The Flying Jewels, Deer, and Brave Girls Club

FYI: It took all week for me to write this post, so it's a long one. (Most of it is photos, but the last two parts are a little long). If you read even half of it, you might want to grab an aspirin beforehand.

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Only 63 days until Disney World!

While there haven't been any pirate ships powered by pixie dust flying overhead, there have been a lot of hummingbirds.

Come Monday morning we looked out the window and didn't see the usual 2 or 3 hummingbirds fighting over the feeders. Instead, there was a group of them. (I read online that a group of hummingbirds are called several things: A Charm, Glittering, Shimmer, Tune, or Bouquet).

There are always hummers at the feeders, but we're not used to seeing so many of them all at the same time. I guess this means the season is winding down.

Watching them has been quite educational. What I've learned is that hummers personalities are not of the Disney variety. They are so territorial. They don't care about us being out there, but with the other hummers wanting to eat too... they are VICIOUS! They knock each other around like they're bowling pins and they'll jab their beaks in each others faces.

In my next life I am most definitely not coming back as a hummingbird. It looks exhausting and scary!




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I took LOADS of video of them, but upon uploading them to YouTube the quality lessened considerably. Because of this, I'm only going to share a few of the videos.














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Since she was so beautiful, I took another photo of the moon the other night.

And here are photos from last week I believe....



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Crick Hollow has been bursting with critters lately. Every single night there's a herd of deer in the yard. It started a few nights ago, when I let Abby outside. Except for the porch light, it was pitch black out and I could hear some animal snorting. I turned, and inside the darkness I saw a herd of glowing eyes staring at me. We counted at least 7 deer total.



The above photo was taken very early one morning, so I had to clean and brighten it up as best I could. The same could be said for the video from our security cameras. We need a better light out there.

And in the video below, isn't that one deer a bit mean?! What a selfish grouch, hogging all the food.



This next pic and video was taken close to sunset Wednesday evening, hence the poor picture quality.











I might have edited these better, but I was having a little trouble. This is a great camera, but the quality of some of the original pics weren't so great because they were taken through the windows.

Very dirty windows, mind you. This is the country, and you just can't get away from the dirt that all the wind gusts pick up.




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So the girls had an adventure last weekend, only it wasn't one that had them smiling like in the picture above. Not all adventures are positive, and when they're not you really do have to just let it all go. (And typing it up is my way of doing that. You might want to skip this part).

What I'm speaking of is the girls visit to Tractor Supply to get their vaccinations. It would have been too difficult for us to take all three of the dogs, not to mention unfair to the other people waiting in line, so we decided to take the little one's this time and take Maddie in in a few weeks.

First off, I felt sorry for Maddie because as I was gathering the leashes and heading out the door with Abby and Izzy... poor Maddie was so excited. It was chaos already (caused with Izzy's ring-leader barking), but I'm certain Maddie's excitement turned into confusion once we left her behind.

I just know she was all !!! They went walking and to McDonald's without me?! Don't they love me anymore?"

Long story short... (believe me, I am editing this)... once it was time to be examined the girls were terrified. Izzy was NOT LIKING THESE PEOPLE ONE BIT. It was nearly impossible to do the simplest thing, so they had to muzzle the poor thing. Izzy was so freaked out that the vet kept listening to her heart. I think she was afraid she was going to stroke out.

We did, too, and the vet constantly listening to her heart rate ticked me off to be perfectly honest. Izzy was so hysterical already and it was common sense that the only remedy was to get her out of that environment. The cause of her alarming heart rate was clear.

As I was holding her as they examined her, she looked into my eyes and just froze. I could only stare back, afraid to break eye contact for fear that she'd start trying to escape again. I was so worried for her. When it was time for the rest of her shots, Mom took over while I stayed with Abby.

Abby, whom was oblivious and perfectly calm. She would just rest her chin on my shoulder and look over at all the other people and their dogs. She was clueless.

Clueless until it was her turn...

Hearing of Abby's ticks and seizures when she was a puppy, the vet said it'd be safest to only give her the rabies shot and nothing else. (We've always assumed it was a reaction to her puppy shots, but the vet thinks that perhaps she has Hydrocephalus. If that's true - and I've always suspected it might be - I think it's a milder form).

Abby was no longer a happy girl, and she was terribly afraid and shaking so hard. That little girl's eyes locked on to me so intensely. As they administered her shots, all I could do was sweet talk to her and pat her head. She was being so incredibly good, but boy was she frightened. I'll never forget how her eyes were IMPLORING me to explain to her what was happening and why won't I rescue her? It was heartbreaking.

Once we got back in the car to go home, Izzy was freaking out again. This time she wasn't only panting, but WHEEZING. Mom and I were really worried. We'd never seen her as hysterical as she was that day.

Thank Goodness it's all over now. The girls don't seem to remember it at all. I think they forgot about it pretty soon after we returned home.







This is off topic from the rest of this rambling post, but if I didn't ramble the title of this blog would be an outright lie, right?

Something strange happened Wednesday afternoon. My father has been in Canada all week and was coming home. When his plane (United Airlines) was just a few feet from the ground it suddenly pulled right back up. The pilot told everyone there was "an accident" and they would be landing in San Antonio.

San Antonio, when the wheels were only 20 feet from the ground and the accident wasn't even on the runway.

We became even more confused when we discovered that online it said the plane had landed on time at the proper destination in Austin. All we knew was that were being fed two different stories.

We finally saw on the news what happened. Basically, there was a crash of a small airplane nearby. Apparently, the United Airlines pilot panicked and so he pulled the plane back up in the air to land elsewhere.



Which was ridiculous because he was cleared for landing. (I also find it ridiculous that the website said they landed when the fact was they had not. Shouldn't that kind of thing be confirmed before they report it as actual fact?) I guess being the day before the 911 anniversary, the pilot lost his head for a moment.

Which is pretty scary when you think about it. I know this pilot is only human and entitled to make mistakes, but in his field they're trained to think under pressure. That concerns me. His poor reaction not only caused a great inconvenience to many people, but it was also dangerous. Landing would have been safest, and this pilot had no orders to the contrary.

I know that in the end no one was hurt, but had I been on that flight I would have been pretty annoyed.

My father said there was this one young girl on the plane with her future in-laws, and she was terrified of flying. When the plane suddenly banked right up, just 20 feet from the runway... well I can only imagine how even more frightened she became after that! My father said she was pretty shaken up.

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CAMERA CRITTERS / SATURDAY'S CRITTERS / I'D RATHER B BIRDIN' / SKYWATCH FRIDAY