Tony's Finch Diner Emerges From Bankruptcy

Tweet, tweet! Tony decided to give his Finch Diner another go. After firing the Chef and splurging on some fresh thistle seed, the Diner is ready for a comeback. As I write this there is a finch gorging himself at the feeder. I have the High Primal to thank for this reversal of fortunes. She kept harping that the thistle I had was too cheap. It was thistle given to me. I not sure of the donor's ethnicity but in the future it will pay to beware of Greeks bearing gifts.

One For The Birds

If one is fortunate enough to join the ranks of nonagenarians and still possesses his mental faculties as well as physical prowess (although limited), he feels entitled to enjoy certain harmless hobbies. Years ago this nonagenarian became a fan of bird feeders. Tony's Finch Diner has been the target of a number of posts (see Birds, Finch Diner labels) over the years. It is now time to once again update the status of Tony's Finch Diner.

Tony's Finch Diner is again on the verge of bankruptcy. If there are any finches left in this world they have found better feeding grounds. St. Francis who is the greeter for Tony's diner has been in tears.  Where have all the finch gone? The last time I asked this question was 07/03/2012. At the time I blamed my diner problems on Romney. Holy cow! It was during campaign 2012. Could it be that finches stay away during the circus we call selecting Presidential candidates? Our political climate scares the hell out of me - why not the finch. There is also a rumor going around that Trump has built some kind of a wall to keep finches out of the USA. I doubt that. The last finch chirp I heard did not sound Mexican. Even an ass like Trump knows that birds fly over walls. Another rumor is that the Bernie Sanders' bombastic rhetoric is just too much -  even for a bird. By the way there is no truth to the rumor that the Clinton Foundation has offered to bail me out.

I doubt that there is a  connection between presidential campaigns and Tony's Finch Diner problems. After all, so far Campaign 2016 has been for the birds.

This is for the birds

Mayday! Mayday! We're all messed up! A little bird told me that today is the day we celebrate labor but he was wrong. The little fellow has a bad GPS and thought he was in Europe.

If we are such a good friend of the European Union why do we celebrate Labor Day on the first Monday of September rather than today? A more relevant question is how long will it be before the Republicans and the Tea Party weaken the labor movement so much that a Labor Day celebration will become irrelevant?

When I came up with this post, I had no intent of cutting a hog in the ass. I just  wanted to make note of a day which honors people who dirty their hands while working ( I know, I know, the wolfs of Wall Street have dirty hands also). Besides that, it would be nice to start off the month with a post. I decided to kill two birds with one stone and take a flier. As it turns out, the early bird did not get the worm. A post about May Day falls flat. Its just not much of a holiday in these parts. On May 1st we'd prefer to celebrate the start of Spring weather, plant some geraniums, dance around the maypole and start making plans for that barbecue or baseball game on Memorial Day.

The best that can be said for this post is that a post in the hand is worth two in the bush.  If I had to rate it, I would give it the bird.

Tony's Finch Diner Under New Management

Tony's Finch Diner (est.1995) has survived terrorists masked as racoons, Bush's Great Recession, the pettiness of a F--king Homeowners Association, corporate raiders and threats from La Mano Nero. Business has never been better. Lately it has been so good that brawls have broken out as the birds circled for a perch. Of course brawling birds is a no-no. The last thing Tony wants is for the F--king

Welcome to Tony's Finch Diner

Home Owners Association to file a bird nuisance complaint with the Police. Sparing no expense, Tony has hired a Maitre-de. St. Francis of Assisi has come out from retirement to take charge of Tony's Finch Diner.  He has been on the job for two days and there has been nary a brawl. Correction! One rogue finch, denied a perch,  did mount a protest movement and shit on the Maitre-de's head. St. Francis didn't flinch and was heard chanting: "It is in pardoning that we are pardoned. Where there is injury let me sow pardon". True to his words St. Francis escorted the rogue bird to a top perch mumbling: "Shit happens".

By the way there is no truth to the rumor that Pope Francis was so pissed about St. Francis coming out of retirement that he plans to send him to sainthood limbo.

( Haven't seen a Purple Finch dining at the feeder in quite awhile. Saw one today. St. Francis is earning his keep.)

