Big Brass Ones

I may be dumb, but I'm not stupid.

Well, Littermates, it has been an excellent day so far.

The biped and I got up at a little before six this morning. The first thing we discovered--to our unanimous amazement, I assure you--was Phoebe, that young hussy, pacing back and forth on the outside windowsill next to the back door. Apparently, she had been locked out all night, owing to a... ahem... wardrobe malfunction. It seems that she had misplaced her magnetic collar somewhere--left it in some Tom's litter box, I shouldn't wonder--and without it, she cannot enter through the cat door!

When the biped opened the back door to let me out--thank you, my good man!--Phoebe rushed right in without so much as pausing to hear my sincere condolences on her misfortune. Cats!

Once the biped and I had taken care of our respective morning duties, we hoped in/on DexCorp 1 and headed for Garland Park. Where at least one of us had a positively delightful morning chasing red-wing blackbird shadows.

Now then, I may be dumb, but I am not stupid. Or have I already mentioned that? No matter--you just cannot be too repetitious when you are dealing with simpletons. Not that I'm saying you are a simpleton. Necessarily.

Anyway, I am fully aware that birds and bird shadows are related phenomena. What with one being both causally and temporally connected to the other and whatnot. And if I do not know precisely which causes which, or which came first, or why either might wish to cross the road... well, I am in very good company, I assure you. Some of your best wheelchair-bound cosmologists admit to not really knowing which way is up. And not even Sir Isaac Newton every succeeded in discovering why the philosopher's chicken crossed the road.

So it is not the case that I am not aware of birds. I have even been known to flush a bird or two from time to time. It is just that I am interested in birds only to the extent that I know birds to be inextricably linked to their shadows. A bird just sitting on the ground, or in a bush, is of interest to me only to the extend that I know that, if I persuade him to take to the air, he will then produce a very chasable shadow. And I love chasing shadows.

So the biped was having a good laugh at my expense this morning (little does he know I’m using his credit card!) because, he says, he had never seen a dog so enjoying being dive bombed by blackbirds. The birds, he says, were attempting to drive me away from their nesting area. And I was loving it! My tail-wagging muscles will be sore for a week! By repeatedly diving upon my very dogson, the blackbirds kept me supplied with a veritable flock of shadows for upwards of half an hour. I must have run a dozen of them to ground.

Birds are so stupid!