Sweet Nothings

As the days grow shorter, we enter, sweetly, into everyone's favourite time of year —— Candy Season. 

Things kick off at Hallowe'en with secret stashes of bite-sized Snickers. December's high holy days of peppermint bark, rum balls, and macaroons melt into Valentine's sampler box of assorted creams. And we don't emerge from the sugar coma until we've bitten off the chocolate Easter bunny's ears. By April, If we're lucky, our blood sugar A1C will just squeak in under the diabetes threshold of 7.0, "Yes! My body can still make its own insulin!"

We get all spring and summer to detox, ready to start anew when October rolls around again. Will we ever learn? Not likely. 

What is it with our sweet tooth, anyway? 

Preferring sweet over bitter is in our DNA. It's self defense, passed down across the aeons from our prehistoric ancestors. Babies learn to distinguish between the pleasantly sugary sensation of mashed carrots — a biological mechanism that helps them avoid potentially toxic substances — like, say, mashed turnips. From there It's a slippery slope to Cap'n Crunch and Froot Loops. 

According to my research, the term, "sweet tooth" dates way back to the 1300s — (you could say it is an idiom that is "long in the tooth," ha ha) — a reference that meant food was "toothsome" or tasty — i.e. sweet to the palate. 

Clearly, we come by our love of sugar naturally. Kids grow up believing that candy is their birthright. As adults, we lap up headlines about chocolate being good for us like it's the only good news on Planet Earth. Even our language is sprinkled with candied phrases: sweet talker, sugar coated, sugar Daddy, sugar pill, short and sweet, your own sweet time, a rose by any other name would smell as sweet, sugar buzz, a sweet deal, as sweet as pie, like taking candy from a baby — which I think might be harder than it sounds.

Children are supposed to love candy, aren't they? Everybody does. Right? Not this kid. I was the oddball who couldn't give two hoots about Hallowe'en loot. Sure, it was fun to go out and collect it like all the other little hooligans in the neighbourhood. But I was only playing along, feigning my glee about the eventual sugar OD. And the next day at school, when kids would groan about their stomachaches and glucose-induced hangovers, I'd be like, all smug. By January, my bagful of unwrapped candy (nothing came wrapped in those days) would be stuck to the side of the breadbox where it got stuffed on November 1st. Inside, the jaw breakers, licorice whips, candy corn, and Bazooka gum would congeal into one sticky, rock hard lump of crystallized sugar, looking like a neon geode from the Cenozoic era. My mother would throw it in the trash.

I grew out of that phase. Now I can put away a mini Coffee Crisp or Kit Kat with the best of them.

These days chocolate bars and Smarties come in hygienic little wrappers with no expiry dates. If you bought the Hefty Pak for your Trick or Treaters, I bet you saved some for yourself. ("One for the kiddies. Two for me.") You could easily indulge your sugar habit until candy cane season. 

At our house, we hand out toothbrushes. Trick or Treat, kids! The candy is for MEEEEEE! Bwa-hah-hah-hah-hah!

Happy Hallowe'en! 

For the Birds

We put up a bird feeder this week. Suddenly, this is our whole life. 

Birds must use some kind of social media — tweets, I imagine — because the back yard was all a-Twitter within minutes of the feeder going up. It was like opening weekend at an-all-you-can-eater with happy hour specials. 

Juncos were the first to arrive. Polite groups of four to six, taking turns, lined up on a nearby perch, waiting for their table to be called before swooping in to nosh on a seed or two. They're the kind of birds that would never exceed 10 items in the grocery express aisle. 

Nuthatches are more inclined to the dine-and-dash approach, elbowing each other, grabbing their seed, then going back for seconds. Chickadees take their time, checking out the bill of fare as though ordering at a food truck. Fox Sparrows use the feeder like a Tim Horton's drive-through. Raggedy flocks of Bushtits come marauding in like a pack of chattering teenagers at lunchtime descending on the high school cafeteria. 

Everybody scatters when the Steller's Jay rambles in. This sleek, shiny blue, pompadoured Fonzarelli of birds, sits in the feeder tray as if he's in a souped-up Thunderbird at a 1950s drive-in diner, intimidating the other guys, and doing his best to impress the girls. 

I'm telling you, it's non-stop action out there. And non-stop demand for seed! MORE seed! WE WANT MORE SEED! Talk about needy. The Mr dishes up daily servings of hulled sunflower seeds, and the birds sit and watch, waiting, eye-balling him, "Hurry up, Mister!" He feels like they might just land on him before he's done refilling the trays. Retirement is supposed to be a transformational stage in life, but I told him, I didn't expect he'd turn into St Francis of Assisi!

Meanwhile, the Hummingbirds lounge around the Nectar Cocktail Bar as though it's their neighbourhood watering hole. I'm making simple syrup twice a week to keep up with their drinking habits. Bunch of nectarholics if you ask me.

This is not the first time we have put food out for our feathered friends. In previous days, we experienced some issues with a certain rodent whose name does not rhyme with "house" and swore we'd never feed birds ever again. But now that the news about declining bird populations has become so distressing, we thought we should do our bit to help them stay fed and healthy. We consulted a wild bird supply store and learned about proper culinary techniques, and bought the gourmet food, and — so far, so good — no rodentia. 

Squirrels are few in this area, so we haven't needed the baffle attachment yet. I guess squirrels can't be all that bright if a cone shape collar stumps them. ("Huh! I'm baffled!")

We have, however, attracted some cats. They slyly hide under the hedge where they salivate over our avian carte de jour. I am happy to report no incidents thus far. At least, not to my knowledge, because when I shoo the felines away, I have yet to see any tell-tale feathers hanging from a kitty's lips. ("What? What did I do?" says the cat with righteous indignation.) 

The feeder is conveniently located directly opposite the kitchen window. Now our life revolves around our Birdie Bistro — filling it, watching the feeding frenzy, talking about the birds that visit, talking TO them, enjoying the show.

It's the most fun a retiree can have without getting up from the breakfast table.