Friday Funnies: Unknown Etymologies

     Been a while since I have laid down a Friday Funnies post- a friends Facebook post got me started on this- these are origins of some words you may not know- Thanks, Harold Blulite for getting me going.

Bamboozled- Verb- To Confuse or con someone into buying asian plants from the grass family

Discombobulated- Adjective- To be confused and puzzled about the fact that Robert is no longer here

Cattywampus- Adjective- Thrown askew, by a fight between some cats and a fictional snowbeast from Star Wars

Lollygag- Verb- To dawdle, but quietly because one has a large piece of hard candy attached to a stick in ones mouth

Skedaddle- Verb- To leave quickly across the snow on two thin pieces of wood

Arbitrary-Adjective- A capricious or needless choice to eat at Arby's-Example: Mr Smith arbitrarily insisted his Vegetarian sister have lunch with him at Arby's because they have the meats

I had some dental work done yesterday and ended up in this conversation at 4:30 AM- This is not my weirdest ever conversation with my roommate, nor hers with me. 

Gelatinous Ecology

     Today, I went to Sprouts to pick up some items and found that one of the items- Their store brand bulk Gummi Bears (@ $.99 this week) was out of stock. Dare I say... Extinct.

     That got me thinking about the ecology of Ursus Gelatinosis Fructus Sapidus, more commonly known as the lesser gummi bear. They used to be plentiful, roaming across the fields and hills of Germany, but the division of the country after WWII cut into their migratory path and affected their habitat. only after 1989 when the Berlin wall fell was the breeding program established in the black forest by Haribo able to bring these once proud creatures back to a fraction of their former numbers. They have come back from Critical to near threatened, and are approaching least concern.

     When I went back to Sprouts later, they had restocked- I made sure to ask if they were farm raised, free-range, or wild caught. The checkout clerk wasn't sure, but suspected free range.

     I'm happy to report that Salmo Nanus Cerasium Gelata, or the Dwarf Cherry Jelly Salmon is doing excellently in the salmon hatcheries of Ikea, where it is filleted, halved, and packaged under the suspiciously mundane name of Swedish fish.

Friday Funnies: The Mysterious Origins of Bitcoin

     Bitcoin's origin is shrouded in Ancient Mystery, but it is believed to go back to China. Jin Chan, The golden toad of wealth is believed to be the originator; pictured as a three-legged Red-eyed toad biting a coin and perched on a pile of wealth, he is a symbol of good monetary fortune.

     In later times, people would bite coins to determine their authenticity.

 This is very helpful in determining whether an item is real gold, or chocolate covered in gold colored foil.

     However doing so too often can leave stains on the teeth

the Festival of Phlockenschifften

     The Time has come at my place to celebrate PhlockenSchifften.

     What is Phlockenschifften? Essentially, it's a word I made up that refers to the old German tradition of moving parrots around, which I also made up.

     We are changing the arrangement of cages so that I have the Lovebirds in my room, leaving Sam with Sid(Cockatoo) Ickabob(Green-Cheeked Conure) and Apollo(Jardines Parrot AKA Green Recluse Parrot*) Tango and Cappy of course stay where they are, and Wallace is still by my desk.

     Just over a week ago, I adopted a lovebird who had part of one wing amputated due to a tumor and needed a good home. We call him Little Star. It was immediately apparent, or nearly so, that he could detect the presence of other lovebirds and wanted to be near them, so we bit the bullet. We moved Ruby and Ginko in with me. We are hoping that:

1. His time socializing with other lovebirds will be good for him
2. Apollo's behavior to me involves familiarity breeding contempt
3. absence and distance will make Apollo fonder toward me. 

Time will tell. at the least, Sam feeding Apollo should get me bit far less. So far, Ginko is very interested in the new lovebird. Ruby...she's a little more reticent. 

   


*The Nickname Green Recluse Parrot was Coined also by me after he took a quarter-inch wide and deep chunk out of my arm because he thought it was funny. The Bird is a tool- I love him, but am leery of him. 

Round Robin Challenge: Two Great Tastes That Are Great together

 The challenge this week is about bringing things together that either should be together, like chocolate and peanut butter, or that don't, but work for you together. This could be a crossover, similar to last week's challenge, or something you cook for yourself, or anything else you desire.

     But isn't there always a twist? This is no exception. To tell you about the twist, I have to go back into a little known legend... The legend of Sir Aldward Kantribus. Sir Aldward was a man of peace, a humble and gentle man, who traveled across England and Western Europe mediating disputes, forging alliances, and uniting families. He is best known for the day he performed a mass wedding ceremony binding one half of a village to the other half, and in the resulting confusion, no one knew who they were now wedded to. Even today we still make reference to the little Swiss village of Kloestervuck

     His family motto, Unum Est Numero Maxime Solum(one is the number most alone) was well known among the scholarly, but the common folk knew him best by his shield device, three hounds rampant on a field of gold surrounding a table. The common folk called him the three-dog knight.

