Pigeons

The weather has a bit of the crazies and has gone from 70 degrees to 10 inches of snow in a matter of days. The "wintry mix" started early this morning and started to make the roads disastrous fairly quickly. This led my boss to schedule a meeting with the team from 2-4:30 to review various issues and most likely to keep us at work.

I made it home and actually shoveled my sidewalk (much to my neighbors surprise). To celebrate my accomplishment, I made some tea. My guest bedroom was feeling neglected so I went up and looked out over my backyard as I sipped my dairretic and noticed an intereting site: about 10 pigeons perched on a cable connected to my neighbor's house. Normally, this wouldn't be anything to think twice about but it was pelting ice with some heavily duty winds. Yet, there they sat, perched in unison and adjusting their tails to keep their balance seemingly ignoring the ridiculous weather.

Now, I've never been a fan of pigeons. To put it mildly, I think they are filthy street rats that just get in your way. If you've ever walked down a street in NYC, you know what I'm talking about. They just walk around jabbing their necks forward in ingorance as they walk and peck at anything that looks disgusting. They are lazy creatures that don't fly unless it's absolutely necessary. I mean, you would literally have to pick one up and throw it off a bridge for it to actually fly. I once saw a person kick one and even then, nothing. It rolled a few times, looked a the guy and continued pecking at the ground.

But apparently, some people value these things. In Middle Eastern countries, they are a delicacy (they were actually on menus in Egypt) and in San Juan, they have a little square with hundreds of them. People visit this square and feed them. As thanks, pigeons flock there by the hundreds and crap all over the ground and make the entire block radius smell with foul odors.

Back to the here and now though, the pigeons are sitting on this wire and I realized how incompetent these things really are. They are sitting on this wire, getting pelted by a lot of ice at high winds and they don't feel like making the effort to look for a place that has some shelter. Despite my distaste for these creatures, they could have easily flown (heaven forbid) to my covered back porched and rode out the storm there and I would have only charged them a nominal fee. They could have even WALKED 30 feet further and had a plethora of cards to hide underneath.

Maybe I'm overcomplicating things. PERHAPS, these animals are impervious to ice and other elements. I don't know. I just thought it was ridiculous that they would sit there and take it. And yes, I've spent way too much time thinking about pigeons... I need another cup of tea.