Attack of the Red-Winged Blackbird – Part 2

There are so many things I wish to write about but didn’t have the time yesterday but perhaps I’ll start off with a little story of our friend Agelaius phoeniceus.

I was thinking that I had the bird beat a few days ago when I decided to move my car eight spots farther down the parking lot to avoid Agelaius. I pull into the parking lot space #8 while listening to some morning news, minding my own business when I put it into park and am about to hop out when I freeze.

“Where is Agelaius?” I ponder.

I scope out the territory and don’t see Agelaius anywhere so I think I am safe. It is raining out there so perhaps birds lay low for the time being. I reflect on the fact that I don’t really know a lot about birds at this point in my life and wonder if I am missing out not being a bird watcher. My own mother emailed me the other day and indicated that it is not a morning dove, but a mourning dove. Funny how the spelling of a word can bring such a happy picture of a bird to a tragic one.

I exit the vehicle seeing that the bus is waiting at the stop and it has been known to pull away at the last moment. I have 50 meters of pavement to dash across so I close my door and look around. I’m safe! Agelaius is not to be seen!

At the half way mark I am feeling pretty good until I hear the shrill cry of the Banshee. In other’s ears, they hear “Tweet, tweeeet!”. In mine I hear “You thought I was gone. I have returned. I will wreak havoc on your vehicle.”

In fear, I turn suddenly to find out where my arch enemy is to find that he is hopping and shitting along someone else’s car. Excellent. Perhaps he will be amused for the entire day with this other person’s vehicle, although I now wonder if I should leave a note on their car indicating that I wish to create a task force (perhaps Delta Force?) to take care of this problem.

All was well when I got back to my car that night to find it had rained on it all day long and most of the crap on the car that I had failed to wipe off was gone.

Fast forward to this morning, I am feeling like a new man. I still decide to pull into Parking Spot #8 (a few meters away from my old spot, but all that more to run to the bus with) and am feeling good. The sun is shining, I hear Bluesfest is coming to town (holy crap, I just read Dose on the bus this morning and found out that Matt Mays and Sam Roberts are playing together. I am in heaven.), and life is good (other than the exam I have to write on Saturday night). I hop out of the car.

“Hey buddy, how’s it going?” I hear.

I peer to my right and there he is. The bane of my existence. Agelaius up in a tree. I look around. There are no other cars in this section because I came in a little early this morning.

“Oh no.” I think. What do I do?

The bus pulls up and I have 45 meters to cover. Do I go back to the car and park it on the far side of the lot? That will mean I have to wait 10 minutes for the next bus. But I will have peace of mind when I think of the bird shit and the bird clawing away at my paint job. In a rash decision I run to the bus thinking that Agelaius will find other cars closer to his tree to bother today.

But I still felt the pain when Agelaius swooped in towards my car and started to hop around the side mirror so it could see its reflection in my window. You’ve won this time Agelaius…but the war is not over.