My Back Yard

Andy strode to the microphone in the middle of my high school’s gym and began to sing. “On a tree by a river a little tom tit sang, willow, tit willow, tit willow.” He smirked as he sounded these lines from Gilbert and Sullivan’s operetta, The Mikado. I guess he was proud of himself for exploiting the talent show to repeatedly say the t-word under the guise of culture. I felt embarrassed. I also felt appalled. Andy was abusing one of my favorite pieces of music.

I listened to The Mikado play at home on a hulking hi-fi stereo in a wooden cabinet the size of a refrigerator turned on its side. My body sat on a bland beige sectional sofa, but my mind drifted away to an exotic Japan of schoolgirls, scoundrels, and heroes who fall in love, engage in deception, and scheme to get their way. There’s an elaborate plot that I might boil down to to elderly Katisha loves noble Nanki-Poo who loves young, lissome Yum-Yum who loves Nanki-Poo, but is betrothed to Koko. Apparently it was penned as a slap at British politics, but that went way over my head.

Some parts of the operetta were tough to relate to. Especially those “Three little maids from school.” I felt certain they were the popular girls. Whereas I was the quintessential last girl picked for a team in gym class.

Instead, I identified with Katisha, the elderly spinster who’s hot in pursuit of Nanki-Poo, the emperor’s son. I had to admire her gumption. I wouldn’t have dared aim so high. Katisha touched me most at her lowest point when she sang “Alone and yet alive.” I felt alone, too. So it was especially satisfying when Koko sings “Tit willow” to woo Katisha. Perhaps I’d find someone, too.

“…and I need you, like the desert needs the rain.”

Funny how the songs in spinning class set my mind off. Returning to spinning class after almost a three-month break, I felt like the desert soaking up the rain atop my two-wheeled apparatus.

Who sings this song? What’s it called? I’m visiting some lyrics websites: http://music.yahoo.com/lyrics and http://FindMeATune.com. They’re yielding conflicting suggestions.

Update on Feb. 23
The verdict is in. It’s “Missing” by Everything But the Girl. You can hear it on a video clip.

Three mourning doves trolling the ground in front of the Squirrel Palace. One picking at sunflower seeds on the patio.

Four sparrows splashing in the bird bath. Several flying out of the hedges near the back driveway.

One tufted titmouse in the next door neighbor’s cherry tree.

Will you be mine,
asks the chocolate candy frog,
bulbous body
teetering on feet
melted into their
milk chocolate base.

The frog’s cute,
but too alluring,
so I bite into his head,
revealing the empty space,
inside tasty carapace.

This poem is my response to the Totally Optional Prompt’s suggestion to write “romance.”

This definition popped up on my computer today:
“virago: an ill-tempered, overbearing woman; also, a woman of great strength and courage.”

Interesting that one word can have such negative and positive connotations. I think it’s a sign of society’s negative attitudes toward strong women.

Sadly, at least one British chef has offered up a recipe for squirrel.

And more than 400 squirrels were shredded at Schiphol airport in the Netherlands.

Here’s a link to a list of “Best Blogs for Writers.”

While you’re at it, check out other tips for writers on this blog by Michelle Vranizen Rafter.

Last weekend I counted birds in my backyard for the Audubon Society:
* 1 mourning dove
* 1 tufted titmouse

No sparrows? More typically, we’re inundated with sparrows, getting 40-50 targeting the bird seed Iggy scatters on our patio. This is very strange.

I wonder if they’ve been scared off by the dead sparrow I saw lying next to the garage.

“People hold on to their clutter because they are afraid to let it go–afraid of the emotions they may experience in the process of sorting through the stuff, afraid they may make a mistake and later regret getting rid of something, afraid they will leave themselves vulnerable, exposed or at risk in some way.”

This quote from Karen Kingston’s Clear Your Clutter with Feng Shui applies to me. Getting rid of things makes me anxious. I tossed a lot of stuff in January. Now I’ve got to rest awhile.

I imagine that Iggy also feels anxious about tossing stuff. He thinks he might need it later.

Sometimes squirrels don’t win in the battle vs. birds, as this New York Times story shows.