It's For The Birds

 That’s right. The birds.

      There are bunches of them, and they’ve been driving my family crazy for a week now. We go to bed, wake up to, and spend our time at home surrounded by what sounds like a small dog barking and a squeaky toy being repetitively stepped on. In reality, the racket is coming from a huge black raven honking its head off at some louder, squeakier and even more irritating group of magpies. They’re fighting over sticks. Really. Sticks that they each want to use for nests they are in the midst of constructing. Nest that will be home for their squawking babies for 5 – 7 weeks. These nests, as creative and lovely as they may seem, are large and obstructive, and are either in the tree directly outside my window or ON the log truss holding up the roof, which is also right outside my window. The squawking never ceases; there are no quiet moments of reprieve, but rather just a constant chafing of an otherwise perfect spring day.

      I know…nature at it’s best, but I have to tell you these huge and ominous looking flying freaks are making me a little insane. It’s not the sweet chirp of a robin or peaceful song of a dove that is ringing in my ears, but a loud and grating tuneless screech instead. It’s incessant. It’s tasteless. It’s what I imagine brainwashers and interrogators would use to render their victims helpless, willing and adaptable. It’s what was making me raven (I mean raving) mad! And no wonder it’s called a murder of ravens or magpies. No mistake there.

      Hey, I’m all about living in harmony with nature, but I don’t feel like the birds are being respectful or civil at all. They’re not listening to MY needs. I’d be happy to let them build the nest and have their little flying rodents, if they’d just tone it down a bit. Compromise….the foundation of any tolerable relationship.

        Before I knew it, I found myself sitting at my desk with the window opened fully, my pump action BB rifle perched perfectly on the sill as I awaited the next twig installment. Being that it was only 30 degrees out, I wrapped myself in a down jacket, pulled on my Uggs, protected my neck and face from the cold with my favorite cashmere wrap (I was already sporting it), and pulled my hat over my head….My hunting hat….in blazing Hunter’s Orange. Yeehaw. Thinking back, I must have been quite a sight… looking like a conspicuous fashion-conscious assassin…but when adrenaline and survival mode kick in, there is no room for perfect planning or a wardrobe change.

         I was only about 8 feet from the nest, the birdy bulls-eye, but it was sitting above me at an angle that wasn’t really giving me a clean shot. As I had scared the diabolical beasts away during my dressing, window opening and gun positioning, I thought this may be a great time for a test shot….to see how I should best hold the firearm in order to ensure a nice vital shot when the nasty creature returned (didn’t want some big bird flopping around the yard, if I missed the vital…) I crouched, leaned my gun on the sill at the perfect angle to pick off the latest building material, a pathetic looking stick, and just as I was about the pull the trigger, it crossed my loopy mind that if I missed, the BB could ricochet off the log truss and either break an expensive solar tinted window, or plug ME in the head! And would a BB gun do the trick anyway? Was I gonzo? It was obvious that I had been so obsessed with eliminating the feathered fussing, that I had neglected my better judgment, succumbing to insane thoughts of retaliation and madness instead. I had lost my serenity. I had lost my mind. I had been rendered mad by birds. Had I become Tippi Hedren? Would I slowly descend into madness as Poe’s character in The Raven? (And I used to love that poem….)

      Snapped back to reality, I questioned my self further. Is it even legal to shoot ravens and magpies in Wyoming? I couldn’t remember. I know that all songbirds are protected, but for god’s sake, there is nothing song-like coming out of those things. So I researched anyway, just to be sure I wouldn’t be headed to jail after my next psychotic episode. Couldn’t you just see the headlines? “Crazed Housewife Holds Flock of Magpies Responsible for Her Shooting Spree” or “Frenzied Female Fights Fowl Play” Great. My husband would love that one. The guy I phoned at the Game and Fish said I could shoot crows, but not ravens or magpies…even though they are in the same family. I asked him again…”Are you sure? Isn’t a raven just an enormous crow? Isn’t a magpie called the ‘coyote in the sky’? You can kill coyotes here…but I wouldn’t…” He confirmed his first stance, and asked me if there was a problem with something and where I was calling from. I hung up. So it turns out, those pesky things are not on the predacious list, and are in fact, protected under Wyoming Game and Fish law. I can NOT shoot them, nor even seriously bother them, no matter how mean they are to the sweet Robins or tuneful doves. Ravens, I read, are actually considered good for the environment, because they help cull mice population and eat the carrion. (Well, who cares - my dogs do that too…..)

      Starlings on the other hand are considered intrusive and fair game…..and they cause quite a rumpus too….

        And my husband wonders what I do all day.

I Got Conched Out

     You'd think I'd have learned my lesson.

     But that defiant Hungarian nature wouldn't let me admit defeat...

      The trek to "Big Ds" seemed like a good idea, mainly because it was a

trek.  An excursion on a lazy island.  A chance for us to explore this 1/2 mile wide adventure land.  Something that felt like moving.  Besides, I'd finished my book...

      Big D's, it turns out, is a conch shack...or place that sells raw, bacteria laden mollusks that have been sitting out in a boat for hours.  In Big D's defense, the prep area looked quite clean, and I personally watched D himself brushing the cutting board with soap and water (conch water?).  But it was his expertise in slicing oranges, tomatoes, onions, limes and that slimy thing called conch, that helped me trust the man with my intestinal tract.  He threw the oranges up into the air, and sliced them with his big, sharp knife as they floated through the down.  He talked to us about how he's been featured in 27 magazines as having the best conch in the world, and how Al Roker did a spot on him on the today show....etc.  So I thought that if Al Roker trusts him, then why shouldn't I?  What I didn't know was that Al was born on Exuma, and has a town named after his family here.  That he has a special interest in promoting the island that is his home. That his opinions are slanted and not entirely objective. That his stomach is accustomed to eating raw, bacteria laden mollusks, made with fruit and vegetables washed in a bucket that also is used for washing raw conch.

      In any case, I tried it.  Actually, more than just tried it.....I ate an extraordinarily large bowl, pilled high into a beautiful triangular pyramid by Big D himself..... sculpted with his large hands that had just made the raw, bacteria laden conch salad.  Yum. And, as you've guessed by now, the gentle gods have decided that being allergic to gluten, diary, all trees and grasses, mold, penicillin and certain types of people, is not a sufficient test for me.  Apparently, now I am to be allergic to conch too.  Yes - I could barely make it home that afternoon – driving 50 miles an hour on a road that shouldn’t be driven more than 35 – because you could fall off the edge of the thing into the mangroves - before, once again, alternating ends over the

toilet for 2 hours straight.  Never planned on getting so intimate with the porcelain. Fun.  No one else got sick, or even cranky, so after inquiring with the oracle (Mr. Google), I discovered that I had displayed symptoms of a mild (they obviously weren’t in the bathroom with me) shellfish allergy.  And, it appears, that one can be allergic to only a few or one form of shellfish, like myself....I think....because up until now, I've been eating mussels and shrimp with no adverse effects.  But the allergy can develop at anytime in one's life, and it will never cease, but only get worse.  Lucky me.

       So, I'll add conch to my list of allergies and now will have to be extra annoying when ordering seafood in a place that also serves conch.... My friends will be overjoyed to dine with me.

      The rest of this trip, I'll be dining on Uncle Ben’s instant boxed rice and canned peas from the best market in town. Oh, and rum.

     Dreaming of paprika chicken with rice noodles and lots of fresh vegetables.