"If God answered prayers, you people wouldn't be here."

SO there is less than a month until the infamous Lifelight festival. We live across the highway from where it will be this year. They have NOTHING built. Their fields are currently flooded and un-mowed. Most of the roads leading into the area are gravel or dirt and are in bad condition from the flooding. There is ONE intersection that they expect to move 120,000 people through a day. I don't know how they are going to pull any of it off.

But that's ok with us. Nobody asked us if it was ok to have a festival with 300,000 people across the street. We will have to put up barriers to keep drunks off of our property. We will have to put up with the loud music until 2am. Personally, we are disgusted with the whole mess and think that Alan Greene needs to be more considerate and actually ask people living in the area if it is ok to throw a giant party across the street.

Hopefully they will get rained out and move the concert back to the Arena in Sioux Falls where it belongs. Or even Sioux City. Somewhere that doesn't mind having so many people in one place at once.

4-22-10

I got the best compliment I could ever ask for on Earth day while working. This was our first field trip where we actually got out of the bio van and wandered around the park.

After pointing out a speck at the top of a hill that was a field sparrow, one of the students asked me
"So do you want to be an ornithologist?"

Before I could answer Dr. Lewis said,

"She IS an ornithologist!"

MLIA :)

Being sick sucks...the life out of you

So I have no idea how I got this weak. It must be a combination of the withdrawl, the new side effects, and some other strange illness that presents without a fever. I feel like shit. It sucks to move, it makes me dizzy.

I feel so weak. I lost 20 pounds in less than two weeks! That is really bad. Ugh I hope I don't lose any more. I need to find the energy to go to class. I sleep for 12+ hours a day, and still I am tired.

I think the last time I felt this bad was when I had just gotten out of the hospital in 2007. I dislike this.

FG

half birthday

I really have no idea anymore about where I'm going. Its up in the air. I'm just trying to live day by day.
So many hurdles to jump. So many that I've missed or knocked down. Yeah I know, clumsy me.
But it's getting there. Whatever it means to "get there."
It will all get sorted out in the end.

FG

Stupid people doing stupid things

RANT:

So the weirdest thing just happened. I was in my room reading my leisure book when all of a sudden I hear all of this chanting from outside my window. I get up to look, and it appears that there was an accident infront of the dorms. I look closer, and there are three tow trucks and a couple cop cars towing people's cars from the street. WTF Augie?
First of all, its midnight.
Second, we are only supposed to get half an inch of snow!
Third, where was the email telling people to move their cars?
This school and city has some really fucked up ways of dealing with people. There was a crowd of about 15 people standing out in the negative degree weather. A couple were trying to negotiate the tow trucks to just put their cars back down and they would move them. Ugh. It makes me sick to think that the city targets colleges as an easy income for them. The whole undertaking was totally unfair to students, and it disgusts me to know that these things happen, and that the school, campus safety and the cops don's seems to give a crap about the student's rights, and needs when it comes to finding parking.
The school needs to fix this. Build another parking lot with all that money we give you each year!

END RANT.

Orion & Dog - Sea Wolf

Orion said, This body is mine,
And you may do with it what ever you like
But when the sky turns red you'd better come back home
'Cause i can't spend these summer nights alone

Orion said, I'm just a humble hunter
The dog the only company I keep
Forgive me if if I fear that you will change me
But I've seen my fortune written in the leaves

Ah, push it through! Ah, push it through!
Because the body and the mind can't heal in two
Orion and dog, how the road you've walked was long
But the winter of your song
Is slowly fading

Orion said, You'd better treat me true
You should hold me like a bird inside your palm
'Cause I can't be just another heart you've broken
'Cause I'm getting much too old

Orion, she said, I know all men are mortal
And the ships in which you travel are full of thieves
But the only way that you will ever have me
Is if you through your body into the sea

Ah, push it through! Ah, push it through!
Because the body and the mind can't heal in two
Orion and dog, how the road you've walked was long
But the winter of your song
Is slowly fading

Orion and dog, How your light will live beyond
your final summer song
Or so it's fated
Or so it's fated
So it is fated

"Before they put us in a coffin I've got things to say..."

Update! Finally. So this blog I suppose has been turned into my miscellaneous blog, as I have two other ones now to fulfill specific areas of my writing needs.
SO lets talk about college. I think I finally have it all put together. I have my own room and that means I have my own place to do anything I want. Well not anything I suppose. But I can do my homework in here without being bothered by people, I can listen to my music all the time, and I can go to bed at a reasonable hour. The only main problem about my living arrangements is the fact that it is a dorm. I chose the end of the hallway for a reason. It usually is quieter. Psych! Guess what!? My neighbor LOVES to party all night long, with her weird friends that sing karaoke at 3am. Oh, and did I mention the guys that live above me typically spend their nights playing video games or watching sports and loudly cheering and moving furniture about. Oh well.
Classes this semester are all after noon. This is great for me and my stupid sleep problems. Its a workload, but I'm only really taking one challenging course as recommended to me by my parents. So far I've been able to complete all my homework easily, leaving me bored and at a loss of what to do. So I guess I am writing blogs now for fun :P
It really sucks to have Ryan be gone. I worry all the time about him. It freaks me out that he is in a college setting overseas. It couldn't be worse for my maniacal pessimistic mind. But I'm hoping things will turn out alright.
Thats it for now. I'm off to go finish reading some more leisure books.

