Tulsa Soccer Tournament

Tulsa, Oklahoma, is a 4.5 to 5 hours drive from DFW. It's tornado season. Who cares? Let's all drive there for a weekend soccer tournament anyway! It was, of course, a great weekend.

A recent shake up in US youth soccer changed teams from being grade level/academic year to  acalendar year system. Last season David's U11 team was made up of 5th graders, kids born in 2004/2005; this season the U12's are all born in 2005, a mixture of 5th & 6th graders. This effectively divided all the teams in the club in half and redistributed them. David was given the choice to 'play up' with the 2004's, which included some of his good friends from school. It was a tough decision but he chose to play in his age group. Therefore the aim of the tournament was for the kids to get to know each other and bond both on and off the pitch.

After driving through the pretty and green Oklahoma countryside, (narrowly avoiding going 30 miles the wrong way down the "Indian Toll Road") we eventually arrived in Tulsa and went straight to David's first game, which was a comfortable win. Afterwards we checked in to our hotel and the boys played in the pool, before we all headed out for dinner in an Italian restaurant. Sunday brought two more games. We had to leave before all the games in their group had been played as it was a long drive home. David & I kept ourselves busy playing 'Spot the Dead Dillo', our count of armadillo roadkill got up to 11. Eventually the results of the final games came through; the team had won their group. A fantastic start for the Fever 05's, and a fun weekend for all.

David's on the ball!

Owl rescue

This morning, whilst walking the dog with a couple of friends, we spotted a beautiful owl sitting in a tree on quite a low branch. The owl was only moving it's head and eyes and we thought it odd to see an owl in broad daylight. We decided to continue on our walk and see if the owl was still be there on our return, as it wasn't far from home. Thirty minutes later we find the owl on a lower branch and it was obvious something was wrong with it's right wing; it was hanging at a strange angle. My friend, Kathy, made some calls and discovered a local animal hospital that will take injured birds of prey, as long as WE catch it and take it in: The mission was set!

A beautiful Barred Owl with a poorly wing

We went home, got our wellies on and hopped in the car (luckily the owl wasn't far from a road) with a blanket and some heavy duty gloves, and headed back to get the owl. We had to scramble down through a creek and up the other side and through lots of scrub to get to him, whilst trying to put out of our minds that this was snake territory. As we approached the owl from behind, he slowly turned his head 360 degrees to look at us, we both stopped in our tracks and said "wow!", it was quite a sight. He then got jittery and flapped awkwardly onto a different branch, so we crept towards him slowly from different sides of the tree. We managed to get close enough to wrap the blanket around him. I tried to lift him from the branch and he clung on with all his might, his huge talons were very strong, but he eventually let go. He was surprisingly calm all wrapped up in the blanket as we clambered back through the undergrowth and crossed the creek. We carried him to the car and drove to the Southlake Animal Hospital without a peep. On our way, we decided we should give him a name, so we came up with 'Shakespeare', as in 'The Bard', given he was a barred owl.

The nurse at the animal hospital took Shakespeare from us. She thought he looked quite healthy, bright and alert, and hopefully hadn't been injured for very long. We told them we had called him Shakespeare, but she kindly informed us that they don't give the birds names, just a number, so they don't get attached to them.

I phoned the animal hospital a few days later, explaining how we had dropped off an owl with an injured wing and were wondering how he was getting along. The nurse said 'Oh, you mean Shakespeare!' - so much for the number! She said the vet had mended the wing, and Shakespeare was recuperating in a large barn at the back of the practice. If he regains his full strength, he will be returned to the wild.