La Mano Nera

It was a morning like all mornings. At least I thought so until I started opening blinds hoping that the sun would see fit to make its presence known. I dutifully opened the back patio sliding door blinds and there it was - a black hand! No doubt about it. A black hand was ominously lying on my patio. I had heard of the The Black Hand during my childhood days. I can remember the adults mentioning La Mano Nera in hushed tones as they discussed the news about the latest violence in the neighborhood. The Black Hand symbol was an ominous message of physical harm to come if an extortion demand was not met.

Whoa! I never received any extortion demand so what the hell was a black hand doing on my patio. Was it merely a warning? A warning about what? I lead a relatively quiet life. Who could I have possibly offended? My God, I forgot about my blog! It’s full of rants and pointed comments on individuals and organizations.

 I’ve bad mouthed the Home Owners Association or more accurately certain individuals representing the Association. Would they have the balls to threaten me? Not really, I’m sure they have no balls or they would have had the courtesy of discussing the placement of my bird feeder  with me before forcing me to take it down (Tony's Finch Diner Ordered Shutdown by Homeowners Association). Just for the record I‘m back in business with a Finch Diner - all legal.

 More recently I’ve not been very kind about Obamacare. Scratch Obamacare from the list of persons of interest. They have enough to occupy themselves with, besides threatening an unknown blogger. I’m at my wit's end ( now there’s a cliché I ought to write about someday).

( brief pause while I see who is at the front door)

Mystery solved. That was the landscaper asking permission to retrieve his lost glove. He was sure he dropped it on my back patio.

As I watched him retrieve the black glove, I noticed a bulge under his sweatshirt. Gun? A change of mind? Lesson learned - blogging can be dangerous for your health.

Finch Diner Destroyed

Tony’s Finch Diner is gone! Unknown intruders invaded Tony’s patio, raised holy hell with some of the furniture and ripped down the finch feeder. Coming on the heels of past threats from the f***king  homeowners association, the demolition does not appear to be due to natural causes. There have been no reports of an earthquake in the area and we are in the middle of a drought. There has, however, been a report of a masked critter roaming the common ground by Tony’s patio.

Tony suspects that some corporate raiders were hired to put an end to Tony’s Finch Diner. As previously reported in this blog, for the past several months hardly a finch has been seen at the feeder. He speculated that the corporate raiders outsourced the finches to China. Not satisfied with ruining the diner business, the raiders collaborated with the f***king  homeowners association, hired some raccoons and put the diner out of business once and for all.
　

When asked if he had any plans for a new diner, Tony could only mumble something about the f***king  homeowners association , Bain Capital and Romney.

Romney does resemble a raccoon. Hm mm!

For information leading to the apprehension of the critters of interest, Tony has promised to make a generous contribution to the Obama campaign.

7/20/12-BREAKING NEWS:
The critter of interest that put Tony out of the finch diner business is out of the neighborhood. He was last seen strapped atop some wealthy politician's car headed for Canada. Tony has promised to write that check for Obama. He was going to attach a note asking that he get the balls to do something about gun control but decided that Obama had enough on his plate. Maybe next January.

Finches On Strike

No way to run a diner

As Campaign 2012 heats up, I’m surprised that no one has picked up on the dearth of finches this summer. The finch population is noticeably reduced. As a result, finch feeders are in trouble. According to Obama the private sector is doing fine but who’s worrying about the bird sector. The bird sector, as far as finches are concerned, has gone to the birds. Romney has not chirped about this in his commercials. I suspect that he has outsourced our finch population to China.

Tony’s Finch Diner is on the verge of bankruptcy once again. The diner’s business plan took a hit over a year ago when he had to move the diner from a prime location. Tony’s Finch Diner was ordered shutdown by the F------s Homeowners Association. As reported in this blog, “Unknown asses have succeeded in getting the f***ing F------s Homeowners Association to order Tony to get his Finch Diner the hell off of common property. The asses are suspected to be Tea Party activists who don‘t have the cagliones to do anything important in local politics. Not wanting to make waves, Tony has agreed to move his diner to safe ground.”

