From The East Wing, With The Little Trochilidae, Pup Baby's Email, Sophia Clinton & Gore, Bug Off, The Rains of Spring

Greetings to all, and welcome new friends to the East Wing.

Just like clockwork, the Little Brown Eyed Friend of Mine, the hummingbird, came back to visit the East Wing. The online information indicated hummingbirds would be in Northern Indiana around the end of May so I put out the two hummingbird feeders on May 31st. Barely had time to get back to the East Wing, and there she was having an early lunch. Sometimes she eats sa much as 200 times an hour. Most every time I look out to the feeders she’s there eating. Guess that little hummingbird just likes hillbilly cooking.

Now for you folks more tuned into the scientific world, she’s known as : Kingdom: Animalia, Phylum: Chordata Class: Aves, Order: Apodiformes, Family: Trochilidae. But to me she's just the Little Brown Eyed Friend of Mine. It’s so much more fun to have a hummingbird in your yard than a Trochilidae.

That little girl bird picked up right where she left off when she went south for the winter last year. She'd not been in the yard two days and when I came home from work, the little boyfriend was there too. All girls end up with boyfriends and hummingbirds are like that too, yeah they are. She came to the East Wing Window within the first hour after I put out the feeders. She hovers, looks at me and flies away back to the feeder. Pretty little thing, that Trochilidae.

I think the Little Brown Eyed Friend of Mine is making a nest in the Maple Tree directly above the feeders. It seems every time I see her come to eat, she descends from the tree, and when finished takes the elevator back up. Hope the nest is in the maple, never seen one before.

Boy, did Mustina, the Pup Baby, ever get the email last week, along with the Gray Lady. The 2girldogs topped Sophia the Republican Cat in emails received for the first time ever. Course the 2girldogs were as happy as can be and Sophia was fit to be tied for two or three days.

She claimed the 2girldogs email was just the sympathy vote for Pup Baby almost dying, and the Ladies email was just ‘cause she stayed by her baby. The truth being know, Sophia didn’t live at the East Wing at that time of the tribulation , so I don’t know how she’d have reacted to such tough times, the night of the Long Night or the second night when The Thunder Rolled. Had she been there I’d bet she'd have a different story tell.

When Sophia heard more bad news ‘bout the presidents men offering more jobs to people if they wouldn’t enter democratic primaries, she got real happy real quick. With a smile on her face and chuckle in her meow, Sophia said “Chicago Politics, it’s the Dailey Way, and after all the President’s a homeboy ya know”

Sophia was glad the President went to the Gulf and said the oil leak was his fault but don’t blame him, ‘cause after all it’s really Bush’s fault. According to Sophia the President said he was gona kick ass ‘cause they couldn’t stick a plug in it. Sophia wanted to tell him where to stick the plug but the Gray Lady intervened and promised bodily harm if she went there. Sophia walked the line, didn’t step over, just walked the line. The cat’s a high wire walker in Calico. I love to watch her smile as she walks that line.

A no win situation for us all, an open oil well in the Gulf of Mexico and nobody can stop it. Not the President, not the army, nothing in the Federal Government can do a thing except talk. The total technology to deal with this disaster lies solely with BP, and no matter how the President tries to convince us otherwise he too is a spectator. Unlike us, he has a front row seat. Maybe the only time in this life where he wished he had the back row seat.

Being unable to stop that oil flow, and an unknown volume underground, it’s a good thing they didn’t drill any deeper, else they’d have let out the devil himself. From the live cameras at the bottom of the ocean, maybe they have.

Sophia’s spent last two weeks working daily on her Tea Cat Project. I’m surprised at the number of email addresses she’s received asking to get on her mailing list. I think in retaliation for being put on the White House email list when garnering support for the health care bill, she’ll return the favor.

Sophia’s been to Chicago a couple times lately, the South Side of Chicago. To her old neighborhood, where she ran the Cat House. She still insists she thinks the President was at her cat house when he was a community organizer in Chicago, but can’t say for sure ‘cause the all look alike, those community organizers. Said she’s up there on business, came home as the official spokescat for the CCCC.

As Sophia traveled ‘round the country she accepted several offers to become the official spokescat for an ever increasing voice of opposition to the current political atmosphere sweeping across the country. As the winds of political change start to gather, Sophia now becomes the official spokescat for CCCC (Chicago Calico Cat Conference) as well as the ACCA (Arizona Calico Cat Association)

I had an interesting conversation with Sophia prior to her trip to Arizona. One day just out of the blue, she asked me I thought she looked Mexican. I asked why, said she’s lost her passport and didn’t want to take the time to find it in all her cat crap stuff before she went to Arizona. Told her ya don’t need passports to go to Arizona. Said she better take it just in case. I told her she didn’t look too Mexican, but be sure not to meow in Spanish or tell anybody her middle name is Guadalupe. That cat’s so pretty when she smiles in Spanish.

From there she went to California to meet with the a liberal cat group interested in becoming more politically active in their opposition to some of the recent laws passed by neighboring states. She introduced herself as Sophia Guadalupe, as she meowed in Spanish. She’s not yet heard back from those California Cats, but I expect she’ll get their spokescat job too. One thing I'll say for that humble little cat, she’s persistent in her undertakings, and had a great deal of flexibility in her view points, when the money’s right. Money talks, even to Calico Cats. Now she’s starting to meow like Bill Clinton and Al Gore.

