Tuesday, July 29, 2008

3 is a (black) magic number

there's some weird voodoo going on between work and birds. 2 years ago, i hit a bird coming off the freeway and although i didn't kill it, it left a macabrely beautiful imprint on my bumper. almost as if it had been coated in fairy dust.

last month, there was this mournful incident.

this morning, there was this:




aren't birds supposed to get out of the way? so often they're weaving in and out of traffic, playing chicken as it were, only to swoop away at the last second. clearly birds have a precise, inherent sense of timing and space that enables them to survive this game. well, this guy missed my windshield, but obviously didn't factor in my roof rack. when we found him, he had one wing crooked over the bar while the rest of his body had passed under it. oops.

this happened on the off-ramp of the freeway and as we came to the red light at the end of the ramp, other vehicles were pointing at us, trying to draw our attention to the fact that we had a dead creature on our roof. as if we didn't notice the horrific thump it made on impact!

and of course this had to happen when i had a carful of witnesses, too. the teenagers were somewhat shocked and expressed (in my opinion, fake) disgust. fortunately, pooka seemed unfazed and bug was oblivious.

when we got to work, chris retrieved a stick and pushed the bird onto the ground, and then i aske done of the building maintenance men to dispose of it. i figured they would have gloves and shovels and other appropriate tools. when we returned to the truck later in the day, all that was left was some small white feathers.

well, at least i got blog fodder out of it.