The “safe ground” worked fine until this Spring. In 2012 finches have been scarcer than a hens teeth. I really don’t think that politics has anything to do with the catastrophic drop in business. I say this because my limited knowledge of finch chatter picked up what I’m sure was a chirp that the finches are pissed with the f***ing F------s Homeowners Association and won’t have anything to do with finch feeders in the area. This observation has been confirmed by The High Primal who emphatically stated that the f**king birds are on strike. Tony’s Finch Diner has fed a few scabs lately but that hardly makes the effort of maintaining the feeder worth it.

Tony’s Finch Diner Board of Directors is scheduled to meet later this month to consider what action should be taken. The rumor is that the diner will remain open at least until the November election. The betting is that if Romney wins, the diner will end up in the trash barrel along with the rest of the country.

Can Spring be far behind

Just as a funk was getting the best of me ( I actually began to wonder whether or not this blog was relevant), I gazed out the window and glory, glory, hallelujah, and two hoorays, two finches were at my feeder. I had not seen a finch out there since last November. So what? Amidst all the garbage that is going on in the nation and world, its refreshing to realize that there are  some beautiful things to look forward to - Spring for instance, with its birds, flowers and yes, baseball.

 Obviously I did not ditch this blog. Is it relevant? Not really, but if I measured everything by relevancy, life would end up being pretty dull and  there would be little left to chirp about ( could not resist that). As for blogging, I need to remind myself now and then that after all, blogging is not for sissies (that last one might make a good tweet).

Get Rid of the Canadians - Geese That Is!



Walking along the trail by the golf course this morning, I was amazed at the number of Canadian Geese that have flown into Ohio to play golf at the Aberdeen Country Club. I'm sure that the club operators are more frustrated than amazed as they zip around the course trying to collect their green fees.

It seems to me that the problem of Canadian Geese illegally crossing our northern border has been largely ignored by our politicians. Too much time is spent on devising methods to keep out illegals from Mexico rather than illegals from Canada. At least the Mexicans are willing to do all those jobs we hate while the all that the Canadians (Geese) do is shit all over our golf courses.

 Actually the solution to keeping out the Canadian Geese is simple and  anyone of the Republican candidates is welcome to use it in the next debate. My preference is Perry but Cain will do if if the sexual harassment he's accused of wasn't a goose.

Right off the bat I must reveal that I initially offered the solution to Obama but he respectfully reminded me that he was much too busy to deal with a bird like me to say nothing about birds from Canada.

To get rid of the Canadian Geese problem all we have to do is to establish a no fly zone over The Great Lakes. Before we do this we must not forget to get UN approval because inevitably NATO must be asked to conduct some bombing missions over golf courses. The Federal government need not get directly involved beyond a nice speech at the UN.

The down side of this plan is that after ninety days there will be more hazards than desirable on our golf courses to say nothing of the tremendous cleanup of geese carcasses. To make matters worse the golf course operators will still be out of green fees.

All is not lost. The geese will be gone . The golf course operators can request assistance from China which China will be glad to give in exchange for a monopoly on providing golf carts.

The more I think about my solution, the more I feel I should find another form of exercise. As I've mentioned before , walking can be dangerous for your mental health.

Tony's Finch Diner Ordered Shutdown By Homeowners Association

Unknown asses have succeeded in getting the  f***ing F------s Homeowners Association to order Tony to get his Finch Diner the hell off of common property. The asses are suspected to be Tea Party activists who don‘t have the cagliones to do anything important in local politics. Not wanting to make waves, Tony has agreed to move his diner to safe ground. He has served notice however that he intends to report the abuse of Finches by the F------s Homeowners Association to the Audubon Society. Tony also suspects who the asses are and has called a meeting of all the Finches in the neighborhood to tweet about the anti-Finch terrorists. The guest twitter at the meeting will be the lead bird from Alfred Hitchcock “Birds” movie. It is rumored that this bird is an expert at pecking asses and will provide instructions on precision ass pecking for a group of Finches who have volunteered to form a special Finch Attack Force (FAF). In the meantime, Tony has engaged a contractor to remove the offending Finch feeder. Asked where the feeder was being moved to, Tony would not disclose the location and would only mumble: I’ll get rid of my last feeder when they pry it from my cold, dead hands.

