The last work week was unlike any I've seen in a long while. Stressful, but full of opportunity and the kind of strokes you're lucky to experience in any career.

We ended the week with an evening of Symphony Friday night, hearing 3 pieces: Grieg's Funeral March in Memory of Richard Nordraak (1866), the very first performance of Thow's Bellini Sky, commissioned for the SF Symphony lead by Julie Ann Giacobassi playing the English Horn, and Tchaikovsky's Symphony No. 6 in B Minor, Pathétique. I've always loved Tchaikovsky, but I have a new favorite instrument in Giacobassi's English Horn...Breathtaking. Bellini Sky was all about images of Springtime and birth, sunrises and sunsets. It was the kind of music to make you believe music has color...

From a recent DailyOM:
"Spring is a time to reinvent ourselves. We can give birth to a new life for ourselves and start fresh. All a tiny seed needs to sprout is soil, sun, and rain. All we need is a willing heart. During these first days of Spring, know that you are in perfect balance and give yourself the nutrients to not only grow, but to blossom in all your glory."

Last night I lay in bed meditating before allowing myself to fall asleep. Something from my subconscious bubbled up and came to mind, but before I go in to that I want to clarify something I feel strongly about.

Moments like those remind me that we all have a higher-self, a super-consciousness if you will, the center of our infinite selves with eternal access to the Akashic Record, or the sum total of all human experience and consciousness throughout time. When we connect with our higher selves, we find we have all the answers to all of the questions we could possibly ask. It's easy to forget we have this kind of power, because we're human, live in a human world day-to-day, and have grown very accustomed to the limitations that come with physical incarnation. The time involved to develop the ear for hearing our higher selves is different for every person, as it has more to do with your willingness to hear it than any kind of inherent ability. Anyone can do it. They simply must have the need, or the will.

That said, in bed, and at peace, my subsciousness made contact with my higher self, and I found I could ask the questions at the forefront of my mind consciously. (Are you still with me?) I asked of my higher self what guidance it could offer to help me achieve my goals. Some deep breathing passed, and being as tired as I was the answers didn't take long to emerge. "Seek the joy in the process."

This made complete sense to me. But it was my question, and my answer.

My next question was how was I to deal with my own self-doubts, my own attempts to derail my success. "Focus on your joy, not on the possibility of failure. Realize the joy of success before it happens, and let it guide you through your difficulties." I translated this to mean: imagine what it would feel like to notice progress, to feel pride in yourself for your accomplishments, to avoid the habit of negativity.

My profundity of the day: listen to yourself, you have all your own answers.

I've dropped another 2 pounds. All feels good. We're just transitioned into the waxing moon cycle, so it's time to hit the exercise a little harder, and keep the food intake moderate-to-high, but healthful.

Reality Check: I've had a glance at my bar tab of late, and hoo-whee, Houston we have a problem. I'm drinking at levels that are surprising even to me. It's time to slow down not because I think I have a problem, but because it's just an amount that surprises me. I'm off the booze until next weekend. Whenever I first get back into regular exercise, I tend to drop between 4-8 pounds in the first week alone. Basically shedding my immediately excess water weight. But not this time. I'm pretty sure my hooch consumption is the reason. Next check in in 2 weeks. I'll know for sure then if it's the culprit.

Kelly is not a pufferfish. (See below.)

She does however bear a striking resemblance after she has her bath. I'm still learning to anticipate when she'll attempt her impersonation. I'll get you a picture as soon as I wring the water out of the camera.

It would seem my credit union has a new security measure in place for safe access to your personal information on their website. After inputing your UserID, you click Login and get this:

"The picture and text below is your CUOnline secret PassMark. We will show you this before asking for your password every time you login. When you see this PassMark, you can be sure that you are at the genuine Stanford Federal Credit Union CUOnline".

Now click on the picture below to see what I saw...

My `PassMark' is a picture of tropical fruit...How appropos. My brain farts trying to wrap around how `Smart Truck' fits in with their Big Brother-esque Psychic Eye view into my personal life, but hey? braaaap. Excuse me - brain fart.

Blessed be. Kelly's results are negative.
Here's to the next 60 years, baby...

To have a dream that your bird is frolicking with a macaw in a big cage, playing with toys, preening each other, having a grand old time...on the same day you're likely to hear back from the Vet if that could ever safely happen...

Ug. Hope that can happen some day.

Of course, the latter part of the dream, that which bubbled from the primordial soup comprising the reptilian portion of my brain, produced a short storyline of Kelly laying a perfect white egg. Which before my eyes slowly turned into a small white poodle. Replete with little blue bow. Curse you Mother.

Kelly's 10-day stint of antibiotics has passed, and oddly enough, even after the tension and worry that came when I first heard they were necessary, I miss them. Kelly will, too. Dr. Sanders looked at me askance when I said Kelly adored the peanut-flavored Cipro. I think he may now think what most Vets who've seen Kelly come to think - she's nuts (for an Amazon.) The peanut flavoring makes Cipro nearly tolerable for most birds, but Kelly regressed and yearned for it when she was in burrito-form.

A benefit to the experience for she and I is that Kelly is no longer even remotely concerned about being toweled any longer, by me. A bird-behaviorist whom I'm reading these days says it's a healthy practice to continue to perpetuate a healthy bond, and to keep Kelly prepared should quick/emergency toweling be necessary. And she's just so damned cute when wrapped up. She lets me rub her belly and her head, and she's limp for a little while (under 30 seconds). I'm going to see if I can increase that time; see if she'll accept it as a playing scenario.

I should hear from the vet sometime today, or through Wednesday, about her blood test results. I honestly have no idea how I'm going to react.

Love and light...