I Hate Birds: Part Two – Dirty Words about Filthy Birds

It’s a thin line between love and hate for most people, but for me and my relationship with birds – the line isn’t very thin at all. I realize that I might be crossing a line by condemning your flying friends, but I’m willing to risk it. Some of you reading this and a few of my close friends are actually bird lovers, but I don’t hold it against any of you. I am disgusted and appalled by it, but I don’t hold it against you.

People get so offended when you talk about their pets and, as a Real pet owner of a very cool dog, I totally agree when that happens – but here’s the thing: Dogs are pets. I will even concede that cats can be considered pets – even though I severely dislike them. Having a cat is like having an arrogant roommate that won’t let you touch their stuff and they shit on your stuff. Not to mention that when cats see a baby sleeping those sneaky bastards jump on the baby’s chest and try to suck the milk out of their mouth; but, like I said – birds aren’t pets! They are disgusting rats that just happen to have wings! Why in God’s name is there a rat on display in your house? Also, it is really fucking weird when a parrot asks me how I am, how my day was or do I need him to fluff my pillow! THAT IS NOT COOL IN ANY WAY – IT’S ACTUALLY VERY FREAKY AND WEIRD! 

Weezie and her surprises

My friend Weezie and I have known each other since college and she is one of my craziest friends. You’ll see a lot of stuff about her on here for one very good reason – something is seriously wrong with her! I mean to say that she’s truly nuts but that’s why we get along so well and I wouldn’t have it any other way! This is the girl that didn’t catch the bouquet at her brother’s wedding when the bride threw it so she rugby-slide-tackled the girl that caught it. That would have been OK if she let it go at that, but as they were rolling around on the dance floor tugging at the flowers – Weezie threw her legs around the girl, pincer-style and wrestled her for it. Talk about a wedding to remember! That is the very reason that my wife refused to throw the bouquet at our wedding – the last thing she wanted to see was Weezie taking out one of our friends from work with a sneak attack off of one of the banquet chairs like the Flying Karamazov Brothers! I, on the other hand, thought it would add a certain element of fun and bring the reception to another level – but marriage is about compromise and regretfully, I lost that battle.

Weezie and I were out drinking one night in Queens, so I crashed at her house since she lives nearby. Her mother Hazel has two gross tenants in their house that they call pet bids (but as I said earlier, birds are not real pets!) and after too many drinks to remember, Weezie explained to me how her mother does this “thing” when they have people sleep over their house which they think is really cute and fun. I, of course, immediately thought how great it would be to be woken up to breakfast in bed with pancakes made in the shape of the Fraggles or Luke Skywaffles, but that wasn’t the “thing.” What they think is cute is to have one of their filthy birds wake up their houseguest!

What’s wrong with her mother?

Her mother has one of those birds wake up the person staying over their house! “Wake Up, Wake Up! Good Morning!” it bellows as it literally struts across the bed and scares the shit out of (I mean, wakes up) the poor, unsuspecting visitor…I begged her to keep those birds away from me, but she just kept laughing at me and went off to her room. I told her that I didn’t want to be remembered as the guy who strangled their bird or shit the bed when the bird tried to wake him up, but she went down the hallway and ignored me. She went to bed and I couldn’t go to sleep in that house. I was up all night hiding out under the sheets terrified like that kid who saw dead people in The Sixth Sense. Literally, I got no sleep there out of sheer terror!

Luckily for that bird, she listened and didn’t bring it anywhere near me or have it try to wake me up. I am like a dead body when I’m asleep – I’m literally out cold – and I have been viciously attacked in the past by birds (see “I hate birds – part one”), so I get up ready to rumble if I’m jostled (sort of like my friend Sue who actually punched her Sorority sister Collette in the face as she tried to wake her up because she was going to be late for class – needless to say Collette didn’t try to wake her up twice!) I think Weezie realized that if I woke up and that thing was anywhere near me, I would have went all Kung Fu on that bird and beat the shit out of it!

You innocently invite someone into your home and then you turn on them and go all Man vs. Wild? I mean, what if that bird farts on the pillow as it’s casually strolling around – Do you then catch pink eye and bird flu? What’s next – are you gonna teach that bird how to talk with a Jamaican accent? Picture waking up to that filthy little thing bopping on the headboard with a little Rasta hat with dreads hanging down his neck asking if you want a Red Stripe or if want him to braid your hair. Not cool at all! This post should actually be hung at their front door and used as a public service announcement to any of Weezie’s friends about the dangers of sleeping over her house: Hazel is the cutest little thing on two wheels – but you have to beware of the cute ones!

Who does this shit happen to?

Speaking of really freaky pets and the lunatics that own them, when I was in High School there were two sisters that I was friendly with that were so ugly it was a sin. I’m not an attractive person in any way, so this isn’t coming from a place of arrogance – it is coming from a place of consideration. I’m not exaggerating, those poor girls were butt ugly. I have seen malnourished, third-world refugees that have a better shot of getting laid at the local pub on a Saturday night. I’m telling you this from the standpoint of a compadre because if I wasn’t funny, there would be nothing going for me and I’d still be single!

