Tastes Like Chicken
We’d just fed the kids. Each in their own spot, as usual: Havoc in the kitchen, Beasil in the entry and Brücke on the downstairs patio.
I was sitting at the computer near Brücke and realized that she was barking at something. I went out to the patio to see her woofing at... a pile of poop? NO, it was a baby bird. = (
I called her into her room (she’s getting much better at responding to her name) and closed the door.
I attempted to catch the little critter but it fluttered across the patio next to the spa. (Barb was watching from the upper yard, where she had the other two contained behind the gate. I’m quite sure she was ready to cry.) I cupped my hands around the poor, frightened critter and carried up the stairs, around the pond and deposited it on the hillside above the 4-foot retaining wall.
Keep in mind that the yard is pretty dense with foliage and none of the dogs could see where I released the bird.
I went downstairs and let Brücke out of her room. She immediately ran to the back corner where I’d let the bird go.
I called her (and she came) and opened the gate to let her into the upper yard. Beasil shot through the gate and back to the corner, followed by Brücke. I called Brücke and deposited her on the other side of the gate and went to get Beasil.
Beasil had vaulted herself over the wall and was frantically trying to get her jaws on the fluttering bird. By the time I got over to her -- chomp!
I called her to me, thinking that I’d have to lift her down.
Wrong. She effortlessly floated down to my feet and looked up at me. I expected to see a wing or tail sticking out of her mouth, but her expression told me why: it was gone.
She marched over to the gate as if to say “My work here is finished. Call me if there’s anything else.”
I wonder if all those feathers will make it ‘dryer than a popcorn fart’?
Tuesday, July 22, 2008
