Todd's Cavalcade of Whimsy

Not to get all Alfred Hitchcock or anything, but something really freaky is going on with the birds today. Not once, not twice, but three times over the span of a few hours did birds careen into my house's windows. And let me tell you, nothing makes you scream, "I'M NOT READY TO DIE!" like a wee girl more than sitting calmly at the computer when a live animal smashes into the glass two feet away from you. Twice it happened at my office window upstairs. Then during lunch downstairs, another bird flattened itself against our big dining room picture window.

When I went out to investigate the third one, I found the bird in question standing about 6 feet to the left of the window. It looked pretty dazed, as you would have expected. I walked up to it, and it just stood there fairly motionless, struggling to keep its expressionless little eyes open. I moved in closer, but it freaked me out to have its head cock quickly to the side to focus on my movements. I pictured the bird going ape-shit (bird-shit?) on me and pecking at my eyes until my ocular cavities were emptied and my now-drained eyeballs hung from my skull like so much linguini, so I didn't fully approach it. I felt like I should do something for it, but the only thing I know about caring for animals is a) when a dog eats grass, it's trying to throw up, and b) they shoot horses when their legs are broken. The grass-eating option was clearly out of the question since my pansy-ass was too afraid to get near the bird, so I briefly considered the second option. Realizing I don't own a gun, I went with the lesser-utilized third option of caring for creatures that are more helpless than us humans: I pretended the whole thing didn't happen. Back into the house I went.

Thankfully a few hours later the bird flew away on its own, and I put the whole bizarro episode of the three birds dive-bombing our house behind me. Until 10 minutes ago, when I heard this horrible screeching noise coming from our back porch. Three birds (different than the windows-challenged birds) were fighting something fierce on the patio. I mean a knock down, drag out, throw each other around fighting. And whenever I neared the door or the window, they would all stop, look at me, and stare me down, which is unsettling on a whole different level. It really makes me feel oogy when wild animals are aware of me, but show no fear, and even more so when the animals are smaller than me. I mean, I understand why a bear isn't going to be afraid of me, but a squirrel showing signs of bravery only means it's crazy and feral enough to really do some damage on my unprotected extremities. This also goes for birds, raccoons, and especially the ever-so-freaky Praying Mantis. I once had a Praying Mantis land on my screen door (on the opposite side, thankfully), and whenever I would approach it, its weird triangle head and those bulbous, all-seeing eyes would slowly rotate and track me as I moved like it was freaking Predator. I didn't know what it was planning in its frightening insect head, but I knew it had something to do with chewing off my face and "mounting" my body so as to lay eggs in it.

But the good news is that it's no longer so insanely hot here, so all the windows are securely closed. I don't know what happens when a bird flies full speed into a window screen, but neither making it through and attacking me about me head, neck, and chest nor not making it through and becoming criss-cut bird are all that appealing to me.