Bird Baths and Old Houses...

For those of you who follow this photostream (and who doesn't?) you may know that Sheree and I have been REALLY busy over the past few weeks. So we decided to hop into the car and go for a couple of road trips together this weekend.

 

One of our road trips started like this. Sheree looks at me and says "Before we go, can you get the bird bath out of the box for me?" About a month ago, we purchased a cast iron bird bath for SEVENTY DOLLARS at Canadian Tire...and it's been sitting alone in our living room since then. Still in the box. One day it moved to the center of the floor, apparently to attract my attention. (I actually had to step around it.)

 

Apparently said birdbath is the perfect addition to the seventy-nine bird feeders and water bowls and little birdie mattresses and massage tables we already have on our deck to attract their attention. I had resolved to ignore it.

 

Sheree looks up and smiles innocently. We both know what's happening, of course. It's checkmate from the start. Beautifully played. I will open the box containing the birdbath for those fricking birds she keeps feeding, apparently so they will continue to poop copiously all over our deck. Then I will put together the birdbath since taking it out of the box, leaving the crap all over the floor and creeping off to the bathroom is a tactic of the Lesser Man. (Besides...I just used it yesterday.)

 

I shudder just a little as I see mysterious screws and nuts and those little round things I always forget to put on until the nuts are REALLY tight. They are vacuum packed against stiff cardboard. This means an exacto knife...and I'm the first to admit I should not be trusted with anything that sharp...

 

But we were going on a road trip, so I was in a pretty good mood. Attempting to cast my feelings of impending doom to one side, I arrayed the dizzying pile of crap in front of me. I then sat down to try to interpret the directions, obviously written by someone who learned English second hand from a slow-witted stuttering Dutch sailor. I give up on the words and commence trying to glean hints from the illustrations that had not been that good to start with and copied way too often...

 

MEANWHILE Sheree is listening to music. Our good friend, Fred, sent her a ton of wonderful soul music. However we could only open twelve of the songs. Sheree likes them and so we have been listening to the same fricking twelve songs for DAYS.

 

(Brief sidebar: Once the events described herein are done, we are in the car and I am listening to Joe Tex singing: "SHOW ME A MAN WHO'S GOT A GOOOOOD WOMAN..." (again) and I look at Sheree and start making sharp retching sounds.

 

"What's wrong?" she asks.

 

"I can't listen to this fricking song one more time," I respond. "I used to like it. But you've played it over and over...good GOD, woman!"

 

"I still like it,"she says with a shrug.

 

I go into the cluttered compartment between our seats and draw out an 80 GIG iPod which I have given her. (I have actually given her TWO iPods...)

 

"This is an iPod," I say.

 

She nods and listens to the music. She's not even pretending to pay attention to me. I sigh.

 

"Sheree," I say. "You could listen to the music on this iPod for fourteen days and never hear the same song twice."

 

She nods absently. I am looking at her incredulously.

 

Joe Tex is still yelling at me: "Show me a man who has a GOOD WOMAN!"

 

I revise strategies and begin to moan and mime having small seizures in my seat. This draws a distantly interested glance from Sheree. She is watching only long enough to make sure I am only being a jerk...and not in the throes of a medical emergency.

 

"Well hook it up then," she says finally.

 

"The iPod?" I ask.

 

She nods.

 

"You mean you don't want to listen to your four cd's all day long?" I ask.

 

Here endeth the sidebar.)

 

SO I am putting the fricking birdbath together. I am done. It looks okay. I have only done myself minor injuries. But I have one screw left. Why? WHY??? WHY?????

 

There are those people who would toss the screw into the garbage and call it done...and those of us who really get bugged by that one screw. Where is it SUPPOSED to go??? (I have often suspected that there is some psychopath at the factory who puts one EXTRA screw into the package ON PURPOSE...chortling and chuckling about the emotional carnage he knows it will cause.)

 

I started thinking of innocent birds, bathing joyfully in this bath when suddenly the whole structure cants to one side and then, with murderous force, slams into the deck, getting bird guts all over the wood of my deck.

 

"How are you doing with that?" calls Sheree cheerily from the deck.

 

I mutter something and consider putting the screw in my pocket. But I just can't do it.

 

I tell her I am almost finished. I start taking the stoooopid birdbath apart and find an empty hole the same size as the screw. It holds a little thing to a large roundish bigger thing. Oho! I think. (Oho is an outstanding word...try it the next time you figure something very difficult out. Just sit there and say "OHO!" to yourself. You'll understand what I mean.)

 

I am elated. I screw it in and put the birdbath back together. No problems.

 

"Oho!" I say again...just because.

 

Sheree enters a moment later and examines my handiwork.

 

"It looks like a birdbath," she observes shrewdly.

 

I beam. Even the guys who built the space shuttle could not have been this proud.

 

She pokes a finger at a stooopid ornamental bird on a stooopid branch. It moves.

 

"This bird is loose," she says as it flops to one side and hangs there looking...well...stoooopid.

 

We both contemplate it quietly for a moment.

 

"It's supposed to be that way," I tell her. "It needs to maintain a...flexibility...quotient...so high winds don't...y'know... blow it over." My words hang in the air between us, weakly gasping for life before eventually shambling off into oblivion with a hopeless sigh.

 

Sheree fixes those blue eyes on me and I briefly consider sticking to my stoooopid story.

 

I sigh.

 

"Okay," I say with yet another sigh, designed to CLEARLY convey that I won't be held responsible for the ensuing carnage should the intended repairs be made. "I can try to tighten it."

 

"Good idea," she says. She is standing looking at me.

 

I am dreading the impending repairs because I have a history of really messing crap up if I dare take anything apart when it's pretty much working.

 

"You want me to do it NOW?" I ask. "I'm pretty busy, you know."

 

She sighs.

 

I start unscrewing the stoooopid bird.

 

"Can you give me one of those screwdrivers that has that cross thingie on it?" I ask. It seems to me that she really should be doing something other than supervising me.

 

"You mean a PHILLIPS screwdriver?" she asks.

 

"Whatever," I mutter. "Showoff."

 

She gives me the screwdriver and I channel all my nervous energy into fusing that stooopod bird with that stooopoid branch.

 

I screw the whole thing back on and await the Return of the Princess. I am prepared now to accept the admiration that surely shall be mine.

 

She walks into the room, pokes the bird with a finger. It doesn't move.

 

"Hummmph," she says. (This is as close as I can come to the actual spelling of the sound she made. Put into words, I think it would translate into "About time, you moron.")

 

So we put the bird bath onto the deck with all the rest of the bird crap we aleady have out there.

 

And we hit the road.

 

Among other things, we went to Heritage Days in the tiny town of Onoway -- which was what I started to tell you about. But the birdbath story just took over. Maybe another time...

 

Oh...right. The picture. We took this one on our way OUT of Onoway. Sheree kinda tells the story about it here: www.flickr.com/photos/97705796@N00/4673417501/

 

BY THE WAY: I have yet to see a SINGLE bird go anywhere near the birdbath. Will keep you posted.

Done