Melange a la Maison de Trinkle (aka the zoo)

I sat down to write today and thought, " There's so much to write about and there's no ONE thing to write about over the next thing." So, the word melange came to mind- it is French for "mixture". I think about it as a mixture of a variety of things- a bowl of multi- colored fruit or a group of people with 20 different shades of skin. Here, it means so many things. In many ways, things are always the same here- there is always alot of work to do, I am almost always joyful to do it, and our population stays about the same. Recently we had a really wonderful happening. Our green cheek conure, Bob, who was rehomed for safety issues 2 years ago with a dear friend (we were fostering a dog who thought Bob was something to eat). So we occasionally spoke of Bob and how he was doing and how we missed him. The foster dog got adopted. One day I was on Craigslist and there was an ad for a green cheek conure- I never click on those. I did. The ad said, " Bobby is for sale and I need to find a home for him immediately." Well, I called my friend who we had placed Bob with and she told me SHE had to rehome him for her dogs were trying to kill him and she had placed him with a nice young mom who had named him Bobby. I screamed, ' KAREN, HE IS ON CRAIGSLIST!!" Long story short- Jon and the girls FREAKED OUT, we called this young mom and Jon rushed over to get our beloved bird.He is the tiny bird with the burgandy feathers on his stomach. I cannot tell you how happy we all were but Julianna in particular was in tears over the reunion. He had been in smoking home with the young mom and had developed a fear of small kids. Karen of course, being a wonderful and amazing animal lover did not know she had placed him in a smoking home- and had interviewed this chick real well. We just love Karen. Bless his heart- he's fine now- very happy to be here and not afraid of anything. He is sitting on my shoulder as I type, trying to eat either my glasses or my neck. :) Very nicely and gently. God is specific.

We lost our dear Galina, as you read in our last post. Heartbreaking. Yesterday we went to a warehouse where we buy our bird food at a great discount (Deviney Enterprises- that's for you Anne- love you!) (If you live in North Florida or South Georgia and want some of the most GORGEOUS SEED AND FRUIT for your birds- go there. You can email me at JonAnne@aol.com for their address. Their prices are amazing and they sell almost every pet food you can think of, not just bird food. and we talked these poor folks ears off. There was an orange winged amazon in the office- we asked, " Anne, is he yours?" "No, he is for sale for a friend of mine." I went on and played with Anne's dachshaunds and the next thing I know Anne says, " Holy smokes, look at that." Jon was rubbing "Buddy's " head. I said, " What?" " Anne, that bird HATES MEN!!!" I just smiled and said, " Yea, I know, my hubby is the bird whisperer." Jon went on to talk in this super sweet voice and rub and rub this bird's head. Well, he's here now, his name is Monkey (he is so funny, he likes to hand from his feet from the top of his cage and looks just like a little monkey bird). No big investment- but a new great home for this fun bird- he makes the funniest littlest noises and is SO EMOTIONALLY SOUND. This is a delight for us as most of our birds are rescues, thus have messed up heads. Monkey is the yellow cheeked parrot with the golden eye.

Sam continues to live and even his bad breath brings me joy- every day with this amazing dog is a delight. Janie still has breast cancer but is doing well and sleeps next to my stomach each night. Gracie Rose is having a false pregnancy and it is about to kill me. I have NEVER EVER EVER EVER waited too late to have a dog spayed and time got away from me and she went into heat - of course we do not have any intact animals here, so she couldn't get preggers, but I felt like the worst doggy mom in the world. :) I keep telling her, " I am so sorry, little girl." My morals about certain things are almost too much. :)

We still deal with cold weather, occasional bouts of diarrhea, dogs who won't listen and having to keep up with everyone's shots or wormings and ALWAYS TOENAILS. But pretty much this is the life I love and my family loves it too. We all get tired sometimes and don't want to do our chores, but then we hear a meow or a version of "happy birthday to you" from Pepper or Gracie shows us her favorite toy by wagging her butt all over the place and you just forget your tiredness and laugh and smile and God gives you one more burst of energy. It's heaven on earth for us.