Tony's Dove Feeder Has Moved

The last meal

Tony's Finch Feeder - correction, Dove Feeder-  proved to be an unintentional, overwhelming success among the Mourning Doves. Unfortunately the popularity of the feeder amongst the dove population far exceeded the available toilet facilities,  Doves queuing up for dinner made  liberal use of the lawn furniture. There was no way Tony was going to devote his days to cleaning up bird shit, so he called an emergency meeting of his Finch Diner Board. By a  unanimous vote it was decided to move the finch feeder to an undisclosed location. Once this was done, the Twitter social network was set ablaze with  tweets expressing anger about Tony's treatment of Doves. It now appears that a Mourning Dove Spring is in progress. At last reports the Interior Department has called for banning Tony and his board from all bird feeder activity. Tony vehemently has stated that he is in the bird feeder business to stay in spite of the damn doves. He also added that in a couple of weeks it will be Summer and that should take care of the Mourning Dove Spring.

More Stimulus Money Gone Bad

In my 6/2/11 post I confessed to the misuse of stimulus money concerning my finch feeder project. Further investigation has revealed that the fraudulent use of stimulus money was greater than reported.

Funds were also used to establish "an upscale Humming Bird Bar where Humming Birds could wet their whistle with Tony's special nectar ". Once the project was completed the high primal and I began our watch for hummingbirds. Not a bird was sighted. This in spite of the meticulous care taken to clean the feeder.  In disgust, about a week ago, the diner/feeder was demolished, stimulus money be damned.

Thanks to dicklincoln.com

Lo and behold, this morning, a hummingbird was sighted at the sight of what was formerly Tony's Hummingbird Diner. The damn bird was having a great time satiating himself with nectar from the flowers which surrounded the former feeder.

When I reported this to the high primal , she asked if I was going to try a feeder again. My response. " Hell no! From now on, the only hummingbirds  welcome in our yard are Free Range Hummingbirds."

As for the stimulus money, The Treasury Department can consider it money well spent to verify that birds prefer Mother Nature.

Stimulus Money Gone To the Birds

President Obama will be in Toledo Friday hoping to garner a few votes by touting the success of the stimulus plan to save the domestic auto companies. Evidently there are those who say that this was money ill spent. It is not my intent to debate this issue. Since I drive a Toyota, anything I would have to to say would be tainted. On the other hand , I am familiar with  stimulus money being ill spent.

On 3/28 I wrote a post, "Tony's Finch Diner Files for Clicheruptcy". in which I chronicled my problems with my finch feeder franchise. A fellow blogger took note of my problems and promised to contact his congressman to enlist his aid in getting some significant stimulus money to save Tony's Finch Diners.

To my surprise, the stimulus money did become available. After consulting my board, I embarked upon a major renovation of my finch feeder ( code for " I bought an expensive feeder").

Early in May, Tony's Finch Diner had a grand opening. Business was great and finches of all varieties flocked to the new feeder. Success was short lived. News of the diner spread to the bird population. Especially noted was the platform at the bottom of the feeder. Mourning Doves decided that the platform was put there for their use. Yes, the doves became regular customers. What was meant to be a finch feeder was now a dove feeder.

Tony's Dove Feeder

To add insult to injury, yesterday I received a letter from the Treasury Department. In no uncertain terms I was advised that I had misspent the stimulus money. It was meant for a finch feeder, not a dove feeder. There is no way I can pay back the money. I did offer to ship the feeder to The White House. I understand there is a dog named Bo there ( I assume he is still there - hasn't been in the news lately)  who might be able to scare the doves away. I received another insulting letter calling me a fool to think the dog would scare the doves and not the finches. I responded that since the stimulus money spent on the car companies is still going to result in an 11 billion dollar loss for The Treasury, they could easily absorb my $29.95 loss.

Standing Room Only

The last I heard was that Obama was going to keep his distance from my yard when it comes to touting stimulus money successes.



