K I T S C H — Cate's Blog

Tuesday, August 02, 2005

Flightless birds

It's amazing that no one died in this plane crash. What's not so remarkable, I suppose, were the number of jerkwads who stopped their cars on the highway next to the airport and got out to watch the plane burning. Seriously, who does shit like that? And on a major highway during rush hour? Wouldn't you be embarrassed if people you knew recognized you and your car in news footage being broadcast around the world?

We're at least five miles away from the crash, but when I stepped out into the white smog haze on my balcony a few minutes ago, I just about passed out from the smell of burning airplane. Not surprisingly, it's a really eerie smell -- not like anything I've ever encountered before, thank God. I sure hope none of those useless gapers on the highway needed treatment for smoke inhalation.

Over the past few weeks, we've come across two birds that needed rescuing. The first one was a seagull in the park. It was caught by the end of its wing on a fishing hook someone had left dangling off a branch over Etobicoke Creek: the same creek that burning plane is sitting next to right now. The seagull was too far over the water for us to reach it, although, to be honest, I can't say I'd be brave enough to perform a rescue attempt on a thrashing, terrified bird with a wingspan of three feet or so.

Because we're the last cellphoneless losers in Toronto, we drove to a nearby payphone. By the time we'd navigated through the byzantine automated phone system of Parks and Recreation late on a Friday afternoon and actually reached a live person who promised to send someone out, the seagull had worked itself free and flown off. The Parks and Rec guy who came out managed to knock the hook off the line by throwing branches at it. He said birds get caught on hooks like that surprisingly often. Something else that was surprising to me was that we were the only ones who had tried to call someone out. Seriously, what is wrong with people?

This past weekend we were with some friends at a park zoo in Waterloo. Have you ever seen a white peacock? I hadn't until Sunday. That is one pretty bird. And with its tail feathers spread out, its ass looks like a beautiful, fancy, feathery chair. But I digress.

There was a family of pheasanty-looking young birds with their mother in an enclosure, except one of the chicks had found its way outside through a gap between the fence and the gate. Instead of trying to get back in, it stuck as close as it could to its mother, who had moved twenty feet away from the gate. This baby bird's brain was about the size of a peanut, so it's really not so strange that it would be flummoxed by the physics knowledge required to navigate its way back inside.

I figured I could take this bird on, seeing as how it was less than a foot tall, so I started walking it back to the gate in the hope that it could make the connection and find its way back in. There were a few times I thought it might start pecking me, but luckily I managed to scare it into moving on by shaking the container of almonds we keep in the trunk for emergency squirrel feeding. The almonds are a little old since they're left over from Sir Pet-A-Lot, but have you seen some of the stuff squirrels eat? They even enjoy SweetTarts. Um, not that I should tell you how I know this fact.

So, the baby pheasant is making these pathetic little chirping sounds, obviously afraid that I'm a very slow-moving hunter intent on turning it into a delicious dinner by braining it with a Tupperware container full of nuts. I had a few fearful moments myself as I wondered if I'd be able to get this bird back into its home before the arrival of the nasty family we'd seen by the bunny enclosure earlier -- the parents who smiled proudly as their two dreadful children tried to wallop the rabbits through the fence with sticks while screaming at the top of their lungs. I know that if I had children, the first thing I'd want to teach them is how to frighten creatures who are much smaller and more helpless than they are. That sure is a valuable life lesson.

God, I'm so self-righteous today. But seriously, what is wrong with people?

The pheasant managed to squeeze under a gap in the fence before the children could turn it into a pinata. I really like to think that spoiled the little demon urchins' day.

I also like to think that God rewarded me by making the fuckwits down at Canada Post finally locate the shiny new modem I'm using to upload this entry -- the same modem they've been sitting on for almost three weeks now. Their inability to send out even one of the two postcards they're supposed to deliver so I can pick up my package makes me think that in a chess match against a baby pheasant, they might not fare so well.