pickles and snot

coming home from an errand on friday morning, i let my dog out onto the back patio. instead of scrambling up the cast iron stairs as usual (i live in a basement apartment), she beelined under the stairs and, in an act of "terrier"ism, she attacked a fuzzy pile of baby birds, each the size of a lime. eventually i was able to wrestle my dog from the melee, but it was too late for one bird and another was severely injured.

i was upset so i called animal control and they said to bring in peanut (the dead one) and bradley (the injured one). (s. and i named them after the fact. we named the two who survived pickles and snot). on the phone, the woman had the voice of a concerned and informed zookeeper; i assumed then and do now that when she told me that bradley was going to be sent to a rehabilitation park for injured birds, she meant it. after she inspected bradley when i arrived at animal control, the woman told me that they were baby starlings.

returning from animal control, i peeked out my window at the remaining two birds. it seemed that they'd recovered from the earlier trauma and the disappearance of their brothers because they were moving around in the leaves under the stairs. s. and i had a fun time watching them over the weekend; it felt like we'd acquired two new pets. by sunday night, though, they were bouncing around the bottom of the stairs like popcorn. we realized that they were learning to fly. it was cute; they were hopping around so much that, lying in bed sunday night, i could hear them hit the backdoor and the walls with each failed attempt. they gradually got higher and higher off the ground and, by monday night, each had flown away.

anyway, it was neat to watch. i'm sad they're gone but my dog is thankful she can go out onto the patio again.