Democracy for New Mexico

Superbowl Sunday Bird Blogging

Sunny the baby sun conure is finally getting more feathers. In the next few months he'll start looking like a sun conure should, replacing those grey downy feathers with gaily colored orange, yellow and green ones. You can compare today's photos with the ones we took when he first arrived. We know now that Sunny is definitely a boy. His DNA test results confirmed that he's a male, and his other lab tests gave him a clean bill of health.

He gets more tame by the day and enjoys sitting on our shoulders and playing tug-o-war with us using his toys. He likes being hand fed with sunflower seeds, peanuts and pieces of fruit. He can still be very territorial around his cage though, which you can see is filled with attractive toys. He spends most of his time on the top of his cage and atop his adjacent gym, alternating between rowdy playfulness and pooped out napping. His home in our den, with many windows, provides him a bird's-eye view of the skies, trees and outside birds that visit our backyard feeders.

Sunny's all wet above, after a bath in his water bowl. He likes to be sprayed with a water bottle too, so he can get soaked in all the places he can't reach himself. He says his bath yesterday was in preparation for today's Superbowl. Sunny is avidly rooting for the Seahawks, him being an avian and all, but the humans in the house are both Steelers fans. Let's hope he doesn't drown out the game with his squawks for the Hawks! (Click on photos for larger images.)

Sunday (Filibuster) Bird Blogging

Bosco the peach-faced lovebird is very angry about what the BushCo Republicans have been doing lately.I'm sorry to report that his restraint crumbled this morning and he viciously attacked his monkey acrobat toy:

Yes, I'm afraid that Bosco realized just how much that monkey resembles Bush. He's well aware that Dubya most resembles a chimp:

But but I guess a monkey visage of any kind was enough to provoke Bosco in this political climate. Just think what he'll do if the Democratic Party doesn't rein in its Senators and insist they join in the filibuster. It won't be pretty. His donkey toys are already trembling. Bosco says that if the Party can't achieve unity on the horrible Alito nomination, what CAN they achieve unity on?   

Here's a plea from Sen. Ted Kennedy urging us to continue the struggle to get the votes needed for a filibuster, and an updated look at strategy on Daily Kos. Insiders are reporting that the situation is still "fluid" and that there's still a chance we can get the required votes to stop cloture. Recent additions to the list of Senators supporting a filibuster: Hillary Clinton, Barak Obama, Joe Biden, Diane Feinstein and Harry Reid. Our own Sen. Bingaman, however, has so far refused to support it, though he is voting no on Alito. Let's see if we can change his mind.

Annatopia is reporting we are just TWO VOTES SHY.

Recommended: Flood the Senate switchboard with calls at 9AM EST (7AM MST): You can  use these toll-free numbers (and ask for the Senators by name): 888-355-3588 or 888-818-6641.

Sunday (Newspaper) Bird Blogging

I'm one of those fossils who still enjoys reading the newspaper in the morning, especially Sunday mornings, even if all I have to read is the Albuquerque Journal. It's an ingrained habit -- a compulsion really. I grew up in a family that read four Chicago newspapers a day: the Sun-Times, the Tribune, the (Herald) American and the Daily News. As you can see above, Bosco the peach-faced lovebird likes to join me in the dim light of early morning.

Bosco told me how much he enjoyed the Journal story on conservation pioneer, Stewart Udall, and the photo of Mr. Udall walking with poet Robert Frost back in the heady days of the Kennedy administration, when he was Interior Secretary. Can you imagine anyone in the Bush administration hanging out with a poet? For that matter, can you imagine anyone in the Bush administration being a courageous, even visionary, environmentalist? 

Because the news is often depressing these days, we like to bring out the big smile mask seen above and at least pretend to be in a cheerful, optimistic mood.

Above, Bosco is happy, even without the smile mask, while reading a report about more funding that'll be available at New Mexico's upcoming legislative session for important things like pre-kindergarten education, new schools, health care for more children and even $11 million for buying paper ballot voting machines all over the state. That was before we read the article about the likelihood of cold-blooded Samuel Alito becoming a Supreme Court Justice. Out came the smile mask, once again. (Click photos for larger versions.)

P.S. Bear Down Chicago Bears in today's NFL playoff game against the Carolina Panthers!