FG

Ryan's Love

I want you to know that I love you like a dog loves an owner,
I wait for you like a cactus waits for Rain,
That I wish I could be with you always like the stars at night,
that I could bask in your light, like the moon and the sun.
That i could be surrounded by you like a stone in the river,
be cute and cuddly like little bears, make love like dogs, :)
and one day people will say I wish we could be like Caity and Ryan together forever, in love for all time, the perfect couple, a love story for all time..


Later my Love,

Ryan

2am and I can't sleep

I don't know whether its because I truly don't want to sleep, or if I'm afraid to fall asleep. Maybe its the cane sugar cola, or the hot chocolate. Or the humming and the creaks of the house as it settles. Or my wandering mind. Thinking about Ryan and how he will be waking up as I struggle to fall asleep. Maybe its the temperature of my room. Its too cold in here. Or my mattress that I'm not used to sleeping on. Whatever it is, I can't sleep.

So I will rant. This rant will be directed towards birders. I was once amongst their kind, excited to see new birds, excited with greed. But as I slowly awakened to the reality of the situation, I reacted with denial, anger, and have come into this final stage of pity and understanding. So lets go through the stages.
1) Denial.
I wanted to desperately think that being a birder I cared about the environment and the animals in it more than most people. I thought that my knowledge about identification would lead me to glory and recognition amongst my birder peers. I thought that being a birder was a special and unique pastime. I thought that somehow I was better than people who weren't birders. I thought that one of the most important goals of my life would be to see as many birds as I could.
2) Realization of the truth and Anger.
I had been happily and obliviously birding for 7 years when an English class prompted me pay more attention to my vocabulary. I realized that I was saying such things as "I need to see this bird!" and "I need this bird for my list." Or phrases like "I had this bird yesterday" You HAD a bird? Picked it up? OWNED it? NEED. What a horrible greedy word to use when describing the want to view a bird. People NEED food, water, and shelter to SURVIVE. And I was blindly saying that I NEEDED to see a bird to SURVIVE. Such a statement only proves the greed and selfishness of the person spewing it forth. I started to listen to other birder's speech. I would hear the newly found British term "twitch" which meant to casually see and mark a bird off one's list. People would say that they "twitched" an extremely rare bird, and would completely undermine that bird's importance. There is some vulgarity about using the word "twitch" to see a special bird. Its anti-climatic. And it leaves the non-birder listener thinking that birders get Tourette's whenever they see a bird. This phrase to me was nearly as insulting to the bird as the phrase "trash bird."
So I started a campaign to try to help my birder friends overcome their nasty habits and indecent vocabulary. Most defiantly defended themselves and said "Oh, I don't see a problem with it, it's just slang." Some agreed with my ideas, but were reluctant to change their ways. My anger with them grew and I considered myself to no longer be a part of them. I was a bird-appreciator. A true ornithologist. Not someone who just notched their belt.
3) Pity.
Having been separated from the birding world for over 10 months now, I think my anger has cooled enough to write this. I still have a wonderful time looking for birds when I go about my daily business. I still see "lifers" but I have long thrown away my list. My focus with birds has returned to where it begun. To parrots. I'm developing my skills as bird-caretaker and aviculturist. Becoming familiar with the genetics of species and how essential it is for conservation efforts to be able to breed rare or endangered parrots. The only way to fight extinction for some of these species, especially those on the pet trade, is to form breeding programs. Even if some species may never be introduced back into the wild, (like the goffin cockatoo; habitat destruction and heavy predation makes reintroductions fatal) their species will be preserved. And with the realization that I can actually help the birds I love, comes the realization that birders will never be able to help a bird by simply seeing it. Between the bird and the human, the only one who comes away from the experience of being "twitched" with positive note is the birder. The bird, usually if its a rare bird for the area, is usually suffering with some ailment that got it into the wrong place. This initial stress added with the stress of hundreds of people with obtrusive cameras, car and noise pollution is of severe detriment to the bird. Usually the bird will die or disappear withing a few days of being "discovered." Its a pity that they derive enjoyment from seeing a dying animal.
4) Understanding.
I was one of the lucky ones and grew out of the selfish hobby of birding. When I look back, it is more clear to me that birding was a manifestation of my childish need to collect and compete, aspiring with good intentions to be the best. This is seen a lot with children and adolescences, and examples of similar things to birding include video games, trophy hunting, pokemon cards, beanie babies, and stamps. I feel that other birders are stuck in this childish and selfish stage; unable to grow up and let it go. With this understanding, comes the idea that selfish people are never satisfied. I have come to realize that it is the quality of your experience with a bird that is important, not the quantity of birds that you have seen.

It took me almost a year to be able to write about this enlightenment. I hope that others who have addictions to selfish hobbies will be able to reflect upon their behaviors and see if what it is that they are doing is worth their time. I'm aware that some people will never grow out of their addiction. This is life.

On that note, I must be getting back to the reality of my own and get to bed.

FG