I've Been Tagged

1. This the first time I've been tagged. Although I've filled out many email friend surveys, which seems to be a similar game.

2. I was born at home and my dad delivered me. I guess my mom also played a part in it. My parents weren't too keen on some of the procedures practiced in hospitals during deliveries at the time, so my dad read a book and called it good.

3. I wanted to win a gold medal in gymnastics more than anything when I was young. I was a gymnast from age 8 to age 17 and even attended an Olympic developement high school where sports was a requirement and everyone had two P.E. classes a day. When I was about to graduate and it was more than apparent I wasn't going to go to the Olympics in 1996, I had no idea what to study in college, because I only wanted to be an Olympian.

4. I wanted to be 5'9. Somehow, I got this idea in my head that 5'9 was the perfect height and if I focused hard enough on getting there I could do it. By the way, I'm 5'6 and seem to have a habit of setting impossible goals.

5. I've always wanted to have twins. I have no kids right now, so this statement may come back to haunt me as a reminder to be careful what you ask for. I love kids and good deals, so why wouldn't I want two for the price of one.

6. I'm not a messy person, unless I'm eating chocolate. I'm not kidding. Ask my husband. Somehow it will end up on my pants, in my hair, on the couch, etc... This is really ironic, considering it is my favorite thing to eat, so you think I would be extra careful to get it ALL in my mouth.

7. In third grade I ate an entire piece of paper in front of my whole class. Our substitute teacher told me my hand writing was too small and I needed to do the entire assignment over again. I told her my normal teacher liked my hand writing and an arguement insued. I'm a little fuzzy on the details, but somehow eating my paper, so she couldn't throw it away seemed like my best alternative. I showed her!

Give Me Some Gum Cukaburra

My little brother Luke came to visit me a couple weeks ago. We had fun taking advantage of a few things Utah has to offer, one of which was visiting the Tracy Aviary. The first bird on this post is a cukaburra. When I saw him, I began singing the cukaburra song I had learned in elementary school. Cukaburra sits in the old gum tree, eating all the gum drops he can see, laugh cukaburra, laugh.... come on you know the one... right? Well my brother Luke had never heard it, so we called my sister and she had never heard it, so then we asked my husband when we got home about it and he thought I was crazy too! The rest of the trip they would mockingly say, "Give me some cukaburra." My point is, back me up if you've ever heard the song. I know I can't be the only one who had to learn it in school. By the way, their official name is Laughing Cukaburra, but apparently he didn't think I was very funny. I used all my best material and not even a peep. Luke, on the other hand, thought I was hilarious;)

Our theory is they put the ducks up front because you are excited to see them when you first enter, but after you see the more exotic birds you'd be like, "Great. A duck." Unless it was a blue duck, because I've never seen one of those.

Our favorite birds were the cukoos. They flew everywhere huddled together like this and they were not shy at all!
They might be cukoo, but they were not crazy enough to take a picture with us. Sad.

A rare sighting of a giant albatross. Just kidding, but the birds sure didn't like to share camera space with people.
The only one I could get to stay in a picture with me was a vulture of course.

The coolest national mascot ever. Beauty, grace, strength and smarts all wrapped up in one animal.
I loved this Golden Eagle that kept trying to fly despite only having one wing. He was very tenacious.
I'm probably putting in a few too many pics, but it's always hard to decide. This crane was beautiful and by far the most active bird in the park.

I included this picture of a speckled hen for my dad, because he likes saying the word speckled.

I think owls are some of the coolest birds. They didn't have many owls here, but I was happy to find this Snow Owl.
Why is it that all the other birds and animals in zoos are caged and peacocks get to roam free? What did they ever do that was so special? It's bad enough to flaunt their beautiful feathers to the other birds, but then they get to be free too?

Are you bored yet? I thought this was a blog, not science class. Flamingos are okay. They've never been my favorite, but I included them because you don't see to many pink things in nature, so they're kind of different. Plus the color pink is supposed to improve your mood by 25% when you see it and I want happy blog readers.

More to Come

I have about seven posts in my mind right now to add to the blog, but our computer has been having problems for a few weeks. We already wiped the hard drive and I want to make sure everything is right again, before I start downloading pictures. Please stay tuned.