NerdBird : Beaker, Banjo, Mahana

Hahn's Mini Macaw / Ferret / Jenday Conure

Late but worth mentioning

Last Friday during lunch I had to stop home and it was such a nice day I thought that I'd take Beaker back with me to work. We spent about half a day together at work. I brought food and water for him. He was great. Didn't make a lot of noise and everyone loved him.

After that I wanted to do a test so I took him to a local pub that I frequent (about a block away from work). I'm friends with the owner and he previously said it would be ok. I couldn't have been happier. Beaker didn't peep at all except once when the phone rang and he said "hello?". He just sat on my shoulder and watched people. He also let me know when he had to go so we stepped outside to do his business. I've taken him to the park and he's been good but I just wanted to see how he does in/with various situations, places, people. Seems he's fine with it and very well behaved. He's such a good boy.

La Pew

Hanging out late last night and I see a buddy walking around. Curious little guy. Let me follow him around and take some pictures. As long as you're not threatening they're cool.
IMG_0687

Lazy Saturday

It's hot and I'm pooped!
IMG_0523

Comments

Just added a comments feature. Doubt anyone will actually use it but it's there. Neato!

Play dead

Too funny. Wish Mahana could do that.

Live feed

Every morning I have a pair of Gold Finches visit so I'll have the live feed on them for a while. Now watch that I have the camera on them they'll not show up.

Trimmed

Yesterday Mahana got her trim. It's so nice being able to take her outside with me and not worry. I foresee a fun filled summer with walks and visiting parks and having some great bonding time.

I'm not real happy about how they clipped Beaker. They cut it all off so if he jumps or falls off of me he drops like a brick. Yesterday he fell off of me while I was moving some computer things around and four of his long tail feathers came out because he landed on them. NOT happy. I told them to keep one or two of the first flight feathers on Mahana. Not only because I want her to be able to float to the ground without injury but damn, those feathers are beautiful.

Live

Going to stick with UStream. I'm liking that the best. Sure it's not nearly as smooth as hosting myself but now I'm only using about 25KBps upstream instead of 120+KBps. It's nice to hear them too.

Live stream test 2

Today I'm testing UStream and so far I like it better than Stickam. The resolution isn't as high but the audio works much better and it has built in volume control. I guess my only complaint would be that the time stamp is PST whereas I'm in EST. I didn't look hard but I didn't see an option to tell it which time zone I'm in. Anyhow, I may stick with this.

Bird Shower (from YouTube)

Testing live stream

I have been doing the live video stream feed directly from home which is fine and all but it chews up my bandwidth especially if a few people are watching. Using a re-broadcaster like this allows me to only have one upstream and they will handle multiple downstreams. Today I've been testing out Stickam. It's ok. I like that it will do video and audio but it's laggy and the audio doesn't always come through. More than anything it's probably because I'm hosting from an old G3 iBook 500mhz. Just not enough oompfh to do it all. Tomorrow I'll try out UStream.

Right now my media center is a Mac Cube which I love dearly but it's not fast enough to do high-def content even though it has been upgraded (CPU, HD, RAM, GFX, etc.). I plan on getting a Mac Mini but damn it Apple. Update it to the Core Duo 2! So, if after WDC this month it gets a much over-due update I'll be getting a Mini to replace the Cube. Then use the Cube for the bird server which will easily handle video/audio feeds.

That time again

Beaker got a trim today. Beak, nails, wings. Ahhh. Now his biting will be more like being gummed instead of harpooned with a needle. Mahana is next, on Tuesday.
This image is a theme.plist hack