Sunday Bird Blogging

Here are the latest photos of Sunny, our new baby sun conure. About six months old now, Sunny has come a long way in trusting his (or her) new human friends. He's still awaiting his first molt at about nine months old, when he will gain a full set of adult feathers. In the meantime, he's having fun testing out all his toys and exploring his new world.

His favorite foods so far are unsalted peanuts in the shell, bits of pumpernickel bread, sunflower seeds and fresh celery. Believe it or not, he seems to prefer old rhythm and blues and soul music, and we got him to dance on his play gym the other day to Aretha Franklin and Stevie Wonder. A sun conure dancing is a sight to behold.

One of his favorite toys is this red chain. Sunny likes it when Mary Ellen holds the chain so he can explore both the toy and her fingers. He's very skilled at fingernail cleaning and cuticle trimming. Nibble nibble. He's much less likely to bite hard these days, and likes to be carried around the house on your shoulder while he grooms your hair, tickles your ears and picks threads on your clothes.

Note the I See Dean People sign in the background above. Not surprisingly, Sunny is a big fan of Howard Dean, just like his humans. The other day he quietly squawked that his early pick for president is Senator Russ Feingold and that he wants to work hard to defeat that culture of corruption cohort, Heather Wilson. Now if we can only train him to phone bank and canvass...

Sunday (Pagan) Bird Blogging

Bosco the peach-faced lovebird loves all things pagan, of nature. (Well, maybe not cats and such.) He told me he thinks all the right-wing hoopla about the "war on Christmas" is misguided and silly, given the holiday's symbolic focus on pagan rituals aimed at countering the darkness of a long winter's night. Festival of Light! Consider: holly, ivy, mistletoe, yule log, the giving of gifts, decorated evergreen tree, magical reindeer, etc.

Above, Bosco seems more interested in the strap that came off the camera than the Xmas tree and wintertime mascots but trust me, he digs the sights and sounds of the holidaze.

Of course, most of the world's religions and ethnicities honor this human tendency to gather around light, fire, food and mythical stories in Fall or Winter by overlaying or combining their own stories with much older tribal or pagan celebrations. Take your pick: Kwanzaa, Chanukah, Christmas, Diwali, Saturnalia, Yule, Lenaea, the Long Night, Bodhi Day, Bacchanalia, Soyal, Shab-e Yaldaa, just plain secular hustle, bustle, gift-giving and feasting. Or, as Bosco does, feel free to intermingle your affection for green rubber extra-terrestrials, Santa and polar bears in one diverse Winter Solstice get-together.

In this last photo, Bosco is singing "Christmas is Coming" to his Noel-mates. It's one of his favorites mostly because it mentions geese, which at least are distant relatives of lovebirds:

Christmas is coming,
The geese are getting fat,
Please put a penny
In the old man's hat.
If you haven't got a penny,
A ha'penny will do,
If you haven't got a ha'penny,
Then God bless you.

He whispered to me that he's looking forward to kissing under the mistletoe, him being a lovebird and all. You know how they are.

Sunday Bird Blogging: Bring the Troops Home Edition

Bosco the peach-faced lovebird wants everyone to know he sides with Rep. John Murtha, DNC Chair Howard Dean and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi on bringing the troops home from Iraq as soon as it's "practicably possible." Here he is contemplating peace and his collection of hippie beads.

Bosco grew quite agitated when I mentioned all the grief DLC-type Dems are giving Murtha, Dean, Pelosi and others for their realistic assessments of where we stand in the Iraq War and what we need to do to end the growing quagmire. Like most rank and file Dems, Bosco can't stand the endless cowardly posturing and fear of speaking truth to power that characterizes way too many self-appointed "leaders" in our Party.

Bosco got really het up (see above) when I mentioned Joe Lieberman's Bush-kissing remarks this week, which stopped just short of labeling anyone brave enough to speak out about the war as treasonous and against the troops. As Bosco knows, nothing could be further from the truth. "Lieberman should fly away to a new home in the Republican Party," said Bosco, flapping his wings to demonstrate. Bosco may be a bird brain, but even he knows Joementum is full of bird poop. (Click on images for larger versions.)

Bosco also highly recommends this video of Murtha's appearance on Hardball this week, and the Atlantic Monthly article, " If America Left Iraq," by Nir Rosen.

Sunday (Sunny) Bird Blogging

We finally got some photos of the newest addition to our bird family. Sunny is a baby sun conure who moved in with us a couple weeks ago. Above, he's sitting on his play gym, where he likes to hang out during the day when he's not in his cage. The playground is on a cart with wheels so we can roll him around the house, which he really seems to enjoy. Sun conures are nosy.

