Here in Gladys, VA, it seems we have discovered a demented bird that has developed an unnatural attraction for the rear window of the Invader. A gorgeous, bright red cardinal perches on small twigs right behind out trailer, makes a variety of nifty bird noises and then flies at and smashes his face on our rear window. He started this behavior at about 6:30 this morning, increasing the frequency of his face-smashing until he was making about 10 or 15 face-plants per minute, seemingly with no ill effects.
In an effort to stop him from suicide by plate glass window, Peggy created a watercolor painting of what appeared to be the upper head of an owl with a lower section that was a grinning killer clown from space. This masterpiece was attached to the rear window right where the cardinal could easily spot it but it had an effect that, if anything, created even more frequent bird splats. The cardinal’s nice little tweeting noises took on a malicious tone during his efforts to eradicate the owl/clown from his anvil using his head as the sledgehammer.
Our next strategy was to take all the fresh, green twigs outside our window and securely wrap them around the Invader’s roof access ladder, seemingly eliminating the idiot cardinal’s perches from which he was launching his attacks. This technique was not particularly effective as the cardinal now merely limited his attacks on our glazing to one concentrated area.
Further efforts were plainly required to stop the cardinal’s poor behavior. Peggy then hung a large, patterned tablecloth over the interior of the window in an effort to eliminate reflections which seemed to drive the cardinal bonkers. However, the tablecloth technique only resulted in a brief lull in the now-invisible thumping of the bird’s head on our beloved home.
Next was a slightly more high-tech method to stop the self abuse by the pesky avian. I took out my 1,000,000 volt stun gun and fired it near the area of the cardinal’s misbehavior. Although it got the attention of some nearby human neighbors, it was totally ineffective at curtailing the bird’s self-destructive habits.
Our final technique was to leave all of our killer clown illustrations, twisted foliage, tablecloth and stun gun applications in place and listen to the dull thumps outside the trailer as the bird continues his fun with seemingly inexhaustible energy.
We started out this morning saying “poor little guy” and “Oh, I hope he doesn’t hurt himself” which, regrettably degenerated through the day to “the stupid bugger just won’t quit” and finally we acquiesced to resigned silence regularly interrupted by dull thumping noises, some of them with alarming frequency and determination as the persistent red bastard continued his head-banging on our trailer’s durable exterior.
As morning transitioned into early afternoon, we changed our preventative technique. Peggy placed some birdseed outside the trailer in an effort to get the stupid red bird to eat instead of performing face-plants. This method was also ineffective as the bird now took short breaks from his head-butting of our trailer to eat the seed, all the while making angry bird noises before resuming the masochistic head-smashing with newly fueled vigor.
We can now consider writing a sequel to Alfred Hitchcock’s classic except we will name it “The Bird.”