Alien Invasion Cake Day

Lookit the birds!!  This was a communal shout from the kids in the front row, who get to watch Uncle Squirrel come and eat peanuts that we strew outside for him.  Maybe it's Auntie Squirrel.  One child asked, How do we know if it's an Uncle?  The wise child next to him said, I don't wanna look.  But there was also an immense winter flock of starlings picking through the dormant grass of the park outside the school, at least three hundred birds needling their beaks amongst the flattened blades in search of sleeping beetles.

They had swooped down in a flowing wave of dark brown bodies, you've seen them as they rise and fall, or spiral in the sky.  It's a survival technique not used during summer.  When clustered to roost inside a pine or hedge at night, the collective body heat can raise the surrounding temperature a few degrees.  Think of being in a room with many people, and how you are suffocating from stuffiness in about 30 minutes.  There you go.

Where do they come from, where do they go, why are there so many, wish I had my Dad's gun, (cripes), what are they doing?  So much for the vocabulary words I was listing on the board.  I figured a five minute briefing on animal habits was okay, for how many urban kids get that excited about wildlife?  These are the kids who go bananas if they find a bug outside, these are the kids whose foot you have to stop from squashing said insect.  I think this squirrel feeding is raising some sort of awareness, at least that is the hope of the bigger world.

Starlings, so many.  An invasive species that pushed out many native songbirds, introduced from only 80 birds in 1890.  Earlier, to keep nostalgic European immigrants happy, the house sparrow was introduced in Cincinnati, Ohio and have become so ubiquitous, many humans have no idea that they are non-native birds.  Robins, bluebirds, finches, chickadees, thrushes, martins and song sparrows have been displaced by these tough, aggressive little things.

The yellow butter-and-eggs flowers that resemble tiny snapdragons are not originally from here, but then neither is any livestock except for llamas, American bison, and turkeys.  Apples are from China, tomatoes from South America, but mostly only grow where cultivated.  Nothing ever stays the same, so we might as well get used to it, with an eye to controlling future exchanges.  We received Dutch Elm Disease, we gave Europe grey squirrels and poison ivy.

Going on, it's to be a baking day just right with the snow coming down in a few half-hearted flumphs here and there, melted by tomorrow's predicted warm temperatures. Global warming may very well displace many species we are used to seeing, replacing them with more moderate climate organisms.  Like those big mosquitoes and bigger spiders.  No thenk yew.

Well, now to the Lemon Syrup Cake for someone's 33 birthday, a good boy become a good man Who Could Live a Little Closer to His Family and Furthermore Ask Her to Marry You Already.  I don't think he reads this blog, but a wish is a wish that may knock him in the head.

Treat each other well, it will reflect in your dreams, and bring your cakes to rising heights.