He (or is it she?) is so young he still has many of his gray, downy baby feathers (see above and below) that have yet to be replaced by adult plumage. Eventually all that gray will be bright orange, yellow and green. As Sunny ages, his plumage will change again, adding more yellow and orange to replace many of the green feathers.

Sunny was the first name that came to us for him. Of late, we find ourselves calling him Groucho, Grumpy or Mr. Magoo as well, depending on his mood. Once he starts displaying more of his personality, that may change again.

He's a handful and will take much patience, attention and training before he trust and bonds with his new humans. So far, only Mary Ellen has been working with him directly, teaching him to "step up" onto sticks and her fingers and holding him against her body with a towel while petting his head and breast so he becomes accustomed to her scent. She's got a couple bite marks on her fingers to show for it. Squawk! Once he gets more comfortable with her, I'll join the training regime too.

Each day he exhibits more trust for us, a growing sense of curiosity and more willingness to interact in a friendly manner. Sun conures live 20-25 years and once they're bonded with you, they have a reputation for being highly intelligent, fun-loving and cuddly. We'll keep you posted. (Click on photos for larger images.)

Sunday (Sunny) Bird Bloggin

I confess. We got another bird. Actually, it's mostly Mary Ellen's doing, but I have to admit I was won over as soon as I saw the baby sun conure. A couple who bred and hand-fed the conure brought it over to our house last week so we could take a look, and that was that.

We don't have any photos of Sunny yet because we left our camera with someone at yesterday's SCC meeting (much more on that next week). Instead, I thought I'd supply a couple of generic shots of sun conures so you can get an idea of what they're like. Sunny, at about three months old, looks alot like this:

He or she still has many of its downy gray baby feathers, and its much more colorful adult feathers are coming in willy nilly. There's alot of color variation in sun conure feathers as they age, and also between individuals, but here's what young adults generally look like:

Sun conures usually get more orange feathers as they age. Including their tails, they're about 12 inches tall at maturity. Quite beautiful, don't you think?  At the moment, Sunny is still quite shy and defensive in his/her new environment and tends to hiss at us and make loud growly sounds when we approach its cage or try to get Sunny to "step up" onto a stick or our fingers. This reaction should fade quickly as Sunny gets grounded and begins to trust us.

Sun conures are highly intelligent, curious, inquisitive, active and playful. They enjoy spending the day outside their cage, romping on a play gym or stand, swinging on ropes, playing with humans, cracking nuts and nibbling fruit. We'll be working with Sunny many times a day to gain the bird's trust and demonstrate that interaction with the new humans can be fun. Awk! We'll keep you posted.

Sunday Bird (Bath) Blogging

Sunday is often bath day for Bosco the peach-faced lovebird. Here he is getting ready to splash. Sometimes we have to coax him into his bathtub with bright-colored ribbons and beads. He can play hard to get.

Eventually, though, he plunges in and splashes and submerges and flaps and wiggles. When he emerges, he shakes his rear end in what we call his lobster tail boogie.

Afterwards, he likes to perch on your shoulder and rub his wet feathers in the crook of your neck. If he's in an especially chummy mood, he lets us scratch him all around his neck and head, guiding our fingers under his beak and and around his tiny eyes and up to the crown of his head. He's very particular, fussy even. Ah, nothing like the distinctive smell of a wet lovebird on a Sunday morning, kinda musty yet sweet.

Sunday Bird Blogging: Dia De Los Muertos-Halloween Edition

With the potential dangers of bird flu being hyped day and night, Bosco the peach-faced lovebird has been contemplating the underlying messages of the coming Day of the Dead and Halloween holidays. Of course in the photo above he may look more interested in chewing Fall leaves, but rest assured his mind is chewing on larger philosophical concepts.

As you can see, he feels a special affinity for the green skeleton because it provides such a stunning background for his electric green feathers. And he admitted to me he thinks this pose makes him look scary and bold to the parakeets in the house.

However, even brave Bosco gets his feathers ruffled by thoughts of his own mortality. That's why he's planning to fly over to tonight's burning of Kookooee (also known as El Cucui or Coco) in Albuquerque's South Valley. He's looking forward to writing a note about his fears for the coming year and having it burned with Kookooee at the Festival de Otoño. He's no bird brain.

(Click on images for larger versions.)