In celebration of the legend, the challenge this week includes the triple-dog dare. Write your post, and challenge someone else to write a post for the round robin as well. This can be someone you know, someone you don't know but admire, someone who has been involved in the past or someone who has never heard of this challenge. Remember, this is open to bloggers, tweeters, facebookers, pinteresters, Instagrammarians, you name it. We might expand the circle, meet new people, or just have some fun. I triple-dog dare you.

Update- Lets give this two weeks for maximum results

Round Robin Challenge: Behind the Music

A Coast to Coast Dedication from

     I'm Cliffy Crankcasem, and this is the story behind our number six song this week,

     A Few Months before this song was written, the A little Bar in northern Wyoming was the starting point of a massive manhunt for the worst serial killer in Wyoming history. O'Malleys bar was the scene where Julie,the killer, would meet with Keith, the philandering man she was obsessed with. 

     He would grow bored with their relationship, and search the newspaper ads in the personals, looking to meet someone new. They would arrange to meet, and his girlfriend would waylay his new interest, and meet him instead. She would use the psychopath's ability to cunningly show the behaviors and interests he expected to see. Later, after the date, she would drive the other woman up US14 to Bighorn National Forest. There, she would dismember  the body and bury the remains. 

     It was a rainy night in late July when a woman named Dierdre Bowens  was almost Julie's 29th victim. Evading the shovel swung at her, she staggered into O'Malleys bar with Julie hot on her heels, and full into the view of Keith and everyone else gathered within. 

     Julie was fully prepared for another impersonation and another new romance with Keith, but not Prepared for the desperate run to the Bighorn forest. She was never caught, because her car went off the road but they never found the body. 

     So here with a murder mystery turned into a pop song, is Julie's story. Because the girl she was set to impersonate, Dierdre...liked Pina Coladas and walks in the rain...

And now with the top songs this week...

• Toy Break takes us back to 1984 with a personal anecdote about...Missing You.
• Alexis' Universe comes in with a long distance dedication from her Mom with You Are Not Alone

I Can BS With the Best of Them

     I am Happy to report that I finished my Degree this morning after starting it way back in mid-February 2017, I went back to school at Thunderwood College, and I did this for you. In this age of Alternative Facts, you need a man you can trust to know what is right, what is wrong, and what is just plain made up. I happen to be that man, because I made a lot of it up myself.

   Making Goofy Stuff and Toy Pictures Great Again!

Measuring Units

     With the Topics of Gale-Force winds in Colorado Springs in the news and possibly delaying a package of mine, I thought I would address this. Everyone talks about Gale-Force winds, but no one really uses the term correctly, or addresses it's origin.

     One Gale (named after the weather researches of Dorothy Gale), is the unit of measure equivalent to lift one KF or Kansas Farmhouse and deposit it with Occulticidal force.

or: 1G =MKF / C x DW


     This has been fiction. Thank you. Out of my head and into yours.

Warriors of the Air

     Good Morning- I don't often do this, but I thought I would guest post on Daddy's Blog. You see, despite all my efforts to rearrange his keyboard into something usable, it remains the same flat, lifeless oblong it has always been.

     My name, for studious readers of the blog, is  High Councilor T'ahngolario Verdantwing of the Green Cheeked Clan, but for brevity's sake...you may refer to me as Tango.

     The subject that has brought me here, is one of great importance and I will address it with the gravity it deserves. A question was asked recently on the social platform Daddy uses, "facebeak" about Birds, and stretching.

     The truth of the matter is that most birds are supremely skilled in martial arts. And most of us begin with a stretching discipline known as Flai Chi, or Supreme Ultimate Flapping. It is a philosophy of balance and centeredness. it keeps us sharp, limber and viewing the world as the 5 dimensional landscape it is, rather than the flat map that the bipeds walk on.

     My own studies are primarily on the climbing and leaping art, Flockour, Flae-Kwon-Do and Beak-Jutsu, but Flai-Chi is where it all began for me.

     At this point you are probably curious, as humans often are, about other Bird martial arts, and there are many. I will touch upon the ones in common use around my neighborhood, and among my roommates. Together, we cover a large number of branches.

     Cappy, the interloper, He of the greedy clan of Gold-cap, is my rival for Daddy's affections.He favors a close wrestling style known as Wing-Chun, where he immobilizes the opponent with his claw while darting the beak in close for attacks.

