Not what I was hoping

Today was a yucky day, one of those where it rains with reckless abandon on you while you are, for instance, walking across the SU campus to get to your car after a discouraging meeting with an adviser where your son learned that, contrary to what he had been told, he actually cannot fit the required pre-med coursework into a four-year schedule that also accommodates his music performance degree requirements.

Since his scholarship is from the school of music, he can't drop music courses.

But, we will have to pay for either a slew of summer school, or an extra year or two of classes in order for him to complete pre-med requirements. Which makes the scholarship seem rather less valuable, if you know what I mean.

So getting rained on--drenched--by huge, splatting drops the size of slugs added insult to injury. Which was compounded by the sun coming out immediately after we got into our van, which turned everything hot and steamy and humid and generally very uncomfortable.

And that is how the day went, scattered thundershowers broken up by periods of intense heat and humidity, until I just felt completely droopy and damp and stringy. And I even did my hair this morning, which is the first time in over a week, since I even forgot to do it for DJ's grad party (or to put on make-up, which is why you will not be seeing any pictures of me at that party).

It rained yet again on the sleeping bag that I washed for Jonathan between camp weeks and cannot for the life of me seem to get dry.

We picked up Schubert from the groomer in the midst of a punishing deluge... the poor dog was doubly traumatized.

Upon arriving home, we found that the robin whose nest sits in our weeping cherry tree was beside herself, soaked and squawking, practically screaming, hopping in a frenzy around the yard.

I observed her for awhile, and then noticed, camouflaged in the mulch of the landscaping, a small baby bird that could hardly hop, and was certainly not big enough the be out of the nest yet. I called the kids. We knew we should not touch the baby, or our smell would make the mother reject it. I retrieved a shovel from the garage, and Jonathan gently shooed the baby bird onto it. I felt just like the Snort in Are You My Mother?

Jon and Laura set up a ladder for me next to the tree, and I climbed up. Jon handed me the shovel so I could deposit the baby bird, but as I looked into the nest, I saw the bloodied and mangled remains of the other two baby birds. I did not know what to do. Jon said the crow that lives around here must have got them. He said, "Get me an air gun, and I'll get that crow!"

I wanted to clear out the death from the nest before putting the baby bird back, but they told me I must not touch the nest. So I dumped the little bird off the shovel and onto the lifeless, broken bodies of his siblings. It was an awful feeling.


(Here is a picture where you can see the baby birds hidden in the cherry tree leaves back before they had any feathers, when they were all still alive... click to enlarge; you can count the three gaping beaks)


The parent robins seem happy to have the baby back in the nest. I have seen them bringing beaks full of food to him. I imagine that perhaps they cleaned out the nest. I know they work very hard at keeping their nests clean after the original hatching, and also as the baby birds soil their nest. So maybe they know what to do about the dead bodies. Ugh.

On top of of all that, Shawn had been saying he wanted us to get away this weekend, just he and I, on a little overnight for some rest and relaxation since we don't get a vacation this year. But he called from work at 6:30 p.m. and said he had to go out for dinner with a potential new hire for their company. So instead of a nice dinner in a restaurant with my husband, I had cornflakes.

Bah.