Angry Birds

This week, on the Nature Channel, we explore the delicate - and painful - relationship between girl and bird. Watch now, as these winged creatures flap their way into a nest of terror and intimidation. These beasts truly know how to mark - and then poop on - a territory.

Guys? I am LIVING IN THE NATURE CHANNEL. Apparently, the bird-like creatures of the animal kingdom had a meeting this winter and were like "Birds, when the time comes, we will reign down a feathery terror on thy enemy, and thine enemy is PHARON! SOAR!!!!"

See, my birdmare all started back in Vegas. I had gotten through a terrible flight (not ironically) and was ready to calm down with some ladies. On our first morning there, we all spread our towels out on the lounges at the Paris pool and before I had smoothed the creases out in my rented towel, I felt a slippery wet blop on my back. I reached back and felt the strap of my ill-fitting bikini and pulled my fingers away to see a brownish GUCK.

"OMG. A BIRD $HIT ON ME!!! I'M IN VEGAS AND A BIRD POOPED ON MY BACK ON THE FIRST DAY!"

That was only the beginning. Then the birds started targeting my car.

A couple weeks after I recovered from the back poop saga, I was driving back to the Cities on one fine Tues. morning. It was like 6:15 a.m. when I raced out of Rochester. Ahead of me, I saw a bird. A bird on a mission. It swooped and rose before me, but when it should have ducked out of the way of my (barely) speeding vehicle, it instead locked eyes with me. And then it bird-dove RIGHT INTO MY WINDSHIELD.

Bird kamikaze.

I was being sent a message. A message that I would not soon forget.

It was but days later when I had recovered enough to venture out into the world in my car again. I cautiously drove down the streets of this city, calmly navigating obstacle after obstacle. And then I saw two birds bobbing and weaving together in the air.

"Love," I breathlessly thought. How adorable!

And as I tried to dodge the airy lovemakers in my car, I heard a faint "POOF." I looked in my rear view mirror in horror as two birds lay smack in the middle of the road. I was inconsolable.

I tried to calm my nerves (and stop getting fat) by walk/running around this one lake in Rochester. I was elated to learn that there was a lake with watery goodness and tasty trails upon which I could tread. But the bird word about me had gotten out to other feathery fiends. On my first trek, I met this gentleman:

Apparently, this jerkwad then alerted his buddies and about 100 yards later, this blocked my path:

Yeah, a bazillion hissing geese just waiting to peck my eyes out. Needless to say, my foray back into fitness was short-lived.

I really thought that I was overreacting; overly sensitive to the wily ways of the airborne terrors. But then it happened to poor Geo. Geo, who is unflappable, was stung by the bitter beak of airborne bullies.

We were sitting on our patio, enjoying a glass of wine and probably a conversation about why I can't wear two different shoes if both are equally cute. I noticed a tiny pile of comically miniature poop on our patio table. I tried googling from what creature the poop might have come, when Geo announced "I'm going to open the umbrella to keep the sun out. Is that cool?"

I replied "Ha! Yeah, as long as a bat or something doesn't swoop out."

And then, as if I had conjured up the beast myself, a bat SWOOPED out of the umbrella. Geo ran for the hills. I ran, much slower, and hid behind him; swatting at the unholy beast that I figured was trying to nest inside my unwashed hair.

I know a bat is not a bird. I know a bat is like, I don't know, a vampire or a rat or something. But whatever. It had wings and it was OUT FOR BLOOD.

What I've learned from this summer is that birds are not our friends. They don't make cute chirping noises to talk to each other about fun new worm spots or to spread juicy gossip about that one blue jay who we ALL know is just out to get some tail. They are, in fact, talking about how they will destroy the human race.