Go To BED Young Children!

Spring break starts on Friday the 13th. I am not superstitious. As a matter of fact, I have always liked Friday the 13th and feel it is more lucky for me. But that's me. And no I am not a witch. Well, maybe my students think so, but anyway. . .

We have been learning the art of written persuasion in the classroom. Well, I have been teaching, they have been learning.

Sometimes someone says something (who knew you could put so many "some" words all together?) and you just KNOW they have been watching things they shouldn't be watching.

The topic was "Your school is banning TV watching during the week. Do you agree or disagree? Persuade someone to see your side."

A couple of the girls actually opted for the banning of TV (it didn't surprise me). Word got around the room and some of the boys were shaking their heads.

One couldn't stop there. He blurted out (now remember this is fourth grade and they are at most ten) , "Oh my gosh. Girls gone wild!"

Obviously, TV should be banned in his house late at night.

Beeper, the bird who proved the saying

Have you ever noticed how many bird sayings there are?? The early bird gets the worm, a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush, etc. Why is this?

Anyway, I got sidetracked. I am here today to tell you the story of Beeper. Beeper was a little zebra finch I had. He was named by my hubby, who has names for everything (see older post). He got his name because he beeped a lot. On early sunny mornings he had another name, which I won't put here (trying to keep it clean folks ;). Beeper even had a wife later on in life - Mrs. Beeper. And they had babies, and the one we ended up keeping was, yes, you guessed it, Baby Beeper.

But none of this matters. The story is starting to get lost, so I will now begin.

Beeper spent his summers in a cage on the back deck. He loved it out there. Other birds would often come land on his cage and chat with him. Sometimes they would eat some of his millet that was hanging on the side. He was a very tiny bird and even the smallest of wild birds were like giants to him.

One day Beeper found out he could slide through the bars of his cage. I chased him around the backyard trees for hours with a butterfly net and a towel (how I usually caught him inside). He wasn't a good flier because he hadn't had much practice. But he was getting it now.

For three days, I couldn't catch him. He stayed nearby though and I could hear him taunting me and beeping while I laid their sunbathing.

On the fourth day, I heard the familiar beep once again. It sounded close. Really close.

No lie, he was in his cage.

He had come back. (I guess hunger and fear beat him and we had left the cage propped open just in case this kinda thing might happen.)

And believe it or not, this very same thing happened the next summer when hubby "accidentally" (so he says - we had been having lots of sunny early mornings) left the cage door open.

So twice he was "let free" and twice he came back. I guess he loved me after all :)

As an extra side note lesson of the day, all my pictures of Beeper were on my computer. The computer died (and so has Beeper) and I didn't have an external hard drive at the time. Hence, I have no pictures of this wonderful little bird.