For some folks the down sides of late spring and the upcoming summer are the BUGS!! On the other hand ya gotta admit that if ya look at the little fellers real close, I mean real, real close, they’re pretty impressive creatures. It’s almost a shame to smash those little complex creatures of God, but we do, and never blink an eye.

Will never forget the very first time I looked at bugs under a microscope. Not a very good microscope mind you, but the best one in Toto when I was a kid. I found out ‘bout a compound eye up close. Bugs and grasshoppers up close were monsters waiting for movies to be made. And so they were, the monster movies, THE FLY, THE ATTACH OF THE GIANT ANTS, and I’m sure there were others but those two come to mind right off. They didn’t scare me too much, I’d seen ‘em up close before.

Interesting creatures, those insects. I fully believe every life form on this planet is here for a purpose. It’s damn hard to figure out the purpose for some of ‘em. Another way to look at the bugs, wanta see a dinosaur, just hunt up a cock roach. Unchanged design for 60 million years and counting.

But the way ya look at it don’t matter, ‘cause they’re awfully annoying to many people. After getting bit by a mosquito the other evening, I decided to take ‘em on, after all last year I did win the War of the Hornet Nation, so mosquitoes would be a cakewalk.

Now if you’re gona cook outside and cook like a real man, and use charcoal and not be a wimp and use gas, then put a little sage or rosemary over coals to repel mosquitoes. It works. I used to cook out like a real man and use charcoal and put rosemary and sage on the charcoal, but now I cook like the wimps and us gas and swat the mosquitoes, or pollute the air by doing the spray can thing.

Here at the East Wing, we plant basil in pots all over the outside decks as part of the mosquito abatement program. Rubbing the skin with baby oil or imitation vanilla extract repels biting insects such as mosquitoes and black flies. Somebody told me that one time and I laughed at ‘em.

A long time ago I had a Bat House, don’t remember what ever happened to it. Did ya know that one small brown bat can eat as many as 600 mosquitoes in one hour? But I think that’s the one that comes in your house when you’re sleeping and bites your neck. OH, now I remember why I had to get rid of my Bat House. I told her those marks on her neck were just hickeys. She didn’t buy into that hickey deal and said she got bit by a bat and it was either her or the Bat House.

I miss that Bat House. I wonder if she would’ve just worn turtle neck pajamas. I think she got bit by mosquitoes missed by my bat. Maybe I should have gotten another Bat House for even better mosquito control, oh well, it’s little late to worry over long gone Bat Houses that could have been. Maybe I'll ask her again ‘bout the Bat House, she may have forgotten.

Now some people swear garlic works and swallow slivered garlic to ward off these bugs of summer. Some nuts ever take garlic tablets or rub garlic juice directly on their skin. Now I’m telling ya, with the amount of Italians I live with and the amount of garlic these people eat, well there wouldn’t be mosquitoes in Starke County Indiana. They are, so garlic must not work for that. I’ve even heard of people making a past of smashed garlic for bee stings, also heard people do radish juice for bee stings.

There are some neat flowering plants that tend to control bugs and insects, things like marigolds, chrysanthemums, asters, and pyrethrum daisies, along with herbs such as basil, anise, and coriander, are planted on the East Wing Decks every year. But the best way to really control mosquitoes is to drain the pond. Dump out all standing water from everything. When they can’t find water at your house, they'll go find water at your neighbor’s house, and your problem’s solved.

Years ago when I was going to repaint my house, had a fellow at the paint store tell me to add a few drops of citronella to each gallon of the paint to keep the bugs off the wet paint, it works. The citronella won't affect the paint, but it will keep the bugs from being stuck in your fresh paint job. I hate when that happens.

I just happen to remember this little ditty ’bout mosquitoes. Y know that annoying, high-pitched buzzing sound of a mosquito hovering around your head at night, it’s most likely made by a girl mosquito looking for a boyfriend. Mosquitoes mate in midair, (which is kinda cool) then the girl mosquito flies off to drink blood to nourish her eggs, and oh yeah it’s gona be your blood, that night when ya heard the buzzing. Ya don’t hear ‘em buzz when they bite your neck.

As I read of the devastating flash flood in Arkansas early last Friday Morning round 3:30 AM killing a yet untold number, it sent chills down my spine. I witnessed a flash flood one time, way up in the mountains. Saw the water rise more than 50ft in less than 5 minutes. Thank God I was still more than 50ft from the water and in a position to climb higher on the mountain if need be. Nothing more powerful than running water. It can move mountains, and does.

I’ve had several emails asking why I no longer say “stay safe in Iraq” at the end of the letters. No one in Iraq is reading stories from the East Wing. Truth is all the military men and women who visited the East Wing each Wednesday have been either sent home or, in some instances, just moved to a different war, that being Afghanistan. Prayers still need there for the safety of the people in harms way in that war. And so they’re offered.

Not the best weekend weather ever, but watching the storm roll through late Saturday Afternoon was special. That's what so neat ‘bout the East Wing, ya can set out in the storm and not get wet.

Thank you for sharing your time this late Spring Sunday in June. We enjoy your company so much. Summer will be here before we know it, just 8 days. I think that was a Beetles Week, that 8 days.

Stay safe in Afghanistan

From the East Wing, With The Little Trochilidae, Pup Baby’s Email, Sophia Clinton & Gore, Bug Off, The Rains of Spring

I Wish You Well
BobbyRay