Chuck will in the morning.

At least he will this morning, anyway. Before dawn this loud mouthed bird went off. It flew around the house and set up outside each open window and shouted in through the screens. Over and over and over. We called them whippoorwills growing up but that's a different bird. Whippoorwills go north for the summer and pass through here only during the nicest weather in the early spring. Chuck wills hang out all summer trying to get us to stay awake all night and sleep all day by harrassing us with the loudest most incessant "song" of the night in the animal kingdom. Even the owls and coyotes have the decency to shut up after a bit. I once lived in a very old farm house in South Carolina that was perched on a hill in the middle of several pastures. It had somehow become a sort of singles bar for chuck wills. I did love to hear them at first, but after a while it got to where I really really needed some sleep. I stared out the windows of that old house several times as a male went through his strut and grind mating song to impress a girl. I have not seen the mating noise mentioned in the bird books but I have it ground in to my memory. It sounds like a combination of the noises on a futuristic video pin ball game except for having no bells. The "boings" and "buzzes" are all there. Weird to hear for the first time, particularly in the middle of the night. I would give another night's sleep to experience it again but not every night's sleep like I had to do the last time. I was getting a bit nutty from deprevation before the mating was accomplished and the birds had to shut up and raise their kids which is about now in the scheme of things.

Why this morning's chuck will's widow got noisy, I don't know, but he pulled me from a serious dream sequence, none the less. I actually wanted to hear the bird better when it first started and had to overcome the shut mechanism in my eyes to force myself more awake. I remember my dreams much more clearly at such times but this one has the quality of a phone conversation that is breaking up with some clear moments and some static. My head was working on something and the dream was only metaphor. Women were talking. I don't know what they were saying but they weren't exactly happy. I've lived a lot of my life around unhappy women so it was nothing new. A long time ago I decided that the only time my Grandmother was happy was when she was miserable. My mom was a bit like that too. I think it is a Scotch-Irish thing.

I've noticed this again in the Irish somewhat recently. They are having a rather happy time giving the President of the United States hell right now. Even though both the president and the Irish were mad, only the Irish were happy. He is over there staying in Castles and trying to convince the Europeans that he is not a moron. It's not working.

The Bush team agreed to a television interview and demanded that all the questions that were going to be asked be provided at least three days in advance. They were, and the President's team had three days to get him primed up with the answers. It now turns out that the biggest balls in journalism are hanging on a woman named Carol Coleman. She had the temerity to demand that George Bush actually answer a question he had had three days to work on. He got mad and testy and never did answer the questions. Then the Bush team cancelled a planned interview with Laura Bush. Too bad the interview didn't come out until after Michael Moore's film opened.

That's it!!! That's what my dream was about! Unhappy women asking questions and not getting answers. In an early sequence in Moore's documentary we are on the House of Representatives floor when Al Gore has the ironic duty to certify his own stolen election. There are several Florida Congresswomen who are contesting the Florida vote. They have evidence, since verified by every single investigator that looked into it, that the voters in their districts were cheated out of their votes. They were making an absolutely constitutionally legal challenge to the election results that installed George W. Bush in the Presidency, except for one thing...In order to have legal validity, the challenge had to have the signature of a Senator of the United States. Just one! Not one single Senator would come forward and sign his name. There is one Senator I question more than any other at this point and that is Bob Graham, D-Fla. Former candidate for President. By all accounts, Bob Graham is an honorable man, particularly for a Senator. What the hell were you thinking, Bob?

I like the animals better than I like people some times. When a bird wakes me up in the night, it is nothing personal. A bird gotta do what a bird gotta do. People have no excuses. When a bird clips on to the stem of a plant sticking out of the ground and tells the whole world that he's a chuck will's widow, over and over and over again, it is just because a feeling came over him that said he had to. Sorry, gotta sing! Too bad it's 4:30 am. I forgive the bird. When a Senator, ok, 100 Senators, fail to do the right thing called for by the Constitution, I get mad and I remember it. John Kerry, you messed up too! Now you have to make it right.

Another thought hits me...If you or I had won something and found out that it was wrong, what would we do? There is no question that Al Gore won the most votes in Florida. Even with Kathryn Harris violating the Constitutional rights to vote of roughly 40,000 Floridians who should have had their vote counted, Gore won the recount when they counted the whole state. Bush lost, fair and square. Do you think that the man who "Promised to restore Integrity and Morality to the Whitehouse" should resign? Would that be the moral thing to do? Where is Integrity in staying on?

I sticking with the Bird on this one! Never did get back to sleep.

Here are some sites where you can click on a link and listen to the call of the chuck-will and the whip-poor-will to hear the difference in their songs.

Chuck will's Widow:

http://www.mbr-pwrc.usgs.gov/id/framlst/i4160id.html

Whippoorwill:

http://www.mbr-pwrc.usgs.gov/id/framlst/i4170id.html

Peace,

Steve



The guy just keeps on changing positions on things:

Flip flops and waffles:

"The most important thing is for us to find Osama bin Laden. It is our number one priority and we will not rest until we find him."
George W. Bush
Sept. 13, 2001

"I don't know where [Osama bin Laden] is and I really don't care. It's not that important. It's not our priority."
George W. Bush
March 13, 2003