Saturday, May 21, 2016

WHEN THE RED, RED ROBIN COMES CRASH, CRASH CRASHING.


It is now about 12 weeks, and the bird keeps crashing into my window! This bird is the epitome of the usage: “Bird Brain.”

On the side of my house, where my dining room sits there is a trellis, which is the entry to a side garden. On the trellis birds will on occasion land and rest for a while. After resting they will fly off and return to their nest or perhaps continue their flight to somewhere I know not. But they came, they sat, they left, and all was well.

Then one morning as I was getting up at 5:30 AM, I heard this constant knock coming from downstairs. I wondered why my wife was mopping the floors at such an ungodly hour! It sounded like the mop was hitting a wall or some object, but thought nothing more of it.

Arriving downstairs I got my customary cup of coffee and sat in the den with TLW (The Little Woman). I hear the noise again, and ask what it was. She shrugs her shoulder and says it sounds like it is coming from the kitchen between the den and dining room. I go to investigate, hear it again, but not in the kitchen! I investigate further and go into the dining room and hear it one more time. A robin is flying into the window! He would fly into the window, crash onto the ground and fly up to the trellis again and do it all over again! When I got close to the window it flew away, leaving me thinking: “Crazy bird!”

Not five minutes have gone by when I hear the noise again, I get up to see and the damned bird is at it once more! I run to the window this time and shoo it away, thinking I scared it and it will not return. And so for the rest of the day, this went on, the stupid bird flying into my window.

I start to think that maybe I should put some up so it doesn’t hurt or kill itself, and TLW puts some newspapers on the inside of the window, hoping that will do the trick. Nope, back it comes again! After a few days of this, I go out to the trellis and spray some vinegar on the trellis, hoping the smell might discourage it, it lands on the vinegar (maybe looking for a salad) and the process still continues.

We go on the internet and look up ways to discourage the bird from attacking my window. TLW says it might be in love with me or some smart aleck remark like that. But on one website it is suggested that marking up the window with soap will do the trick! GREAT!

I grab a bar of Ivory hand soap and march outside and smear the window, taking my frustrations out on the bird by writing him/her a note: “GO AWAY YOU STUPID DAMNED BIRD!”

It was immediately after reading what I wrote that I realized that the bird was not the only one who was a bird brain in this affair, I had succumbed to its trickery! However, the frustration was alleviated at least, and so I left it there. In fact, my neighbor posted a picture of it on her Facebook page!

And so March turned to April and April to May, and here we are, with no resolution in sight on how to rid this bird of its illusions. Some theories are they bird sees itself in the reflection and wants to mate, it sees one of my paintings on the wall and is confused, and so on and so forth.

If it is any consolation, the bird has cut down on its frequency of visits, stays away on rainy days and only comes once or twice a day for a little while.

It has got me wondering if it is one and the same bird or maybe more than one.

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