Saving Animals

You know when you're little and you want to save everything? A bird flies into the window, you rush out and put into a container with tissues, wrap it up and keep it warm with a bottle cap of water. And it lies there with its little neck broken, screaming inside "put me out of my misery" and you happily make it a little jacket and some flying goggles so it will see better next time. And then you put it into the hot water cupboard* and check on it every ten minutes to see if it was up and awake from its coma.  

After a couple of hours of waiting for it to move again, you'd take it outside, throw it in the air and encourage it to fly, fly away.  And it it would drop to the ground like a lead balloon and finally you would realize the futility of it so you would have a funeral and all of a sudden, there are a dozen small mounds in the back yard with dandelions artfully arranged across the top**.


Then there were the baby possums that you saved after the mothers died*** by pulling them out of the pouches and sticking them in a box with an old sweater and trying to feed them milk with an eye dropper.  Not knowing if they drank milk, or at least cow milk, but feeling heroic, virtuous and like you were rearing the next big thing in possums.  Then the possum would crawl out when you weren't looking, slip into the sweater and head back to the farm so it could show the other baby possums the latest in possum sweaters.

And then there was the time you saved a baby lamb and put that in the hot water cupboard.  That was a nice surprise for Mum.  But you didn't do that again...

*I don't know if America has these, haven't seen one yet. Basically an airing cupboard that contains a water heater. Growing up, Mum would put the line-dried clothes on the shelves in there to air them out and then tell us to take them upstairs to our room. And it took days to get them there. I'd put the clothes on the stairs first and then walk by them for a couple of days, then move them up a couple of steps and then eventually throw them on my floor.
**And no bird because the cat dug it up, brought it inside and tried to pass it off as it's own kill and you feel like the poor thing will never be laid to rest...
***Cause of death unknown but given that they are pests, I'm going to take a wild guess and say that there were suspicious circumstances

Sometimes I...

• Add something to my list of things to do that I've already done so I can cross it off and feel accomplished. Sometimes that's the whole list and then I sit down and relax whilst congratulating myself for excelling.
• Don't get dressed
• Curse and swear at other drivers. Actually not sometimes...
• Am very, very good. But mostly not.
• Have an extra cup of tea in the morning. Don't hate
• Eat cake. Also, not sometimes...
• Have a good hair day. Last November
• Sing out loud. And then I get shushed.
• Think I can dance. But then I can't
• Soothe myself with wine. Called cake.
• Talk to my cat. But it's ok because he talks back.How embarrassing would it be, if he ignored me?
• Count Mini Cooper's on the drive to work. But not obsessively. Because I don't do it on weekends. Because it doesn't count if it's not the same route.
• Don't make my bed. But I always wash the dishes.
• Wish I knew more about Physics so I could invent a portal and go home for the weekend. I've got the Marketing Plan ready to go, I'm just missing the science.
• Think about getting up but then I don't
• Think about ironing clothes before I actually need to wear them. And then I decide to wear something else.
• Have nowhere to go when I look really good.  Which then reverses when I have somewhere to go.
• Hate beautiful people even though Pantene told me not to. 
• Think I am mutton dressed as lamb
• Pretend I am going to get up and workout before work. 
• Put workout clothes on and walk all the way to the couch
• Think I look good in hats. And then I put one on...
• Want to go camping. But just for one night, then hotel.
• Want to run away, travel, live off the land and have no cares and responsibilities but then I remember my retirement savings plan doesn't allow for that.  And by retirement savings plan, I mean the lottery. And then I remember that I don't buy tickets.