Let me start by saying I’m stone cold sober as I write this journal. I am a smidge lightheaded and somewhat jittery because in the last 12 hours I’ve eaten only Lucky Charms… four bowls, and downed two cups of Italian coffee (it’s the only coffee I can drink since I got back from the Winter Olympics in Torino).

Okay, so my distaste for birds continues. Though I love eating them. Only the plumper of fowl… turkey, chicken and duck. The skinny ones which on rainy days sit and dukie all over my front porch are testing fate and the laws of nature.

In the last week I have battled two of these freaky flying feathered rats which are trying to build a nest on my porch. I’ve thrown three of their “under construction” nests from my porch into the yard.

In one instance I made sure the birds were watching as I screamed at them like a lunatic, and then angrily tossed the nest. Psychological warfare. I was hoping they would think to themselves, “That dude is ca-razy! Let’s move down the street.” But alas birds are victim of their own cliché. See, you don’t end up with a cliché phrase such as, “Bird Brain!” unless there is some truth there. Birds in fact have very tiny brains. So their critical thinking is not great. I’m not even sure they “think on the fly.” That cliché I’m certain has nothing to with birds. Not possible.

So all my screaming and violent nest tossing went for not. It did help some neighbors who witnessed it get a clearer picture of just who the Carolina Traveler is… not a pretty picture, but a more accurate one. Anyway the birds tried to rebuild their nest on my porch again and again. Talk about stubborn. Birds make mules look co-dependent.

I decided to be the bigger, um, man. And in the name of love (for my wife) and compromise (with the birds) I extended an olive branch (And could a metaphor be more appropriate? Not possible. It’s a branch!) to my beady-eyed irritants. That last sentence won’t make much sense unless you go back and read journal 206 and also read it without the multiple parenthetical statements.

Thus I took my weird Valentine gift and created a bird Shangri-La about 10 feet from the porch. My son and I sunk a 6 foot long treated 4x4 into cement and attached the Taj Ma-nest to the top. Then I stained the 4x4 post to match the Ritz Carlton of bird houses and voila, upscale housing for animals that are known to attack their own reflections. Geniuses.

It looks so good one of my neighbors said, “It’s like miniature a ski lodge!” I simultaneously felt proud and insane.

I’m hungry. Be right back.

I’m back. That’s four bowls of Lucky Charms, two very strong coffees and a hot dog.

The Taj Ma-nest has been up for two weeks. No birds have moved in. It has a copper roof, a covered porch, two patio homes, a two-story townhouse… and no birds. My wife even took the last “under construction” bird nest and set it on the front porch of Taj Ma-nest. We were thinking the parallels would entice them. No dice.

So what’s my point? I’m not intolerant. I can compromise… with birds (it’s a start). But (and here’s the life lesson of it all) one cannot reason with something that has no brain. Feel free to apply that little pearl-O-wisdom to your everyday life. A coworker perhaps. A boss. A relationship.

Compromise all you want, but a bird-brain won’t meet you halfway. I’ll give you a few minutes to breathe that in. It will help if you can lay your head down on your desk and take a nap. Just tell your coworkers you’re meditating. I do it all the time. But have a napkin handy for the inevitable drool.

Okay, I’m spent.

Be well,

Mike Redding