The moment you’ve all been waiting for… has FINALLY ARRIVED. YES FOLKS, everyone’s favorite SLOB, the divine Curly Wurly Gurly, has come to PHILLY. And I was there to document every fantabulous moment.
So go grab some candy, sit back, relax, and click HERE to watch the world premier of MY VERRRY FIRST MOVIE EVERRRR!!
WATCH OUT WORLD. FLAT CURLY COMES TO PHILLY!
ENJOY!!!
Good morning all. Today I need to get some things off my chest. I know that life seems pretty peaches & cream here at the West Philly palatial estate, but let me tell you. LIFE IS HARD. At least when you like to complain.
Back in August we adopted two kittens. These kittens, Ziggy and Pepper, have now entered advanced *FRISKY* stage. So they spend most of each day shredding our leather furniture, hanging from the woodwork, killing countless potted plants and STALKING. Just look at these photos.
Until recently, these reenactments of WILD KINGDOM had been tame. But the altercations between Kiwi and the kittens have grown in intensity. Yesterday I found my ox-pecking appendage of a bird cornered beneath a table on the back porch, the kittens primed for the kill. Kiwi is so damn feisty and DUMB she actually FLEW DOWN TO THE FLOOR to have it out w/ them. The bird is ornery. She is jealous. She REEAALLLLLLLLLY wants to kick their ass. But if she doesn’t wise up soon, she’s gonna be 2 bites of meat for one of these cats.
We have tried a dozen different tactics. Locking Kiwi in her cage – which she HATES. Locking her in a room. Which she HATES. Locking the kittens in a room. WHICH THEY HATE. Letting them all range free – which they ALL LOVE but will lead to one or more deaths and/or maimings. I have to face facts. If we keep these cats, I will lose my bird. and it will be ugly.
SO. Several months ago I posted about our dishwasher dying. WELL. Seems all our appliances have a 7-year life cycle, b/c wouldn’t you know? As of 3 weeks ago, our dryer’s done gone dead. It was working fine – then BLAMMO. Nada. The thing just won’t turn on. John has concluded the motor’s burned out. And now, 3 wks later, the washer has joined it in solidarity. We’ve all heard of couples, when one partner dies, the other loses all will to live. Apparently my washer-dryer were a match made in heaven. No matter how hard I beg/plead/sweet talk to this machine, I trudge down to the basement umpteen times a day to find a tub full of water and half-washed clothes. I fill the machine, run the sucker, and once it’s “done,” I check it. Inevitably, the washer has somehow mysteriously completed the cycle w/out emptying. HOW DOES IT DO THIS?? Go through spin w/out any spinning. Or draining. Or ANYTHING.
I know I am a throw-back to the 50s housewives of yore, But I love doing laundry. LOVE IT. It is the ONE HOUSEHOLD CHORE (besides cooking) I enjoy. I love the smell of fresh laundry. The feel of it. The sense of satisfaction only 5 baskets of neatly-folded clothing can bring. And I love my laundry room. Even though it’s down in the filthy basement where most people hate to go, it’s my home away from home – in my home. I’ve hung the peeling walls w/ pictures drawn by my children. Scenes of the African plain, animals, signs reading “I LovE you MoMMy, YOUR the BEST!” It doesn’t get any better than that. Rather than resent my family while I labor at their behest, I think fondly of them all. My laundry room. My happy place. UNTIL NOW. Now that both machines have broken. BREAKING MY REVERIE. Leaving me neither high, nor dry.
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We have a large butterfly bush in our front yard which attracts a huge variety of insects. Butterflies (of course), as well as all types of bees, flies, – this year we even had a hummingbird! Pretty darn rare in the city. Anyway. b/c of the number of butterflies, this bush is also home to a large cadre of praying mantises. Mantids LOVE butterflies. Their tender juicy middles in particular. After gobbling them up, they drop the butterflies’ colorful but otherwise unappealing wings to the floor below. So all summer long, while I’m weeding the garden, my daughters are gathering up the wings like so many discarded petals.
When I was a kid I never saw a praying mantis. But I clearly remember people saying they were endangered, and telling me never to kill one. I believe it was illegal at the time (the 1980s), but I haven’t been able to confirm or deny that. All I know for certain is that mantids are thriving in 2008 – at least in our yard. If a postage-sized stamp of a garden in the middle of a city is any indication of the greater picture, I’d say they’re doing fine.
And yet each time we find a praying mantis, you’d think it was the very first time. We drop everything. Holla to each other. COME QUICK! B/c we all want to see. Their thoughtful eyes and slender grace are fascinating. My daughters found a small one several weeks ago – of all places, beneath a checkout in Trader Joes. They scooped him up, and carried him out of the store. He seemed happy to be free. But rather than hop off outside the exit, he rode for blocks on my older daughter’s hand. Only once we reached the Market Street bridge did he fly off, soaring stories into the sky.
We’ve been fortunate enough to capture several others over the years. Not in any box, but on film. My skillful husband took these photos a couple weeks ago of a pair mating, and I just had to share them. They are beautiful. The text is excerpted from the North Forty News. Many thanks for sharing.
PS: We now have a large egg case on one of the branches. Here’s to next year’s offspring!
This brings us to the delicate subject of mantid love – or, more precisely, mantid sexual behavior.
Slender adult male mantids, smaller than the female, usually feature brown tones in contrast to the female’s greens. They display rather slow, deliberate care around prospective mates, often approaching from the rear and leaping on the female’s ample back when close enough. Females warrant this caution, even though their substantial weight keeps them grounded while males can fly, because a female may hunger for a substantial meal more than sex.
Sometimes she wants both.
Even attached and fully engaged, a male may literally lose his head servicing his chosen female. The female can swivel her head in a disconcertingly human-like gesture and decapitate her suitor. This may not even interrupt the act at hand. One author states that “removal of the male’s head, the bit which the female eats first, releases the male’s genitalia from nervous inhibition from the brain and leads to incessant copulatory movements.”
The smartest–or the luckiest–males avoid this circumstance, however, leap off their temporarily groggy paramour and run quickly away. Such mortal danger may insure that only the smartest males live to mate again.
Once inseminated, a female searches for a plant stem or fence post suitable for making an egg case and laying her eggs. Usually she selects a location 1 to 4 feet off the ground and constructs a case that resembles tan foam with the texture of a roasted marshmallow. Chinese mantids build round cases; the Europeans flatten theirs on one side.