     The Magpies, blackbirds and crows in the area all seem conversant with a style known as Krow Makaw which was developed by hooded crows in Israel- it is influenced by and derived from a number of other styles.

     Budgies tend to use Keet June Do, which uses minimal movements with maximum effects and extreme speed.

     Pigeons and Doves in the area have a certain skill in Pigeolism, or Bare-Beaked Boxing, but using Marquis of Darwin rules.

     Sidney, the Cockatoo, likes two forms- Too-Jistu, The art of using your opponents strength to get cuddles and Tooshu or "shredding-beak-art"

     I am only just beginning to learn of the mysterious traditional fighting styles of the lovebirds and the Jardines parrot, but they seem to involve an initial assault with the beak followed by taunting or laughter.

     I hope this brings a little more knowledge to your human brains. I despair of conveying the subtleties in your clumsy and inefficient tongue, but I can only try.

Bird-Day #4

     Round these here parts, we consider Tango's hatching day to be November 27th. This would make yesterday Tango's fourth birthday.

     He got to eat dinner with Daddy last night, and many things were revealed- mainly that I have been feeding him completely wrong for the last four years. He looked up at me with huge eyes that said "WOW! You finally managed to feed me the Potatoes Au Gratin that my kind eats in the wild! Thank you! This is even better than the Yam from yesterday!"

     In honor of that- here are some more of my Little Known Fictitious Facts.

•      Gold Capped Conures in the wild weave platforms out of branches that they can stand on and watch around them. What I call Cappy's "Drawbridge" serves this purpose here. 
•      The Wild range of Green Cheeked Conures is plentiful with naturally-occurring potatoes au gratin, multicolored round gourds with rattling metal seeds inside to chase and springs of gatorade to drink from. 
•      The deadly Black Ceramic Heater Asp is a terrible predator that Gold Capped Conures are incredibly watchful of. 
•      Sam will be blamed if I put something resembling this predator in the room, because Cappy loves me, so clearly I had to have been pushed into it. (this is actually a fact-he gave Sam the stink-eye all evening)
•      Under the Special Laws that govern the behavior of Gold Capped Conures, no matter what doors you open for them first thing in the morning they can only exit the cage via the food cup door. (Conure regulation 547a subparagraph 12/j)

This Plastic ball resembles the Wild Jingle-Gourd

the Drawbridge of Sir Cappy

the Black Ceramic Heater Asp is the most venemous variety

    And here is a shot from archery Wednesday- I had fun

Protecting the world from the Foam Zombie Hoard

Bird Calls

     It is a little known fact that the call of the Gold Capped Conure can be heard for hundreds of miles when I am on the phone with my Sister on the western slope or my daughter in California.

I admit that the phone helps carry the call that distance.

But Cappy is still really proud of his range. 

Represent, Cappy, Represent. 

New Hashtag for the Blog

     I will be adding a new Hashtag, starting with this post, but added retroactively where called for- that is the Hashtag for Little Known Fictional Facts (that I made up).

     To Commemorate this, I would like to inform you that Deer mice are the cause of all my car's problems.

    you have seen me, from time to time, report on the eccentricities of my 20+ year old Civic. The tail lights, the trick speedometer, all of it can be attributed to Deer mice.

     Deer mice are hard to tell from regular field mice in the fall. The fall is also the time when they are most active, and most able to get into smaller spaces because this is when they shed their antlers. In the spring, you will hear the tiny thumps as deer mice butt heads with each other, vying to impress the doe mice, but in the fall, they settle down and make a lot of noise in my walls at night. Probably yours too.

     Anyway- so if I have my Ficts (fictional facts) correct, they are also known to carry an illness known as Hondavirus, which I believe is what is affecting my car.

     More seriously, we have been dealing with occasional mice in this older house since about January, and have tried no-kill traps, spring traps, repellents, improvised traps, and finally glue traps. I hate glue traps, I hate killing anything. But I hate mice in Tango's cage far more. If anyone has a good, reliable, merciful de-mousing solution I have not tried, please Comment it below, and I will give it a shot.

R'Kea PSA

    Time to talk about a serious subject. Many of you out there are not bird people, and don't know about R'Kea.

What is R'Kea?

  R'Kea is a serious condition that affects one in three Conures. An ordinary, quiet, well behaved bird will suddenly burst out into loud, shrill noise, like so.

 What can I do to help?

     With your awareness and your help to spread the word, we can tell birds like Cappy that, no, it's too early for R'Kea, and they are waking up everyone in the damn house. We can tell them it's OK, and no, they don't need to R'Kea. We don't need R'Kea right now. we can tell them..."Use your words, Cappy"


    Please give birds like Cappy a chance; help us strive for a R'Kea free tomorrow

seriously, this is how Cappy talks to the birds in the other room, and in Nebraska

Daylight Savings

Tango knows daylight savings time is a lie.

