For those of you that follow Real Housewives of Atlanta...no...Nene Leakes did NOT land in our backyard (but could you IMAGINE if she had???? Now THAT'D be a blog entry). Rather, the nene is a Hawaiian goose. It is the world's rarest goose and is considered endangered.
So Chris and I were just hanging out in our living room when out of the corner of my eye I see this:
"Chris! I think there's a goose in our yard!" say I.
"What?!" says Chris.
We leap up to investigate...keep in mind my dear readers, I LIVE IN THE MIDDLE OF NO WHERE. And now to add insult to injury we have no TV. So yes, a goose landing in our backyard is pretty darn exciting by our current living standards.
"I think it's a nene." says Chris. This now kicks our excitement up a few notches. We take a few pictures and then after staring at it and watching it (I wish I could say I was exaggerating) for a good hour or so, we call the local rescue people.
THE NENE UP CLOSE
As the nene is endangered, we don't want to mess too much with this thing. So imagine our surprise when they tell us to feed it and give it water. Keep in mind that there are signs all over Hawaii not to feed the nene.
The lady Chris called needed to get in contact with the nene biologist (or as Chris calls her, "the federally licensed nene messer with-er"). In the meanwhile we were to watch the nene and of course feed it. This was not a difficult task as it was the most exciting thing to happen to Chris since I'd been gone on my trip back to the East coast.
WE TAUGHT IT TO BOW FOR BREAD (I'M KIDDING) 
GAVE IT WATER 
"PLEASE SIR, I WANT SOME MORE" 
AND FED IT LETTUCE Apparently nene go gaga for lettuce. But on a more serious note, we had noticed that it was missing a foot. This is another reason we had called the rescue folks. The poor thing just hobbled around like it was sensitive to bear weight on it and it was pretty sad to watch.
The rescue lady called Chris back and this is what I heard on my end: "Uh-huh. Really? Wow. How? Have you ever done this before? Okay, my girlfriend can help me."
So what did we have to do? Oh, nothing but CATCH AN ENDANGERED SPECIES and put it in a box. And had the rescue lady done this herself? Yeah, once....with a turkey!
Well, we came up with a stellar plan. I'd lure it with bread or lettuce and then Chris would pounce (not literally) with a towel and scoop him up so we could place him in a box. Unfortunately, they may be endangered, but nene are no dummies. It knew what was up.
So this was a perfect time to get friendly with the neighbors. We called them down from their balcony (Connie and Aaron/Alan?) and with the four of us we basically chased the poor thing into a corner on our porch so that Chris could do his towel and grab maneuver.
DUCK IN A BOX (HA HA...CHRIS THINKS THIS IS HYSTERICAL)The rescue lady came to pick him up shortly thereafter and after a short lecture on folding the box flaps as we had (Apparently some chicken had gotten it's neck stuck in the gap and had accidentaly hung itself), we thought that'd be the end of Nene S&$*ts as we've taken to calling our nene since it had managed to poop EVERYWHERE in the short time it was with us (Chris again being "punny" on the Real Housewife's name).
Later in the afternoon we get a call from our rescue lady. Our friend was deemed fine and his foot was not needing medical attention. So they re-released him into our backyard and he's been there for the last day or two.
We can't have a pet on our lease, but it didn't say anything about us being adopted by an endangered species....now I wonder what it would take to get a giant panda to land in our yard....
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