But I Had Reservations

Tony's Finch Diner Files For Clicheruptcy

Tony’s Finch Diner was established in 1995 and has been the diner of choice for countless Goldfinches, Purple Finches and House Finches. In spite of a crappy economy, in the Spring of 2009, Tony decided to franchise the Diner. He didn’t let any grass grow under his feet and by the end of 2010 there were three Tony’s Finch Diners feeding the neighborhood’s Finch population. Judging from the Tweets on Twitter, Tony’s Finch Diners have been a success but anyone with a bird brain could have seen that success would be fleeting. Most analysts looked at the Finch diner expansion as a classic case of the grass looking greener on the other side.

Notwithstanding predictions of failure, Tony developed what he considered a sure fire business plan. The plan simply called for Tony eating like a bird and relying on birds of a feather to flock together. This would result in improved health, which would result in reduced health costs thus providing for the influx of Finches to his feeders. The reduced health costs would be more than enough to cover the rising cost of thistle and he'd be the toast of the business world. The strategy did result in fewer medical visits and procedures in 2010 but by 2011 it became clear that in spite of improved health, health costs were actually ballooning or more to the point were flying out of control. At the end of the day, reduced health costs could not be relied upon to cover the rising cost of thistle . The business model was in a complete meltdown. It was a case of too much business ruining the business. The return on investment was miniscule.

A little bird told this reporter, that starting this Spring, two Tony's Finch Diners will fly the coop, leaving only one Tony’s Finch Diner open for business. When asked to comment, Tony confirmed the rumor, stating a bird in the hand’s worth two in the bush. He emphatically said that he has Tweeted Mother Nature about his plan to downsize and reminded her of her responsibility for feeding Finches. He also mentioned that hopefully his neighbor’s feeder will pick up some of the feeding (Tony never understood why his feeders were so popular while the neighbors feeder’s thistle consumption was hardly enough to feed a bird).

Upon further questioning, Tony also revealed that he seriously considered throwing in the towel and becoming free as a bird. Asked to explain himself, Tony said he was not about to sing like a bird. The interview ended abruptly when Tony unceremoniously gave this reporter the bird.

Ed Note: In spite of all the lame excuses about rising health costs, an anonymous source has revealed that the owner of Tony’s Finch Diners is just too damn lazy to operate more than one diner. It has also been reported that Mother Nature Tweeted Tony and informed him in no uncertain terms that she never asked for his help and was perfectly capable of taking care of her own. When asked to comment, Tony’s response was that there will always be a Tony’s Finch Diner and that he was planning a new venture for 2011 - an upscale Humming Bird Bar where Humming Birds could wet their whistle with Tony's special nectar. When told that this was not compatible with the reasons he has previously given for downsizing his Finch diners, he responded that thanks to new funding and his formula for nectar he had a sure fire plan for his new venture. He did not reveal the source of his funding

All Is Well

I put my humming bird feeder out a couple of days ago and today I got my first visitor. The nectar must have been good since his visit was a long one. If someone spots an intoxicated humming bird flying around its my friend - tell him he didn't pay his bar tab. Finch feeders and humming bird feeders - life doesn't get any better.

Tony's Finch Diner

Tony’s Finch Diner was established in 1995 and is still the diner of choice for connoisseurs of good food among goldfinches, purple finches and house finches. Business is flourishing in spite of the economy since birds prefer to eat out. By word of beak and lately the social networking phenomenon Twitter, birds of a feather have been twittering up a storm about Tony’s Finch Diner.

Birds do not eat like a bird and with the price of thistle going up it is becoming a challenge to maintain the high standards at Tony‘s Finch Diner. Some thought has been given to charging a perch fee but collecting it would be impossible and brings up scenes from the movie “Birds”. Diluting the thistle, cutting down on the number of perches, and shortening the feeder hours were also options but dismissed out of hand. Someone also suggested hiring a cat as a security guard to reduce the traffic. The price would be cheap, all the birds it could eat. The result would be bankruptcy for the Diner and would make a jailbird out of Tony once word got out to the Audubon Society.

Actually the problem is not so difficult to solve. If Tony starts eating like a bird he can afford thistle ( for the birds) no matter how high the price. Moreover, a more healthy life style will reduce health costs and Tony can begin to consider franchising Tony’s Finch Diner. Once the money starts rolling in, its eat, drink and be merry!