I'm laying here, reading, and listening to him fuss.

He started about 15 minutes ago,kicking seed out of his bowl, and I asked him: "What are you doing?"

"Wakeup!"

" not time yet, Tango"
"Muttermuttermutteroutrageousmuttermutter"
" I will feed you guys at 630, Tango. That won't be far from what you expect."
"Grumblegrumblegrumbleoutrageous"

A little-known fictional fact I made up is that green-cheeked conures have a quartz core in their stomach which pulses at one beat per second and keeps exact time. You could literally let a conure set your watch for you if you didn't want it to still have buttons afterward.

Terrible, Terrible Lies About Cockatoos

     The Name "Cockatoo" comes from the name french explorers gave to the bird, "Coq Au Deux" or "Second Chicken"

     Taxonomy: they generally do not file returns(this is actually true)

     The female Cockatoo is more properly termed a "Henatoo" not a Hentai- that is waaay different and involves tentacles and schoolgirls

     The Coloration of the Cockatoo indicates that it is originally an arctic creature. Like the polar bear, they have black skin with a white coat. My carefully researched information indicates that the Cockatoo migrated south in prehistoric times because A) it was cold up there and B) they were looking for humans to provide snuggles.

     In the Olympics from 1896-1924 Australian Gymnasts would toss a Cockatoo from hand to hand rather than using chalk to improve their grip.



this post is dedicated to Sid, roommate of my roommate who dances wildly to "Crazy Loop" and loves it when I sing "For Those About to Flock (We Salute 'Too)" and "I Know It's Only Cockatoo But I Like It"

League Assignment-Cryptozoology-Finding the Unknown Predators

     Cryptozoology is, at it's core, the search for and study or creatures for which there is no scientific proof they actually exist.  There is an exhaustive list of creatures here, but I choose to focus on...none of them. I write today about animals so secretive, so unknown that the only trace of them is in the pattern recognition of other animals they prey on. Prey animals are smart enough to get out of the way of anything that even remotely looks like the animals that generations of genetic heritage have programmed them to avoid- because animals that did not avoid them did not leave a genetic heritage

so without further delay, here are 

LITTLE KNOWN BIRD PREDATORS OF AUSTRALIA AND SOUTH AMERICA

     The Queensland Golden Groundsweeper Viper(vipera scopa)- Characterized by it's long, stiff spine and it's odd movement, swishing back and forth on it's mouth, the Golden Groundsweeper is known to scatter flocks of Australian parakeets at the merest hint of its presence. I include here its more venomous cousin, the Scarlet Groundsweeper for comparison.

     The Canister Constrictors(Morelia spilota lautus cheynei)- An entire family of oddly shaped serpents with a terrifying whining hiss, these reptiles will move back and forth across the ground drawing up anything in their path, wet or dry. They say nature abhors a vacuum, but what it really hates is just the shape it takes

     The Brazilian Verdant Ticking Owlet(viridi ericius horologius culinae)- Mainly an egg predator, this opportunist will also eat smaller parrots if they are unwary. Both nocturnal and diurnal, it makes a distinctive "tiktiktiktiktiktiktikSHHRIIIIING" just before it strikes

     The Amaranthine Beverage Skink(stellio manibus utrem purpuram)- A patient and silent hunter, this creature can wait immobile for endless hours before suddenly sprouting clawed limbs and pouncing on an unwary bird. 

These creatures all resemble household items that my birds are terrified of. Just remember, next time your bird shies away in a cloud of rapidly expanding dust, discarded feathers and a dopplering squawk...there might be a real creature out there that looks like what you just picked up, and your bird is smart enough to get away from it

My Fellow Leaguers have their own encounters:

Adam Nori talks about some of the most famous cryptids

G.I. Jigsaw brings us Cryptid toys

The Nerd Nook and Brian from Cool and Collected both hit up Bigfoot

and Revenge of the Toy Box started off looking for a creature, and found that even the figure of it was elusive

Winged Migration

     Not the movie about geese and other birds- this is the Burrows remake...

     Tango has grown out a couple of primary flight feathers on each wing, and he's been essaying a flight here and there. but it takes something truly threatening(Sam) or terrifying(Still Sam) to make him really take off. Sam tends to wave her fingers at him and make him play the "Flee Mommy" Game.

     Anyway... the upshot of this is Tango flew from his cage over to Aldo's. This is a distance of 4 feet, 5 inches, and according to my cursory search of Google, appears to be a new world record for below-ground conure flight.