Stupid bird

It's a nice cool night but the windows are shut because Stupid Bird and its two siblings have woken me up every day this week.  They are baby mockingbirds.   We can't actually tell them apart except one of them seems a bit larger and more persistent than the others, and this is Stupid Bird.  The others are Dumb Bird (unfortunately, not dumb sound-wise) and Demented Bird.  There are other baby birds around, but Stupid Bird is the most annoying, although not the only one that has woken me up way too early.  I am unused to Nature and so any animal noise wakes me up.  I used to sleep through sirens (lived round the corner from a fire station), deep bass (lived behind a club), dining noises/clinking silverware (lived above a restaurant with an outdoor patio), trains, traffic, even a certain beeping garbage truck that came at five am (lived on a glorified garbage lane behind the club and other establishments), and I'm getting used to sleeping through the nighttime explosions here, but I cannot sleep through two things: breaking glass and Nature.  One little frog pip is enough to wake me up.  I don't know what the heck is going on out there, actually, but I keep getting woken up.  And the only noise I recognize is Stupid Bird.

So, my sleep has been kind of crappy this week.

Today, 20.4 (I think) miles biking in 90 minutes with my husband.  He set a more comfortable pace and picked a much more comfortable route avoiding all sharp hills.  Unfortunately, the hills are on my commutes so all of my rides until today have had them---gosh, biking is soooo much easier without steep hills!   It was actually an easy ride today.  I got more comfortable using the lowest handlebar position too.  I hadn't bothered much with it until today, when I had no choice.  My hands are a bit blistered from the shoveling, and consequently my usual hand position is irritating.  Finally, I gave up and plunked my hands on the lowest part and I don't know what I did differently, but it was luxurious.  It was like lying down!

Then, I jogged for an hour in front of a lecture.  MHC class I and class II.  Basically, MHC I signals killer T cells (Cd8+??) so the peptide is a darn tight fit because mistakes are costly, whereas MHC II signals (is that even the right word?  aids?)  helper T cells (Cd4+?), not so much at stake, thus it offers a more relaxed hotdog bun sort of fit.    Hopefully I got this right.  If I didn't, at least I jogged for an hour.

Then, more digging/lifting dirt.  We now have the right sized hole in the ground, I think, and I will level for the concrete blocks tomorrow.  Fortunately, it turns out that the bottom is mostly clay, so I won't bother putting in a concrete collar after all.