December 15th, 2002

For my first entry in the new "journal" I think I'll tell you all about my day yesterday. Well, not all about it. I'll just elaborate on the most "exciting" 30-45 minutes of it. It all started about 7:20 AM. My mom had just left for work and I was curled up in bed enjoying the first of two episodes of News Radio on A&E. I heard a little russling in the kitchen and at first thought my mom had not yet left for work. I continued listening closely but heard nothing else so I chalked it up to my imagination. I kept on watching my beloved News Radio then I heard something else in the kitchen. Just a slight... I don't know how to explain it. Just a little noise. Still, nothing was going to take me from my News Radio. But the third time, it was too loud to ignore. I got out of bed as the first show was ending. I walked into the kitchen and took a look around but didn't really see anything out of place nor was there anyone in there stealing silverware or anything so, again, I was ready to chalk it up to my imagination. That was until something flew right at my face and had me hit the floor like I had just heard a gunshot. I looked up and what did I see? Quite a bit of brownie crumbs on the floor beside me. Also, a bird was in the house. I stood up and took a look out the window to make sure no one had witnessed my Matrix-esque, scared sh!tless backward flail to the floor.

When I was sure no one had, I turned my attention back to the bird that had almost taken my head off. No, I'm not exaggerating. Sparrows have been known to do that. And this was no ordinary sparrow. It was a full grown sparrow. I flung the back door open and decided I should try to herd it out the door. After about twenty minutes of chasing it from a shelf to a window, I decided this wasn't going to work. Also, it was very cold out so it was about 30 degrees in the house now. It was time for plan B. I had to get help from the expert bird catcher... My dog Rowdy. I'm serious, he can actually catch birds. You'll occasionally find a dead one out in the yard that he's caught. I don't know if they're the retarded ones and just fall out of trees or if they just decide to fly low to the ground to toy with him or what. It seems it would be near impossible to be a bird and die via dog bite. Though there is this bush that birds occasionally land in. Rowdy goes nuts for that. It's a rare occurence so any time it happens you can bet he's going to charge it and dive in headlong. It's pretty funny to watch. So anyway, I let Rowdy in and he goes right to work... Cleaning up those brownie crumbs I mentioned. But after that I try to show him the bird and run it around a little to make him aware of it. He does as I thought and is going psycho. He's climing in chairs and running all over the place after that bird.

I grabbed a broom which I thought would help for some reason but things still don't go as planned. Rowdy is no help at all and the bird is still not seeing the wide open door. It's been about thirty or thirty five minutes now and I can tell the bird is dead tired. I'm also getting there pretty quickly so out of desperation, I grab a blanket. I'm hoping that the thing will fly at me and I'll time everything just right and catch it in the blanket then just carry it outside. I tried that about twice and coming into contact with something it didn't mean to come into contact with sent the bird into a craze. It went all over the place and I eventually grabbed the broom and started batting at it. It went low and hit a chair. That's where Rowdy sprang into action. He dove but missed and knocked over a houseplant in the process. The bird took off and hit another chair because it was now under the kitchen table. Rowdy went for it again but was too slow. He was in the zone by now and was not going to give up easily. He took advantage of the situation (the two being under the kitchen table) and just went, as Dennis Heiskill would put it, "ape shit." He eventually got the bird and gave it a few little bites, making it unable to fly. I ordered him out of the house and somehow he understood the order. He carried the bird outside and put it down on the front lawn. I watched him bite it a few more times until it was dead before I shut the door.