Squash mouth

The non-avian members of our house, neglected by this blog, are doing well. Andreas has been out of his hide every day for more than two months now, I believe. Here he is, basking:Elsa is brumating, which is a type of hibernation. She'll sometimes spend more than a week inside her hide, but surprised us all over the weekend by coming out for a bask. I offered her a bit of butternut squash and she, unlike Andreas, gobbled it up. The parrots aren't the only ones with squash mouth!The fish were apparently very hungry over the weekend, even though their feeding schedules hadn't changed. They normally eat around 5 pm, when I get home from work. Around 3 pm on Saturday, they kept following me (as best they could, since they are in a tank) as I passed in front of their cage, begging to be fed.

In this video, you can see how the right side of the tank is pretty much empty, and how they all come over when they realize it's feeding time. There are two smaller fish -- in the beginning, one is in the upper center part of the frame and towards the end, one is at the bottom right -- those are the babies that hatched in the tank earlier in the year.

On the cooking front, of which I've also been remiss on the blog lately, Thomas made granola yesterday. It is quite delicious! I think we'll be trying many different variations of this in the months to come:
Since it was so cold and icy and we were pretty much stuck inside all day, I also made some banana bread and banana muffins (had a bunch of old bananas to use!)

I couldn't believe how icy it was! I tried running with my group of friends for our weekly run; every single one of us almost slipped exiting our cars, so we drove to a local indoor track instead and ran there. The scenery left much to be desired, but at least we didn't break any bones! Upon returning home, I found that my car could not make it into the garage due to the ice -- my wheels just kept spinning. So I parked my car on the side of the road and tried to walk up the driveway -- I couldn't make it and kept sliding down! Our driveway is not that steep, either. I finally made it home by walking on the snow instead.

The parrots did not have to worry about the weather, confined as they are to our house.

Rocky was the only one I photographed over the weekend. When he gets in the hallway by the bathroom, he will bite even Thomas if he tried to have him step up. He didn't have a stick nearby, so he scooped Rocky into his arm, thereby avoiding a bite:
Later, Rocky was hanging out on a plant:After I took this picture, he hurried over to hang out with Thomas's foot:We still don't get his fascination with feet!