Anyway, the sisters were into Theatre too, so we were always in the school plays together and we became pretty friendly. One day after rehearsal was over, we were heading out the doors and it was raining cats and dogs. Their mother pulled up and as they got into their station wagon, she asked if I wanted a ride home and I gratefully accepted.

As we were heading out of the parking lot, I got a good look and couldn’t help but realize that their mother was actually a decent looking woman. She wasn’t a MILF or anything but, truthfully, I might have hit that on a drunk night in college given the chance or the right amounts of alcohol. She introduced herself and invited me over for dinner which I accepted. I couldn’t help but think that she absolutely couldn’t be more pleasant and I wondered where the attitude on these two sisters came from; It must be their father, I thought. As we drove to their house, I looked sister to sister, and then back to mom, and then sister to sister again and then back to mom and I just truly, truly hoped for both of their sakes, that this was only an awkward phase that they were going through.

Rats all Folks…

When we got to their house, I met their father, his mother who lived with them, and their younger brother. Amazingly enough, all of them were just as appealing as the sisters. You could see the resemblance to their father immediately, and that is not a compliment or something any girl should ever have to go through. We were making small talk and I took a seat on the couch next to their sweet little grandmother.  As we were talking, their mother was looking over my shoulder shaking her head no, but I wasn’t paying attention to her because I was captivated by their grandmother. She was telling me about how both of her granddaughters were so funny and so beautiful. She repeated it three times and I laughed along with her thinking she must be kidding around because neither of those two qualities could be used to describe either sister on their best day – but she was serious. I was questioning to myself whether dementia had settled in with her…when at that moment everyone got quiet.

I thought I heard something jostling around and turned my head to see a rat racing across the top of their couch towards me! A FUCKING RAT! As it crawled across the couch and up to my sleeve, I nearly dropped dead right there! I thought that I must be hallucinating looking right at this gray little rat shooting across the couch like a rocket – dragging the biggest set of balls I have ever seen in my life. Yes, when I say balls I mean balls. Seriously, I haven’t seen balls that big on adult men in gym locker rooms, but here was this little fucker charging across the couch at me – proud as can be! My first reaction was absolute shock and terror at being this close to a rat. My second reaction was about the sheer size of that rat’s balls because they were probably ten percent of his body weight. It was just Shocking! 

I was overcome with paralyzing fear and lost control of myself and did what any self-respecting man in my position would do: I started screaming hysterically like a little girl. “CALL 911 – THERE’S A FUCKING RAT ON THE COUCH! WHAT THE FUCK!!!GET THAT FUCKING RAT OUT OF HERE!!! (at this point they were hysterical laughing and said it was their pet – one of four rats they kept in the house.) As the rat was advancing up my arm now, getting closer to my face I lost it: “HELLO, WHAT THE FUCK!!!YOU UGLY FUCK, GET THAT FUCKING RAT AWAY FROM ME!…WHAT DID I JUST SAY???…THE FUCKING RAT IS ON ME…YOU UGLY BITCH…THAT…FUCKING…RAT…IS…ON…MY…ARM!!!GET THAT FUCKING THING OUT OF HERE NOW YOU UGLY FUCK!!!” 

With that, the room fell dead silent and their brother scooped up the rat. All eyes were on me and no one was saying a word as I tried to nonchalantly check and make sure that I hadn’t just shit my pants on their couch. My heart was racing a mile a minute and I was looking around the room, not to see if they were all staring at me which they were, but to make sure there were no other rats out…The sister that had put the rat onto the couch was closest to me and she gave me the full stink eye and said “He’s harmless and you’re being such a little baby. And by the way, my mother thinks I’m beautiful!” As I tried to calm myself and catch my breath, I offered “Who keeps rats in their house? Get that fucking thing out of here. You don’t put that on people! What’s wrong with you? That’s disgusting! Hello, it’s a fucking rat! And also, your mother is a fucking liar!” That last bit came out a lot harsher than the way I actually meant it, but I was just attacked by a rat so my emotional state was shaky at best and I shouldn’t have been held responsible for anything that I was saying. 

Their mother turned from cute to crazy in an instant and lashed into me something fierce. She really let me have it. I don’t know what happened to that pleasant, sweet-as-can-be woman from the car ride, but this crazy bitch went off. She tried to make it like there was something wrong with me (if you can believe that) and that I had been the one out of line – as if it’s normal to put a rat on someone – and she wanted me to apologize. I couldn’t tell if she meant for me to apologize to the rat or one of them. With that, my invitation for dinner was revoked as was my ride home and they told me to get out immediately. Not only did I have to walk in the pouring rain, but they lived even further away from my house than the school was, so it took me twice as long to get home. Needless to say, I never went back to that house again – nor did I ever receive another invitation – but that’s not the point. Who puts a rat on someone? What is wrong with people?