last Friday. So I am going to have to say the really important thing first. Then I will write about the funeral and post that later today.

Don't go read her story yet. Please stay for this important announcement. Then you can go check out Auburn Pisces.

And now, my announcement:

No birds are going to want to visit our bird feeder. It is ugly. It is a bunch of dry sunflowers tied together hanging from a branch on a tree next to our backyard patio paradise, The Vortex.

First of all, the cigarette smoke from The Vortex will kill any birds that think about perching nearby. Or they will get hit by the whiskey bottles we toss over our shoulders. Actually, I'm the only whiskey drinker in the house, but sometimes if I am too drunk tired, I will ask The Handsome Prince or The Math Whiz to toss my bottle for me. It sounds like a euphemism for something else, doesn't it? "Hey, will you toss my bottle for a couple minutes?"

Anyway. Besides its proximity to "the wrong kind of people", the bird feeder isn't a hotel. It is a known fact that most birds prefer little wooden hotel or bed and breakfast birdhouses/feeders. Our bird feeder does not have the class of a bird hotel. It is not even a Motel 6. Staying at our bird hotel would be like sleeping on a compost heap.

I have always wanted to go inside a bird hotel. But I don't try to peek inside of the bird hotels anymore. You should hear the little birdie screams that emerge from the bird hotels when I stick my eye up to the hotel and try to look inside. Since I don't like to terrorize the guests, I am left to my imagination.

I imagine boy birds trying to pick up on girl birds as they sit at the hotel bar inside. I am not trying to sound homophobic here. It's just that the bird hotels I've seen could never be gay hotels. They are too cute and "country" and usually have "Welcome Feathered Friends" or somesuch nonsense painted on little wooden signs out front of the hotel. Gay birds would need to stay somewhere with neon out front.

Some lesbian birds probably visit the country inn bird hotels from time to time, but they probably pretend to be sisters or best friends so the straight birds don't freak out. Country inn bird hotels can be quite conservative, and some of them don't even have cable television, so there is nothing to do but read old issues of National Geographic or take a pair of binoculars outside and do some peoplewatching. Well, that's what I imagine anyway. Like I said, I've never been inside a bird hotel.

I feel better now that I've addressed this important topic. Now I will be able to turn my attention to an account of the funeral last Friday. It was quite an experience, and, remarkably, Auburn Pisces and I found much to laugh about in spite of the sorrow and loss she is experiencing. I never met her brother, Jim, but I don't think he would mind my making his sister laugh when she's hurting. He loved her so much. I think he'd want it that way.

Thanks for listening to my important thoughts on bird feeders. You can go now. Auburn Pisces is right over here.