- New Thing Learned for 20 February: Flamingos produce "crop milk" to feed their young, like pigeons do. Alas, I can't seem to find a reliable confirmation as to whether said flamingo crop milk is pink. [Source: Wikipedia.]
- New Thing Learned for 21 February: A 2005 Saturn Ion consumes about 1/4 gallon of gas per hour sitting at a casual idle, based on an estimate of 1/4 of a roughly 12-gallon tank divided into an 11-hour period; also, this is apparently a very safe neighborhood. The part about Mum needing a Helper Monkey, I already knew. [Source: ...but at least it was nice and warmed up.]
(I'm not sure which was the really surprising part of that story, that Mum actually left the car running, or that the car was still there in the morning. Apparently the Mighty Thor isn't sexy enough to be worth stealing even by the laziest joyriding teenager. I choose to lay at least some of the blame for this blunder on the car itself, because it's got an electronic milage readout and since Mum's job involves Driving Stuff she's got to note down the mileage before shutting down for the night, hence the opportunity for distraction right there between "parked" and "off". But no real harm done, in the end, besides maybe $8 of gas down the toilet, and it's always nice when a potential disaster turns out as an amusing anecdote instead.)
As for my own state of mind lately, between an imminent root-canal appointment and that big red 37 staring at me from next month's calendar page, I've been in quite a picturesque funk about my inexplicable failure to have conquered the Known World yet. I spent Wednesday overcompensating for it by tackling a few projects I'd been putting off until the workroom was more in order, including finding the hacksaw so I could finally finish up with the shades in my room, but I'm still feeling more out of sorts and ignored than usual for February, and fighting hard against my usual instincts to clam up and keep my head down when maybe I should be more outspoken about the insecurities roiling behind my enigmatic facade. Anybody out there feel like helping me organize a "You could call me Dennis" party for the end of next month, since I'm demonstrably incapable of pulling off anything involving planning myself?