A Bat Home

First, it was the sunbirds making their nest on my balcony, now the fruit bats have come to hang out at the entrance.

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Oblivious of the human traffic, it hangs in there...

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There it is...

Egg Nest

The two regular Sunbird visitors have decided -- they are moving in!

So they started - weaving their nest twig by twig. For each twig, they would have to to fly hundreds of feet away to collect them. Its painstaking (to me as a human being), but the birds didn't seem to mind.

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It is fascinating that they had in them the construction know-how - to hang it off a branch, to get the right shape and size, and even to keep a cute opening for the mother bird to enter and also to rest her head while sitting on her eggs.

High Spirits

When I came home a few days ago, a bottle of freshly harvested papaya wine exploded, splattering the wine and shattered glass all over the place. After cleaning them up, I opened the other bottles to release the pressure to avert another explosion and the first bottle popped like a high pressure jet splashing its contents all over my face, shooting up to the ceiling and messing the place all over again!

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Then as I thought the worst was over, a bottle slipped off the fridge and smashed itself into bits, as I was trying to make space there. What a mess!

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What went 'wrong' was that I had followed the recipe without understanding the reasons behind each step properly. Stirring the ferment every morning is to allow the resulting carbon dioxide to escape and not form pressure in the fluid. What I didn't understand was that besides tasting the fermenting wine, I should also be checking the effervescence in the fluid, to judge if they are ready to be bottled. And so, I had foolishly loaded the fluid together with the residual sugar waiting to convert to alcohol and carbon-dioxide that was to blow up its vessel.

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The second lesson I learned from the incident is that no matter what, I should not to be stressed up. If I had been more relaxed and mindful, I wouldn't have let the bottle slipped from the fridge and smashed up on the floor. If I had been cool about it, I could have even taken some pixs for this blog post before cleaning the mess up. It was quite a scene and would have made fascinating photographic material. :)

Side notes:

Brewing wine is fun! Witnessing, tasting and understanding the fermentation process first hand is fun!

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Like human beings, different types of fruits have different nature and therefore behaves differently though put through the same process. Some become explosive faster while others have gentler ways of dissipating pressure.

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In other words, be mindful and know what you are brewing everyday and remember to stay cool so that you can enjoy the fruits of your harvest. It applies not only to making wine!

It's a Dog's Life 2 - Rivalry

This is whisky. She has just mothered three Shetland puppies. She is the kind and gentle one in the house.

This is Junior (left) and Beanie (right). Both are hyperactive attention seekers. Beanie is only six months old and is now the darling of the house. This is annoying Junior who used to be the youngest in the house.

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This is Jack, an African Grey parrot. He keeps calling out to Junior, "Junior, where's the ball?" Now thanks to Jack's inspiration, Junior goes around with the ball in his mouth, asking everyone to play with him - a way to turn our attention to him and away from Beanie. It's a dog's life!

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Cat's Play 2 - Up the tree

This is my silly kitten.In the dead of the night, she climbed up the tree this high! She knows how to go up, but didn't know how to come down in reverse order. So she was stuck about 11m high (5 storeys high) and was crying out for help. We were brought to the attention by the kitten's mother, who was circling around the kitchen table nervously and calling us to follow her into the garden.

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My ladder is only 6m tall. She was another 5 metre above me and it was dark and cold outside. Climbing the almost branchless 5 metre section was too risky. We called the firemen, but their truck wouldn't be able to access our garden. It is also not possible to enter from the forest side. They would have to climb up the extra 5m after the ladder. Sometimes, the fireman might inadvertently frighten the kitten and she may panic and jump to her death. So they suggested that we leave her out there for a night and see what can be done the next day, but no more than a day as she will starve to death.
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Meanwhile, we cracked our heads and came up with an idea to tie something heavy to one end of a rope and throw it up over the branch where the kitten was, then lower the heavy object, and attach a basket to it. I tried that but it was too difficult. I dare not throw it too near the kitten in case I smash her face killing her, or scare her and she jumped to death. Besides, it was difficult standing at 6m on the ladder and throwing the dumbell (yes, we use a small one used by joggers!!!) almost vertically. I tried throwing up a few times - the last time it came down and landed on my chin. So now I have a bruised chin and the kitten was still up there crying in desperation.

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Next idea: we tied a basket to a fallen tree branch, but the branch was too short... haiz.

.So we extended the length, by with a few of them...

Thus, there I was at the top of the 6m ladder, in the darkness under the canopy of the night forest, straining my arms holding the bottom end of the heavy five metre long stick, moving the basket at the far end till it reaches the kitten. When the basket reached her, she looked into it, but didn't jump!!! URGH!!! My arms were now aching and wobbling, as it was heavy holding the stick with the basket at the far end. Besides, I was recovering from sciatic pains and every stretch of the leg was a stinging pain. As I persisted, my arms and legs shivered. I knew it was a point of no return. If I give up and lower the basket and the kitten happen to jump, she would jump to her death.

After ten more minutes, my persistence paid off. She finally got the hint and jumped into the basket. The sudden weight in the basket at the far end of the long stick threw me off balance momentarily, and I had to grab the tree quickly to keep still. So at last, the rescue is done. I got the basket and saw her. She looked petrified, but relieved.

A few months ago, I had another problem. I dropped my Dopod stylus in between the terrace timber floor boards. The gap is barely 1 cm wide and it is 10cm above a sandy ground below.

See picture below. We managed to rescue the stylus without taking out the floor boards or tunneling the ground. :) Do you want to think about how we did it? :)

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Cat's Play

My cat likes to bring back dead mice into the house, meant as presents for me. It is his own way of saying "thank you" to me. However, I don't really want these dead creatures like, mice, frogs, birds, dragon flies...etc, in the house as I will have to clean up and throw them out again. It is work for me. Also these creatures, including the mice, are from the woods and are not house pests, they had been minding their own business until they were caught by my cat.

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Isn't life sometimes like this? Each of us acting out our own part in our own nature, often meaning well and hoping that we fit into the grand picture?

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Like the teenage daughter bringing her 'cool and hip' friends home, to the worry of mum and dad when they meet them? Or the industrious husband coming home after a long day, only to be met by the wife's distressing naggings about his long hours at work? Or the overzealous boyfriend chasing the girl of his dream, eventually scaring her away?

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Each of them are acting out their part in their own nature, often perceived to be well meaning, but with conflicting desires, demands and results.

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Other posts:

Bucky Group - Thankful

Somedays we forget

To look around us

Somedays we can't see

The joy that surrounds us

So caught up inside ourselves

We take when we should give... more

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Environment 5 - Balance

A slippery problem

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It has been a rainy summer. Slugs abound. Slugs are tough creatures, they multiply every four weeks and can stay dormant in dry weathers for up to 4 years!

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Hedgehogs and birds who are their natural predators die after accumulating the human introduced 'slug poison' eaten by slugs. So now there are too many slugs.

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It is hard to say who the 'bad guys' are, but ecology needs balance. This prevailing imbalance has cost my friend her veggie patch tomatoes, as they were eaten almost entirely by slugs.

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There are ecological ways to get rid of slugs, by introducing nematodes (worm like creatures) and hedgehogs that feed on them. A hedgehog eats up to 120 slugs a day. You can also leave a tub of beer in your garden and very soon you will see many of them coming for a drink, then get drunk and drowned in the alcohol. Sounds familiar! haha.

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Note for the pure Buddhists and other non-killing religions, that the last method also amounts to murder. Or is it man-slaughter slug-slaughter or abetting suicide? :)

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