The Bird Man of Matthews

Yesterday I was refilling the gas tank on the wood chipper and looked up to see an eastern phoebe (a flycatcher) had landed on a small limb about ten feet away. This was pretty unusual, I thought, especially considering all the racket I had made with the chipper just moments earlier. I watched the bird for a minute and before long it swooped toward me to catch a bug, then landed on the hopper of the wood chipper, just three feet away! I stood very still, not sure if the phoebe was somehow unaware of my presence, completely unwary of humans, or was rabid and about to peck my eyeballs out.

Moments later I found out. It WAS rabid. It flew right at my face and when I ducked my head back, it fluttered around for a moment in front of my face, but then settled back to its perch on the chipper.

So I decided it wasn’t rabid after all and was uninhibited. Seeing how tame it was I slowly stretched my hand toward it, got within six inches, and amazingly, it flew up and perched on my index finger!

About this time Audry came out to see why I was standing so still staring at the chipper and as she approached I turned toward her, my arm still outstretched, to present my new friend. Imagine her face to see me standing in the woods with a wild bird on my finger! I could have eaten this bird like Golum if I’d wanted to, he was so friendly.

He swooped to get another bug and landed on a limb, but not long after that, he flew up to Audry and landed right on her head! I guess that’s what he (or she) was trying to do when it flew toward my face earlier. So, it stood on Audry’s head for a minute (fortunately didn’t poop) swooped for a bug, then perched on my arm for a while before heading to a limb again.

A funny thing is that this phoebe would not leave us. For ten or fifteen minutes, until we finally went inside, he hadn’t flown more than a few feet away. He was swooping and diving in between us, always perching within just a few feet.

I don’t know what’s wrong with me. At the apartment I had Carolina wrens eating lunch with me in the living room, anoles and skinks eating from my hand, and now an eastern phoebe finds me in the woods and wants to be pals.

Just call me Jeffrey Doolittle.

That’s Doctor Doolittle, please.

Yuck

So, the first day of class is over, I'm in my hotel room at the Hampton Inn waiting for the clock to turn seven so I can meet a few collagues for dinner. Meanwhile, someone is changing my bed. When I sat on the bed I noticed several (many severals actually)long dark hairs on the white comforter. Ok, not the worst sanitation offense in history, but, when I turned the comforter down to hide the hair while I waited for the front desk to send up fresh bedding, I saw (I hope you've eaten your dinner) a blood stain on the sheet! Not a drop, but a stain about 2-inches in diameter.

This is not acceptable. Obviously nobody changed the bedding after the last occupant checked out. And by the looks of the stain they may have checked out in more ways than one.

It took the young Asain man who just left my room about 10 minutes to change the bedding, but he was good-natured and appologetic so all's forgiven.

I just hope I can forget the image of my bed before appetizers arrive.

Away for the week

When I started my new job with Union County it was understood that after about a year I would have to start taking classes to enhance my skills as a tax assessor. But because of scheduling issues, I think, my department has me going away to Chapel Hill—after just four months—for a week of training starting on Monday. The class is called Judo-Yoga and the Art of Tax Payer Dispatch. Okay, no it isn’t. It’s called Property Tax Listing and Assessing, but I like the sound of the Judo-Yoga class much better.

The class runs four days, Monday through Thursday, and there’s a test Friday morning (how dare they) at nine, and then I’ll come home right afterward, which is nice of course, because I’ll get back by mid-afternoon making for a somewhat abbreviated work day. That’s right, a workday. Just because I’m eating eggs benedict on the County, copying answers for the test from the geek next to me, and charging a Starbucks to the county for the drive home doesn’t mean I’m not working.

Incidentally, I’m not a big fan of overnight travel for work-related purposes, especially trips that require several consecutive nights away from home. But I've been fortunate up to this point in my life to not EVER spend a night away for business. Of course, a good number of my vocational years I spent in self-employment, but that’s not the point.

The point is I don’t want to be away from home unless I'm with Audry (I can hear your heart-felt sobs). In five years of marriage we’ve been lucky not to have been apart on more than two occasions, and for only two nights both times. The first time is when Audry stayed with her friend Jennifer to attend an architecture seminar in Boston, and the second is that time early in our marriage when I neglected to change my socks for several days straight and had to sleep in the tool shed until I promised to submit to regular hygiene inspections.

But those days are over. Thank goodness for all of us.

Anyway, that’s the sad state of my (and Audry’s) life this week. So do your health a favor and give Audry a buzz this week. Or I’ll mail my dirty socks to your front door.