Fowl Play

Apologies, Apologies, this blog has once again been woefully neglected! As ever, life caught up with me and this blog got sidelined a little (a lot) but I’m back with the full force of summer upon me and as such I intend to blog more and less randomly.

With that said, I’m going to get the past out of my system and I’m going to start out with an entirely random (if much more lighthearted) post, a post about birds.

I go to a University with an intense amount of waterfowl, so many in fact that in this season you can’t move 10 metres before encountering a rather angry bird. I don’t know if you’ve ever encountered a situation like this, but if you haven’t I assure you that goose fear is not irrational. These *evil* creatures attack at the slightest offence (such as walking past them) and you’ll see countless students walking completely out of their way to avoid them and desperately trying to not to make eye contact, which is difficult when a 2ft tall goose is trying to initiate a staring contest.

Canadian Geese plus spawn…

The only upside to this chaos, is babies…babies everywhere. Whilst geese may have dinosaur-like offspring, I’ve yet to come across a duckling that hasn’t brought forth a girly squeal from my lips. A few weeks back I almost became the adoptive mother to twelve ducklings scared away by the sound of a car, running to huddle at my feet before their real mother angrily quacked them away. My brief thoughts of becoming a parent to ducklings and all the fun we could have together shattered very swiftly.

Black Swans, same height as my EYES when standing…

Tonight on the way to a birthday party I once again envisioned this future…forget cat lady, I think I may end up as a duck lady…Despite the fact I was majorly late, and despite the fact I was hanging around, looking fairly dodgy, on a bridge, I couldn’t help but follow the plight of a poor little baby bird (a coot I believe…) squeaking away on the open lake. It was only until I saw an adult bird (which I really hope was its parent or, failing that, a bird with my own inclination to adoption within different species) that I did depart it but it was begrudgingly and I still feel pretty awful about leaving it out there without knowing it actually was safe. Maybe this is a sign of my emotional state, maybe about my empathetic nature or maybe I’m too far gone after a horrific term of exams and stress that I can’t think straight anymore. This post is definitely proof of one of them and I sincerely hope its not the latter – in which case I apologise profusely for my mental state.

The worrying part is, at this rate, it is not hard to picture a future of wrapping up any children of my own in cotton wool and bubble wrap and never letting them leave my sight, at least not until they can swim (a lá baby bird) and fight off foxes and ravens.

Over the past few years I’ve become heavily acquainted with birds, if this post doesn’t already prove that, and it is this time of year that at once fills me with dread and also makes my insides feel all warm and fuzzy…and broody. I’m already despairing about moving back home for the summer where the wildlife consists off pissed-off pigeons and violent seagulls with asbos.

So, words from the wise… run away from charging geese, stick around near ducklings (and particularly those who are trying to emancipate themselves or are looking like they are particularly in trouble) and at the end of the day, if you ever think this deep knowledge of the lives of birds is worrying, just think, there’s definitely a pub quiz question out there where it’ll come into use. And that’ll be me getting out more too.